Antagonist training #2

Now I'm still getting my head around this business of blogging, so forgive me. I thought after posting below about training antagonists that I should have explained a bit more what I'm talking about for those of you new to common practices in training for rock climbing.

When we climb a lot or train specifically for climbing (often one and the same) we are building up and/or stressing particular muscle and joint structures. In the case of elbows as I mentioned in my last post we tend to develop brachialis, bracioradialis and biceps (the elbow flexors) a lot, but dont use the extensors (triceps) as much, not to mention many other assisting muscles and structures. This tends to cause an imbalance across joints affecting the stress on connective tissue. Build up of stress translates to injury in various forms. Thats why it's important to spend a litle of your training time developing the 'lower priority' muscle groups so your body stays in balance with its differing strengths across different areas.

In planning your training it's important to keep in mind that developing anything in a big way is likely to have knock on effects somewhere else. These sometimes need some careful thinking (or outside advice) to predict. This applies to all aspects of training.