Climbing Gear Needed for Indoor Rock Climbing

Series Summary

Rock climbing is an exciting sport, full of thrills, danger, and physical endurance. The feeling of victory is almost tangible as you look down a scaled cliff face. Rock climbing is also physically and mentally demanding, combining the need for great physical endurance, nerves of steel, and a high strength to weight ratio. There are some very helpful techniques that any beginner can learn before jumping on the wall. If you would like to learn rock climbing techniques for your first time climbing, you can learn for free and online from one of our experts.

In this free rock climbing video series, learn from expert rock climber Danny Logan. Danny will tell you what rock climbing gear you will need to start rock climbing and what types of rock climbing holds to expect in an indoor rock climbing gym. He will demonstrate rock climbing techniques such as how to belay a climber, how to tie a figure 8 knot, how to cat the fall when belaying, how to fall when lead climbing, how to boulder, how to dyno when rock climbing, and how to perform a heel hook.

Video Transcript

"Hey guys, this is Danny Logan and on behalf of Expert Village, I'm here to talk to you about indoor rock climbing. Okay, in this clip, we are going to be talking about the most essential gear for indoor climbing. One of the most essential gear that you need is a harness; a harness that is snug, not too loose, but not too tight either. You just get a harness, slip it in like so and now I'll talk about the individual parts of the harness. So once you get a harness on, you want to make sure your leg moves and it's nice and snug; not too tight, not too loose. You just tighten them up like that. You get your waist. This type of harness is pretty much a very simple harness to put on; there's nothing technical about it. You have these nice little gear loops. These loops we use to put on gear, carabiners, as we climb, you can take them off and put on here. This loop right here is what we call our belay loop. We attach our belaying device to this loop, which is right here. This is called an ATC. It's what we use to control the rope and the climber as we climb. It just goes like so. And, once you've got your harness on, the next most important piece of gear or equipment is your shoes. Shoes are very important. First, every type of shoes is designed for a specific type of climbing. You want a shoe that's very snug. You don't want it loose at all. You want it tight, so that your toes can form to the shoe and as well, to the wall. This shoe for instance is designed for more of an edge type of climbing so it can snag one of these small little holds right here. Other shoes are designed for long approaches that take many types of hours to climb and after that period of time, your feet may start to hurt. So they are designed to be a little bit more flexible, like this type of shoe. It doesn't hurt your toes as much. The other essential is what we like to call chalk. A chalk bag is like this and it's full of chalk as you can see. As you climb, your fingers may get tired and sweat will accumulate and you start to slip off the rock. So you want to dab some chalk on and it kind of helps you to keep your grip, like so you can climb and perform better. "