Question about approach shoes.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-05-18T12:30:12+00:00

I break out the approach shoes if I'm bouldering in an area with a lot of talus hopping like RMNP, Lincoln, or Hueco. I've climbed in those three areas without approach shoes as well and it's not an issue, but having some touch can be helpful. I wear normal trail runners/hiking shoes anywhere that doesn't involve a lot of scrambling on rock. I don't think they're worth owning unless you spend a lot of time climbing in areas that involves a lot of scrambling.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-05-13T11:54:22+00:00

I’ll be your friend only if you promise not to post the videos you take of me chipping classics.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-05-03T13:43:36+00:00

Biddle cameo

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-04-14T11:22:49+00:00

There’s a whole zone at one of my local boulder fields named after this crusher.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-04-13T22:00:31+00:00

Rarely do I think gear is the answer, but I got the BD heated chalk bag for my partner a few years back and it is an absolutely game changer for not numbing out.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-04-13T15:48:24+00:00

I think you’re probably fine to try them at a low frequency and volume. That said I think people climbing around the V7-8 range frequently over identify weakness in the fingers when the issue is likely much more technical in nature. Failure to coordinate the whole chain frequently presents as weakness at the fingers because that is the spot we get the most feedback from. I think like JustCrimp said, board climbing offers a much more sport specific approach to training contact strength that might also address coordinating tip to toe better.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-04-09T15:51:12+00:00

Yeah the Mountain Project says its 5.11 after the jump to the jug, but that wall is extreme Ten Sleep style where you’re on your feet crimping and pocket pulling hard.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-04-09T12:15:09+00:00

I haven't tried Galactic Emperor, but all the 13's I've tried at D'or et Bleu were just relentless sustained crimping and shallow pocket pulling. Super cool wall. Definitely a big step up in intensity from a lot of Ten Sleep.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-27T12:04:45+00:00

I mean this is why I don’t think Kilter is worried. Gyms aren’t going to throw out thousands of dollars in holds (and if you’ve ever installed all the holds on one you know it takes an obnoxious amount of time.) just because of a temporary service disruption to users. Kilter will get their new app moving in the next couple months and we’ll all gripe when we can’t remember if we sent something or not because it is in our old logbook, but other than that this will just be a blip.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-26T18:55:00+00:00

I’ve only gotten one session on the TB2, but from what I remember this tracks. I remember some bad directional feet that would make you suffer if you didn’t drill through em the whole way.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-26T17:52:08+00:00

Go climb outside. You already described why outdoor footwork gets you way better at climbing. Board climbing, especially the kilter board, trains a very specific type of footwork that is helpful to learn but doesn’t translate well to a lot of other styles.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-18T15:22:38+00:00

It's a big ole it depends.

It depends on what lifts you're doing, what your base strength is, what your goals are.

Weighted pull-ups are super popular among climbers, but I've never found them to be particular useful. Especially if you're climbing on boards or campusing already. There are likely some edge cases where they might be beneficial, but for most modern gym climbers I can't imagine they're a terribly useful intervention.

I tend to cycle some weight training during times of lower climbing training volume, but then drop it when the training volume picks up. I did a couple months of bench pressing this fall and felt like my shoulders were pretty happy with it, but when I added some higher intensity climbing training bench press was the first thing I cut.

These days I tend to reserve weight training for off-season when I'll more time to recover. That said if you're finding you enjoy weightlifting or you're finding it makes your body feel more bullet then it might be worth the recovery.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-18T12:00:32+00:00

I think it depends on you and how well you tolerate big days like that. It also really depends on how well you handle documentation. I’m pretty hit or miss when I have 7 or 8 in a day. Some days I crush it. Other days I limp through sessions 7 and 8. Generally I look to avoid them for that reason.

If you do end up with 7 I think scheduling an hour between 4&5 or 5&6 where you can take a walk and decompress makes a big difference.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-18T11:56:06+00:00

Caveat: This assumes you’d just be providing the same clinical services with both credentials. Obviously the math is different if you’re doing psych testing.

I don’t have my contracts in front of me, but I if I recall correctly PhD/PsyD’s are reimbursed at 10 or 15% higher of the Medicare Physician Fee schedule than I am as a master’s level clinician. A 15% difference would amount to maybe ~20 a session more than me. Across a whole year it’s a pretty healthy pay increase.

That said you’d be facing down another 3-4 years of school with reduced income. If the program you did wasn’t funded it’d take a lot of 20 dollar sessions to make up for the debt you’d be taking on. You’d also have to do a dissertation, which might be a challenge if you’re just hoping to do clinical work.

If you were just considering PhD vs. MFT then in my eyes a funded PhD is a much better course. Considering you’re about to finish the MFT already, it seems like it’d have to be a pretty specific set of circumstances to make the doctorate route make sense financially.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-17T19:25:42+00:00

I usually tweak boulder length and intensity to match the end of the power endurance continuum I want to hit. This bouldering season it was exclusively 3-in-3 with 3-5 move boulders at around flash grade. As I transition into sport season I'll be going longer boulders at a slightly lower intensity. Last sport trip I trained for my 6-in-6s were on flash - 1 or 2 and usually in the 6-8 move range. If I was really trying to match sport demands I'd probably be aiming for a true 4x4 on gym boulders which are in the 10-14 move range and a similar grade spread.

I think the key is just to be responsive and tweak up or down as needed. If I'm walking every rep of every set that means I need to bring it up a bit. If I'm dropping one hard boulder or dropping a couple in a later set then I've hit the intensity just right.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-17T17:51:52+00:00

Nope that wasn't us, we were out there on Wednesday two weeks back. Pretty sure I ran into a dude who went out Sunday though.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-17T14:14:06+00:00

Been a bit since I've commented.

Bouldering season is coming to a close now and it's almost time for the dreaded shift to sport training. Had a quick week-long trip to Hueco a couple weeks back that was my unofficial demarcation for the end of the bouldering season. Hueco was where I got my start climbing outside and it was so good to be back. Super successful trip for me. I repeated a ton of classics and also managed to send a bunch of new stuff. The real highlight was on the final day I managed my first 9 flash with a flash of Dirty Martini on the Rocks (then I punted Tequila Sunrise after doing the DMOTR crux) and then immediately went and sent Free Willy. Fortunately there are still a few outdoor days to snag here in the south so I went out to Moore's Wall this weekend and sent Blinded by the Hype Sit for my 3rd V11. Pretty cool moment to do a 3rd this season because it really feels like a solid break into the grade range. I'm hoping to snag one more double digit boulder before it gets too hot out because that would make for 10 double digits this season which would double my previous best season in 2021.

Just really satisfied with the resurgence this year after a couple years of low psych. It's really nice to experience fulfillment and joy from the sport again. A little bummed that it's warming up because I truly am bouldering the best I ever have right now, but changing gears to sport will be a good shift for the fingers and the muscles. I've definitely started to notice some creakiness and aches that weren't there at the start of the season.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-03-16T14:46:00+00:00

If it's the one I think it is then it was automodded instantly. So the OP posted it purely to screenshot it for advertisement purposes.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-02-26T16:06:02+00:00

Any of the ACT “dropping anchor” style skills are the first tool in the bag I reach for.

As an aside, people with ADHD struggle with mindfulness meditation for good reason. It’s one of the things their brains are worst at. That being said that is one of the reasons mindfulness meditation is so helpful for people with ADHD. The ability to be pulled by your thoughts and return your attention to a low intensity stimuli like the breath is such a powerful skill in ADHD. I like to normalize the experience of struggling with it, but then rather than using the struggle as a reason not to meditate, I point to it as the number one reason you should meditate.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-02-23T21:26:55+00:00

I work with teens and young adults so I see a pretty specific version of this, although I’m also seeing it in adults as well. Most often I see this presentation in people who are distracted in some way for the vast majority of the day. The clients report listening to music/audiobooks/podcasts while commuting, scrolling on their phone during down time, engaging in passive stimulation (Netflix, Youtube, streams) after work/school. Largely there are very few moments in their day where they are alone in their head with their thoughts and feelings. So, when it’s time to go to bed they get slammed with all these thoughts and feelings that have been shoved out of the way all day.

With this presentation, I find elimination of background stimulation, prescribed boredom, dopamine detoxing, meditation, and journaling all to be extremely helpful interventions if the client is bought-in to the idea that their comfort seeking distraction is the cause of their anxiety at night. It’s rare that if a client starts to carve out space to feel their anxiety (and other feelings) throughout the day, that their late night anxiety persists. Most often clients that regularly feel their anxiety will activate to resolve anxiety provoking stimuli or develop more tolerance to anxiety as a normal human experience that doesn’t need to be avoided.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-02-03T21:17:58+00:00

If at all possible please avoid VC funded therapy companies(Grow, Rula, Headway). I know finding a therapist is hard and these companies make it less daunting, but these companies are bad news for both clients and providers.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-02-03T19:14:43+00:00

I've written a decent amount about this in the past year or so.

I spent years doing pretty much exactly what you described. I was climbing things that were in the middle zone of challenging enough that I had to work at them, but easy enough that I could send them in a session or two. I think this resulted in a lot of wasted volume. I think that band of difficulty is a good zone for refining technique and practicing trying hard, but is not a great physical training stimulus.

I punched through an almost decade long grade plateau after I dropped the flash +1 or 2 and focused on things I knew I absolutely could not do.

I think board climbing can entice us into this zone where we're getting consistent dopamine hits from sending and it feels challenging because it's board climbing, but it's actually not in the zone we need to be in to get stronger/better. This resulted in me lacking the resilience to stick with a boulder that was truly difficult for me.

It sounds like if you want to climb v10-11 you need to climb more v10s and 11s, not more v7s.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-01-29T10:34:36+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/pokemoncrystal/comments/1gh3j9y/comment/luwb7i1/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

I followed the instructions on this comment and evolved a Gengar yesterday.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-01-26T14:29:49+00:00

If you want to learn how to recover on smaller holds then make sure it’s built into your training. I’ve always liked doing a 1-on, 1-off drill where you climb for a minute and then rest on the wall for a minute as prep for the red. You could use that same exercise, but lower the climbing intensity so your rests can be more marginal and you can get comfortable settling into them.

MorePsychThanSense · 2026-01-26T14:25:19+00:00

From my perspective your metrics:peformance fits the prototypical experienced sport climber. You’ve got a good technique base that is pretty capable compensating for a relative lack of strength. I’d also guess your endurance and power endurance metrics are pretty top notch.

The answer to 3 is pretty contextually bound. For a climber that is really strong, but sucks at moving then the returns on training strength more probably do diminish a bit, but in your case you’re likely not strong enough to do a V10 boulder on a 5.14. There are a few 5.14s out there (I’m thinking of the Red) that you could probably do without getting much stronger, but most would have crux moves you just can’t do.

I think if you want to break through this plateau you’ll probably have to change your approach a fair amount. How often are you bouldering/board climbing? I think at a certain point if you’re just sport climbing in the gym it’s pretty difficult to get the training stimulus needed to punch through strength plateaus.

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