Sans Chalk

After reading some article and noticing the trend in the gym, I decided to be like the cool kids and try climbing without chalk.

The result is not at all what I expected.

For the most part I don’t miss it.

I thought my hands without chalk would be all sweaty and slippery, but that hasn’t been the case.

The way the article made it sound was that chalk actually reduced the friction between your fingers and the holds you were on, and so far that’s mostly what I’ve experienced. Last night on a particularly slopey hold route, I had problems near the end where I think chalk would have helped. It felt like chalk would have increased the friction for me on those holds (yeah, opposite of everything else), yet at the same time I realized so would more strength.

So now I have a new goal (in addition to all the other 11c’s and 12’s). Climb that slopey hold route to the top without chalk. It will only make me stronger.

– b