Climbing book review: 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes by Dave Macloed

The first thing I did when I finished reading this book was turn back to page one and start reading it again – it really is that good!

In this truly inspirational climbing book, Dave MacLoed embarks on a step by step mission to destroy every excuse that stands between you and your success as a rock climber (or if you think laterally, between you and success in your job, or any other sport).

The book is broken down into 5 chapters:

1. Creatures of habit

Dave really gets to the bottom of some of the psychological reasons that climbers don’t succeed. If you really take it to heart and examine your own climbing, there’s some pretty tough things to come to terms with here. For me this is the most important section in the book. Climbing is such a psychological sport, if you’re not prepared mentally, you’ll never succeed. I loved the stuff about avoiding getting into the habit of only climbing the type of routes that you can look good on, or being afraid to climb in front of strangers who might be better climbers than you. This stuff is solid gold. I think most people will be able to admit that at some point, they have been affected by the issues in this chapter.

2. The big four: movement technique, finger strength, endurance, body mass

In this section Dave gets into the physical aspects of climbing. What’s really nice is that he has a deep understanding of motivation and external factors that might influence your climbing ability. He really takes into account that everyone has a different level of time and emotional commitment that they can give to the sport.

3. Fear of falling: the real problem, probably…

All climbers (humans) have a fear of falling, it’s hard wired into our DNA to keep us alive. However we all have different levels of fear and ways of dealing with it. There’s some really practical advice on dealing with the fear of falling here, complete with some drills to help you to overcome it.

4. The other big four: attitude, lifestyle, circumstances, tactics

This section smashes a few more of the excuses you might have about improving your climbing – think you’re too old? Forget that! There’s some top quality advice on training to be the best you can be whatever age.

5. What’s next coach? Planning your improvement

Here you’ll find a blueprint for planning your training and recovery. As with the other chapters, it’s real, easy-to-follow, practical advice.

I can hand on heart tell you that the advice contained in this book contributed to my improving my climbing performance by a good couple of grades. Those improvements largely came about from mental and attitude changes rather than some kind of physical regime, so they came pretty quickly.

If you feel like you have hit a bit of a plateau in your rock climbing performance and you want to find a way to push to the next level, I defy you to read this book and not find at least a couple of things which will help you to do it.

I’m proudly stocking it in my new, online climbing books shop. Buy Dave MacLoed – 9 out of 10 climbers make the same mistakes for just £15 – bargain!