Art of Prevention
Our mission is to decrease the prevalence of preventable injuries and athletes therein optimizing performance by decreasing the time that our athletes spend benched due to injury. We are going to distill information and practices from experts in the field of injury prevention. High level coaches and top performing athletes. We believe this information should be accessible to everyone so that we can reduce the rates of preventable injuries.
Art of Prevention
Preventing Wrist Injuries in Rock Climbing: Part 2 with Aaron Simon
Discover the secrets to keeping your wrists injury-free while rock climbing with expert insights from physical therapist Aaron Simon. Ever wondered why certain climbing spots seem to breed more wrist injuries than others? Join our conversation as Aaron reveals the unique climbing styles in regions like Las Vegas, Nevada, and how moves like side pulls and mantles can strain your wrists. We also take a fascinating journey comparing injury trends between iconic climbing locales such as Frankenjura, Germany, and Red Rocks, exploring the distinct ways these environments influence wrist injury prevalence.
Delving deeper into the anatomy and types of wrist injuries, Aaron and I categorize them into acute and chronic issues, discussing how repeated strain from multiple climbs can lead to long-term problems. Learn about the parallels between the wrist's triangular fibrocartilage complex (TFCC) and the knee's meniscus, and understand why conservative care is vital for recovery. We emphasize the importance of analyzing climbing techniques and training regimens to identify and prevent factors that contribute to chronic wrist injuries, ensuring climbers can enjoy their sport without debilitating pain.
The final part of our discussion focuses on practical strategies for rehabilitation and wrist strengthening. Aaron outlines a series of isometric exercises designed to safely increase the pain-free range of motion and build load tolerance. We'll guide you through the process of reintroducing weight-bearing exercises and adjusting body positions to minimize strain while maintaining climbing practice. Whether you're preparing for a climbing trip or managing wrist pain, Aaron’s expert tips will help you stay injury-free and keep climbing strong. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share to stay updated with more valuable insights from the Art of Prevention podcast!
You can find Aaron at:
https://www.onsightmovement.com/
Instagram: @onsight.movement
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Hello everyone and welcome to part two of my interview with Aaron Simon. So, if you don't know who Aaron Simon is, he's a physical therapist outside of Las Vegas, nevada, and he specializes in the treatment and physical therapy of rock climbers and adventure climbers. And now we're going to dive into a specific subject that Aaron has a lot of experience with, which is treating the wrist of rock climbers. So in this episode, we're going to talk mostly about the wrist. We're going to talk some about the anatomy of the wrist and then go from there as far as talking about some of the injuries that we see with climbers in the wrist and then, hopefully, how to prevent those injuries from happening in the first place. So, aaron, tell me about why the wrist was one of the things.
Speaker 2:One of the subjects that you wanted not expect to see as often as I'm seeing it. And you know I've been like working with climbers for like three years now and like the first time it happened I went, oh that's, that's kind of funny, like I guess you know, because people can injure their wrist climbing um, and that must that'll be the only time I see that and like it just kept happening more and more and like you know, kind of going. You know we talked about patterns and such, and I think I think red rocks is like exceptionally set up for that, where it's lots of like hard moves, like side pulls, mantles. It's easy to get a lot of goes on them. And you know lots of good bouldering gyms here in town and like, yeah, people are like I'm just surprised that like lots of good bouldering gyms here in town and like, yeah, people are like I'm just surprised that like, uh, because I think it defies the like injury data.
Speaker 1:Um, like from what I've seen, it makes up like a pretty significant amount of what I've seen well, I mean I we have some like cool research that's been done on injury prevalence, so like where people get injured rock climbing, but there are, like some, I mean there's some pretty huge flaws in that data too. I mean, even when we look back to, like the clinical management of the rock climber course, all of that data as far as, like, the prevalence of injuries, it's taken from three papers. All three of those papers are from the same authors in the same place, which is right outside of Franken you're a Germany and it's all people that it went to like the emergency room that, like those authors are at. So it's like it's no surprise that we would have differences in the prevalence of injuries depending on where we're at. So, like for you it's like a ton of underclings, those interesting side pulls, the mantles that might be super different from the climbing in frankenura, you know, and like a lot of the like competition climbers that they treat and things like that. So I mean it's one of those things where it's like there's always there are always flaws in research and it's almost like our gold standard is like those three papers and they are also like time period papers. So that's why we saw like the trend differences because it was like in the early 2000s and then like 2011, 2012 was one, and then like 2017, 2018 was another one.
Speaker 1:Right, those, yeah, those years are probably wrong. But I I have like looked pretty hard at the data there and it's really fun to think like, oh, this is like the rate at which injuries happen for rock climbers. But then you go to somewhere like red rocks and the climbing style is super different and you see really different injury trends. And then you know the classic example is like 10 sleep, right. Where you go on, it's like's like oh, hope you don't pull a pulley in 10 sleep, or like have fun blowing your fingers out at 10 sleep. That's usually what I tell people when they leave from rifle, like near the end of the summer, when it's really hot and sweaty and slippery, and then they're always going to 10 sleep right um, so okay, note to self for when I eventually make it out there oh yeah, like it's.
Speaker 1:I mean it's extremely fun, but it is crimp and like pocket city for sure. I what you were saying about the craft boulders like really sounds interesting as far as, like one, the sheer number of problems and boulders there that seem like super accessible.
Speaker 1:But then all of that funky climbing style that you were talking about reminds me a lot of rifle gotcha yeah well and like in that there's like injury trend like papers the wrist represents, like I want to say it was like less than five percent of injuries, oh yeah, um. So it was like less than 5% of injuries. But I mean, looking at what I've seen from like the Frank and Europe, it sounds like it's kind of like pockety limestone, you know. So I don't know I mean I haven't ever climbed there it sounds like it'd be a really fun time, but maybe that's one of the some of the.
Speaker 2:Those are some of the reasons why we see that trend data and how it could be different from your clinical experience yeah, yeah, you got to get out here and test the waters yeah um, you know another thing, you know this is just like my experience as a pt out here, but, um, I think a lot of people are willing to like take a shot at rehabbing their own pulley injury. You know there's some good resources out there and so usually when people have rehab, you know they have a finger injury. They give it a shot themselves. Maybe it goes well, life is good. Or they give it a shot and it's not going as well, and that's when I'm seeing for finger injuries. Or they give it a shot and it's not going as well, and that's when I see them for finger injuries.
Speaker 2:But, like, the wrist injuries can be like really, really like irritable, and I think that that encourages people to like seek treatment like a little bit more because they're like, yeah, I can't even, you know, grab a weight without it hurting, let alone climbing right, whereas with some of these finger injuries, like, okay, you can like use an open handed position and you can do some taping and you can often like skirt around it a little bit, but but the risk, like when it's when it's bothering you like, they're like okay, we I need to address this for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and let's go over. I mean, we don't need to make this into an anatomy course, but what's some of the anatomy that you feel like is pretty important that you're explaining to clients on like a weekly basis or something? Or you know, what kind of stuff do you tell people about clients? Or tell people about their wrist?
Speaker 2:I like to, you know, keep it pretty simple and, like you know, let them know that we've got multiple planes of movement at the wrist, we've got a connection between our radius and our ulna that allows for that rotation, and then we've got some of our muscles and tendons that bend and straighten, straighten, you know, bend and uh, straighten the wrist at uh like on either side, and there's a lot happening there in like a smaller space, um. So if we add in you know, some awkward positions, whether that's like the wrist extension, um mantilly type move, um even like some, you know, some funky gastones's or some under, we can suddenly be pissing things off like that. So I don't like to go into too much detail, people, and, like we said, like let's just understand what's going on and go from there to say like all right, how do I move on from here? How do I move from that?
Speaker 2:The things that I think are most relevant for people, you know, if you want to like dive into it a little bit, or when people have this like pinky sided wrist pain or ulnar sided wrist pain, we call it, we want to differentiate, like, okay, is this truly an injury to the TFCC, which is this cartilage complex that provides stability at your wrist, or is it an injury to the TFCC? Which is this cartilage complex that provides stability at your wrist? Or is it an injury to, like some of our flexor or extensor tendons and that's usually a little bit easier to tease out just with like some like manual muscle testing, like positioning things like that, even even just kind of like palpating the structures?
Speaker 1:it's pretty clear even just kind of like palpating the structures. It's pretty clear. And what are some of the things that lead you to think more like TFCC versus like some of the tendons that cross that ulnar side or pinky side of the wrist?
Speaker 2:Often it's the. You know, there's kind of a cluster of tests that you can do and like one that I think stands out is like your compression tests, where we're kind of like passively adding a load to the hand and just literally, you know, trying to add some, some compression of that tfcc joint. I think that one's pretty relevant, the. There's another one that involves lifting yourself off from the chair, kind of in like a like a dip position. Yeah, like that chair lift off seems to be like pretty indicative too because like, uh, we're, we're in a pretty happy position and, like you know, neutral wrist, normally that's pretty well tolerated and if just like adding that pressure to it aggravates things, like I've got a pretty high suspicion for that tfcc type injury, whereas, like the, the muscle tendon injuries are going to be aggravated with like specific movements biasing that muscle group.
Speaker 1:Basically, okay, um, so when we're compressing the tfcc or the you know I like to get nerdy about stuff too, though. So I still say, like the, the triangular fibrocartilaginous complex of the ulnar side of the wrist um, you gotta say it once when you're talking about the wrist right, um, so when we're compressing that pinky side, so if everybody takes their wrist and then holds on to their hand and then moves into that ulnar deviation or moves toward their wrist, towards the pinky side, then you're compressing that TFCC. And if you're compressing it, then that might be something that aggravates some of your symptoms, versus if you're like picking something up, then it might be somewhat more associated with the tendons that cross that, that wrist. Would you say that'd be like a good, like general kind of statement.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would agree with that. There is, like you know, another element of the exam is, like you said, like picking something up, and that can be that just puts a ton of force at that, at that wrist, so it's, you know, pretty reminiscent of like a strong underclean, so that's pretty reminiscent of a strong undercling, so that can be irritable too. But yeah, I think that's a great point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we already mentioned some of the provoking movements or moves that can irritate these wrist structures, such as underclings and side pulls, but one thing that you pointed out a bunch are all the mantles that are available to people in Red Rocks, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, definitely. That seems to be like a pretty common finding, whether it's somebody who injured it on one like specific climb, one specific move, or they've got the more chronic presentation where it's just gotten worse over time, as they have that history of lots of mantling, especially here. They're working on some boulder with a difficult top out or, yeah, some of the other things. The heinous side pulls or the underclings will definitely do it as well.
Speaker 1:Is there like a nemesis boulder that you've heard a bunch of people injuring their wrists on in Red Rocks?
Speaker 2:I don't know if I can think of one off the top of my mind. I will have to do that research. So I think you know we mentioned yeah, I'll have to follow up with you on that, because it seems like, uh, it really just depends on like. I think it just depends on the individual I mean from what it sounds like.
Speaker 1:It sounds like people can get on a lot of boulders in one session out at red rocks right oh, definitely, um, it's.
Speaker 2:It's like a little mini outdoor bouldering gym and that's. That's just craft right. There's there another. I couldn't even tell you how big, but the park itself is huge. That's just one small element of it.
Speaker 1:Okay, so maybe it's not like one specific boulder, but it's really the cumulative load from being able to go out and then top out and mantle up onto many different boulders.
Speaker 2:Definitely. I've seen both presentations where people have told me you know, oh it, it happened on this climb and this move is definitely this right um, and I've seen others who say, yeah, I remember wrist has really just kind of gradually gotten worse over the past. You know two, three weeks, and oh, by the way, I, you know two, three weeks, and oh, by the way, I, you know I'm doing the van life out here and I've been climbing nonstop since I got out here.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah. So that's one of the things that we definitely keyed into and maybe we should give a little synopsis of the last episode in case somebody is just really psyched on, like wrist injuries, but two big umbrella categories of injuries that don't include trauma or like don't include you like falling on your wrist. The two big categories are chronic injury as well as acute injury. So acute is oh, I was doing this one really hard move, I was trying really hard and then I felt something pop or felt something let go in my wrist, versus I've been doing a ton of volume, been doing a ton of boulders, long sessions, multiple days on and my wrist started bugging me and it's slowly been getting progressively worse over x amount of time.
Speaker 1:Right and yep spot on if you're somebody who's listening and you want to go back to learn more about those like patterns as far as like for general injuries, go back to the last episode, so part one, and then if you're still psyched on the wrist itself, then we're going to keep going on the wrist. So one thing that stuck out to me was when you talked about the wrist and some of the fibrocartilage that's within that wrist and how it's similar to a knee. So how is the wrist similar to a knee and then what does that mean for our rehab?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so there's a paper on this that I read a while back that I think opened my eyes a little bit. You know, I originally thought, okay, like a TFCC injury is a TFCC injury. And you know, when we talk about the meniscus in the knee, I think we've all known somebody who's had that injury and some people, depending on where it's injured, there's a pretty good like capacity for healing, there's better blood flow, Maybe it's less, you know, easily irritated, and some people get a meniscal injury and they recover just fine. Others, you know, opt for like a surgical approach because it's not getting better. And this basically compared the you know that portion of the wrist to. They said, oh, it's kind of analogous to the meniscus, where there's actually a lot of different ways that you could like tear or injure your TFCC and like the same principles apply that like some of them have better blood flow than others, Some of them are going to be like more involved in, like everyday movements, whereas other aspects of it are going to be involved in, like the very end ranges of motion that like you're only doing in in this one awkward position.
Speaker 2:Um, so it like goes on to say you know the you know some of the best practices are conservative care for like several months, right, and helping people have this like gradual progression in their strength, training the compressive and like the distractive forces at the wrist those are kind of two different categories and then like incorporating those movements back into, like you know, in this case, climbing to, I seen some people just do really really well in a matter of like one or two months and some people on that longer end of the spectrum of you know five or six months and I think it's just where they're getting injured. But the only way we can really know that is with more imaging. And most well, I've yet to see a climber come in who has you know MRI imaging of the wrist for this injury. So yeah, come in. Who has you know mri imaging of?
Speaker 1:the wrist for this injury. So yeah, and I think having that big picture in mind is really crucial for people that are coming back from an injury or if they're kind of dealing with that slow onset of the injury is, hey, like it doesn't matter what you do, like you're gonna be working with this, for you said, the quick ones are like a month or two months right. And I think having that big picture in mind when it comes to like the rehab or kind of digging yourself out of the hole of a chronic, repetitive injury, like having that big picture, is so crucial, especially when it comes to like returning load and returning capacity to those tissues.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely Like with the. You know, with the, with the acute injuries, you go well, you blew it. You know life happens and in this case, like you got injured right, but with these more chronic ones, it's you know okay. What elements of your training needs to be addressed. How are you climbing right, like somebody who's more static versus somebody more dynamic? Are we getting good weight through our feet? Are we utilizing like good shoulder and elbow position to kind of take that load off the wrist too? There's a lot to be done there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think some of the coursework that we've done together evaluating like, how people hang on just like a hangboard which is just a level edge can be indicative of like why your people are getting these chronic overuse injuries. So again back to that ulnar deviation, or bringing the pinky towards the arm, like kind of deviating the pinky side of the wrist outwards. If you're seeing somebody hang on just a hangboard and you see them in a ton of ulnar deviation, then we can see why they're getting more compression over time in that TFCC area or in some of the like I know, like some of the papers have talked about, like the ulnar carpal recess, which is just in between your ulna bone and the carpal bones, and getting irritation there. Uh, what are your thoughts on taping the wrist?
Speaker 2:You know, plain and simple, I would say if it, uh, if it's helpful, do it With the caveat of whether it's tape or whether it's these little wrist widgets that effectively give you some support at the wrist, people will get overly ambitious because it can immediately bring down their symptoms. I've had people come in and they hang on the hangboard without it and their pain is at a five or six, and we throw on a wrist widget and it's like a two or a three. They go well cool. All I got to do is wear this wrist widget and I can keep climbing at the exact same pattern that I was doing before. We're overstressing tissue.
Speaker 2:At that point we're getting into positions that are potentially you know, potentially, you know re-aggravating this injury, and so I think it's kind of a double-edged sword. I think the best practices do include splinting or some sort of like supportive measure early on, but then it's a matter of like weaning off of it in the coming weeks and months. You know, and I think most people would say that that, you know, rings true Like around here, like if you look around the gym or if you look out at craft, you'll see people wearing a wrist widget or they're wearing tape on their wrists and some of it's maybe a mental thing. Some of it, you know, continues to be well, it allows me to keep climbing, but I think any good rehab program should eventually have you weaning off of that. Um, you know that that breaks right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's you know. I think that if it's something where you need that in order to climb and you're not getting it addressed and somebody needs to see somebody like yourself or myself, and it's like, hey, you need to get these tissues addressed so that you hopefully at one point don't need to wear that wrist widget or don't need to have tape on, and then if it's a psychological thing, then kind of this kind of the same thing where it's like, either like wean yourself off of it or like see a qualified professional to give you an evaluation and assess, like, do you really need this or are you just using this as a literal, like psychological crutch to help you go out and like feel safe with climbing?
Speaker 1:yeah, for sure so in those people? What are some of the exercises and like things that you give them to make them feel safe again or help them regain strength in their wrist?
Speaker 2:yeah, so that's a good question. Early on, uh, people are sometimes have really good insight and they're like, well, it hurts when I do. You know x movement, like uh being in a push-up position would be like a great example, and if I just avoid that then I'm fine. Um, but yeah, early on I want to help people put some load through that wrist and through some of those like supportive uh, like active stabilizers of the wrist, because that's essentially what we need to do is we need to create more stability at the wrist. Um, and so I've seen like isometric wrist curls, so just like in a neutral wrist position, not with it bent over to either side, like not tilted toward that, that ulnar or that radial side, but like starting with a neutral wrist and loading in multiple directions is like a great way for people to kind of regain some of that confidence that, oh, cool, I can, I can grip things, I can load this and this actually feels pretty manageable.
Speaker 2:And going back to like our original discussion again, I think isometrics tend to be pretty well tolerated. Sometimes people do like higher intensity ones for a shorter duration, maybe like 10 or 15 seconds, compared to other injuries. I've seen where they do. Actually I'm doing like 60 second hold at a little bit of a lower intensity, right. Both of those tend to be a pretty good starting point and so I look to gradually like increase that range of motion that they have that continues to be pain-free. So we start with like isometrics in a neutral wrist position and slowly work into a little bit of wrist flexion, wrist extension, like either direction as well, um, and then like also like incorporating that rotational aspect of the wrist, like so for um, so for everybody, listening, like palm down or palm up, being, you know, pronation or supination, that's. That's another motion that is generally quite irritable with this, um. So starting like that is is a great point, and people will do that and gradually increase their loads, usually over the course of a couple of weeks, and then they're ready to move on to what I would say is like kind of the next step in this, which is like moving against resistance, like throughout that range of motion.
Speaker 2:Once we can do that, then it starts to be a little bit more fun. You know, then it's actually be a little bit more fun. Then it's actually cool. We're doing things that start to look more and more like pushing, pulling and whatnot. So that's getting people back on hang boards, getting people into weight-bearing positions including push-up positions are a great example or even replicating some of those on the wall.
Speaker 2:I could talk about this a lot because I think something that I've taken from, uh, you know, some of the other rehab professionals, like working with climbers, is I think there's a ton to be done like off the wall, uh, like hands down. That's like the low hanging fruit that people are can start with, but then it's learning that, all right, I can, I can do, you know, this certain movement like let's just go with the mantles again. Maybe I can't do my entire body weight on it, but I can change my foot position to take some load off my wrist and now I can mantle right. Um, so doing a lot more drills on the wall, maybe with feet on you know really good holds or on the ground. That that's where it starts to get to be fun and that's where people are like really seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, especially with, like, some of these nagging wrist injuries for sure yeah, what's some of the advice that you have for people trying to get back onto the wall?
Speaker 1:so let's say they've done some of the isometric strengthening and let's say they have a largely pain free range of motion. What's some of the advice or exercises that you'll give people? I love that. That part about just changing body position allows some people to be able to do the move, but they, you know it's obviously different as far as, like the biomechanical stressors at the wrist. So what are some other drills and tips that you give people when they're trying to get back on the wall in a safe fashion?
Speaker 1:yeah, um off the wall drills or I would often include on the wall, on the wall, yeah, on the wall, yeah, um.
Speaker 2:So we talked about like the like distracting or like pulling apart motion. That happens when we're hanging right, I think, like hang boards, systems, boards um, campus boards are really good opportunity here, because you can, you know, very easily change the, the feet that you have and you can make it really good or really bad and still utilize like the exact same hold right. Um, if you don't have that available, like bathroom scales or like resistance bands to kind of like support your body, are a really good option. Um, if you're actually like on, let's say you're, you know, climbing in a gym and I feel like I make a lot of references because you know I treat climbers in a gym, so I see a lot of those things Getting on different terrain, right.
Speaker 2:So we think about if your wrist is really aggravated, maybe in like kind of an awkward side pull and you notice that it happens every time you're climbing like a cave style route or like really overhung on on a board, then let's get you to more like vertical terrain, let's get you to more slab terrain, and we can suddenly have a lot more of our weight distributed to our feet than to our hands.
Speaker 2:So, though just simply like changing that terrain is, is a pretty good option for people. That would be one. Something else that I've seen people do is like changing the rate at which they're loading it right. So if you do like a plyometric pushup and you do it, whether it's like against the wall or on the ground, you're getting really quick load through that wrist. And so if you're climbing really statically or climbing really dynamically, like same thing, we're to have peak forces that are just like spiking right. Uh, so changing that style too. Um, in general, I think it's helpful for people to climb a little bit more statically while they're recovering from this and then kind of ease back into, like, the more dynamic movements, the more comp style movements.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, I think that's like some really really great advice as far as taking, you know, whatever measurables we have whether that's the amount of load, like with the bathroom scale, or we can decrease the amount of load with a resistance band wrapped around our feet if we're hangboarding to looking at some of the measurables on the wall as far as hold types, as well as the inclination of the wall, and then, yeah, speed of movement and how that's going to affect the amount of force that's being transferred through the wrist. So static versus dynamic movements oh all right can I give you one more?
Speaker 1:of Of course, give me 10 more, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, um, let's take, uh, you know, take, take any move, take any hold, and maybe it's not like the whole type itself, but it's more like what position is our wrist, you know, shoulder, elbow and wrist in and trying to just like make some subtle tweaks there. You know we talked about like a neutral wrist position versus an ulnarly deviated position, and like if, by engaging our shoulder, we can bring, for example, the elbow in just a little bit, we potentially put ourselves in a much better position. So you kind of take, you know, take a move that would be painful or bothersome to a rehabbing climber and cool, let's, let's make it a little bit easier, a little bit more manageable that way, and like slowly expand that, um, that range of motion or like those comfortable positions for people yeah, I like training.
Speaker 1:Uh, I love that aspect of training, the coordination, because that's another thing that's done in a lot of, like injury prevention programs is just neuromuscular training. But it's always tough because it's like what the hell does that even mean neuromuscular training program? And if you look at all these different programs basically means like whatever people want it to mean, right. So if your brain has a means by which it holds on to things like whenever you go up and you grip a hold, you're in that like ulnar deviation and it's painful Like I love giving people the task of, can you hold that hold in a way that's non-painful, which I think is basically the premise of what you're talking about. And then training that coordination, neuromuscular training, right.
Speaker 1:And then training that coordination neuromuscular training right, so that then you can more often utilize different hold types without pain, and in some ways it's training the brain right and in some ways it's de-stressing tissues at the same time. So I love that you brought that up, because that's like some pretty powerful stuff. Whether they're like a runner or like somebody who can't walk without pain, you can do that with like a lot of different things and I love applying it to climbing as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, definitely, like the first time that somebody goes. Well, you know, every time I grab this hold type it hurts, and you know, we gradually expose them to that, like little by little. Like if you miss all those like intermediate steps, then like we've just always associated with that with pain and like the likelihood of that being painful is like probably a little higher right. But if we've like gradually worked ourself into that position and we, you know, we've exposed our brain to it and our brain says I guess this isn't as painful anymore. Um, that's great, you know. Um, that's a great way to go about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like that you brought the pain, neuroscience, into it.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that's going to be the next one. Maybe we'll do a part three and we'll just go right into pain neuroscience Super hot topic nowadays, but a little bit into the weeds, um, um.
Speaker 2:But I mean that's a good place to go, um, I think like there's always like value that we can draw from everything, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, like you pick and pull from the things that like, all right, like that's good, I'm gonna, I'm gonna utilize that and, um, you know, add another tool to my toolbox.
Speaker 1:Oh for sure. What advice do you give people or what advice would you give people who are maybe doing that trip to Red Rocks Like, let's say, they've got a month long trip coming up and they're going to spend it in Red Rocks bouldering at the craft boulders Like, what are some exercises or strengthening tips that you would give them to make their wrist nice and strong so that we hopefully prevent these wrist injuries from happening?
Speaker 2:With the idea of keeping it simple, I would be trying to train my wrist like in a like distractive manner. So definitely getting some work on slopers right and controlling our wrist position. So definitely getting some work on slopers right and controlling our wrist position. I think you know lots of indoor boards are helpful for that, even just hang boards, but then also like that that compressive aspect, so loading it, so what that can look like if it's just body weight being in like a neutral wrist push-up position. Parallettes are really helpful for that, or just dumbbells. Kettlebells are actually quite fun for this because they have that like capacity to wiggle and move a little bit.
Speaker 1:Oh, so like holding a kettlebell like in the air, with like the bellend upwards and you're like kind of balancing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was the next one I'd get to, but, um, yeah, and I that's usually uh kind of an intermediate as we're getting back to load, so, like you know, it's really easy for people to progress. Cool, I did this with, you know, 10 pounds this week. I can do it with it more next week, but uh, actually, yeah, that's a great exercise, um, but uh, I was referring to like kettlebells on the ground, oh, I know, on a push-up position, and so the reason I think that's helpful is it's like more reminiscent of like some of these, uh like mantles that we see out here okay or even like control, and you can.
Speaker 2:You can adjust like your position on those kettlebells too, so you can bias, like some of those wrist flexors or like wrist extensors, so you can be outside of that neutral position too. Yeah, those are.
Speaker 1:Those would be the things that I'd probably start with, and if you're not, already like starting to just work, just work through, like that full range of motion.
Speaker 2:Okay, so ensure full range of motion and then maybe messing around with those kettlebells a little bit, I mean safely, though you know I don't want to, you know, fall and do whatever yeah well, and like loading through that full range of motion too right, like, yeah, if you know that you're going to be pressing, like with you know your wrist just like fully extended back and like off to the side, then like getting some of that in uh uh, we talked about this earlier.
Speaker 2:You know, like if the first time you go to do that is topping out like your project for that whole trip, like I don't know, it's just like it's if you get hurt, like of course it happened right, but if you did some preparation for that and you still managed to get hurt, like at least you did everything you know you could, right and you've prepared your body to be in that position and I think your risk of injuring it during that goes down like significantly I, I completely agree.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like, obviously, like we want to expose ourselves to those loads and it sounds like if we're going to craft, we need to expose ourselves to some wrist specific loads, like with all the actionable tools that you just talked about. All right, we're at 36 minutes time, kind of flew by with this one, um, but you knew this was coming. What is the ounce of prevention advice that you have for people? Uh, regarding wrist injury or regarding a trip to red rocks?
Speaker 2:ounce of prevention for wrist injury. I would say a wrist is like kind of the neglected uh aspect in climbing. You know people are like yeah, been, you know, working on my shoulder blades, working on my rotator cuff. Uh, do it every time when I warm up. You know I've been training my trying to have really strong fingers. Uh, not much happening for the wrist. Um, so doing doing some of those things that we talked about, um, doing some strength training for, like, multi-directional wrist stability, um, getting some loading in the wrists would be super key. So ounce of prevention, like summed up, would be like don't neglect your risks. Um, it doesn't take much, but like add that to your warmup routine, um, especially if you know it's going to be involved in whatever you're climbing.
Speaker 1:All right, well, I know what I'm adding to my warmup routine. All right, aaron. Always great to talk to you, man, great to catch up again. Thank you so much for volunteering your time. How can people find you? How can people reach out to you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, first of all, like hey, thanks for thanks for the opportunity, man, hopefully we got some something on here that'll be helpful for people. And if you're ever out here, like come stay, come climb I'm in like full dad mode these days, so if I get a chance to go climb with someone, I'm, I'm all about it. People can find me on Instagram it's at onsitemovement. The website is, you know, onsitemovementcom. Those are kind of the two best ways to reach me. If anybody has other questions, they can do that, or my email, Aaron, at onsitemovementcom, and I'm stoked. Whether it's climbing, running, anything, I just enjoy people who want to be like active and healthy and like take accountability for like improving themselves, right, um, so, yeah, would love to chat with you. Know anyone who's got some questions?
Speaker 1:awesome. Well, we'll definitely put links to all those things in the show notes. Uh, if you're in red rocks and you've got an injury, you definitely need to go check out aaron at onsite pt or onsite movement.
Speaker 2:I get onsite movementcom or or on onsite pt is uh also someone that you should like get on the podcast at some point oh yeah, I remember she was at that course as well yeah, um, that's uh anna yeah, yeah, yeah okay yeah, great, now I've got ideas for the next podcast yeah, yeah, I've spoken to her a few times and she is just like a phenomenal source of information and like, if you know, plug for her, like people who are in the Pacific Northwest I can't remember exactly where, but yeah, she's a great resource too.
Speaker 1:Awesome, all right. Well, thanks again, man, and we'll be in touch, for sure.
Speaker 2:All right, thanks, man.
Speaker 1:I hope that you enjoyed this episode of the Art of Prevention podcast. If you did enjoy and or benefit from some of the information in this podcast, please be sure to like, subscribe and share this podcast, or please give us a five-star review on any platform that you find podcasts. One thing to note that this podcast is for education and entertainment purposes only. No patient is formed and if you are having any difficulty, pain, discomfort, etc. With any of the movements or ideas described within this podcast, please seek the help ofa qualified and board-certified medical professional, such as your medical doctor or a sports chiropractor, physical therapist, etc.