Right. This has been brewing for some time, but I haven't had time to spout it. Weight Vests. Ever since there was that damned video about Patxi Usobiaga circling his board with one on, thats all you see young hopefuls wearing. Me and Foley even bought them, and I'm not saying there's something wrong with using them, or that they couldn't lead to results, but that these days they are more often being misused for the purposes of showboating.
Training with weight on has been around for years. It's led to some great injuries and to some strong people. Undoubtedly it could work, but it's a high risk strategy. Yes, if you don't break then you could get strong - nay, very strong - but unless you progressively build up the weight and do it properly having identified that really is your weakness, you're at risk of breaking yourself. That's not actually the point here. Since that bloody video I see two things at our walls - people climbing short problems on JUGS with weight vests on, and people who have no jobs coming down at the busiest time of day and sharking on the comp wall - i.e. watching people, waiting for them to fail on something, and then mincing up it in a weight vest. If this describes you - you are a CUNT.
Patxi was using weight, and climbing on jugs - but doing a lot of moves. He was training endurance. Doing 5 or 6 moves to get to the top of the comp wall on a problem you have done 100 times, with a weight vest on is training your ego. Stop show boating and do harder problems. Are you seriously saying that you cannot do hard enough moves withough having to add weight? You're not trying the right problems. Use smaller holds. Worse feet.
You can train power with added weight, but climbing problems you have wired isn't doing that - it's showing off. Analyse your weakness, is ability to swing between jugs carrying a rucsac really it? If you want to get strong - hang from a fingerboard with weight on. If you want more power - do powerful moves - get on the Beastmaker board - you don't need to add weight to make that hard, so why aren't you there? oh I see - because you cant get to the top, and you want to look good!
Ultimately, you can do whatever you want of course, but don't let's lie about it.
