By Mark Anderson In 2015 I crossed paths with prolific route-developer Tod Anderson (no relation). Tod has been a major player in Front Range route development for decades, but he is probably best known as the Devil’s Head crag patron—discovering countless crags, opening hundreds of routes, establishing positive relationships with land managers, replacing old hardware,…
By Mark Anderson You may recall from this post that I had an abnormally long and successful Fall 2016 climbing season. Typically after I send a hard project I take along break from climbing, but I sent my season goal-route (Shadowboxing) so early in the Fall 2016 season that I was still stoked to continue working (and…
By Mark Anderson This is the final installment in a multi-part series about my training for Shadowboxing. For the first installment click here. Wolfgang Gullich famously exclaimed “climbing is so complex!” after a winter of hard training failed to yield the desired results. Many factors need to come together simultaneously to complete a route truly…
By Mark Anderson This is the third installment in a multi-part series about my training for Shadowboxing. For the first installment click here. For the second installment click here. Visualization is an important part of any hard ascent, but the picture in our mind is often overly idealized. We imagine everything going flawlessly—executing the sequence…
by Mark Anderson Last week Mike and I did another podcast with our friend Neely Quinn over at TrainingBeta.com. You can check out the podcast here. The interview runs about an hour and covers a wide variety of topics including: What went into designing the Rock Prodigy Forge, and why we think it’s the most advanced hangboard…
Limit Bouldering is one of the best ways for rock climbers to train power. When done properly, Limit Bouldering trains max recruitment, contraction speed, core strength and inter-muscular coordination. If that weren’t enough, Limit Bouldering is also highly sport-specific, so the skills developed will translate directly to the rock. The crux of Limit Bouldering is…
by Mark Anderson A home climbing wall offers many advantages to the performance-oriented climber. Chief among them are: Convenience – with a wall literally in your backyard, commuting time and cost is eliminated along with most other excuses for skipping workouts. Those with families or pets can train with their loved ones without disturbing others, and…
by Mark Anderson I’m a big fan of puzzles. Crossword puzzles, brainteasers, jigsaw puzzles. Without a doubt, my favorite part of project climbing is solving the sequence puzzle. The more baffling the sequence, the more rewarding it is to solve. This challenge is magnified on first ascents, which typically lack obvious clues like chalk and…
by Mark Anderson Roof climbing is my nemesis. As someone who “grew up” climbing at Smith Rock, I always gravitated towards clean, monolithic faces that sweep skyward in one continuous plane of consistent steepness. My best angle is probably plumb vertical, and the steeper it gets after that, the more I struggle. The climbing on…
by Mark Anderson As soon as Kate and I committed to a trip to Germany, I started looking for information on “The Campus Center”, the birthplace (and namesake) of the Campus Board. Legend has it that Wolfgang Gullich was looking for a new way to train explosive power for a new cutting-edge route he was…
The Rock Climber's Training Manual 