Specialization, Weaknesses, and the SAID Principle

Woah! Yesterday's gym session was a physiological punch in the gut, and an undeniable example of the SAID principle. The SAID (Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demands) principle is one of the foundations of exercise science. Essentially, you only increase your capacity to perform a certain activity by engaging in that activity or something similar. Additionally, if you trained for an adaptation in the past, but then neglect to continue imposing demand for that adaptation, your performance will decrease to your baseline levels (a process called ‘de-training’).  For example: If someone spends all their time climbing powerfully on very steep terrain, they’re probably pretty good at it, or at least better at it than they might be at technical face climbing (if they rarely or never practice that style of climbing).

 You probably know someone who feels comfortable climbing on vertical walls, but as soon as there is a roof or the wall starts to kick back, they flail. The most common reaction to this is “I can’t do overhangs, they’re too hard” and they go right back to the vertical climbs. Seemingly in the hopes that, on some magical day, overhangs will become “easy”. Unfortunately that magical day does not exist. If it did I imagine it would be called “Awesome Day”. The only way to get better at what you are bad at, it to practice what you are bad at. When you practice what you are bad at you get better at it faster than when you get better at what you are better at when you practice what you are better at (I know I could exercise my vocabulary, but I like how that last sentence is almost a tongue twister). Why? Because it is pretty easy to go from being Terrible to being Mediocre, but relatively much harder to go from being Mediocre to being Awesome. You probably went from not knowing how to drive a car to knowing how to get from point A to point B without killing yourself pretty quickly. You may have backed into a few dumpsters, hit a cat, or rear ended that fool who slammed on the brakes even though the light had only just turned yellow, but hey that’s what happens when you’re learning. Anyway… You are probably a pretty mediocre driver. The vast majority of us are. Now go youtube some rally car race footage. Comparatavely, how much time, practice, and dedication do you think it took to go from navigating the grocery store parking lot to tearing it up through the forest and drifting hairpin turns without crapping your pants at the prospect of certain death? A lot more time than it took you to pass your drivers test. Even if that took a few tries. Moral of the story: work on your weaknesses (but don’t forget your strengths)!

Now back to that gym session I was moaning about at the beginning…I got my butt handed to me at the gym yesterday. I got pumped at the 3^rd bolt of a route. Grabbed a draw on an easy route (shameful). Got pumped on a BOULDER PROBLEM! And could hardly pinch anything. I felt so weak. Like a kitten. meow.

“How could this be!?” you might say (and I definitely said). “Didn’t you just climb some fairly hard routes? How come you suck?”

Answer: The SAID principle.

In the past 6 weeks I have climbed on only 10 routes. 3 were warm-ups I flashed. 1 was a warm-up I did everyday before trying my second project. 1 was a ‘project’ I did 2^nd try. 3 were projects I didn’t send and didn’t try very many times. Which leaves 2 hard projects I actually sent. One took 1 week (and 3 years of work prior) and the other took 2 weeks of dedicated tries. What I’m getting at is the fact that I spent most of my trip trying to adapt to only 2 routes. When you are really trying to redpoint something hard, you only get a few tries before you are too worn out or the skin is too thin. So after 6 weeks of only tying in to the rope @3 times a day/4-5 days a week, I lost a lot of muscle. Evidenced not only by my weak gym performance, but also by my post-trip weight of 149lbs (at my strongest bouldering I weighed about 155-160lbs). I adapted to the demands I was placing on my body. When climbing thin technical pocket routes it is really helpful to be light and rely more on footwork, technique, and endurance. Once I took those adaptations back into the gym, I was obviously out of place. I don’t have the strength or the power to crush my way up pinches and edges anymore.

And now I have a choice: Continue to focus on technical face-climbing (a type of climbing my body naturally excels at) or get back to work on my weaknesses and become a more skilled climber. Option 2…duh. For me this isn’t even a question. I love working my weaknesses. Honestly I think that is the only “gift” I have as a climber. I love to work hard. So to work I go.

You can make the same choice: Specialize in your strength or work on your weaknesses. Neither decision is right or wrong and both take hard work.

A recent post by training guru Steve Bechtel on his website climbstrong.com contained this nugget that I absolutely love:

“Developing your ability as a climber is about compromise, not balance.”

It is impossible to train up all the facets of your climbing to the same high level at the same time. You always peak certain traits at the expense of others. The key lies in making the right decisions about what to compromise, when, and to what degree in order to achieve your goals.

Climbing is hard… so work harder.

I just realized that my idea of hard work might not be in line with yours. Hard work doesn’t always mean sweating it out in the gym. More often, hard work means: eating right, resting properly, adjusting your internal dialogue about your performance, being aware of how your body is moving, staying hydrated, making your training fit into your everyday life, and riding the constant ebb and flow of psyche and performance.

Go forth and crush.