The TrainingBeta Podcast: A Climbing Training Podcast TrainingBeta Podcast

Jesse Grupper is a 27-yr-old climber who frequents podiums at international competitions, has climbed up to 5.15a and has flashed up to 5.14c. He is an amazing climber. AND I LOVE watching Jesse Grupper in climbing comps. His infectious smile, his tenacious try-hard, and his incredible climbing strength and skills are exactly why I watch climbing comps in the first place. I was so thrilled that he agreed to an interview, and I asked him a lot of questions about his approach to climbing, his detailed training program, how he maintains a positive mindset while climbing and competing, and how he’s coping with a current finger injury.

Jesse Grupper is a 2024 Olympian who frequents the podium at World Cups and other comps, and has climbed up to 5.15a (9a+) and flashed up to 5.14c (8c+). He's also an unbelievably positive, thoughtful, caring inspiration of a climber who I was honored to chat with on the show. This is a bonus interview I did with him beyond the public show.

The first question I asked him was about respect because I've been thinking about it and talking about it a lot with my mindset clients. We all want to be respected as climbers so we can belong in the community, so I wanted to know what one of the most elite climbers in the world respects about other climbers and who he looks up to himself. We also talked about what might happen if the women competed against the men in World Cups, how he fuels himself nutritionally, and how he deals with his ulcerative colitis.

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Climbing coach Matt Pincus does a coaching session with Kyle Smith to help him reach his goal of sending his first 5.13a (7c+).

Bronwyn Hodgins is a 31-year-old Squamish-based professional climber and climbing guide whose main focus until recently was big wall and crack climbing. In 2022 she sent Necronomicon (5.13d/14a), which is one of the hardest roof cracks in the world. Before that send, she had climbed up to 5.13d sport and 5.13c trad.
In the summer of 2022, Hodgins and a team (including her husband, Jacob Cook) made a film about an expedition where they spent 65 days putting up many first ascents in Greenland, traveling between climbs via sea kayak. In fact, she’s made a lot of films and you can find them all here.
Needless to say, she is an accomplished, well-rounded climber and adventurer and I have a lot of respect for that. When I read about her recent ascent of La Rubia (5.14c / 8c+) in Villanueva del Rosario, Spain, I was intrigued. How did a big waller who’d climbed just one 5.14a sport route sent a long, burly 14c in Spain? So I asked her to be on the show to talk about her training and preparation for the route.
Turns out it’s a great story and she has a lot of wisdom to offer us.
Bronwyn Hodgins Interview Details
Her climbing story – how she became a pro climber
Big wall experience
Crack climbing training
How she got shut down hard on La Rubia and then trained for a year to send it
Visualization on projects
Managing fear of falling
The festival for women and gender expansive people she’s putting on in July
How running mid distance for so long prepared her for route climbing
Bonus Content on Patreon
redpointing tactics on outdoor routes
her diet
what her lifestyle and finances are like as a pro climber
sexism in climbing and guiding
Support the show and get all of the bonus episodes plus nutrition and mindset training at www.patreon.com/trainingbeta
 
 

In this bonus episode just for subscribers, Bronwyn gets real about what it's like to be a pro climber in terms of finances and lifestyle. We also talk about her diet - what she eats to fuel herself at the crag and at home. And we go into what it's been like for her as a female in the guiding world and as a pro climber, as well as some of her redpointing tactics.

This is a replay of an episode that originally aired in January, 2023. I talk with Coach Alex Stiger about the most common mistakes amde by climbers who are trying to break into 5.12 climbing. Sending 5.12 is the most common goal among her clients, so she has quite a bit of experience with the minutiae of what it takes to do that.
She will share her personal experience of her first 5.12’s and what she learned from her trials and tribulations. She’ll then go into the mindset shifts that are required to jump into the coveted 5.12 territory, and how she helps people do that.
While you might predict that strength training is one of the main tools Alex uses with her clients in this situation, it is not, as she says it is very rare to find a person who is climbing 5.11 who can not climb 5.12 with the strength they already have.
So while we spend a few minutes talking about strength training, you’ll find compelling evidence in this episode that that may not be your issue. Here are some of the other topics we discuss:
Why technique and staying calm are so important
Honing the skill of resting
How to decrease intimidation of the grade
How to learn from your falling experiences
How to have more of a competition mindset
What to climb on in the gym if you’re trying to send 5.12
A better alternative to having a perfect pyramid before entering into 5.12 territory
Why repeating climbs that are sort of hard for you is an important strategy
We talk about a lot in this episode, and I highly recommend it if you’re at the 5.10 or 5.11 level, or if you’re just not consistently climbing 5.12’s and you’d like to. Even if you are climbing 5.12’s consistently, I think a lot of her tactics will help you!


Show Links
Get the 5.12 Breakthrough Series AND the Steep Climbing Workshop for 30% Off
Work with Alex as your coach
Have questions? Email alex@trainingbeta.com or neely@trainingbeta.com