Climbing - Summit Strength & Fitness | Madison's Training Community

embracing the feeling of fear by rock climbing by the lake

Feeling of Fear and the Growth Found Through Climbing

Your leg is vibrating like a sewing needle, breath is shallow, heart is beating out of your chest. This is the feeling of fear. Your hands are wet, stomach churning. A desperate reach, far out to your left. You wrap your hands around a familiar and welcome shape as you lift a nearly empty mug…

Why Handstands are a Powerful Tool for Climbing Training

Build strength, balance, and body awareness with handstands. Learn how they improve climbing and join our upcoming handstand workshop at Summit.

Summit's climbing group workouts are fun.

How Group Workouts Benefit YOU: Energy, Motivation, and Power

Why do group workouts work so well? Explore the science, psychology, and community behind training together at Summit.

winter is a great time to work with a personal trainer

Personal Trainer Benefits: Why Winter Is the Best Time to Start

Working with a personal trainer is a huge benefit year round. However the winter brings special circumstances that make reaching goals a little more difficult. It’s easy to get stuck in a winter rut. Especially in Wisconsin where, let’s be honest, the winter can drag on. Shorter days, colder temperatures, and limited daylight can drain…

There’s Nothing Better than Halloween Climbing at the Red

Halloween climbing, starry nights, and community at the Red River Gorge—a weekend of laughter, adventure, and a much-needed reset in the outdoors.

Patrick lifting large sandbag off the ground

Outdoor Athletes: the exciting reasons we train them at Summit

When you hear the word athlete, you might think of someone on a track, in a gym, or competing in an arena. But what about the climber tackling a multi-pitch route? The skier navigating backcountry powder? Or, the trail runner grinding out elevation gain in the pouring. Those are athletes, too. Outdoor athletes At…

mountain athletes can be great trail runners and can teach you how to improve your running

Learn from these Mountain Athletes how to go further

Mountain athletes push the limits of human endurance, resilience, and skill. Whether they’re scaling the world’s highest peaks, running unimaginable distances, or climbing rock faces, their achievements inspire us to train harder and embrace discomfort. Here are some of the most inspiring mountain athletes—and how we can apply their lessons to our own training. Kilian…

Summit; origins and into a New Phase

In January of 2017, Summit officially opened. It is crazy to imagine (at the time of writing this) that it was over 8 years ago. Some days, it feels like it has been 20 years, some days, it still feels fresh and exciting. If you want to read the whole origin story of Summit, check…

Man standing on top of a cliff in the wind wrapping a rope

How to structure your climbing training for success

During the winter months, most dedicate their training to the climbing gym, using the colder season as an opportunity to build strength, refine technique, and improve endurance for outdoor climbing in the spring. Gym sessions focus on power training through bouldering, endurance drills on the lead wall, and grip strength exercises like hangboarding. Some also…

Man bouldering on rocks in Joshua Tree National Park in California

How to fit Outdoor Climbing into your Training

For many, outdoor climbing is the main motivation for getting better at climbing. This can come with logistical questions. When does one train vs climb outside? How can you ensure you get both in enough? The problem revolves around your access to rocks. The closer you are, the easier it is to get outdoor climbing…

these training board walls are the moon board and a spray wall

How Training board walls unlock your power

Training Board walls have been in climbing for years and years and come in many different board varieties and angles. It should be a part of every climber's training regardless of discipline. It offers three key adaptations to your climbing: Explosive power, strong body tension, and raw finger strength/contact strength. The power element of a…

Youth Climbing on a slab wall at the climbing gym summit strength and fitness

Finding tight knit Community in the Climbing WORLD

As climbers, we often talk about the physical and mental challenges of the sport, but there’s another aspect that makes climbing so special: the community. Wherever you are in the world, the climbing community has a way of welcoming you in and making you feel at home, whether you’re scaling limestone cliffs in a foreign…

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