Bouldering Info Guides

Let’s face it, it’s inevitable that your climbing shoes are going to need cleaning at some point.

Climbers usually delay for as long as possible. They try to avoid cleaning their climbing shoes simply because they’re afraid of ruining them.

…But they shouldn’t.

You see, cleaning your shoes will actually make them perform better, because all that dirt and grime acts like the opposite of chalk.

Even indoor climbers, who won’t necessarily get their shoes dirty, will still see some improvements in grip. Besides, eliminating that terrible “well-used climbing shoes” odor is easily worth it alone.

Anyway, there’s two really easy ways to clean your climbing shoes. One method is excellent for eliminating odor, and the other is for actually cleaning your shoes.

So, let’s take a look at them. First of all:

This is How to Eliminate the Odor of Stinky Climbing Shoes

Fill them with coffee beans, and leave them for two days.

I’m not joking. That’s actually it.

Coffee beans are amazing for absorbing odors. It’s not so much that the fresh smell of coffee makes your climbing shoes smell nicer, it’s that they actually do absorb and eliminate the bad odors.

Just don’t then make coffee with the beans you used. Ew…

When to Do This

This handy little trick is perfect for automatically removing the smell from your climbing shoes after you’re back from a climbing session.

Once you get home, fill them with coffee beans, and a few days later when you head out to climb again, pour the coffee beans away into your compost bin. They’re actually really good for compost. They add nitrogen if you’ve let them have at least 100 days or so to break down.

Another way to use this method without being wasteful is to save up your used coffee grounds and let them dry out. Then you can use those spent coffee grounds to deodorize your climbing shoes. Just make sure they’re completely dry first. You don’t want to actually brew a coffee in your shoes.

Okay, now onto how to actually clean your climbing shoes.

A Super Easy Method to Clean Your Climbing Shoes

Don’t use hot water, but you can use slightly warm water to speed things up a bit. I’m talking the “bread-making” kind of warm here. The kind of temperature you use when making bread dough so that you don’t kill the yeast. Gently warm.

If you brush your climbing shoes under running water, you’ll easily get them clean with a bit of gentle scrubbing.

If you need a shoe brush, then I really recommend this one. Most shoe brushes have an annoyingly narrow area where the bristles actually come into contact with the shoe, probably because they’re trying to get away with selling a brush that has less bristles.

Not this one.

This is the kind of quality brush you might have seen or imagined your grandfather using. And what’s more, is that it’s pretty cheap too. It’s a worthy investment for keeping your climbing shoes happy and grippy.

Nope. That title isn’t clickbait.

It’s simply a technique that not too many people know about.

And its only limitation is how wrecked your finger strength already is from your last climbing session.

In other words, it’s ideal for any climber who’s not already training their finger strength to maximum capacity through their climbing sessions.

For example, if your fingers and wrists are completely limp between climbing sessions, then there’s no way you could push it any further.

However, let me say, that if that’s the case then you’re probably really overdoing it. Ease up on the intensity of your climbing sessions and start lightly training your finger strength every day.

“Every day?” you wonder. “But I thought that you should leave at least 48 hours between workouts for your muscles to repair?”

Well, not according to a recent study which showed that training the same muscle group once per week was not any more effective for strength gains than spreading the same amount of exercise over five days per week.

And then there’s this study which showed exactly the same thing. Spreading the workload over three sessions per week made no difference compared to doing it all in one session per week.

And this study which showed that training on consecutive days is no less effective than leaving a day between training sessions.

And then there’s this one which showed that twice-daily training sessions made no difference in strength gains over training once daily.

…I think you get the idea by now.

Except there’s something else about this that’s important to note. You see, in the last study, the researchers noted that “the twice-daily group might provide some rationale for dividing training load in an attempt to reduce the risk of overtraining.”

In other words, the more you push yourself to do all your training in a single, infrequent session, the more likely you are to injure yourself.

Of course, this is pretty much common sense. If your wrists are limp and your fingers are weak after each climbing session, you’re pushing yourself too much in one go.

In fact, pushing yourself past your limit and injuring yourself this way is only going to hold you back. The researchers in this paper note that “increasing the number of sets performed per exercise session… does not appear to be an effective method for increasing muscle size once a given threshold is surpassed.”

They visualized those “wasted sets” that in this graph here:

As you can see, there’s absolutely no point pushing yourself harder on your climbing sessions if you want to improve faster. You’re just going to injure yourself.

And yes, going past your limit and having a weak grip for the next few days is injuring yourself. Finger strength, grip strength, whatever you want to call it, isn’t the same as training other muscles. Your finger movements start in your forearms, and only the thin tendons of your forearm muscles are found in your hands.

You can take a look at this resource here if you’re interested in learning more about how these tendons work.

Anyway, the point is, tendons are delicate, and you’ve probably noticed that they take far longer to repair than your muscles do.

By training your tendons and forearm muscles every day, you’ll be able to break the cycle of “injury, rest, injury, rest” by evening out the load across your week.

This will get you closer to your ultimate goal of being able to climb harder much faster, because it is precisely those “wasted sets” that are the ones which are injuring you and putting a limit onto your training frequency.

So, take advantage of the technique I’m about to show you, because with it, you can train your finger tendons and forearm strength anywhere, and without any equipment at all.

And what’s more: it’s much safer than hangboarding, because hangboarding is a bodyweight exercise, and this is a self-resistance technique.

The difference? Bodyweight exercises are extremely limited. They only provide one set level of resistance: your entire bodyweight.

And, as you can imagine, that can be far too severe for the delicate tendons and ligaments in your hands unless they’re already somewhat developed.

That means that hangboarding as a beginner or intermediate climber is totally out of the question.

Of course, some people do it anyway, and those who don’t take it easy get injured. Hard.

For most people, their first serious finger injury is their exit out of climbing. There’s nothing quite like months of continuous pain to put someone off their favorite hobby.

Fortunately, training your finger strength doesn’t have to be “all or nothing.” A self-resistance technique is only as forceful as you want it to be, and you’ll naturally decrease that force when you’re starting to get worn out if you focus on keeping your movements smooth.

As you can imagine, that means you’re far less likely to overexert yourself than if you were doing a bodyweight exercise.

So, I’ve gone on long enough. It’s about time we actually took a look at this technique.

The Technique

If you’ve never done self-resistance exercises before, then don’t worry, because they’re very simple.

Your grip strength will get stronger by gripping things hard, just like how lifting weights will grow the muscles that you use to lift them with.

Those weights provide resistance to the muscles. The only difference with self-resistance is that you’re providing that resistance yourself, pitting muscle against muscle.

You can do this with any muscle of course, but right now we’ll just be looking at developing your grip strength. “Grip strength” is just a general term that basically means everything to do with the muscles and tendons that make up your “finger strength,” “wrist strength” and “forearm strength.”

The way that you provide resistance to your grip strength is simple. With both wrists straight, push down against your other hand with just your fingers, using that other hand to provide the resistance to your finger while still allowing them to move through a full range of motion. That means, from being straight, to being curled all the way downwards, and then back to being straight again, and so on until you’re done .

I’d highly recommend training your thumb strength separately, because your hand needs to be in an underhanded position to do that, while your fingers need to be trained overhanded.

Now, you’re probably wondering why this is better than just squeezing something like a stress ball or one of those grip strength trainers like the one below:

The reason is, that these grip trainers don’t allow you to make a full range of motion, which means you’re only training your grip strength at one set finger position. If you want the fancy name for it, it’s called an isometric exercise, whereas the self-resistance “finger curls” I’ve been talking about are an isotonic exercise, which means they go through a full range of movement.

Now, when your fingers grip something, they’ll naturally be making an isometric contraction because your fingers won’t be moving. When you grab a hold in climbing, your fingers are clamped down.

However, there’s a reason why it’s better to train your grip strength through isotonic exercise rather than isometric.

You see, in climbing, your fingers will take any position that they need to in order to grip tightly to holds and pull your bodyweight up. Sometimes you’ll use the fingers flat, like on a sloper, while at other times you’ll use half of your finger length, like on an edge, or even just your fingertips, like on a crimp.

The beauty of self resistance finger curls is that you can train your grip strength in all finger positions by using a full range of motion. If you tried this with a hangboard you’d be putting way too much strain on your tendons, and if you tried this with weights you’d have to balance really light weights on your fingertips while you do finger curl reps, which would just be plain weird. The closest you can get is doing barbell finger curls which are more like a rolling motion.

Now, a thought probably just struck you.

“With a hangboard or barbell finger curls, you can train both hands at once.”

Well, you can do that with self-resistance finger curls too.

Simply push fingertips against fingertips. Your fingers will make a swirling “S” shape, with one hand overhand, and the other underhand. It’s so simple and effective that there’s no reason to do it any other way.

You can do this with “wrist curls” too. With closed fists, knock your finger knuckles against your other hand’s knuckles, and do the same full range of motion. Work on the sides too, because you often make left and right traversing movements in climbing.

Now, after having said all this, I want to remind you again. Take it easy. If you’re doing this right, you won’t get weak grip strength and limp wrists the next day like after an overly-intense climbing session.

Take it easy, gauge how much training is right for you, and, if in doubt, ask your doctor before taking on a new exercise regimen.

I have spent more time looking at climbing shoes than any other clothing item I wear.

Because with so many different options, sizes and shapes of shoe out there, which do you pick?

With your shoes sometimes being the only thing keeping you on the wall, it’s worth spending a bit of extra time choosing the right pair.

Why its important to get the right shoes

“It’s just shoes” you might tell yourself while picking the cheapest pair.

However, once you experience those perfect fitting climbing shoes you will soon change your mind.

With shoes being the connection between your main base of support and the rock, you are going to want to make sure you have a good pair working in your favor.

Changing your shoes can give you lots of benefits in your climbs.

Some shoes will have better rubber than others which can help provide extra grip on the rock or in the gym.

But, if you are using the wrong type of shoes or a poorly fitting pair it can really hold back your climbing.

With extra space for your foot to maneuver in the shoe can cause you to slip or lose your place on a foothold.

I don’t think I even need to mention why this wouldn’t be ideal during a climb.

What to look for in a shoe?

You might hear bits of advice from people who have bought a pair such as “tighter is better” or it’s “all about what you’re comfy in.”

But what it is really going to depend on, is what you are looking for in your shoe.

This is going to differ from person to person.

Some people are just looking for that first pair; others are trying to push their limits and are taking any help they can get to hit the next grade.

If it is your first pair, you are mainly going to want to prioritize comfort and hard rubber.

Different Types Of Shoe

So when you break it down, all climbing shoes have three main things to consider.

The climbing shoe type, the features of the shoe and the fit.

So first I’ll start with the shoe type, climbing shoes tend to be categorized as:

Neutral

This style of shoe has a completely flat and straight sole, what this does is allow your toes to lie flat inside the shoe.

This is great for beginners as usually means they are extremely comfy to wear.

However, this doesn’t mean they are exclusively for beginners. If you are an experienced climber these shoes might be just the ticket to help your feet survive a whole day of climbing.

Another great thing about neutral shoes are the rubber on them tends to be quite thick. This means as a beginner you don’t have to worry too much about sloppy footwork wearing them down.

The only turn off is due to the thicker rubber your feet will be less sensitive, this can be a huge problem when climbing overhanging routes where you need precise and clean foot placement.

Moderate

Moderate climbing shoes refer to a moderate downturn in the sole of the shoe.

What this achieves is getting your toes/feet into a position that will help you generate more power on a hold.

This makes them a great technical shoe allowing them to excel on most routes apart from those sporty overhangs.

This style of shoes can be uncomfortable but you get used to them after a couple of sessions when compared to the aggressive style shoes they are practically krocs.

Aggressive

So I’m not going to sugarcoat it for you, these shoes suck.

They are so tight when you first get them you will only be wearing them for a few minutes at a time.

However, they are known as sport shoes for a reason. These are the bad boys you only break out when you mean business.

This style is the next step up and features an even larger downturn in the sole of the shoe.

This reason for this is to allow you to make precision placements on tiny holds that you tend to see in the later grades.

I would not recommend these shoes to beginners as they will really hurt your feet if you are not used to tight shoes, not to mention that the rubber tends to be a lot thinner on aggressive shoes to up your sensitivity to make those delicate foot placements.

Because the rubber is thinner these tend to wear away faster and are also not suited to smearing which is a technique I relied a lot on as a beginner.

Shoe Features

So a shoe’s features refer to the closure, material and the outsole of the shoe.

The choice for each of these features can change the performance of the shoe, however some options are just plain personal preference so don’t take it too seriously.

The Closure Of The Shoe

So there are really only 3 types of shoe closure, the classic laces, the simple slip-ons, and the sticky velcro straps.

Laces

Climbing shoes with laces are extremely adaptable, due to the nature of laces you can tighten or loosen at a moments notice. This really helps if your feet tend to get too hot or swell after a few hours of climbing.

You can even tighten the shoes up at the toe to help pull your feet into a more aggressive stance to help with those hard overhangs.

Slip Ons

This style of shoe was originally made for children but has since started to take off in the adult range of shoes.

Don’t let this put you off, due to using an elastic material these shoes have an extremely sleek and low profile.

This can help you slip your feet into those thin cracks and crevices with ease.

Due to the lack of material used in slip-on style shoes, they tend to provide greater sensitivity for your feet. This can help toughen your feet or help you feel for that tiny hold where foot placement is everything.

These shoes can sometimes be a battle to get on, especially in a well-fitted pair but once on they feel nice and snug.

One of the downsides of this type of shoe is that it doesn’t fair well against heel hooks, they are prone to popping right off your foot if the fit isn’t really tight.

Strap Shoes

So these strap shoes are sometimes known as “velcro”

They are perfect for those gym sessions or when you are out bouldering, due to the nature of the hook and loop system.

This allows you to take your shoes off with ease, which is a blessing when you need to stretch out those toes between climbs.

Material Of The Shoe

Climbing shoes are mainly made from leather with rubber coating at the bottom.

Manufacturers mainly stick to 3 different materials.

Unlined Leather

This one is the stretchiest of the three materials used. However, it does come with a downside.

The color runs and gives your feet an interesting paint job. While this is great for your friends to laugh at, just make sure you don’t buy a yellow pair.

Since this material is known to stretch make sure you get a tight pair. The golden rule is to make sure your toes are touching the end of the shoe, but they are not cramped up.

Following this advice can keep your shoes fitting well after the stretch.

Lined Leather

This has mostly the same properties of unlined but the stretch is reduced.

Its known that some shoe manufacturers only use this type of leather on the toe area of the shoe to try and help minimize stretch.

When buying shoes with lined leather keep in mind it might not stretch as much as your used too.

Synthetic Material

This material is great if you don’t like your shoes stretching and changing shape.

Unlike the leather options, the synthetic material used in climbing shoes doesn’t really change much as you use them.

So when purchasing shoes of this type, remember that they won’t change much from when you try them on instore.

Outsole Of The Shoe

So, the rubber outsole of the shoe changes from brand to brand and shoe to shoe.

However, the rubbers that are used have different properties.

Not many of the climbing shoe manufacturers give us information about the difference between each of the rubbers they use.

In order to make comparisons, we need have to rely on reviews or personal experience.

So in terms of shoe rubber, there are two options.

The softer sticker rubber or you can go with a more rigid harder rubber.

Both are great but for different purposes.

The softer sticker rubber is great when you need maximum grip on volumes or rock edge, the only downside to this rubber is that it doesn’t last very long in comparison to the rigid one.

This means if your climbing daily you’re going to need to swap these out sooner rather than later.

On the other side of the fence, the rigid style rubber boasts a lot more durability and will last longer, the type of shoe is also great for edging.

Thickness

So, the thickness of the outsole you choose can make a big difference in the sensitivity of your feet on the wall.

If you’re new to climbing and looking at getting your first set of shoes, I would recommend looking for a thick shoe.

The sweet spot for thick shoes tends to be around 4mm – 5.5mm.

This thickness allows the shoe to be durable enough while providing support for your feet and making it easy to edge due to the large area.

The reason I recommend a thick sole for newcomers is due to poor footwork.

Footwork is something we can all improve on, but when you first start climbing its especially bad.

When flailing for holds on that first ascent into unknown grades you tend to smear you shoe wildly across anything it can get purchase on, effectively lowering the life of your shoe.

Thinner soles tend to be more for climbers that are confident in their footwork. They tend to range from 3mm – 4mm the thinner soles are great for when your feet need to feel the rock, this can give a lot of climbers more confidence as they can trust their feet more.

Getting That Perfect Fit

Getting the right pair of shoes is just as hard as finding a needle in a haystack.

Lucky for you I have compiled what I think are the best tips to make sure you get that great fitting pair.

1: Try Them On

I know a lot of people purchase items online, however, this is a dangerous game to play when buying climbing shoes.

Due to the tight fits you really need to try the shoes on to ensure a good match.

The best way is to try them in a local store and see if they will price match an online pair. If that fails, at least you know if the shoe will fit or not.

Every Shoe And Brand Has A Different Fit

When buying shoes its important to keep in mind that you might be size 10 in one style of shoe and size 11 in another.

Make sure you try each shoe on before you buy to make sure it’s not too snug.

Is Tight Right?

So the general consensus in climbing used to be that the tighter the shoe the better it would impact your climb, this was in order to get maximum sensitivity.

However, due to the rubbers used in a modern shoe, this is just not the case anymore.

This being said keep in mind most climbing shoes stretch, So depending on the material, it’s fine if its a little tight at first.

Purchase In The Afternoon

It might sound a bit strange – but trust me on this one! Did you know your feet swell and change throughout the day?

The best time to try on shoes is in the afternoon, as this gives your feet a chance to swell.