How to Make the Transition from Gym Rat to Outdoor Climber
In the summer of ’09 I was camping in Zion National Park with a friend. Around midnight and after a couple swigs of whiskey, we found ourselves running down the side of one of Zion’s many canyons. When I got to the base and reached a cliff, I started climbing. I didn’t climb well, but from that moment on I was hooked.
Fast forward 6 years to January 2015. I was climbing 3 days a week, but only in the gym. While I had become a decent climber, I had gotten outside a grand total of 0 times.
My goal of returning to Zion with a rope and harness, had been derailed by work, friends and a million other excuses. In 2015, I finally decided to make a change and went from never climbing outside to completing my first trad route in Joshua Tree in just 8 months.
Here are the steps I took to finally make the transition from the gym to outdoors. For anyone reading this, I hope it doesn’t take you one tenth as long as it took me to get outside.
- Set clear goals.
Goal setting was the single most important part of my transition to outdoor climbing. The key is to make goals precise and achievable. In 2015, my goal was to lead climb “Amazing Face” a classic climb at Mt. Diablo. I broke this big annual goal into smaller monthly goals to help me get there.
My Excel spreadsheet looked something like this:
January: Complete an outdoor anchoring class.
February: Climb outside at least twice.
March: Climb “Amazing Face” on top rope.
April: Complete a lead climbing class.
May: Climb “Amazing Face” on lead.
Etc.
You don’t need to follow this exact formula, but breaking goals into smaller steps makes it easier to track your progress and be successful.
2. Take a class.
While it’s possible to learn everything you need from an experienced climber, it’s easy to push off climbing outside until you find someone who can teach you. Don’t do this. In San Francisco, I spent $60 on a class that was taught by a well known Yosemite climber. In a single class I learned enough to start building my own anchors and met a bunch of other climbing partners who I still climb with today.
3. Climb with as many different people as possible.
This is one of the best pieces of advice I ever learned. Different climbers have different strengths and weaknesses. One of my climbing partners taught me how to breath and stay calm while leading. Another taught me different SERENE anchoring techniques. By climbing with different people, I learned new skills and accelerated my growth.
With this in mind, don’t be afraid to ask new people at the gym or elsewhere if they want to climb with you. My first ever trad lead was with a friend I met randomly at a climbing event in Bishop — he taught me all the gear and challenged me to give trad a shot.
4. Find one partner with similar goals to you.
Lastly, while a diversity of partners is great, to get truly strong at outdoor climbing you need mileage. To do this you will want to find someone with similar climbing goals as you. My current climbing partner loves pushing himself on challenging outdoor sport routes, which gets me excited too. Since we have similar goals, we make the most of our weekends and both continue to improve every time we climb together.
I hope these tips help. Climb on!
Here are some other good posts on the topic:
- CruxCrush’s 6 tips for getting outdoors.
- Article on building top rope anchors on Climbing.com by Julie Ellison
- Video on building top rope anchors by REI
