Climbing Against Time: The Value of Climbing with a Clock

by James Lucas

With thirty seconds left on the clock, Maya Madere pulled on to the second problem at the 2022 National Team Trials at Stone Summit in Atlanta. Madere swung her arm, gastoned, stepped through and then pulled in, dynamically switching her hands. The clock had five seconds left as Madere perched on her foot. She matched the finish hold just as the timer went off.

Madere certainly pushed the clock when she sent one of the four problems at the 2022 National Team Trials. She’d been given 4 minutes to complete the problem and climbing quickly on her final attempt secured her silver at the event. While Madere’s last second send was unique, it demonstrates the value of climbing quickly.

The Time Crunch

One of the most effective training tools to bring climbing is a simple watch. It’s common to have a time crunch: the Hueco tour needs to leave the boulder problem, the sun has hit the Gallery making the The Gift (5.12d) boil, or dinner time is approaching while there are still three pitches left to finish on Astroman (5.11c) before the North Dome Gully descent. Being aware of how long you have before those events occur can help you decide if you should rest longer or just climber more quickly.

Being aware of your speed can help solve all these problems, allowing for more efficient sends, in better conditions, while getting you back down in time for burritos. Knowing how long you have at a boulder, at the crag, or on the wall helps with basic decision making.

Climbing Pacing

If you’ve ever used a hangboard or had your fingers open up while you hang on enormous holds, you know that your forearms are time bombs. Imagine being on a climb for half the time. While this doesn’t correlate directly to a climb being half the difficulty, moving quickly on a climb helps immensely.

As a long-time traditional climber and having a lot of fear with climbing, I climb in a slow, measured style. In an effort to climb harder without actually getting stronger, I began speeding up my climbing. A friend pointed out how much of a sloth I was on the Moonboard, challenging me to send a climb within the space of a single Instagram story frame, or 14 seconds. I tried to race through the problem, jumping between holds, but I often fumbled hand positions in my attempt to move faster.

After a few tries, I realized that there’s a balance between minimizing the risk of a move and moving through it efficiently. The clock made me aware of my climbing pacing, when I should move fast through easier moves, and when I needed to slow down, concentrate, and make exact movements. Practicing the time limit on the Moonboard translated to me making faster moves on my climbing outside as well.

It’s important to realize that time limits can induce frenzy, which rarely works favorably. Instead, when climbing against a clock, practice being exact and efficient. Speed records are often established using negative splits. Take for example a four-minute mile. The best way to run the laps is to increase speed as you go so that the first lap is 1:03, then the second should be 1:00, the third should be 0:59, and the last should be 0:58. You want to be speeding up as you climb. While it’s hard to know exact splits for climbing because moves and sections can be harder or easier, it’s best to heed the words of speed demon Hans Florine: “Start off slow then go go go. Start off fast, just won’t last.”

The Moments in Between

Another advantage of a clock is that it creates a realistic view of how long it takes between climbs. For some people, it’s easy to rapid fire a climb, to fall off a boulder and immediately hop back on without having properly recovered. This tendency will spiral the climber into a hole of fatigue. Setting a timer for a proper amount of rest between attempts can force rest.

A general rule of thumb is having a minimum rest of ninety seconds per move and fifteen minutes per attempt on an outdoor boulder problem. Resting between redpoint burns on an outdoor sport route should be closer to forty-five minutes. Resting times on indoor problems and routes can be shorter as the climbs tend to be shorter.

Beyond knowing resting times, having a clock makes you aware of the time spent scrolling through Instagram, chatting with your friends, or faffing about between burns. While an extra minute spent looking at a phone may seem arbitrary, those minutes can add up quickly. They’re more easily seen on long traditional routes where an extra five minutes at each belay changeover on a twelve-pitch route adds up to an additional hour on the wall.

The times also have a cumulative effect in increased time in the elements, making everything harder. At the gym, the extra minute you spend on the phone can quickly add up to fifteen, which is plenty of time for a core work out or time working antagonistic muscles.

Creates Definitive Smaller Achievable Goals

At times, climbing progression can become painfully hard. In the midst of a deep one-hang on a project, it’s easy to feel a Sisyphean struggle. One indication of progression on a sport route is how long of a rest is needed while you’re hanging. Shorter recovery times show increased performance. Being able to one-hang a project with a thirty-second rest versus a two-minute rest demonstrates a development on the route. If you’re stuck, using a clock can be an indicator of progress.

Another good way to use a clock to understand performance is determining how long it will take to complete a boulder problem, a route, or a climb. This skill comes in handy when traveling to new areas. Often there will be a limited amount of time at a climb because of group needs, conditions, and the desire to check out an entire area. Being aware of how quickly you can complete an objective will provide a better idea of how to plan for a day of climbing.

One important caveat is that a fixation on speed can help to a certain extent, but an excess will not necessarily correlate to being able to climb increasingly harder routes. This can be seen in the Olympic Speed specialists who were quite adept at racing up the speed route but lacked the same high standard of climbing in bouldering and sport climbing. It’s a common phenomenon in Yosemite where climbers become increasingly fast and efficient at climbing the Nose, but then are unable to climb harder.

Taking the Watch

In general, the low-key anxiety of a deadline, the conscious ticking of the clock increases awareness and performance. Take a watch climbing and note the times it takes to climb a pitch or problem. Be aware of how you felt while climbing. Be consistent with when you start and stop the watch and do the climb again trying to climb faster, better, or both. Videotaping yourself climb can be another great way to know your splits as well because they’re on the film. Regardless of what instrument is used, there’s no time better than now to start to time yourself.

About the Author

James Lucas worked as a senior associate editor at Climbing Magazine and now does freelance work for many publications. Beyond being an obsessive boulderer and sport climber, James is an avid photographer and travels around the country in search of good conditions and excellent rock quality.