Know Your Holds

Learn it

Jug, crimp, sloper, pinch, pocket. Five words, and each one is a different job for the hand: a jug is held, a crimp is stood up on, a sloper is pressed into, a pinch is squeezed, a pocket takes two fingers.

Walk the wall and put a hand on one of each. Say the word out loud as they touch it, so the name and the shape arrive together.

Apply it

Pick a colour and have them climb it while a partner below calls the holds. The climber names the hold before they weight it; the caller agrees or corrects.

Half the group to each coach, on different sections of that colour. The naming out loud is the thing you are marking, so you have to be in earshot of every pair, and at ten you are not.

Run it twice: once naming the hold, once naming it and saying how they are about to hold it.

Demonstrate understanding

• They name all five off the wall without being prompted.
• The grip changes with the hold. Open hand on a sloper, fingers together on a crimp, thumb working on a pinch.
• Asked why a move felt hard, they name the hold that made it hard rather than saying it was just hard.

If the concept isn't sticking

Five is too many at once. Teach jug, crimp and sloper this week and leave pinch and pocket until a route puts one in front of them.

They name it correctly and then grab everything the same way. Stand at one sloper and have them try all three grips on it. The wrong grip fails on the spot, which teaches it faster than being told.