RedGage is the best way to earn real money from your photos, videos, blogs, and links.

How To Toughen Repair Fingers When Climbing

image source: sierranomad.com

Both newbie and old school climbers alike I'm sure would agree that one of the deciding factors of when to climb, aside from aching lats and triceps, is throbbing, painful, worn and sometimes lacerated finger-tips – ouch! So the aim of this post is to provide some advice on what can be done to prevent damage in the first place and then to speed up the healing process post climb.  Therefore this article is split into two sections – ‘Firming those fingers!’ and ‘Healing Time’ This advice is from my own personal experience and therefore is by no means conclusive; please feel free to share opinions and or advice with a comment.

Firming those fingers!

Firm, tough fingers are the key to being able to climb regularly and this will come with time and regular practice, imagine placing a tiny layer of leather over your tips – nice eh!? There are however several steps that you can take to speed up this process, toughening and protecting hands.Surgical Spirits – It wasn’t long after I started climbing that I was complaining about tanning fingers and my granddad (a definite non-climber) suggested that I use Surgical Spirits to toughen them. A tad sceptical I decided to Google this when I got home and found that it was really quite common. The stuff is about £1 from any chemist and all you need to do is dab some on your finger tips with some cotton wool or a cloth, try it once or twice a day for a week and you will notice an improvement – I did. Surgical Spirits doesn’t dry out the hands like you would imagine, it just firms them up nicely. Smells a bit though . . .Use it or loose it – Speaking from personal experience on this one, I find that if I spend several days climbing, or have a heavy week training then take a week off my fingers pay! The firm skin seems to wear down and come away – sounds nice I know. It leaves raw tender skin underneath then I'm back to square one! Which leads to my next point . . . Callas builder – Linked with the above, I came across this on Amazon. I had a £10 gift voucher from work at Christmas and had £3 spare after I bagged myself a Gripmaster. With this priced within my budget I decided to give it ago. Its sort of a sprung surface folded in two, with rough, sandpaper like edges on the outer layer. You squeeze it and this offers slight resistance whilst rubbing lightly against the fingers keeping them firm. I find this great for days off or when I cant get to The Foundry on wet days, well worth a couple of quid!

Healing Time

Already done the damage? Here is my advice on repairing damaged fingers after a heavy climbing session(‘s). If you have any of your own healing advice please let me know with a comment, as this section is a little sparse (but works for me!!) I will feature a couple of additions with links to your profile as thanks. Give it time – I appreciate that this may sound like a slight contradiction with the above statement “Use it or loose it” but bear with me, the principle being don’t climb on damaged, lacerated or blistered skin. Trust me, the immense route you have your eye on can wait till the next dry day. Continually agitating damaged skin will only hold off the healing process putting you out of action for even longer, and may lead to permanent scarring. ‘ClimbOn!’ – This product is legendary! This is without a doubt my top tip for maintaining climb fit hands. You can either purchase in a tin with a lump of the stuff (that lasts ‘forever’) with a sort of soap bar consistency, or putty like cream in a tub. In both cases you rub the stuff on post climb and for me it feels like a warming sensation drawing blood to the surface repairing the hands, your hands will feel moisturised for the rest of the day and this wont undo your callas building either. I really hope that this article has been helpful for those wanting to prevent, cure damage to hands (or both), giving you the best chance to climb as and when you like. As previously stated I would like to open this up as a question? Does anyone have any advice on his or her routine? - climberjames

 

http://hubpages.com/hub/How-To-Toughen-and-Repair-...

Thanks. Your rating has been saved.
You've added this content to your favorites.
$0.00
Make money on RedGage just like climberjames!