In my opinion, the problem is less about the actual hangboarding, and more about beginners not knowing when to stop and let their fingers rest. Since new climbers aren't usually used to the strain that climbing puts on their fingers and tendons, it's very easy to overtrain and to get injured.
This is true just by climbing alone. Add to that the element of hangboarding and you are in a very high risk of injury!
If a new climber can listen to their body, and also follow a strict program that will minimize the potential for finger injuries, even including hangboarding in the program could be fine. But, this will take a lot of self discipline that a lot of climbers don't seem to have.
Generally, I think that if you do things correctly, you could be fine doing finger specific training during your first year of climbing.
It for sure can if you wear the wrong shoes! It would also likely be a combination of other things such as wearing climbing shoes that are too small and landing badly, which could be bad regardless of the shoes, but wearing shoes that are not good for you would most likely increase the risk of bad landings.
Even without combining shoes and other factors, wearing climbing shoes that are not right for you, such as shoes that are too small, can cause damage by itself if you wear them for too long and if they are really too small.
Being well educated about how well sized climbing shoes should feel, mindful of if you got it wrong, and disciplined enough to listen to your body should help prevent damage to your feet though.
Because we are in pain! But not that much pain. Generally, climbing shoes are not comfortable, and leaving them on for a long period of time just starts to hurt after a while. Taking them off in between some of the climbs just lets our feet relax a little bit, and delays the session-ending feet pain.
Rock climbing doesn't really get you big and bulky. It can make you stronger though, just without the massive body size.
There are some people who tend to grow and bulk up faster than others, at least to a certain size. They may get some more muscle mass than others, but for the most part, you muscle mass won't really increase that much.
What really helped me get better at sit starts was climbing on a moon board, and either finding boulders that have sit starts, or building new boulders with sit starts.
I was pretty bad at sit starts since they are very compressed for me, something I am fairly weak at. But after climbing for about a month almost only on the moon board, I really saw the improvement, and it was very noticeable.
I still work quite often on the moon board, and I can really see the difference from before and after. I try to do the most disgusting sit starts possible on the moon board, and I can do all of the sit starts on the regular route setting walls.
The moon board in my gym is a 30 degree angle I believe. If you don't have a moon board, I think you can probably do the same on any other system board.
It can equal stronger climbing, but not necessarily better climbing.
The problem with being very strong is that you start to neglect technique, because if you can just power yourself to the next hold or through the move, why would you do it in a more technical way? Even if you try to be more technical, it can be very hard to get rid of the habit of powering through moves. This is something many climbers struggle with, including myself.
On the other hand, if you are a technical climber, but are weak in terms of physical strength, training your forearms can help quite a lot by balancing you out a little bit. So you would still have the technique that you have developed until now, and you would also just be physically stronger.
So I would say that it just depends on your current situation. Are you more technical, or are you more powerful?
This is a really general question. It depends on a few things:
-
Why kind of climbing are you referring to?
If its bouldering, then you can climb on your own, but if sport climbing, then you require one more person to belay you. -
Why are you climbing?
Assuming the reference is to bouldering, then the question is why you are climbing. If you are climbing to just detach your mind from the day and to just be physically active, then yea, you could climb alone, and it may be better also if you just don't want to deal with people.
On the other hand, if you are bouldering with the goal of improving, then I would say both options are important for your progress. Climbing with other people, especially those that climb better than you, can really give you more insight into climbing, more ideas, betas, experience, and just more growth in general. Climbing alone is still important in my opinion though because it's when you are alone that you can actually practice all that you have learned with others.
That's my take on climbing with people vs climbing alone.
Extra point:
I personally find it quite hard to have a proper bouldering session with some friends. Instead of climbing hard routes, we end up just messing around.
