How to Use Your Hands While Rock Climbing

Video Transcript

"I'm going to go over some hand positions. When you're climbing up the rock, you don't want to always just pull down on the holds in the most obvious way. That's great, but there's other ways to look around, so if you're having trouble finding a hold, there's different things to look for. So, at its most basic, you're going to pull down on the rock and there's two ways to do that -- three ways actually, you can do what's called a crimp, and that's going to go just like that -- just like keeping your hands flat, just like the shoe is flat on a flat hold -- you want the hands to be the same way; it's going to give you the most power. You can do that like this, or you can do that with the thumb over the top which gives you more power. Another thing to think about is, on a sloping hold, just like the smear with the foot, you're going to use your hands -- open hand, so instead of crimped like this, you're going to be open-hand. And that's called a sloper that kind of hold is called a sloper. So, you've got your crimp on the flat hold, your sloper on the sloper hold. Now, not all holds are able to be pulled down on. For some, you need to do what's known as the side pull. And for that -- this is a perfect example, you're going to grab the side pull to the side, and pull to the side, and if you use your feet right and your other hand, that's good enough to keep you on the rock. So with your right hand on this right-facing hole that's called a side pull -- another way to do that is to hold the right-facing hold with the left hand and that's called a Gastogne because a French guy named Gastogne invented it -- so it's called a Gastogne -- it's the same concept, just with the opposite hand. And of course this works with a left-facing hold as well with the left hand being the side pull and the right hand being the Gastogne. One other one to think about is the under-cling. And that's when a hold like this is facing upwards instead of downwards. So the only way to hold onto it is to pull up on it. And if you use your feet, you can get oppositional pressure so that your foot is pushing down and your hand is pushing up. And that's what's going to keep you on the rock there. So look for those when you're climbing -- not just the crimps and the slopers, but also the side pulls, the Gastognes', and the under-clings."