At the wall this morning I noticed a couple of other things that illustrate the stuff I was talking about in this previous post.
To recap, we discussed how really paying attention to your feet and even getting them onto holds silently was a great way to improve your climbing.
The photos I took illustrate what I was talking about – that most people don’t place the feet properly but instead bang them onto the wall above the hold and scrape down onto it. The wall had just done a re-route so the old hold positions show it brilliantly:
Check out the rubber left behind
Try out the 'silent feet' exercise to work on your footwork
Trying to be precise with your feet will translate through your whole climbing movement. To begin with it will feel more tiring. You’ll hang around more as you get the hang of it. But in the long run you’ll climb more efficiently. This will use less energy.
The other massive plus is that it forces you to concentrate on your feet…
So, be kind to your local wall and make your boots last a bit longer!
