Board Meetings | Top 4 Ways to Transition to Outdoor Climbing with Taylor Fragomeni

Kris and fellow Power Company coach, Taylor Fragomeni, sit down and discuss how you can make the transition from indoor to outdoor climbing easier on yourself. They’ll dive into the specifics with ways to:

• warm up well outdoors, even when a crag’s “warmups” aren’t great.

• prepare yourself for using “bad” feet outdoors.

• practice pacing yourself appropriately for changing difficulty throughout routes outdoors.

• making difficult clips outdoors.

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

Kris Hampton  00:37

What's up everybody? I'm your host Kris Hampton.

Taylor Fragomeni  00:40

This is Taylor Fragomeni.

Kris Hampton  00:42

And together we form Bob and Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

Taylor Fragomeni  00:48

Nope.

Kris Hampton  00:48

You really don't know?

Taylor Fragomeni  00:49

I really don't know.

Kris Hampton  00:51

How does nobody ever know these damn references? Bob and Jackie Joyner-Kersee were a husband and wife but most importantly, they were coach and athlete. Jackie Joyner-Kersee, fastest woman ever, I believe, track athlete regardless. Amazing Olympic gold medal track athlete. Bob Kersee also coached a bunch of other gold medalists. But I needed to stay in the sport realm, because we're talking about sport climbing here. Yeah. And I don't often do that these days. So I thought I would throw you an easy one. But no, no, neither you nor Nate. God, I swear. Alright, we're here to talk about the top four ways, top four things you should be considering to transition your gym climbing skills over to outdoor climbing skills, because it's not as simple as just get good in the gym, go outside, and you're automatically going to be climbing the same grades you do.

Taylor Fragomeni  02:04

Yeah, don't let the, don't let all the freakish gym comp kids fool you.

Kris Hampton  02:09

No, not at all. Yeah, there are some people who will just go outside and just crush everything. But it doesn't work that way for the mere mortals among us. And then this is also not talking you know, gym to crag ethics. This is more how to take those actual skills that you're using while climbing out to the crag. So I'm gonna let you lead this one, even though you didn't get the duo reference.

Taylor Fragomeni  02:40

There was no way I was gonna get anything you said. I feel if Nate can't get them, there's no way I'm gonna get them.

Kris Hampton  02:48

I feel like you're calling me old or something.

Taylor Fragomeni  02:52

No.

Kris Hampton  02:52

Dated? 

Taylor Fragomeni  02:53

No, you just have way more knowledge than me.

Kris Hampton  02:56

Oh, is that what it is? Yeah, yeah. Alright, I'm gonna let you get this thing started.

Taylor Fragomeni  03:03

Alright. Well, we're gonna start where we start every climbing session with the warmup. So in the gym, obviously, we've got loads of resources for warming up. There's tons of climbs. Everything's curated to allow you to progress through the grades through your session. But outside that's obviously not always the case. Sometimes you get to the crag, and there's not good warmups, maybe there's a route that is an easier grade, but just has like a really nasty boulder and is like easier on either side of that. And so you're doing harder moves than you want to do initially, and simultaneously not getting pumped enough to be well warmed up or so on. 

Kris Hampton  03:47

Super common to go outside and not have the right things to warm up. Yeah.

Taylor Fragomeni  03:51

Yeah, sometimes there's just literally no options. Sometimes maybe you're climbing somewhere that's really sharp and you're hoping to get on your project and you don't want to shred your skin or warming up on the 11a that has razor blade crimps on it. So what can we do to warm up outside that is a little more creative, I guess, is the question. This is where all all sorts of fun tools become helpful. So we've all seen people with bands at the crag. That can be a great way to just kind of get your shoulders activating a little bit, start to feel the rotator cuffs engaging and warming up the backs of your shoulders and stuff like that. Those can be really great. I'm a big fan of the flash board, I think especially if you, if your goal of not warming up on easier routes is to save skin. I think the flash board is a really great way to do that. I very frequently don't hang it on the wall. Actually, a lot of the time I'll just sit on the ground, then hang it on, like, put it on my foot and just do like little pulls with that. I really like to do longer duration pulls until I start to feel my forearms get a little warm and then I'll rest for a little bit and do it again a few times. And then topping it off with pulling harder and harder so that you can really warm up that, that end range max strength zone as well. That can be great. And then if you don't have all those fancy things, then bodyweight exercises are great, too. You know you can totally, you can do some jump around a little bit, you know, do some squats, do some push ups. You can grab holds that are reachable from the ground and pull on those if you don't have a flash board.

Kris Hampton  03:59

And I think you know, especially if you know what the thing you're getting on is like, if you know, if it's a thing you've tried before, when you're pulling on the flash board, you should be warming your fingers up for those specific kinds of holds. If it's got two finger pockets, warm your two fingers up. If it's got a lot of full-crimp climbing, warm those up, you know. Be, be pretty specific, since you have the option to do that with a flash board or even just grabbing holds on the wall. Just because it's a jug doesn't mean you have to hold it as a jug, you know? 

Taylor Fragomeni  06:21

Yeah, exactly. Um, it's also an option to do all that stuff and then like, get on your project and use that to warm up a little bit too. But there's some tactics involved there as well. So you know, maybe your first time up, you skip the crux section. Maybe you can stick clip through it, or you're able to clip in direct and clip up through it. And climb the easier parts. I think a lot of the time, people in the projecting process kind of neglect the easier sections of their projects anyway. And so warming up can be a great time to really dial everything in so that you don't punt. We don't want that.

Kris Hampton  07:00

Yeah, there was a there's a route in the Red, I can think of that when I was projecting around the like low 5.13 range, there was this 10d that all of the route except for like the second bolt was a really good warm up. And at the second bolt, there was this weird slabby crux that I hated. And it had this tiny little hold that I didn't want to grab, didn't want to pull on it, but it was right next to a bolt. So I would climb up, I would clip the bolt, I would just hold on to the quick draw and pull through on to the next hold, and then I would keep climbing. And honestly, I don't know if I've ever even done that route. But it was a great warm up.

Taylor Fragomeni  07:45

The old nylon jug tactic. Exactly. Yeah, there's all sorts of creative things you can do to get warmed up. All that being said, like if there are good warm ups, use them. Because it's it's nice to like have a check in point for how you're feeling that day. Although that doesn't necessarily equate to how you'll perform.

Kris Hampton  08:08

Well, I'm glad you said use the warm ups because I do think when people hear this kind of stuff. A lot of folks are like, "Oh, well, this is the better way to warm up, this is the easier way to warm up, I'm just going to do this." And I think this can work. You know, it can work really well for a really experienced climber to only warm up on the flash board and then on their project, but there's so much value in doing the easy warm ups if they're there, for the climber who doesn't have as much experience outside. 

Taylor Fragomeni  08:41

Absolutely. And I think variety is really important too. You know, it's easy... People love their routines and getting into those, but I think a common pitfall I see is that people are projecting a sport route and they'll get up to a section, and maybe they're like on point still. And they'll be like, "Oh, it just doesn't feel right," like "Take!" And a lot of the time like they don't even try to push past it not feeling good. Which if you, if you take some time like putting yourself in situations, where maybe you're trying to onsight as your second warmup something that's relatively challenging, challenging for you, you'll get more comfortable with the unknown and being uncomfortable on the wall and just trying anyway, instead of getting totally married to like, "This move has to feel this way or there's no way I can send."

Kris Hampton  09:35

Yeah, along those same lines, you know, if you're warming up for a hard project, I'll give you an example that is relative to me but, I climb and I used to climb even more slowly than I still do. But I knew I needed to climb faster to send this project I was working on. So on my warm ups, I would climb them uncomfortably fast. I like the feeling of like climbing slow and stretching out, you know, and being really slow and deliberate as a warm up, but I knew I needed to climb faster. So I got uncomfortable there. I think that's a really important thing to do if you know your project puts you in an uncomfortable place.

Taylor Fragomeni  10:22

For sure.

Kris Hampton  10:24

I think ultimately what it comes down to is, don't take the warm up lightly. You know, don't just go through the motions. And don't expect that when you get outside, it's going to be like warming up in the gym where you can just go 5.10, 5.11, 5.12 or, you know, 10a, 10b, 10c. Now I'm ready for my 11b project, or whatever it is. That's not always available outside. So you've got all these other options.

Taylor Fragomeni  10:52

Yeah, and start to pay attention when you're warming up in the gym, to what the cues are that you're warmed up. Like how can you tell you're warmed up and ready to try hard? Because that's going to be the feeling that you're gonna go after when you get outside, regardless of the tools that you're using to do it.

Kris Hampton  11:07

Yeah, so much of this should be, should be you conducting a science experiment on yourself. Like, "Okay, I warmed up this way today, I performed like shit. So I don't want to warm up that way anymore. I warm up this way, I feel really good. So how can I replicate that outside? How can I replicate those cues that I'm getting, that feedback I'm getting, while I'm warming up outside?" Good, beta, good, beta. What's next?

Taylor Fragomeni  11:39

Next is footwork. Because all the footholds in the gym are quite large, as a matter of fact.

Kris Hampton  11:46

Yeah, kind of, kind of oddly large, in my opinion. You know, I've put a lot of thought into footholds and why all the footholds in the gym are large and trying to make smaller footholds. And what it comes down to, after talking to a bunch of hold companies, is that it's so much easier to shape and pour a big hold than it is a tiny little finicky thing that's super thin and might crack when you're screwing it into the wall. And you can sell those big holds for $50 each, as opposed to $7 each, and they're easier to make. So why would you make little holds?

Taylor Fragomeni  12:29

Plus, like small footholds are kind of hateful sometimes and people don't really like climbing on them. 

Kris Hampton  12:34

Yeah, I've got a whole... you know, we sell, we sell three different types of footholds here: Diodes, Resistors, and Inductors. They all serve a different purpose that will help prepare you for outdoors. But I don't like them. I don't enjoy climbing on them. They suck. They're hateful. They hate me back. But they do help me prepare.

Taylor Fragomeni  13:01

Yeah, and you know, depending on where you're climbing outside, maybe you don't have to worry about this as much, like you've talked about how the Red has bigger footholds.

Kris Hampton  13:08

Yeah, the Red has giant feet, so...

Taylor Fragomeni  13:10

But if you're climbing on limestone, or maybe other sandstone that's not as featured. Or granite. Yep. I always forget about granite. Sorry, guys.

Kris Hampton  13:20

You sport climbers.

Taylor Fragomeni  13:24

Getting comfortable standing on worse footholds is very important. And it's, it's kind of tricky to practice in the gym, because there's obviously not a lot of options, like we were just saying. So there's a few drills that we can utilize in order to do that. One that I like as a starting point, if you kind of haven't explored this very much and maybe you're more of like a V3 climber – you're gonna go outside and be trying 10s , 11s, maybe even 12-'s.

Kris Hampton  13:56

Woah, you just blew everybody's brains up. You went from V grades to the Yosemite decimal scale and now everybody's like, "I'm a V3 climber and I go try 12's outside? What is she talking about?"

Taylor Fragomeni  14:11

In the gym, I primarily boulder. But outside, I primarily sport climb, so I just did the conversion real quick. Sorry. Um, anyway. If you're used to standing on massive footholds, let me just say that, start out by on your warm ups in the gym, just climbing on feet that are off route that are not as good. Because generally, routes in the V0 to V3 range are gonna have mega feet on them. Every once in a while the setters will throw in educational boulder and it might not, but yeah, try standing on the footholds that are on the V8 that are next to it or stand on the sides of holds and stuff like that. 

Kris Hampton  14:51

I think that's a really important part of it. Like, don't feel like you, you have to just downsize the foothold. Sometimes it can you know, maybe it's facing the wrong way, trying to stand on that can be really valuable in teaching you how to position your body to actually get something out of these footholds.

Taylor Fragomeni  15:10

Absolutely. Which is a great transition into the next drill, which I like to call "Worst Case". This, you could use off Route feet as well. But you could also just use the feet that are on the route. But basically, you're very intentionally going to stand on a worst part of the hold instead of standing on the best part, which isn't something that we normally do. So if it's a larger foot, maybe you're standing on the side of it instead of the top, maybe you're standing in the bolt hole, instead of standing on the larger surface, stuff like that.

Kris Hampton  15:44

If it's like a ripply, kind of hold stand on one of the little ripples, one of the little features of the hold. You know, you might look ridiculous, and somebody is going to come up to you and be like, bro, you're allowed to stand on the whole thing, you know, but fuck them. You're, you're trying to get better.

Taylor Fragomeni  16:04

We'll see who wins out at the crag.

Kris Hampton  16:06

Exactly, exactly. Yeah, I think that's it's so valuable to force yourself into standing on these bad things.

Taylor Fragomeni  16:15

And then on the dualtex. 

Kris Hampton  16:17

Yeah, exactly. And actually, once you start standing on the dualtex, not a whole lot different than standing on other surfaces. Once you believe in it, you know.

Taylor Fragomeni  16:28

It's great, because you'll know real quickly if you're not creating good tension in your feet. Which is really important for sport climbing from an efficiency standpoint, especially, you know, a lot of, a lot of people get pumped off their projects and are like, "Oh, my God, I need more endurance or need more finger strength." And that's the easiest place to go because our forearms are screaming at us and our tendons are tired. And so we get more biofeedback from our, our hands and our arms. But a lot of the time, their issue isn't endurance or finger strength, it's that they're not driving through their feet. 

Kris Hampton  17:03

Right. Totally. 

Taylor Fragomeni  17:04

And so there's a disproportional amount of energy being zapped from the upper body that could be sent into our legs, which generally get a lot less tired over the course of a climb.

Kris Hampton  17:14

Yeah, and I'll say this too: like, gyms because of the like big, big bulbous holds that you're always climbing on, sort of reward climbing in really soft shoes. And outside, especially as the terrain gets closer to vertical, holds get smaller, soft shoes become really hard to climb in on a lot of this terrain. So it's not a bad idea, if you're going to be in an area that would reward stiff shoes, spending some time in the gym climbing in those. You're going to, your footwork is going to be better because you're going to understand the shoe a little better.

Taylor Fragomeni  17:53

Absolutely, Yeah.

Kris Hampton  17:55

There's a foot technique that you've brought up a couple of times in different conversations that is really found outdoors a lot, not found in in the gym nearly as much. And I think there's some others as well. So I'd love to talk about those. And I can't remember what you call it. But it's essentially like paddling up the wall to a high foot.

Taylor Fragomeni  18:16

Oh, yeah. So I call that one the "Tic Tac Toe" drill. Basically, you would do it with open feet generally, because there's not usually enough options on the wall to make it work with just the holds that are set on the route. But for every hand move you'd make, you'd make three foot moves. And not just, not just tapping each foot, each foothold with your foot, but actually transferring weight between each foot as you walk your feet up to the next foothold that you want to use for the following move. This is a really important skill on less vertical or more vertical terrain. And especially on limestone, where there's a lot of a lot of situations where you're kind of walking your feet up. On something like sandstone, where there's maybe less options at lower angles, like somewhere like Red Rocks, it's like, "That's the foothold and that's the foothold," and you're just high-stepping between. But on lower angle limestone, a lot of the time the handholds are poor enough that you can't really lean back to make room to bring your foot up and so being able to walk them up the wall and transition your weight around those positions is really, really important and rarely seen in the gym unless you've got setters at your facility that set very complex sequences.

Kris Hampton  19:37

Yeah, totally. I think the there's another situation you rarely see indoors that that we'll see most often outdoors is you know, really having to turn your hip out in order to get into the usable side of a foothold. Indoors what happens is, even if the hold is facing away from you, very often it's big enough that you can just paste your foot on the bad side of it and jump or something. And, and outdoors, you know, if it's a pocket facing the wrong way or an edge facing the wrong way, you don't have that option to smear on the backside of it, you have to be able to kind of step around and you know. I don't even know if there's a name for this. I've always called it "koala foot".

Taylor Fragomeni  20:26

It's called koala foot now. 

Kris Hampton  20:28

Exactly. It will be after this. And so you're essentially just like turning your hips out and then pressing back toward your body, the foot. Like you're just toeing, toeing in on something that's not facing you. And it's easy to practice in the gym if you force yourself not to just step on the backs of holds, you know?

Taylor Fragomeni  20:51

Yeah, a lot of, a lot of this transition from climbing in the gym outside, is just forcing yourself to make things harder in the gym in ways that you're probably going to be really uncomfortable with.

Kris Hampton  21:01

Yeah, totally. It's, you know, I love gyms. I'm not throwing shade at gyms at all. I think they're an amazing tool. But I've done an episode in the past, Nate and I did an episode on the ways your gym is holding you back. It's not that they mean to. It's just this is the easiest way to build gym and make these great routes in the gym. But they might not always prepare you the best way for outside.

Taylor Fragomeni  21:25

Yeah, yeah absolutely. 

Kris Hampton  21:28

Alright, let's take a let's take a quick commercial break. And we'll be back with the final two. 

Kris Hampton  21:36

Are you searching for a training structure that actually works? For over a decade we've helped climbers prepare for their goals. We've seen patterns emerge showing what's most effective for each level of climber. Those patterns became our Proven Plans, a training system that you can follow from complete beginner to V-double digits, delivered through our mobile app with workouts geared toward your goals and focused on improving not only strength and power, but tactics and mindset as well. Each Proven Plan comes with a built-in group chat and an option to work directly with one of our coaches. We don't believe in a one size fits all approach to climbing. You shouldn't either. 

Kris Hampton  22:13

Alright, we have returned. And Taylor, even though she did not get the duo at the top of the episode, much like Nate never gets the duo, because I'm dated and I'm old, according to Taylor, she still has the privilege of running this episode. So what's next?

Taylor Fragomeni  22:40

Alright, next. This is one of my favorite things to talk about actually, as far as sport climbing performance goes is pacing. So there's a lot of ways we can think about pacing. Speed is definitely one. Like how fast are you moving up the wall? Tension is another, I think for sport climbing. Generally, we need to be efficient unless we have a bunch of extra strength and endurance to burn. So kind of gauging how much effort we're putting into each move becomes a big thing. What's the, what's the minimum effective effort that we can exert on each move?

Kris Hampton  23:21

Yeah, this is an interesting topic. Because I think people, when they think of speed, they understand that it's not a like binary thing. It's not you go turtle slow or rabbit fast, there's a lot of speeds in between. But when people often think of tension or effort, they think of it as a switch, like, either I'm super relaxed, or I'm giving 100%. Or I'm full tension, or I'm full relax, you know? But in reality, both of those are also dials that have lots of gray area in between the two extremes.

Taylor Fragomeni  24:01

Absolutely. I love that you just used switch and dial because that was kind of where I was going with it all too. Um, so in the gym, things are generally set to be quite consistent, which means you don't really have to think about this as much, especially on sport routes in the gym. You know, maybe they're a little easier for the first few bolts for safety, but there there's generally not going to be 5.11 climbing up to a V7 into 5.12- climbing or something like that.

Kris Hampton  24:35

Which is common outside.

Taylor Fragomeni  24:37

Very common outside. So how do we, how do we tackle that in the gym? I think I generally like to start people off with, if, if they climb at a relatively slow pace, the first drill I like to go to is "Hot Laps". And it's basically just, you can do it on boulders or on sport routes, but you just lap the route a few times, and try to climb it a little bit faster than you did the time before each time. So you're not going from your standard pace to as fast as you can. You're just slowly taking it up a little bit.

Kris Hampton  25:15

Yeah, and it should feel a little uncomfortable, right? It shouldn't shouldn't feel like chaos, like, you're just falling all over the place, trying to speed climb.

Taylor Fragomeni  25:24

Yeah. And what you kind of want to do with that drill is find that line where you can move quickly without sacrificing precision and technique. So in order to find that line, you're gonna have to cross it a few times, which is kind of what that drill gets at. And then once you find that line, you can transition into thinking about pace as a switch, if you've never thought about it before. And as you're climbing up the route, switch between moving slow / moving fast a few times. Once you get the hang for that, and how to transition between the two, you can start to think of it more as a dial and finding those in between spaces. And all the while thinking about why. What, where does it feel like it makes sense to move slow? Where does it feel like it makes sense to move fast? And why? What's creating that situation? 

Kris Hampton  26:19

Totally. An important part of it.

Taylor Fragomeni  26:21

Yeah. And it's not, it's not cut and dry. A lot of the time when the wall is steeper, we want to be moving faster. And when it's slow and more technical, we're going to be slowing down. But there's always going to be exceptions. And something you can do to practice this in a more realistic setting is to create linkups in the gym. So obviously, you want to do this in a way that is safe. But luckily, a lot of gyms have multiple routes on the same anchors. So you can start to kind of stitch things together. Maybe you climb the first half of the easier route on the line and then you do the, you do a crux boulder utilizing a section of the harder route and then switch back or something like that.

Kris Hampton  27:05

Question for you: When I was spending, I don't spend much time in commercial gyms anymore, but when I did, I almost never saw anyone linking up things like that, like switching to a different route just to do the crux and then switching back over or whatever. Unless I was coaching them to do that. Is it a common thing? Do you see people doing this very often in the gym? 

Kris Hampton  27:32

Never. No. 

Kris Hampton  27:32

It's so crazy to me, because it's such an obvious, seems like an obvious thing. You know, we do it at our crags outside where it's like, oh, I want to link the bottom crux of this into the top crux of that. And you know, we've got all these criss-crossing linkups. But for some reason in the gym, we don't do it. I don't quite understand that phenomenon.

Taylor Fragomeni  27:53

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I, I'm sure part of it is like some people are just climbing in the gym to climb in the gym, and don't necessarily, their goal isn't necessarily to get better at rock climbing.

Kris Hampton  28:05

Blasphemy.

Taylor Fragomeni  28:09

I know. But I think sometimes people just don't know. Now they'll know since they listened to this. 

Kris Hampton  28:16

Yeah, it's such, it's such a good tool. And you could come up, if you have four routes on one bolt line, you could have, I mean, there's, there's...

Taylor Fragomeni  28:25

Endless possibilities.

Kris Hampton  28:26

...yeah, endless possibilities.

Taylor Fragomeni  28:28

Another cool thing about doing that, too, is that you, you don't have to, I mean, you shouldn't really do it in a way where you're just like picking a random point on the climb to switch. Like look at the routes and where it would make sense to link them together. And that can be a good, like route reading exercise as well. 

Kris Hampton  28:46

Yeah, and those transitions can create some really interesting moves when you're moving from one route to the other. 

Taylor Fragomeni  28:52

Yeah. Yeah, and as far as like, shifting into the effort side of things and the tension, you can kind of progress in the same way where you kind of think of it as a switch at first and then find, find the dial points in between.

Kris Hampton  29:13

I think really, you know, like you mentioned before, like really interrogate the process there. It would be really easy to like, say you found a 5.10 you're climbing up to, and then there's the crux of a 12+ here that you can shift right into. Maybe that crux is a V6 or something. So you're climbing V10 into this V6.

Taylor Fragomeni  29:41

5.10 into V6. 

Kris Hampton  29:42

And... And you fall on the V6. It will be really easy just to say, "Well, it's V6. It's too hard for me," or whatever. Or "That boulder is harder than I thought it was," or something. But really interrogate it. Did you actually, were you successfull in going from V10 relaxation mode in – or 5.10. God, we're both doing it. Going from 5.10 relaxation mode into V6, I need to turn up the tension, turn up the effort, to do this thing. Were you unsuccessful in that, and that's why you fell? You really have to interrogate these things when they're not just perfectly laid out for you, you know?

Taylor Fragomeni  30:28

Absolutely. And one thing that can be really, a really helpful tool in transitioning between those moments, is how you're breathing, for sure. On easier terrain, we're generally taking longer, deeper breaths. But if you're just chilling, and then you have to do a hard boulder, it can really help to take a couple like, deep, quick breaths, maybe give like a little pre emptive "GRRR" to get yourself psyched up a little bit more to engage a bit harder. And then maybe you hit a rest after that and it's back to long, slow, deep breaths, trying to calm down, bring the heart rate down.

Kris Hampton  31:06

Yep. And I think you know, this is a little bit of a sort of tangent off of this, but...

Taylor Fragomeni  31:14

Wouldn't be a board meeting without a tangent.

Kris Hampton  31:16

That's true. You sort of have to understand whether the effort you're about to give is intensive or extensive effort, and change your breathing accordingly. So that's something you're going to have to practice in the gym, I think, to really understand it, and you know, it's the perfect place to practice it. So you should do that. Because I've seen a climber who was getting through the crux of a thing super casually. You know, it's like slopey compression boulder crux at the bottom. And then it's these, like, just paddling on edges for the next 30 feet or something, but considerably easier than the boulder he had just climbed. And he would get through the boulder, he'd get to a rest, he'd get calmed down. But then, as he started to take off again, he would start doing this heavy breathing because he's like, "It's send time, I need to give effort," even though there was no real intensive effort involved. And then he would pump out like three moves later, you know? And just blow off the wall. And I'd be like, "You were so chill. You were through all the hard climbing. What are you doing? You're ramping yourself up like you're having to do that same boulder problem."

Taylor Fragomeni  32:35

Yeah, man, I experience that for like... I've, I've always felt like my strongest point as a sport climber is efficiency. And this last winter, I like really dedicated to bouldering a lot more. And when I went back into sport climbing in the spring, it took me several sessions to realize that I was over-powering moves. I'm like stronger than I've been in the past. I was like, wow, this is, I've never done that intensive of a bouldering season before and transitioning to sport climbing was so weird.

Kris Hampton  33:07

Yeah, it's a real thing. You really have to learn how to, how to change those dials as you go, in order to make the most sense.

Taylor Fragomeni  33:16

Mm hmm.

Kris Hampton  33:20

Alright, what's next?

Taylor Fragomeni  33:22

Next we've got clipping. So in the gym, we set clipping stances, because we don't want people to fall while they're clipping, right? Because obviously, we're trying to mitigate risk as much as we can indoors. Outside, bolts are generally placed where it's nice to clip, but as you progress through the grades, the clipping stances aren't always going to be comfortable. So this can be a tricky thing to transition because I don't want to be just like, yeah, make risky clips in the gym. Like maybe, maybe in some scenarios you could, but like if you're gonna do that, make sure you're high enough off the ground and have a really good belayer and all that fun stuff. Also, like you might get yelled at, I don't know.

Kris Hampton  34:11

Yeah, you probably would. I do really like something like sloth-style climbing, for really learning to own weird positions. And, and I think that, you know, climb super slow, hold the tension all the way through move, that sort of thing helps you feel comfortable when you have to clip in the middle of a move. So I like that for it.

Taylor Fragomeni  34:41

Yeah, I think that's great. If you're someone that gets nervous clipping, climbing like one more move before a clip and kind of practicing that can be helpful. And you can start on routes that you're pretty confident you're not going to fall off of.

Kris Hampton  34:57

Yeah, I think it's great to like get high up on the wall and see if you can clip bolts at your waist.

Taylor Fragomeni  35:03

Yeah, absolutely. And, and bolts in the gym are so close together, it's like doing that is going to help you get more used to climbing above a bolt to the degree that you will be outside. Like they're not always going to be at your knee when you're clipping the next draw very frequently, they're going to be below your feet. So that can be, that can be a helpful way to go about things, too. Trying to like take a really deep breath before you pull rope up to clip can be helpful too, to just calm yourself down a little bit so you're not panic clipping.

Kris Hampton  35:32

Yeah, I think if you're, if you know you're prone to panic clipping, you know, even beyond the deep breath, I might start people by telling them like, you don't get to clip till you've been there for 30 seconds or something, like...

Taylor Fragomeni  35:47

Ooh, 30 seconds? That's a long time.

Kris Hampton  35:48

Make them hang out there and try to, try to shake out and try to calm down instead of the panic clip. 

Taylor Fragomeni  35:55

Totally. Yeah, being, practicing resting above a bolt can be, can be helpful. Because a lot of the time I think we, we break it down to like, "I just have to get to the next draw. And then I'll be, I'll be quote unquote 'safe' again." But if you can, if you can spend a little time in that space where you're above your last bolt and try to like practice being calm there, that's gonna be really helpful.

Kris Hampton  36:19

Yeah, and you're gonna get outside and rest stances aren't always going to be at a bolt either. And they're not always in the gym, but gym bolts are close together. You're, you know, pretty often you're going to be near a bolt when you're resting. That's not always the way outside.

Taylor Fragomeni  36:35

I did this yesterday up it Fossil Hill. It was like, my feet were like three feet above my last bolt and I hung out there for a long time. I was like, "Oh, cool." 

Kris Hampton  36:44

Yeah, the more comfortable you can get doing that kind of thing in the gym, the better.

Taylor Fragomeni  36:49

Yeah. Um, as far as like, mitigating it when you get outside, because there's only so much you can do to prepare for that in the gym, you've got a few options. So, I think understanding how to use a stick clip, like most people do now, but a lot of people don't still. So if you're, if you're someone that is looking at a route that you know will be challenging for you and you're not sure if you can get to the top of it, knowing how to use a stick clip on route is going to be a very empowering tool for you. Because guess what? If you can't get to the top of it, you can get to the top of it, just not by climbing. Um, that can be helpful to utilize. It also allows you to check out clipping stances on things that are challenging for you before you actually have to climb up to it and be able to hang and clip a draw. So that can be a good, a good tool, if you're on something that's really hard for you. Sometimes you might not clip certain draws for several sessions without grabbing them or stick clipping up or anything like that. So practicing pulling on into the clipping stance, and just holding it as long as you can, can be helpful. And you can already have the draw clipped while you're doing that. And then also, like extending draws is helpful too, obviously.

Kris Hampton  38:15

That, that gets missed way more often than it should.

Taylor Fragomeni  38:19

I know. Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  38:20

You know, the people who put these bolts in may not be your size, they may have put the bolt in on rappel and not really known where the rest stance was going to be or the best stance was going to be. So there's, you know, it's completely just arbitrary, in some cases, where the bolts are. And if you find that from one hold lower, you could clip better but you just can't quite reach this quick draw: extend it, and then you're going to be clipping it just fine.

Taylor Fragomeni  38:51

Yeah, there's no shame in that. 

Kris Hampton  38:53

No, absolutely. I've extended like four times.

Taylor Fragomeni  38:56

I do it frequently. Especially being like a little bit shorter. And I know where I like started climbing, a lot of the first ascentionists were taller, like 5'10" and up, and I was always just so locked off clipping draws...

Kris Hampton  39:13

Yeah, if I need to have a three foot...

Taylor Fragomeni  39:15

...or clipping in the middle of the crux. 

Kris Hampton  39:17

Exactly. If I need to have a three foot draw on it, I'm gonna put a three foot draw on it, ya know? I also think it's really important to, especially as you're getting on things that are harder for you or that have hard clips for you, make them part of your beta. A lot of times in the gym, and on easier climbing, we sort of take it for granted that we're just going to be able to clip and we don't consider it in terms of our sequence. But make that part of the beta of the climb, part of the links you have to do when you're working on your project. I want to link not only to here and then grabbing the draw, but I want to link to there and clipping the bolt, you know.

Taylor Fragomeni  39:58

Yeah, I've experienced that a lot more frequently I think in the last like year or so, as I've been trying things that are more limit level for me, but, man, sometimes clipping the draw is a move, for sure. 

Kris Hampton  40:09

Absolutely, it is.

Taylor Fragomeni  40:10

And like step one a lot of the time is like just clipping all the draws, and then linking sections, and then, etc. ,

Kris Hampton  40:18

Yeah, there are definitely projects where I've done it. I know lots of folks who have done it, where like, session number three on the project is just, "Alright, today, I'm gonna clip all the draws without grabbing them." Yeah, that's a real thing.

Taylor Fragomeni  40:33

Or you got to start practicing skipping them if it saves you some.

Kris Hampton  40:36

Exactly. And that's, that's a thing that happens outside too, that doesn't happen in the gym. And, you know, all of those things of getting higher above bolts, resting above a bolt, things like that are going to prepare you for being able to skip a draw when it's safe to do so. And it's gonna help you do the things you want to do.

Taylor Fragomeni  40:58

Absolutely.

Kris Hampton  41:01

That all we got here?

Taylor Fragomeni  41:03

I guess so.

Kris Hampton  41:04

Alright. Oh, my God, that was quick and efficient and easy. Your pacing was good.

Taylor Fragomeni  41:11

Efficiency is my superpower.

Kris Hampton  41:12

You moved through the uncomfortable stances. This was great. You guys out there in the gym who are planning to go outside and you know, not exactly sure how to transition the skills, or maybe you've gone outside for a few seasons and you're finding that things are just enough different out there that it's tough for you, I think these are great tips, great drills to use to, to brush up on those skills that are going to make it easier for you to have a good time outside. Frankly, you know, it's, if you're not able to transition the skills that you've got in the gym to the outside, it can be really frustrating and totally make you not want to do it. And there's so much fun to be had outside.

Taylor Fragomeni  42:00

Yeah, and I think one last like little note on that point too, is like curb your expectations a little bit. If you're used to climbing in the gym predominantly, like give yourself some time to transition to climbing on rock. It's not the same thing at all. Totally expect to be climbing at a lower grade than you are in the gym and just be patient with it and go through the steps and you'll, you'll catch up.

Kris Hampton  42:25

Yeah, absolutely. Really, really smart thing to say. We could have just said that first and been done. So true. You guys know where to find us. You can find Taylor as well at tangentclimbing.com , @tangent_climbing on Instagram. Is that right?

Taylor Fragomeni  42:26

That's right. 

Kris Hampton  42:45

Dang, I'm good at this. And you can find us at powercompanyclimbing.com. You can find us on the Instagrams, the Facebook's, the Pinterest, the YouTubes, probably several other places I can't remember, @powercompanyclimbing. Are you on Twitter? 

Taylor Fragomeni  43:08

No. 

Kris Hampton  43:10

Nobody I know is on Twitter.

Taylor Fragomeni  43:13

I mean I know people are but I don't know anyone.

Kris Hampton  43:17

Everybody's like, "I'm not on Twitter," and I'm like, "Who the fuck is on Twitter?" Well, it's not us. Because we don't tweet, we scream like eagles.