climbing at St. Jeannet

The weather had been epically bad in the UK. Rain, rain, how about a bit more rain? Going to the South of France to catch some rays and get in some climbing seemed just the thing to do!

After arriving at Nice and being whacked over the head with the heat of the Mediterranean it seemed that a rethink was in order… over an ice-cream.

The aim was to go to Saint Jeannet, a small town west of Nice nestled at the foot of an impressive cliff, the Baou, offering a good mix of single and multi pitch sport climbing on limestone. A scouting mission without gear to check out the area was mounted. It soon became obvious, this was going to be hot. Very hot.

The Main Face

The two main areas aimed at were La Source (mostly single pitch) and the Main Face (multi pitch), with the south-east side of the cliff in the sun most of the day and the Main Face in the sun from about 12:30pm. An hour or so hike to the top of the Baou Cliff gave plenty of time to consider hauling one’s butt up a near vertical cliff in the direct sun. Good view at the top mind! At the foot of the Baou lies La Source, now this seemed far more promising with the area shaded by trees and massive rocks (best not to dwell on how they got there).

This called for a bit more of a think (and more ice-cream).

After a couple of days of cooling off in the sea and swimming with the fishies a trip to La Source was called for. Here there is a nice range of grades, ranging from 3 up. On some of the more popular routes the rock is quite polished, mmm soapy. Lots of different styles of climbing too, including some nice fingery slabs (polish not helping!).

(A couple of sea, sun, and ice-cream days later)

On the Main Face there was a tempting 200m 9 pitch climb. All the grades were with in reach, the main issue seemed to be that we would only have about 4 hours till the route would be in full force of the sun. The plan: to give the first couple of pitches a go, and see how it goes, otherwise abseil down if there are any problems. The earliest we could reaching St. Jeannet was 7:45 in the morning, and setting off I thought we were making good time. Wrong. Just the approach to the first pitch covered some tricky scrambles and took longer than expected. In retrospect, should probably have treated them more as climbs since several bolts for protection were passed on the way up. Finally, the first pitch was found!

Booted and ready to go! Since I was seconding, I carried the day pack, including about 4 liters of water, lunch, guide book and other essentials (not to mention a bit of ‘just in case’ kit). I have never carried a pack while climbing before and it threw my balance right out of the window. Although the fist pitch was not hard, it was soapy and not very well protected. Some trad gear came in handy here.

After watching the second pitch being lead over a balancey traverse it became apparent that doubles would have been good. Also, if I had issues on the first pitch carrying the pack (I blame the baguette), the second would be very hard. Time, was also not on our side, and neither of us wanted to be half way up the cliff at the hottest part of the day. Some hard choices would have to be made.

After a quick discussion it was decided not to continue and abseil down. It was the right (if unsatisfactory) choice.  It is not easy to back off a climb, but easier to do it early on rather than halfway up in the midday sun.  Some fun abseiling followed (through some very prickly local plants). Then after reversing the approach (this time with a rope) we went to La Source, to enjoy some more of the excellent single pitch climbs in the shade. Followed by beer and ice-cream… of course!

The plan now is to return at a cooler time of the year with doubles and a better way to distribute load.

 

 

 

what are you made of?

Apart from the sugar, spice and all things nice, I wanted to know what else I was made of. I have always used scales till now, but they are very limited and can only tell you your mass. They can’t tell you how much of that is fat, bone, muscle or brains (erm).

While MRI is able to do this, skin fold and girth measurement is a more accessible, non-invasive option to get a rough estimate of your body composition. It involves taking measurements of your skin folds at different sites on your body using skinfold calipers. This can then be used as an indicator of body composition on their own, or plugged into one of several equations used to calculate body fat.

It is not perfect, you may never know what your exact body fat percentage is (really, it’s not so important), but it can provide a useful bench mark to track changes in your body over time and observe the effects of diet and training.

To get the most accurate readings, have them taken by someone qualified (of course). If you are taking measurements to track changes over a period of time, try to have the same person take them so there is consistency in the way they measure you up and the way they take the skin fold pinch.

Lucky for me, a colleague of mine is qualified (accredited by ISAK) to take these measurements, and to help him keep his eye in I generously donated my body for him to practice on.  I know, too kind… well, it would be, if I didn’t have an ulterior motive. I wanted to conduct a little experiment on myself!

The story

Last year I learnt I would need an operation and I would have to stop exercising for at least 4 weeks after. Esh, 4 whole weeks! So, I wanted to know what would happen to my body composition after the 4 weeks of not training, and the effect of reintroducing my body to exercise again.

I had my body composition measurements taken a month before the operation, 4 weeks after the operation before I started training again and finally again three months after.

It should be noted that my enforced rest was mostly over Christmas. I ate all the pies.

The method

For each session, my height and weight was measured. Eight skin folds were taken at the triceps, subscapular, biceps, lilac crest, supraspinale, abdomen, front thigh, and medial calf. Girths were measured for a relaxed arm, a flexed-tensed arm, the waist, glutes, and calf. Follow this link for a more detailed description of the sites.

I shall now present the results of the weight measurements, sum of the eight skin folds, girth measurements and discuss the changes in body composition.

The results

Weight:

55.1kg before operation

54.5kg after enforced rest

55.33kg after resuming training.

Sum of eight skin folds:

85.8mm before operation

95.4mm after enforced rest

89.6mm after resuming training

Girth measurements

68.1cm waist; 93.1cm glutes; 26.1cm arm relaxed; 26.3cm arm flexed and tensed (before op)

67.8cm waist; 91.2cm glutes; 24.9cm arm relaxed; 25.3cm arm flexed and tensed (after rest)

67.1cm waist; 93.1cm glutes; 25.7cm arm relaxed; 26.3cm arm flexed and tensed (after training)

The discussion

Before and directly after operation

Well, I lost weight while not exercising and eating pie, but as I said at the beginning, this doesn’t mean anything on its own regarding body composition! Based on the sum of skin folds combined with the changes in girth, it can be concluded that my body fat increased and muscle decreased. Check out the relaxed and flexed arm girths, there is a difference of a 1 cm for the flexed arm. There was no difference in the sum of skin folds for the arm so that must all be muscle loss.  This implies the loss of weight is directly linked to the loss of muscle, since fat weighs less than muscle, even though the fat increased.

After training resumed

My weight went back up, in fact slightly more than before! However, the sum of skin folds has gone back down, although not quite to the level it was at before the operation. Interestingly the girth of my waist has reduced even more than it was before the operation, although the girth of my glutes has gone back up again to exactly where it was before. Also, the relaxed girth of my arm has gone up as well as the flexed girth. This implies muscle has gone back on.

In the greater scheme of things, not much has changed. I am now carrying a little more fat than before my operation (that’s 3.8mm distributed over my whole body, i.e. like, nothing) but more importantly, and it looks like I have managed to build up my muscles again.

All these changes are tiny, and this is not even taking into account any measurement error, or the bagel I ate just before. But it is interesting to see how changes in lifestyle can change your body composition in a very short time.

The body fat %

You may noticed I have not talked about body fat percentage. OK, so let’s look at 3 different calculations to estimate my current body fat percentage, Jackson/Pollock 3 Caliper method (JP3), Jackson/Pollock 4 Caliper method (JP4), and Durnin/Wormersley Caliper method (DW). I have used the online calculators you can find here.

17.41% (JP3); 16.88% (JP4); 23.16% (DW)

And they are all different, super different! Which estimate is most reliable? I don’t know, the equations used to calculate them are based on anthropometric data gathered from a generalised population. For the best estimate you need to use the one that is based on people most similar to you.

Age has also been factored in. Let’s knock 5 years off my age:

17.10% (JP3); 16.73% (JP4); 21.05% (DW)

Now I have less body fat, but my skin fold measures were all the same! It may well be true that for a generalised population body fat will tend to increase with age, but my measurements are still the same. The calipers do not know how old I am! Maybe they are assuming as you get older an increase in fat around the internal organs. To know this, far more investigation into the calculation and assumptions made is needed. This does, however,  demonstrates the pitfalls of trying to pin down body fat percentage using an equation.

From what I have seen, the most reliable measure is a comparison of skin folds from one time period to another. In fact, the sum of skin folds is often used, as shown here, precisely because of the errors using calculations. They use 7 sites. If I add up mine I get: 75.8mm. According to this table it puts me in the ‘excellent’ normal range and ‘good’ athletic range.

The conclusion

If you want to know how exercise, training, or diet is really affecting your body composition, throw away the scales and get your skin folds measured. It will tell you so much more than just your mass. Do it over a period of time and track your diet and training. Has it made an impact? What does it mean to you regarding the success of your diet/training and what impact has it had on your sporting performance?

This was an interesting experiment and I have learnt a lot in general about body composition, measurements and the like. However, I am an average joe, not a professional athlete, so all this is over kill. In the end, none of these figures makes me stronger, fitter, more powerful, or faster. Just as they don’t make me a better climber, less sacred to take falls, or perform better in cold weather.

More important than any of this is: to have fun with your sports, enjoy training, eat good wholesome food (with treats), and stretch and relax like a cat on a sunny afternoon (if someone will rub your tummy, all the better).

Be well!

what’s my motivation?

Good question.

What motivates me to train? What motivates you?

I train for lots of reasons. As I am sure most people do. Here are some reasons, in vague order of importance:

1. I get a grump on if I don’t (this is mostly important for friends and family who put up with me)
2. I find it fun! Not just the sports, but the workouts too. I enjoy the challenge
3. To perform better at my chosen sports, which are climbing and running at the moment (more about this in a later post)
4. When I train, I tend to eat better  (I will come back to this one in a later post) and sleep better
5. Boosts confidence. Knowing I can push hard and keep going, that I can rise to challenges and over come them, that I can be self disciplined, are all amazing for boosting confidence at any task.
6. To improve over all long-term health.
7. I like a fit body

 So they are some of my reasons. I am sure they will change and shift over the years, but for now…

Sometimes if you are having trouble sticking to or starting to train, or eat healthy, or just stuck in a rut, it can be good to go back to the beginning and remind yourself why you are doing it in the first place.

So, what’s your motivation?