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I have no place to climb ropes
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The only way I could climb ropes was by going to a climbing gym and paying some dude to 'belay' me. That was going to get expensive quick.
Instead I went and brought 20' of rope spliced it onto a steel bar I picked up from the local scrap yard and I would go down to the park and hang it in the branches of this big old tree. Obviously you try to hang it close to the trunk so it can take your weight but not so close that the trunk is in the way. Total cost about $60.
It took me about 30min of walking around the park to find a tree I could easily climb and one that had the appropriate fork. NOTE" don't leave it there, take it away with you. Liability.
NOTE: always climb with a buddy incase of injury and don't climb more then 10 feet so that a fall is no big deal. My brother in law had 'bouldering' mats we used so I would climb to the 20' mark. Think safe.
On another note, most of the upper body strength work you do (incl lats) will give you the strength you need to climb a rope ok. From the guys I talk to who have been thru selection it's not so much the strength it's the climbing technique. A lot go in having never climbed a rope and you don't get to practice it that much in the courses running up to selection. When you get to the climbing rope parts of 'Nasty Nick' you're tired, the ropes wet and on top of that you really haven’t got you're climbing technique down.
I say all this cos you can practice technique on a 12 foot rope and just do the strength thing at the gym or whatever.
We had one guy who hung it from the main beam of his two story garage and put some old high school gym mats down. Perfect.
Food for thought.
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