EP 117: Yves Gravelle — Lessons From Grip Sports, Basing Your Training on the Demands of Your Goal, and Top 3 Finger Training Methods

The Nugget Climbing Podcast

Yves Gravelle is a V15 boulderer from Canada and a 3x APL World Champion (i.e. grip competitions). We talked about lessons from grip training that we can apply to climbing, the importance of simplicity and consistency, how to break down a bouldering project, basing your training on the demands of a specific goal, top 3 finger training methods, how to train full crimps, and much more.

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Show Notes:

thenuggetclimbing.com/episodes/yves-gravelle

Nuggets:

0:07:18 – How to pronounce Yves’ name, and living in Ottawa

0:09:20 – The most legendary training montage I have ever seen, and an introduction to APL

0:12:32 – Why Yves thinks climbs could represent themselves well in grip sports, and what a competition is like

0:15:22 – Specializing vs. being a well-rounded athlete in grip

0:18:11 – Balancing climbing goals with grip competitions

0:19:28 – What Yves has learned from grip sports, and taking training ideas from powerlifting

0:22:26 – How Yves bases his training around the demands of a specific boulder or goal

0:24:49 – Is it possible to combine outdoor climbing with quality finger strength training?

0:31:07 – An example training week with outdoor bouldering on Sunday

0:35:05 – Preparing your body for the amount of training you want to do, and progressively working your way up

0:36:19 – Building capacity, and learning about nutrition

0:37:55 – Reading nutritional research about bouldering

0:39:33 – How Yves has changed his diet

0:42:28 – Maintaining finger strength during off-seasons, and pushing hard for goals

0:45:51 – Finger training principles, keeping things simple, consistency, writing things down, and using RPE to measure your training

0:51:38 – Training strength when you are fresh, finishing fresh, and not going to failure (adding a buffer)

0:54:14 – Yves’ session load calculator spreadsheet

0:57:36 – Preparation cycles, and competitive cycles

1:00:45 – Jazz

1:02:13 – How Yves trained for ‘So What’ V15, and building shoulder strength and mobility

1:05:15 – Patron question from fdclimbs: Any tips for building climbing-specific shoulder strength?

1:07:34 – Yves top 3 finger training exercises for climbing

1:12:01 – Progressive warmup for finger training

1:13:58 – Micro edge training

1:15:39 – Contact strength training

1:19:20 – Summary of Yves’ top 3 finger training methods

1:21:08 – Patron question from Alan: Does Yves have a favorite way to train full crimps?

1:22:39 – Yves’ full crimp story, and how he prevents finger injuries

1:26:14 – Patron question from fdclimbs: Tips for training individual fingers? (And Yves’ grip positions and anatomy)

1:29:53 – Patron question from Alan: How does Yves balance different methods of training fingers and grip strength?

1:33:19 – Prepping for ‘Terremere’ and Hueco

1:34:17 – Patron question from Daniel: Any plans to travel to world-famous bouldering areas and try the classic V15s or V16s?

1:35:38 – 1-7-11 on the campus board (with slightly different spacing)

1:37:00 – Patron question from Daniel: Is there such thing as “enough power”? What about finger strength?

1:38:18 – Patron question from Xander: Do your finger strength gains still transfer to climbing?

1:39:28 – One of Yves’ favorite coaches to learn from

1:40:59 – When you are starting off almost anything will work

1:41:44 – Patron question from Michael: What is the smallest edge you can hang with one hand? What about two hands?

1:42:54 – Being muscular and still being strong on tiny holds, and putting on muscle mass in the right places

1:44:30 – Patron question from David: How does Yves look after his skin, especially splits and tears?

1:46:48 – Contributing to local bouldering areas, and winning the world championships

1:47:41 – Yves’ daughters and gymnastics

1:50:26 – Listen to your body, and enjoy the process

1:53:10 – Be present

1:54:39 – Wrap up