A Pro’s Advice for Short-Term and Long-Haul Projecting

I often give uninspired attempts on my projects during the first few sessions—hanging on nearly every bolt—despite being a professional climber. To a bystander, it would seem unlikely that I would ever link the sequences of a steep, physical 30-meter cave route together into a send. But over 15-plus years of climbing, and actively studying the “art” of projecting, I’ve learned that the most important part of projecting is learning from my repeated failures. By incorporating this feedback, and dialing in my sequences and strategy, I often see rapid progress from my initial attempts.

So how do you craft an efficient redpoint strategy? And what happens when your project is truly at your limit? It’s all too easy to get stuck in a loop of failure that lasts weeks or months.

In this article, we’ll examine two scenarios common in multi-session projecting. Depending on your situation, the solution to sending may be technical and quick to remedy, or it may be physical and take a month, a season, or more to level up for the send.

Scenario #1: “Any Go Now!”—You’re close to sending the rig

This scenario is characterized by the “one-hang ascent”: often falling off before the anchor, a key rest, or at the end of the crux sequence. When you’re in this situation, don’t despair—instead, be stoked that with some tactical adjustments you are sure to send:

How to Send

Optimize Your Warm Up

A poor warm up equals a wasted attempt—and potentially a vicious flash pump that wrecks your entire day. By contrast, a slow, thorough warm up allows you to wield all the strength, power, and endurance you trained so hard to acquire.

Many climbers do a quick warm-up comprised of a few hangs, pull-ups, and stretches. While this might suffice for a sub-maximal route, success on a limit route demands that your alactic power is fully turned on and your aerobic energy system is fired up.

Turning on your finger strength and upper-body power is best achieved using a portable hangboard. Do a series of progressively strenuous movements such as dead hangs and pull ups. If you’re able, add weight or use progressively smaller holds as you feel your body turn on. Follow this with some shoulder and torso mobility work (for a route at my limit, I will do shoulder circles, neck rolls, sagital and lateral leg kicks). Finally, don’t forget to do at least one set of push-ups—vital for activating your scapular stabilizers.

Activating your aerobic and lactic energy systems is best done on an appropriate warm up (a route with a similar angle, but easier than your project) or going bolt-to-bolt on your project. Either way, be sure that this warm up ascent is strenuous enough to produce a moderate pump, but not a deep, exploding “flash pump.”

Refine Your Beta

Don’t fall into the trap of believing that the first beta you used is the best beta. If you’ve only put in a few goes on the project, there’s a good chance you can further refine your sequences and increase your efficiency of movement. Be sure to focus on non-crux sequences, too. These “filler” sections of a project are often overlooked on the hunt for beta, but they will decide how pumped you’ll be when you engage in the true crux.

If you’re faced with an especially long and/or complex crux sequence, commit to trying a half dozen or more hold and sequence variations. Get creative and a little crazy—this just might give you the beta breakthrough you need!

A final, huge tip: On your formative “working burns” on the project, try to identify the critical rest positions. Knowing the location of all the shake-out positions will allow you to leverage the powerful send-strategy of “sprinting from one rest position to the next.” Learn more about pacing here.

Improve Your Mental Game

This concept is simply too broad to thoroughly address here so I will provide some simple yet profound advice: Optimize your intentions before starting a redpoint attempt.

If you tend to carry a lot of nervous energy up a climb, take a few slow belly breaths to tamp down that inner buzz. Nix any thoughts of “needing to send” or fears of failing (again) by focusing on just the moves ahead of you. Better yet, before climbing, vow to “have fun” no matter the outcome. By letting go of outcome-oriented thoughts, you are liberated to climb your best and enjoy the experience. (Check out Climbing’s “mental training” page for more expert advice.)

Scenario #2: “I’m Getting Worked”—You’re Nowhere Near Sending

If you’ve already logged several days on the project, and progress is slow or imperceptible, then you’re likely in the midst of a long-haul adventure that will demand you become a better, stronger climber. Unfortunately, there is no quick fix to magically piece together a redpoint ascent.

If you’ve succeeded in doing all of the moves, but with many hangs, then you might be able to gain some momentum via the tactic of low-pointing—that is, linking progressively longer sequences up to the anchors. If gains remain slow, you might need to put the project on hold and return in a month or two as a stronger, fitter climber. If you are a relatively new climber (two years or less in the sport), your “training” may just mean improving movement efficiency, or garnering more confidence on lead (by lead climbing more often). However, if you are a rather experienced climber pushing your limit, I have some tips you can implement into your climbing specific training.

Heading back to the gym for some project-specific training is a smart move, but it involves much more than just hitting the hangboard. You need a sober understanding of your physical constraints, specific to your project’s demands. Ask yourself: Does the challenge revolve around doing a difficult boulder problem, or hanging on through a series of pumpy, submaximal sequences?

If it’s the former, then a strength- and power-training block, including limit bouldering sessions, will help you level up. I recommend two of these strength/power/bouldering (SPB) sessions per week, along with two maintenance endurance sessions (done on the day after your SPB session). On the other hand, if you’re failing to redpoint due to the aggregate load of climbing the entire route, then you need to level up your endurance. The pathway to better on-the-rock fitness is climbing more!

Make it your goal to climb four days per week, with at least three of these sessions spent mostly on a rope (gym or crag). Hitting the right training zone is the key here—your goal is not to try maximal routes on every session (a common mistake). Instead, execute two sessions of high-volume submaximal climbing (one to four number grades below your redpoint limit). Round out your week with one strength/power/bouldering session (as maintenance) and one near-limit session of route climbing. The latter is best done in a climbing gym on routes within one number grade of your limit.

After a one-month block of route-specific training, take a few “deload” days and then return to the project for a few attempts. How do you measure up? If progress remains elusive, then you may want to pick another project for the time being and set your sights on returning to the mega-project next season.

To wrap up

In the next article, we’ll dig deeper into energy system training. I will describe even more complex (and very common) scenarios you may face while projecting and the ways you can overcome them with strategic training. Then, at the end of the series, we will go through various climbing-specific exercises you can implement in your training to take your redpointing to a new level!

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