What No One Tells You About Climbing On Pockets (Pocket Injury)
Hooper’s Beta Ep. 86
INTRODUCTION
Pockets are notorious for causing climbing injuries, especially in the lumbricals. But did you know that there are different ways to hold a pocket, and those ways affect how much force you can exert through your fingers and how likely you are to cause an injury? Did you know there are safe ways to train pockets to help reduce an injury? If you did know that, give yourself a crisp high five! If you didn’t know, you ‘bout to do some LEARNIN’.
In this video, we are going to go over what the strong and safe ways to hold a pocket would be, and how you can use this in your climbing to become a safer, smarter climber! We’ll also cover a bit of pocket training at the end, so you can be strong and safe.
PART 1: STRONG BUT RISKY POCKET TECHNIQUE
Before we actually learn what the “strong” pocket technique is, we need to understand this really cool thing called the “Quadriga Effect.”
Quadriga effect
The quadriga refers to the mechanical principle that the force production of our fingers (particularly the flexor digitorum profundus or FDP) is dependent on the development of simultaneous force through all 4 fingers. This is due to the fact that all 4 FDP tendons share a common muscle. Think about walking your 4 favorite doggos. If only 1 dog is pulling, you don’t feel much pull. You can handle it. But, if all 4 doggos see a tennis ball fly across the street and take off, welcome to your first flying lesson.
So, going back to our own bodies here, if you pull through all 4 fingers you can generate more force. If you are only pulling through 1 or 2 fingers, you will generate less force. Thus, bringing forward the strong but risky pocket technique.
Strong but risky Technique
Imagine you’re on the wall, channeling your inner Sharma, cranking on a 1 finger pocket -- basically a jug. You NEED to send, and screaming “PSSSAAATTT” hasn’t been enough. You need to generate more force, so you pull as hard as you can and while you do this all but one of your fingers curl into a fist. And you send!
So what just happened? Well, by flexing all your fingers into your palm while pulling through the extended single finger in the pocket, you got maximum activation of your FDP. You unlocked the Quadriga effect! This allowed you to generate more force through the single finger, allowing you to pull harder, which resulted in you sending your proj.
Pretty sweet, right? But wait, didn’t I say this was the “risky” technique? Indeed, because the story isn’t over.
You stand atop the climb, hallelujah. Rejoice! You feel so superior! In fact, you decide to throw shade to the haters and flip them the bird. But when you try, you experience an intense sensation of pain in the palm of your hand. You desperately want to throw said shade, but you just can’t do it, so you stand there like a shadeless loser.
Why the pain? You likely injured your lumbricals. The lumbricals are a bipennate structure, so maximally flexing one finger while keeping the other extended can cause a shearing effect on the lumbricals, causing an injury. It’s like pulling a feather in two different directions. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, we have an entire video dedicated to lumbrical injuries.
In summary, while this technique can allow you to generate more force on pockets, it often comes with a cost, which is exactly why we have the next technique we’re going to talk about!
PART 2: SAFER BUT LESS POWERFUL POCKET TECHNIQUE
OK, so… sadly we aren’t ALL Chris Sharma, despite our best battle screams on the wall. What can we do to still be able to climb on pockets WITHOUT getting injured? There is a specific technique that I recommend, and for some reason I pretty much never see people talking about it.
The method is quite simple. Just keep your proximal phalanges, aka the first of your fingers, parallel to each other! If they are in line or nearly in line with each other, it will reduce the shearing effect on the lumbricals. Let’s look at an example: If you have the middle and ring (3rd and 4th digits) in a pocket and the index and pinky are out (2nd and 5th digits), try to flex the index and pinky fingers at the PIP and DIP joint while keeping the MCP in equal amount of flexion/extension to the middle and ring fingers. This will keep the proximal phalanges neutral, which will effectively reduce the strain on the lumbricals.
This is the safe method, but can be the weaker method. This is because you aren’t able to maximally engage all 4 tendons, hence, the quadriga effect is not in full force.
Well I’ve got news for you, you can’t always get what you want… except this time!
PART 3: SAFE AND STRONG (OCCASIONALLY)
There are a couple of situation-based techniques you can do to improve pocket strength while maintaining the safety of your hands. These may not work all the time, but are great to have in your back pocket.
Press, Press with your magic hands
The first example is to simply try and press through all fingers when climbing. Does the pocket allow you to keep your other fingers in a more extended position? Can you engage those fingers by pressing into the wall and using a bit of friction? This can be beneficial as it can engage all 4 tendons, plus the added benefit of perhaps adding some friction to make you hang on to the small pocket.
Stacks on stacks on stacks!
What about stacking your fingers? Is the pocket big enough to stack your “unused” fingers on top of the others? This would allow you to engage more tendons and keep your fingers extended to prevent a lumbrical injury. The only thing you have to be aware of here is the amount of torsion placed on your fingers due to one or two of them being at an unusual angle. While this is often harmless, it can sometimes create extra stress on the collateral ligament or the interossei muscles.
OK, so you’re saying I have options, great! But, what if I just want to be the pocket king and want to pull as hard as possible.
PART 4: TRAINING FOR POCKETS TO INCREASE STRENGTH AND REDUCE INJURY RISK
There are obviously extremely strong climbers who will do monos without issue. How do they not just blow up their hands? They train! Your hands CAN become more resilient to pockets if you safely train them.
Basically, I’m saying DO NOT just randomly decide “hey, I heard it’s stronger to flex my fingers on a pocket so I’m gonna do that now.” That’s just a solid way to injure yourself.
Personally, I think your training should be goal-oriented. If you climb in an area with lots of pockets, then train more pockets. If you just want to be safe and strong for the occasional pocket, then integrate pocket training into your routine once or twice a week.
If you’re brand new to pockets, use a tension block or a metolius rock ring and attach weight to it as if performing farmer crimps. If you’re more advanced with pockets, you can integrate them in your hangboarding. Either way, I recommend that you start with two or three holds for 10-15 seconds using 3 fingers (index, middle, and ring). Then perform 2-3 holds of 2 fingers using the index and middle.
If you want more advanced training, include two finger holds of the pinky + ring finger, as well as index + middle finger.
If you are planning on integrating this with your regular hangboard routine, I recommend doing it before you do your crimp training, but after you are warmed up.
If you want to start working on monos, I definitely recommend using a tension block or metolius rock ring and SLOWLY adding weight. If you don’t have this and really want to do it on a hangboard, absolutely use some kind of system to take body weight off when starting out and then progressively work up from there.
OUTRO
And that’s it! Remember to check out our other videos on lumbricals if you want learn more about these weird muscles.
You should now be a safer, smarter, Sharma-wannabe!
Until next time.
Train those pockets smart and safely. Climb like spiderman keeping those lumbricals safe. Send and claim that you can climb better than spiderman. Repeat that same dream, because it was nice feeling like you were really good at climbing.
Research
Title
Biomechanical properties of the crimp grip position in rock climbers,
Citation
Andreas Schweizer, Biomechanical properties of the crimp grip position in rock climbers, Journal of Biomechanics, Volume 34, Issue 2,
2001, Pages 217-223, ISSN 0021-9290, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0021-9290(00)00184-6. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0021929000001846)
Key Takeaways
Abstract: Rock climbers are often using the unique crimp grip position to hold small ledges. Thereby the proximal interphalangeal (PIP) joints are flexed about 90° and the distal interphalangeal joints are hyperextended maximally. During this position of the finger joints bowstringing of the flexor tendon is applying very high load to the flexor tendon pulleys and can cause injuries and overuse syndromes. The objective of this study was to investigate bowstringing and forces during crimp grip position. Two devices were built to measure the force and the distance of bowstringing and one device to measure forces at the fingertip. All measurements of 16 fingers of four subjects were made in vivo. The largest amount of bowstringing was caused by the flexor digitorum profundus tendon in the crimp grip position being less using slope grip position (PIP joint extended). During a warm-up, the distance of bowstringing over the distal edge of the A2 pulley increased by 0.6mm (30%) and was loaded about 3 times the force applied at the fingertip during crimp grip position. Load up to 116N was measured over the A2 pulley. Increase of force in one finger holds by the quadriga effect was shown using crimp and slope grip position.
Keywords: Rock climbing; A2 pulley; Bowstringing; Flexor tendon sheath
Title
The quadriga phenomenon: a review and clinical relevance
Citation
Schreuders TA. The quadriga phenomenon: a review and clinical relevance. J Hand Surg Eur Vol. 2012 Jul;37(6):513-22. doi: 10.1177/1753193411430810. Epub 2011 Dec 14. PMID: 22170246.
Key Takeaways
The quadriga syndrome is a condition in which the flexor tendon excursion is reduced in an unaffected finger when the excursion of the flexor digitorum profundus (FDP) tendon of the adjacent finger is altered by stiffness, injury, or adhesion (Verdan, 1960). It is due to the interconnectedness between the FDP tendons of the fingers, so that restricted motion in one finger will affect the others. When this occurs after injury it could be called a syndrome, but because the effect also occurs in the normal hand it is better to call it the quadriga phenomenon. The phenomenon was named by Verdan (1960), who saw a resemblance between the reins of the four horses of a Roman chariot and the interconnectedness of the four FDP tendons (Giambini et al., 2010) (Figure 1). The quadriga phenomenon is frequently attributed to the common muscle belly of the FDP
The strength of the middle, ring, and small finger significantly diminished when each of the other fingers, including the index, was stiffened
In assessing grip strength or when testing the strength of FDP in active flexion of the DIPJs of the fingers, it is advisable that all the fingers should be allowed to flex and be tested as a group, that is, by asking the patient to make a fist with all fingers and subsequently testing for DIP flexion for all fingers separately
It has been suggested by Schweizer (2003) that rock climbers make use of the quadriga effect in the one-finger-pocket hold (Figure 8). To increase the maximum force of the holding finger, the interphalangeal (IP) joints of the adjacent fingers are maximally flexed.
Disclaimer:
As always, exercises are to be performed assuming your own risk and should not be done if you feel you are at risk for injury. See a medical professional if you have concerns before starting new exercises.
Written and Produced by Jason Hooper (PT, DPT, OCS, SCS, CAFS) and Emile Modesitt
IG: @hoopersbetaofficial
