April Contest Post – Use Your Feet!

(Leave a comment below for a chance to win a new pair of shoes from Evolv!)

How many times have you been at the crux of a route, only to hear your friends shouting encouragingly “Use your feet!” In the back of your mind, you’re thinking, I AM using my feet, my legs are on the wall aren’t they?

As a tall climber, who learned to climb at the Gunks, I developed some bad habits early on. I was rewarded for making big reaches between the positive horizontals, and not worrying too much about what was going on below my waist. Once I latched the next set of jug,s I would just reel them in, shuffle my feet up and continue on.

This realization didn’t occur to me until a couple of years ago, on my first trip back to the Gunks after being gone for about 10 years. A few months before the trip, I’d had the opportunity to do a personal coaching session with movement and technique Jedi Justen Sjong, which I will forever remember as the day I discovered what my feet are really for in climbing. It was with him that I learned about initiating all movement with the lower body, dropping and driving off the foot holds, and other things that people who know how to use their feet well already know.

In the last contest post, about weaknesses, only one person mentioned their footwork, but my guess is it’s something all of us could work on, though perhaps we aren’t as aware of it as something more tangible like finger strength. I was recently reminded of this when Justen came out to do a coaching clinic and I realized I’d been way to focused on strength training this winter and had not given nearly enough attention to the subtleties of technique. It’s less fun to practice, but takes determined repetition to make it part of your repertoire.

What about you? Is technique something you practice on a regular basis? Are you aware of how best to “use your feet” or are they still just those things that weigh you down?

Leave a comment and you’ll be entered to win your choice of a new pair of shoes from Evolv. Few tools are as important to your climbing as your shoes, and if you don’t feel confident standing on your feet, you won’t be able to use your lower body properly. Be sure to click the ad below to browse Evolv’s entire shoe line, and start drooling over what pair you’ll choose if you’re the lucky winner!

Contest closes on 4/30/13, one entry per person. Winners will be chosen by random drawing through the Splitter Choss super computer. If you won last month, you can’t win this month. Folks affiliated with Splitter Choss aren’t allowed to enter, more fine print, etc, etc, etc.