I use the rock prodigy hangboard and follow a workout that I believe would be considered aimed at advanced novice to intermediate hangboard trainees.

I had been climbing for about 5 years before I ever tried to train with a hangboard. In the winter of 2015, I was spending an extended period of time in southern Maine and knew that I would not have access to either indoor or outdoor climbing. I used this time to read the rock prodigy manual and start my first round of hangboard training.

Following the winter of 2015, I returned to Las Vegas and was able to climb 3 or 4 5.12c's after usually 4 or 5 attempts. That felt like a new level of fitness and I believe it was largely influenced by the hangboard training. In May of 2015, I traveled for 3 months and did zero climbing or training for climbing. When I began climbing again in September, my fitness was very obviously less than what it had been, but I had faith that I could regain my previous levels with a 3 to 6 months of consistent training.

I started conservatively. I did not try to redpoint hard routes or hangboard. Instead, I focused on ARC training and general mileage when climbing outdoors. Once December arrived, I re-incorported a beginner level hangboard routine and started with lots of weight reduced.

I continued to consistently hangboard (1 to 2 times per week), ARC (1 to 2 times per week) and lead climb in the gym (1 to 3 times) until Feb. All of Feb was spent sport climbing in MX. I was able flash many routes in the 5.12 range, with my best performance being a flash of a 5.12c. Again this felt like a new level and seems related to the disciplined training (and maybe some soft grades!).

Since Mar of 2016 I have been trying to formalize my training a bit more. Instead of spending so much time in the climbing gym, I wanted to maximize my time and yet still enable myself to realistically push my climbing grades higher.