Beth's Tips #1

Hello everyone and happy spring! This is the first in an ongoing series of updates, tips, muses, thoughts, and anything else that you might possibly find swirling around in my head. I’m a climber by passion and profession, but surprisingly I like to talk more about cooking, hiking, running, dogs, and the mountains. So, I’ll probably mix in my favorite cookie recipe with some useful climbing tips.

I’d also love to hear what you would like to hear about. It helps me keep a backlog of ideas and know what the community is interested in. Otherwise I could ramble on for months about how amazing my CSA box is and all the veggies, and everyone would be thinking, “that’s great Beth, but I really just want to know what shoes you wear for approaches.”

This winter I had shoulder surgery. I tore my labarum, which seems to be the ‘in’ thing in climbing right now. Every event I go to, I hear, “Oh yah, I just heard so and so did the same thing.” Luckily, there are pretty good odds out there right now. My friend Ethan Pringle is about 6 months ahead of me and is already climbing 5.14 again! So there is hope. Granted I am the eternal pessimist when it comes to my own healing, but I have actually tried to be a model patient this go round.

As the snow started to melt, I got the go ahead to start exercising and be active. In my head I pictured a stallion coming out of the gates at full force, knocking everything down in it’s path, running like the wind, shining in all of it’s glory. In reality, I was like a drugged snail; weak, meager, lost, and scared. I was completely timid with any activity, and my fitness level seemed to have dropped off entirely. For a few weeks I took solace in the amazing vegan baked goods that the Bay area has to offer. Cupcakes with frosting tipping the scales, more varieties of cookies than I can count, cinnamon rolls too sticky to eat without wipes nearby, and the ever present vegan doughnut, which I heard called by many patrons ‘the healthy doughnut.’ And if they said it was healthy, then surely it had to be.

Fortunately for me, I am an athlete at heart, I can only be an inactive couch potato for so long before I start to get grumpy. Even my beloved dog, Max, started to wonder what was wrong with me. I watched Rocky IV (yes the one with the Russian, it’s amazing, the best one in my opinion), filled myself with psyche, and went on an entire mile walk. Unimpressive? Yes. Exactly what I needed? Yes. I had to start slow, and really slow at that.

One thing that I soon realized was I needed to start slow, and keep the maintenance up in my body. Stretching was key for this. I found that if I tried to just exercise, I started to feel tweaked, stiff, and sore. But if I just implemented a 10 minute stretching session into my day, I felt more nimble and recovered much more quickly and thoroughly. Below are a few pics of my favorite lower body stretches to help with everyday mobility, and also one for climbing.

Enjoy and send your comments and questions my way. The more I get, the longer this series can be ☺

Remember to warm up for ten minutes or so before you stretch.
Classic open leg split position:
I usually do this one for about 30 – 60 seconds. Starting in the middle, and then slowly moving side to side.
Individual single leg extension and double leg extension.

Elba’s yoga stretch:
I got this one from an old Marmot employee who makes me look like a decrepit tree when it comes to flexibility. Place your foot on the opposing knee. Pretend there is a stake that goes straight through your ankle bone and through the center of your knee. Sit up as straight as you can. Elba could have both of her knees horizontal! So that’s the goal.