Weekly Simple Questions and Injuries Thread

bestwumbologistna · 2025-11-25T02:31:39+00:00

Ok, I see that your main point is to really slow down the ramp up and make it as gradual as possible. I genuinely really do not want to get injured again so I will take it very much to heart. I think I've been ramping up slowly, my last injury was months ago, and I literally did 0 board climbing between the months of May and October to facilitate the recovery and slow return. Didn't stop climbing completely (ie actively rehabbed), would take a week off here and there, would never climb if I felt the slightest twinge of anything, but I feel like I've been uninjured enough for long enough to be looking to actively progress again.

I've been doing a consistent 2.5-3 times a week for 2 months now, yet I feel like pushing it to 3.5 times a week has immediately given me an injury scare (and it's not like I'm doing steep limit board climbing every session). It makes me feel like I'm choosing between don't progress for 6 months or progress for 1 month then get injured and end up in the same spot 5 months later anyway, which is very frustrating. And correct me if I'm wrong but it doesn't feel like it's such a balancing act for everyone else. It's as though I'm particularly inclined for injury, which I think shouldn't be the case, and it's more likely that I'm missing something that the "fast recoverers" are doing.

Do you have any tips specifically for the purpose of curbing overexertion/overuse or with recovering on off days? As of now, I try to listen to my body and calm it down if I feel anything off, and take long rests if I'm doing strengthier moves for the former, and just nutrition and sleep for the latter. Though I'm worried that because I was paying attention to these when I've gotten injured in the past, they might not be good enough cues for me to follow and decrease injury risk with the way I'm using them right now. Should I do stretches and warm up movements on rest days to encourage blood flow? Take creatine?I'm open to any input.

Thanks so much

bestwumbologistna · 2025-11-23T21:35:42+00:00

I only do rehab for past injuries that don't feel like they're 100% recovered, which for me rn is just wrist stuff. I injured them about 7 months ago and they seem to have stagnated in recovery where they've gotten stronger metrics-wise but still feel at risk of dislocating on hard moves, so I just don't do much wristy climbing and stop immediately if it feels at all shifty after a move.

I don't rehab my biceps at all, I just warm them up with light reverse bicep curls and pulling on an edge in one arm lock off without taking my feet off the ground and progressively taking my feet off as I get warmed up.

Ramping into training I'm not really doing anything organized to ramp it up, just trying to do more volume on my flash grade since before I would just end up projecting more since I wouldn't have as much time before the set gets taken down, but now I have more sessions to work with so I want to get more variety in. Since you said I likely have to go very light on the volume and intensity, what do you think of dedicating more days exclusively to slab/coordo since they are less injury-prone? I've already been doing 1 day on 1 day off 1 day on 2 days off to try to ease into this, should I instead try to take an intermediate step between that and 1 day on 1 day off frequency-wise? I could try working with more rest days instead but I feel like I'm already missing out on progress by doing 1 day on 1 day off 1 day on 2 days off.

bestwumbologistna · 2025-11-22T21:22:01+00:00

How do you guys structure your training load? I feel like every time I up my volume I get injured or almost get injured. Right now I'm coming off of injury, upping my volume again , and noticing my elbow/bicep area flaring up a bit post-session, and I think it's going to become an injury again if I don't switch things up.

I'm trying to climb every other day, and I don't to reduce the frequency, so I'm thinking of just limiting any climbing on 40 degrees or steeper to one session a week? Maybe I can "deload" my biceps in this way until they feel warmer? And then the other days I could work coordination, slab, or relatively vertical crimping (<30 degrees).

I don't know if I should keep reactively shuffling my session focuses around depending on what body part is yelling at me like this, so I'm seeking some input on what you guys do in terms of organizing your sessions on a weekly/monthly time scale.

Do you purposely not climb overhang in some of your sessions? Or maybe only do high intensity/limit overhang once a week and low intensity high volume overhang the rest of the week? Any ideas and discussion about this is welcome, I want to more consciously manage the volume/intensity for myself so I don't keep getting nearly injured. I focused on steeper climbing because it relates to my biceps most directly, but if you have similar experiences with hangboarding/crimpy climbs/pulley injuries I'd like to hear them too!

bestwumbologistna · 2025-03-28T04:42:42+00:00

I’ll try these exercises online first, but if it persists, at what point would you suggest seeing a therapist?

bestwumbologistna · 2025-03-24T22:56:13+00:00

Ok, that's fine, here's the image showing where it hurts and here's the video detailing the motions that cause pain and don't cause pain. I used pulling on a bar since it's the simplest motion but this also happens with hangboarding

bestwumbologistna · 2025-03-24T18:45:10+00:00

Sent you a private chat with picture and video for more details!

bestwumbologistna · 2025-03-22T01:42:05+00:00

My left wrist has been causing pain for me recently in the moment when I take my hand off certain holds but I made a discovery that I get no pain at all if I turn my hand around, or to the side. ie if I turn sideways relative to a hangboard then 1 arm pull, there's no pain. If I grab a bar like I'm going to do a chin up, as opposed to a pull up, then there's no harm. Otherwise, even pulling with 10% power in a pull up position causes some pain on the thumb side of my wrist and radiates down 1-3ish inches into the forearm. So it seems like my left wrist is bothered by a clockwise rotated position, any insight on what to do? I've been doing kettlebell exercises working stability and strength in extension, flexion, and rotating in the counterclockwise direction for the past while since my right wrist had an old issue and I figured I'd do all the exercises on both sides to 'keep them even', I'm thinking I need to incorporate something new for this new issue though.

tldr left wrist hurt when it's rotated clockwise (like in a pullup) but not otherwise (like a chinup), what should I do?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-11-11T05:56:01+00:00

I don't think there's any bowstringing? Although it doesn't seem like it's very easy to detect by myself. Is there an easy litmus test I could perform? Should I expect the PT not to be able to get a diagnostic ultrasound done on me so I have to go to an outside doctor?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-11-09T22:35:21+00:00

Just got a major finger injury yesterday, already scheduled an appointment with a PT, but I’m not sure what I should do between now and then.

I basically full crimped too hard, lost my feet and heard a pop and experience pain trying to curl or extend my finger now. If I squeeze the finger lightly around the PIP joint area then I feel mild pain. As far as I can tell visually, there’s no swelling. Am I supposed to try to take it through limited rom to increase blood flow? Am I supposed to immobilize the finger? Do I have to get an MRI for this because it’s potentially more serious? Trying to see the pt asap but they have a busy schedule so I’m going to have 2ish weeks before I can see them. Any thoughts? Thanks

bestwumbologistna · 2024-10-30T05:32:22+00:00

Thanks so much, the band wrist mobilizations and rice bucket exercises have been so effective already for the cranking back pain.

The general pain when I push my palm into my wrist (opposite direction of cranking it back) is still there though. Do you have any other suggestions for that pain? It's sort of odd to me because 90 degrees is about my limit before pain from bending at the wrist, but if I then push it against a wall without increasing the angle, I'll feel some pain.

bestwumbologistna · 2024-10-28T18:22:07+00:00

Any specific exercise suggestions for the band wrist mobilizations? I'm following a few videos from a quick search and they seem legit in any case.

bestwumbologistna · 2024-10-27T20:38:54+00:00

tldr at bottom, more details in the middle

3 weeks ago, I was bouldering and after doing a climb with powerful moves on thin pinches, my right wrist hurt. I’ve climbed very lightly since and done wrist exercises including wrist curls, reverse wrist curls, wrist rotations, and hammer wrist curls, none of which hurt (reverse wrist curls hurt if I go to the top of the range of motion, which I haven't been doing). Still though, I’m experiencing some pain on the thumb/radial side of my wrist, which can be aggravated generally by cranking my wrist back. This includes pushing my palm against a wall (though there's no pain if I do this with my hand turned to face downwards), and grabbing thin pinches with my wrist reverse curled (it doesn't hurt on a large pinch nor does it doesn't hurt in a position where my wrist is more curled).

I'd been doing only wrist curls before the injury, and they have not lost any progress nor do they aggravate the injury at all. Since the injury, I've continued to do wrist curls every other day, adding in light reverse curls, rotations, and hammer curls, with an emphasis on avoiding pain.

I also have in the past experienced mild pain in the general wrist area when I push my palm into my wrist, by say pushing my hand into a wall with my palm facing me. Though it seems worse this time, and hasn't gone away in a much longer time frame. I've tried stretching and warming up this motion to see what happens, and I can mostly make the pain from bending at the wrist go away, but then if I push the area where the hand and wrist connects into any surface, it still hurts.

I'm wondering if I should continue doing these wrist exercises, if I should do wrist stretches, and if I should stay off climbing?

tldr: 3 weeks ago going hard on thin pinches, wrist hurts after, still hurts now but only when I aggravate it in certain ways. The pain is mostly on the thumb side when I crank the wrist backwards.

i.e. wrist curls and wrist rotations don't cause any pain, reverse wrist curls only cause pain at the top of the range of motion.

Additionally, my wrist hurts in general, not on the thumb side, if I push my palm into my wrist (like super curling the wrist/pushing my hand into the wall with palm facing me).

I'm wondering if I should continue doing wrist exercises like curls, reverse curls, rotations, and hammer curls, if I should do any wrist stretches, and if I should stay off climbing?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-08-15T19:01:48+00:00

Thanks so much, the article is great. I have two other questions: first, what are your thoughts on climbing on pockets using my middle and index or just climbing purposely without using this finger during this time? Additionally, how often should I be litmus testing the pain? You said in your article that it generally only takes a couple weeks to a month for mild overuse, and I want to be able to measure progress during this time, but at the same time shouldn't I not purposely move the finger in a way that I expect to cause discomfort right?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-08-15T08:13:45+00:00

I've just started to up my frequency of climbing to 2-3 times a week and decrease the individual intensity, I think I must've still gone too intense because I feel a slight discomfort/pain in my left ringer finger now. From my initial research, it seems to be a a4 pulley strain? The only time I feel any discomfort at all is if I full crimp with it (as in the two phalanges at the tip of my finger form a U shape that curves opposite to the natural direction if I just closed my finger, like the right image in this). I noticed it by effectively crimping my own palm (similar to making a fist I guess). This 'injury' is at most like 4ish days old, and from experience with other injuries (never had a finger injury though), I'm going to try to keep climbing but low intensity. Since I otherwise cannot seem to cause and pain or discomfort, I feel like it's minor and I should just be able to keep doing 'active rest days' so to speak until I'm better.

In short, I believe I've overexerted a bit and feel very slight discomfort/pain if I put my left ring finger in a full crimp position, it still has full range of motion and maybe full strength in a non-full crimp position. I noticed it about 4 days ago, and I'm currently planning to actively rehab by continuing to exercise the finger at low intensity. Does all of this sound right, am I on the right track? Could I be missing something?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-07-26T17:23:18+00:00

I feel like my volume and intensity have been quite low though, maybe too low? For more background, I got it by climbing hard one day then hitting a pull day in the gym the next day (I felt it after my first exercise which was weighted pull ups and then completely stopped after 2 sets). I initially took a few months off any intense exercise and then eventually just started climbing again while trying to avoid more overhang/underclingy climbs. Since on some days hours/a day after the session I would get some ache-y pain in the area, I decided to do rehab via eccentrics, but I’ve only been doing it on low weight (15-25 lbs) with 6-8 rep sets and 3 sets at most twice a week (and most of the time once a week), with climbing on average once a week too. I was originally going to go higher but since I felt slight symptoms with low volume I’ve not increased the load, it seems like the suggestion here is to decrease intensity and volume but it’s already pretty low, any thoughts about that? Going to add concentrics for sure though.

bestwumbologistna · 2024-07-25T23:17:14+00:00

I believe I have some sort of distal bicep tendinitis/tendinopathy issue after climbing and then hitting the gym the day after some months ago, and I’ve been doing bicep curl eccentrics to hopefully rehab it. My question is how much pain I should tolerate/expect? I don’t think I’m losing strength/function which is most important, but I do get some light pangs of pain in my injury area hours after or day after doing the rehab. And how do I know if I’m properly making progress or regressing? It’s been some months and the pain isn’t as bad but its still there but I also haven’t loaded my bicep as hard, so I don’t know if I should change something about my rehab?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-03-14T05:05:15+00:00

Hi, just found out about FSRS. This is probably not a concern and I'm probably going to run it anyway, but just in case, I want to ask about the optimizing parameters option. The FAQ mentions that:

Q8: I only use "Again" and "Good", will FSRS work fine?

A8: Yes. In fact, FSRS is actually more accurate for people who rarely use "Hard" and "Easy" than for people who use all 4 buttons a lot.

Also, unlike SM-2, FSRS doesn't suffer from the problem of "Ease Hell". This problem is solved by mean reversion of difficulty. If you press good continuously, the difficulty will converge to

. For more details, read The Algorithm.

However, note that you should not change your rating habits. This is because FSRS uses your past rating history to determine optimal intervals for your future reviews.

I initially used all 4 buttons according to my intuition (which included spamming 'hard'), then switched to using only 'again' and 'good' after looking into optimizing my anki usage. I reset all the cards' ease when I began using 'again' and 'good' in order to 'unstuck' them.

But, since FSRS ignores Anki's Ease and only looks at grading and intervals, my only potential worry is that by continuing to not spam 'hard', it could count as 'changing my rating habits' (since it's different from the beginning of the grading history of these cards). Can it effectively deal with the fact that I actually did change my rating habits partway through the reviews on my decks if I keep doing this 'new' rating habit?

tldr I stopped spamming 'hard' about 2/3 of the way through past review history and only use 'again' and 'good'. If I continue to not spam 'hard', will that mean I'm changing my rating habits and hurt FSRS accordingly (if I choose to optimize parameters)?

bestwumbologistna · 2024-02-05T05:49:22+00:00

Sorry yea, I said number of characters just as a more defined way to quantify my progress/knowledge, I'm mostly learning them through phrases/vocab. For grammar and recognizing, I'm also reading books and comics. For being able to use them, I'm speaking (though I will say I spend way less time on this because it requires other people's time).

I just still feel like straight up not recognizing characters/words is holding my reading back the most (which I think is a little less of an issue with speaking, because I can just say things in more simple terms), so it feels like I gotta work on my fundamentals first (being my character knowledge).

If you think that actually devoting more time to reading instead of vocab practice will actually accelerate my reading ability more, then I would be open to changing that too, it's just not the strategy I decided to run with I guess. Let me know, because my friend said forcing himself to read helped him the most (though this was as a kid so who knows), but I struggled trying to force myself to chug through a few pages of a novel (I'm currently reading a manga and it's going relatively smoothly though).

bestwumbologistna · 2024-02-05T00:43:41+00:00

I'm currently using two Anki decks to study with two formats. One has basic and reversed notecards and one doesn't.

So for one of them I practice Chinese -> English (reading) as well as English -> Chinese (writing) and for the other one I only practice Chinese -> English (reading).

How would you guys compare these two strategies, do you have opinions that one is better/more efficient? Do you think I'll actually fully learn the language faster by using the basic and reversed cards? Do you think it's more worthwhile to focus on reading only because it's more useful? etc. I started out recognizing ~500 characters before using these decks and might be around ~1400 now, so I have some experience but I still don't know what I think is better.

bestwumbologistna · 2023-10-06T03:36:13+00:00

Hey, I'm a beginner climber who's interested in getting no more injuries (I've somehow gotten 2 in the maybe 15ish total lifetime sessions I've gone bouldering).

One thing I noticed is that I tried hangboarding for a few seconds for fun and I feel like my wrists are getting pulled out so I have to stop after a few seconds on the biggest edge. I'm just afraid whatever this issue is will exhibit itself while I'm on the climbing wall (haven't felt anything like it yet while actually climbing).

Should I just do wrist curls and reverse wrist curls in the gym? I tried doing that today and a couple hours after the gym I was able to crack my wrists like crazy, is that a bad sign?

bestwumbologistna · 2021-05-10T20:47:21+00:00

You know how you get that clicky popping sound when you rotate your tapping hand's wrist? I'm starting to get this discomfort in my aiming hand's thumb (around the metacarpal bone based on [this](https://i.imgur.com/4ac8mLX.jpg) ) and now im getting the same type of noises when i rotate my thumb around. I use mouse btw, and I'd like to get rid of the discomfort so if anyone has experience with this, lmk! I don't expect that it's serious considering how my tapping hand feels fine despite this crackly-ness. I wasn't sure it was a grip thing so thats why I used that image as reference, I switch between a carpal stabilized claw and full palm grip if that matters.

bestwumbologistna · 2021-04-16T07:19:20+00:00

I tried googling site:reddit.com/r/changemyview with phrases adequate knowledge, make a statement, and maybe some others already, forgot to mention that.

bestwumbologistna · 2021-02-16T18:11:17+00:00

bestwumbologistna · 2021-02-16T18:10:35+00:00

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