As climbers, finger strength and the health of our tendons is of the upmost importance. Having strong, healthy fingers will not only allow you to pull effectively on small holds, but will also allow you to keep climbing injury free.
Finger injuries are an unfortunate reality in climbing and something all climbers should actively work to avoid. To help you keep your tendons healthy and strong, here’s an article by Brian Rigby of Climbing Nutrition in which he debunks four myths about how diet can help keep your fingers healthy and provides four dietary suggestions in their place that may actually help.
The four pseudoscientific suggestions Rigby argues against are:
- Supplementing with vitamin C
- Supplementing with manganese
- Taking vitamin and mineral supplements including multivitamins
- Consuming collagen-based proteins
Rigby’s four dietary suggestions that he believes can actually help are:
- Eat More Phytonutrient-Rich Foods
- Consume Sufficient Calories (and Carbohydrates)
- Eat a Diverse, Healthy Diet
- Eat More High-Quality Proteins
Rigby discusses all eight of these suggestions in detail in the full article which you can reach by clicking through bellow. As Rigby himself admits at the beginning of the article, none of these suggestions are a magic cure-all. However, by following his suggestions you can both help your body protect your connective tissue and avoid wasting money on supplements that will have no effect on tendon health.
Also if you are looking for more information about how proper nutrition can help your climbing, check out our Nutrition Guide by Aicacia Young of climbhealthy.com
Click Here: Climbing Nutrition – Tendons
(photo courtesy of climbingnutrition.com)
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I enjoyed reading this very much. Thank you for writing such a thoughtful article. It made me more aware of questions about carbs. For someone like me, who does not tolerate carbs or fruits well (hypoglycemia), I’m getting worried as I was reading your article, that tendon injuries might be unavoidable for me. I make a point of staying below 50 grams of total carbs per day to avoid hypoglycemia. Do you have alternatives for climbers like myself?