Most climbing relationships have friction. Most people never talk about it.
I sat down with Alex Stiger (@alex.stiger ) this week to go deep on all of it — fear and projection at the crag, belay trust, mismatched goals, passive aggression, competition between partners, and the trip planning fights that are usually not even about the trip.
We both share stuff from our own partnerships (respectfully) and I talk through what I’ve learned, including the one thing that changed everything between Seth and me at the crag in Italy last year.
New episode is up now — link in bio or find episode 312 of The TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you get ‘em.
And if you’re interested in couples or partners coaching for climbing specifically, reach out at [email protected] or head to trainingbeta.com/partners for my new coaching service.
A mild winter has led to an early start to the Wolf Point season. I managed to take advantage and finish up Easy Prey this past weekend!
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After falling in the upper crux too many times to count, it felt amazing to finally execute and find myself resting having to keep my nerves in check for the easier exit climbing and final boulder. Luckily, it all felt solid - but hard enough to be full engaged - and I found myself clipping chains.
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At 8b, Easy Prey is far my hardest route on paper. At points during this process, I’d by lying if I said the lower grade and my inability to get it done didn’t bother me. Reflecting on it now, however, I couldn’t care less. This route is one of the best. Period. It’s also a style - purely resistant - that I find difficult and I know working through that has helped me become a better climber. On to the next!
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@frictionlabs@sendclimbing@montaneofficial@rhinoskinsolutions@gnarlynutrition@trainingbeta
I just published a new podcast episode with Coach Matt Pincus (@mpincus87 ) about how to make the most of your board sessions and have good etiquette while you’re at it.
Matt coaches a lot of athletes on board climbing, and this episode is basically a distillation of the most common questions and friction points he hears. Whether you’re frustrated by crowded sessions, unsure if you’re choosing the right problems, or feeling stuck in a plateau, there’s something in here for you.
What Matt Covered:
✅ Board etiquette: taking turns, angle changes, BRUSHING the board
✅ How to choose problems when grades are inconsistent
✅ Whether you should be projecting or sending
✅ A simple “new and old” rule for structuring sessions
✅ Why you probably don’t need to over-engineer your training for specificity — and what to focus on instead
I also told a story at the end about my friend who went from projecting V4’s on the Kilter to sending V9’s after a year of consistent board climbing. It’s a good reminder of what these things can actually do when you commit to them. (Just a reminder though, results may vary!)
Link in bio or find episode 311 of The TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you get ‘em.
If you want to work with Matt as your coach, he has a few athlete spots open. You can find him at trainingbeta.com/matt.
Matt is very good at his job!
If you want a climbing coach who is a strong climber himself, clear and concise in his coaching, and always available to you, try out a month with him.
Thanks for listening and let me know what you think of the episode!
Migraines are one of those things that can completely derail your life—and if you’re a climber who’s trying to perform and train regularly, they can be especially frustrating.
I’ve dealt with migraines for years, and I still feel like I’m trying to understand what’s actually happening in my body and what I should do about them. So I brought on Dr. Danielle Wilhour, a neurologist and headache specialist at the University of Colorado, to help us break it all down.
We talk about what migraines actually are, the different phases of a migraine, and why things like exercise, hormones, and even talking for long periods of time (??) can be triggers.
We also get into:
- Whether it’s safe to exercise during a migraine (and when it’s not)
- Whether some medications affect athletic performance
- The difference between rescue vs. preventive treatments
- My own hesitation around taking medication—and what the actual risks are
- Hormones, birth control, and why migraines are more common in women
- Nutrient deficiencies and supplements like magnesium and CoQ10
- What to do if exercise itself triggers headaches
One thing I appreciated about this conversation is that it’s not just “take this pill and you’re good.” Dr. Wilhour takes a holistic approach and looks at sleep, hydration, stress, nutrition, and overall lifestyle in addition to medication.
If you’ve ever wondered:
“Should I be pushing through this?”
“Am I making this worse by not treating it?”
“Why does this keep happening to me?”
…this episode will give you a much clearer picture of what’s going on.
Link in bio or find episode 310 of The TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you get ‘em.
New episode of the TrainingBeta Podcast — and this one is just me. 🎙️
We talk a lot about training plans, projecting, and performance. But I wanted to get into something that actually affects a lot of climbers day to day: anxiety about food.
The guilt after eating carbs. Being scared to feel full. Having food rules you’re terrified to break. The constant low-grade worry that what you’re eating is going to change your body.
I’ve seen it in clients for years. I’ve experienced my own version of it. And I think it deserves a real conversation.
In this episode I walk through the 5 most common reasons climbers feel anxious about what they eat — and what to actually do about each one.
I also share something personal about adjusting my diet after starting HRT, and how I chose to approach it as a scientist instead of from a place of fear or shame (listen to the clip above). 🙏
Link in bio to listen, or find episode 309 of the TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you listen. 🎧
And if you’ve been thinking about working with me — on your mindset around food or climbing, or on the actual nuts and bolts of your diet — I have limited spots left before my therapy internship starts in August. DM me or find the links in my bio. 💛
I just published a new podcast episode with Coach Alex Stiger on overtraining.
In the episode, @alex.stiger and I talked about the ways we see our clients overtraining and the consequences it has on their bodies, minds, and climbing performance.
We also share how we overdo it ourselves, and how that has affected us.
We go into the causes of overtraining: feeling like more is better, fearing falling behind, not knowing how much training is enough, and as Alex calls it, “chasing fatigue.”
I talk about the ways I work with my mindset coaching clients on this to help them gain perspective and talk to themselves differently.
The ironic part is that although people believe that more activity will make them better climbers, the truth is that sometimes the natural side effect of chilling out both physically and emotionally is better climbing performance...
Listen to the episode from the link in our bio or find episode 308 of The TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Work with Alex As Your Coach
Working with a coach lets you have an objective, trained eye on your activity levels so you can rest assured that you’re not doing too much. Alex works with climbers to give them an effective training plan that won’t burn them out physically or mentally.
If you want to work with Alex as your coach, you can sign up for her wait list in the link in our bio and she will email you within a month with openings in her schedule.
Work with Me on Your Mindset
I work with climbers from all over the world to help them understand why they’re feeling the frustration, shame, and anxiety about climbing that’s keeping them from enjoying it and performing the way they want.
The results of our work are more joy and satisfaction with climbing and other areas of their lives, as well as climbing with less fear and more joy. A nice side effect of working through all of this is that often people end up performing better and climbing harder!
You can sign up for a 15-minute introductory session with me to see if we’re a good fit, or sign up for an hour or 4 hours of sessions with me in the link in our bio.
New episode is out! While I’m not able to board climb right now due to some tears in my glutes, hamstrings, and hip labrum, I do love climbing on boards and think it has been extremely helpful for my route climbing.
When I was climbing on boards a lot (mostly Kilter and the Moonboards), I saw a huge uptick in the following:
✅ My aim for holds while being dynamic
✅ My understanding of the limits of my reach (it’s longer than I thought!)
✅ My ability to jump and be dynamic
✅ My power and strength overall
Which translated to...
✅ Better onsighting on routes
✅ Sending routes that had been too reachy or dynamic for me
✅ More confidence in my abilities
Boards are really useful tools and super fun to climb on! But people are confused about how to use them and which one(s) to use.
So I asked Coach @MattPincus to come on the TrainingBeta Podcast to give us a masterclass on board climbing.
Here’s what he covered:
- Most common questions about boards
- Who should not use boards
- Exactly why boards are amazing training tools
- The pros and cons of each board
- 3 session types you can do on the boards
- Common pitfalls to avoid
- How to not get wrapped up in the grades
It was a really informative and useful interview, and Matt was the perfect person to interview about it. Not only does he pretty much exclusively use boards (of all types) for his indoor training, but he helps his clients successfully incorporate boards into their training programs. He knows his stuff!
Give it a listen and let me know if you want us to do another episode on the topic.
Find a link to the episode in our bio or listen to episode 307 of The TrainingBeta Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
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Work with Matt as Your Coach
If you love what Matt has to say about board climbing and you want him to be your coach, you can work with him from anywhere in the world.
He will create a training program for you and be in constant contact with you via the TrueCoach app to keep you on the right track.
Find his training options in our bio or visit trainingbeta.com/matt
I just published a new episode with a therapist about using exposure therapy and mindfulness to decrease your fear of falling in climbing. If you are struggling with fear of falling, whether that is on toprope, on lead, or on boulders, this episode will help you make an action plan to work on it so you feel less anxious and terrified when you’re climbing.
Even if you don’t struggle with fear but your partner or friends do, this episode will help you have more compassion for them and offer them helpful advice. Please share this episode with your people who need it.
Emma McAdam is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in Utah who has a youtube channel (@TherapyInANutshell ) and online courses on her website therapyinanutshell.com where you can learn therapeutic tools on your own time. I really appreciate Emma’s warm, down-to-Earth approach and her relatable way of speaking and teaching, and I think her youtube videos are really well produced.
Luckily for us, she is also a climber and has a video all about how she used exposure therapy to decrease her fear of falling.
I reached out to her to invite her on the show to talk about her gentle approach to overcoming and managing fear of falling and she kindly accepted my invitation. We talked about all things exposure therapy, but with Emma’s compassionate approach injected into it.
Here’s what we covered:
✅ Where to start with fear of falling
✅ How to practice teaching your brain it’s safe to fall
✅ 2 things that fuel anxiety
✅ What is the emotion of fear asking you?
✅ Building an exposure hierarchy
✅ How to practice falling in a productive way
✅ Difference between risk “tolerance” and risk “choice”
I hope you love this interview as much as I did. Find episode 306 of The TrainingBeta Podcast in the link in our bio or wherever you get your podcasts.
Had a gorgeous day out in the Wyoming high desert with an all time crew and managed to get on top of another quality one.
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Jump the Gun V11
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This @xxbigxcatxx block is the left hand start to Flight of the Antelope and deserves some more attention. It’s quite good and adds quite a bit in my opinion. Turns out the key was actually getting to the end without being numb. Who would have thought that would happen in February…
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@frictionlabs@sendclimbing@rhinoskinsolutions@montaneofficial@gnarlynutrition@trainingbeta
