Climbing shoes have a SECRET...

Climbing shoes provide superhuman abilities, but how much help is too much? Let's discover the secret purpose of the humble climbing shoe...
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Sources:
Magnus Midtbø - • What CLIMBING SHOES Sh...
Adam Ondra - • Adam Ondra #17: The Al...
REI - • REI Presents: Brothers... , • How to Choose Climbing...
Bouldering Vlog - • Jain Kim shows perfect...
Best Gear Lab - • Video
Arc'teryx - • Arc'teryx Presents: Ba...
Best Of Climbing - • Video
TAKEHOLD - • The Goods | How To Fit...
USA Climbing - • 2019 USA Climbing: Com...
Eric Karlsson Bouldering - • Climbing On A Masterpiece
REEL ROCK - • La Dura Complete: The ...
Olympic - • Rio Replay: Women's In...
Giant Rock - • Stoney Point: Rock Cli...
Red Bull - • First Female Rock Clim...
The New York Times - • What if He Falls? The ...
Whistle - • 19-Year-Old Could Beco...
www.climbingcoopers.com
www.eureka-photo.com
www.gearjunkie.com
www.lasportiva.com
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THANK YOU to my subscribers! If you enjoyed this video or you'd like to get involved I'd love to hear from you.
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Music: Stay by Dog, Monsters by Dog
Copyright © Ben Roper 2020

Пікірлер: 75

  • @JimmyTheGiant
    @JimmyTheGiant3 жыл бұрын

    That was really interesting, it'd be interesting to know when were climbing shoes came into the game and if climbers of the time disliked them.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 жыл бұрын

    Totally, great question... maybe I should do a followup?

  • @arthurgarcia7538

    @arthurgarcia7538

    3 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag I'd watch that!

  • @lucaspeters8009

    @lucaspeters8009

    2 жыл бұрын

    Climbing shoes have always been a part of climbing

  • @average-team-kid

    @average-team-kid

    10 ай бұрын

    For anyone interested, beor ong has a video on the history of climbing shoes

  • @franklinmichael671
    @franklinmichael6712 жыл бұрын

    It seems to me that we tend to consider using equipment that will drastically enhance our performance acceptable when the advantage is aimed at fixing a problem that can't be fixed with hard work and is bound to cause a plateau in the performance of any athlete participating in that sport.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    Nailed it!

  • @arahana
    @arahana3 жыл бұрын

    This made me think a little about the sorts of games that are popular in South Korea. While I was out there, the kids all played phone games, and I was always baffled as to why they almost always favoured simple easy to win games. To me good games need to be a challenge, you need to struggle in order to make the achievement worthwhile, much like climbing. When I would boulder, I would spend weeks and even months working on one rout, because the end pay off would be that feeling of achievement. With the kids I used to work with, and in many cases the adults too, I noticed that they needed that same pay off, but they only had 5 minutes of free time to get it. I used to look down on this and think it was lazy, until I realised that modern life there meant you took whatever chance you could to enjoy something, but you needed that win before you had to get back to class or work. It’s something that I think has inspired a whole new kind of gaming.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 жыл бұрын

    That was super interesting! Thanks brother!

  • @Siberius-

    @Siberius-

    11 ай бұрын

    I've never been interested in a whole bunch of suffering in order to get a supposed pay-off at the end with gaming for example. I just wanna chill and have fun. I see bouldering like that, it's always rather fun, and then there's extra highs. I wouldn't do it if it was like, suffering and not fun until the pay-off arrives. Because I don't think the math works out there. It does for a lot of people due to how the brain often works, we quickly forget all the suffering, and then we forget about how the good feelings only lasted a very short amount of time before starting the cycle again with a whole lot of new suffering, but I'm not that kind of person. I see the would-be cycle, and then I opt out lol. I generally don't see the pay-off as being worth it for a lot of things, so I generally take a different approach if I can (particularly with hobby-like activities).

  • @bennpham95
    @bennpham953 жыл бұрын

    I actually can't wear most of those expensive climbing shoes. Some brands had a soft enough heel area, but all of the ones that pinches too hard on the heels aggravates my achilles so I rather just go with those cheap shoes that work for me or (if outside, no shoes on easier routes), due to my achilles not being able to take it being crunched up (since i had achilles tendonitis in the past).

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 жыл бұрын

    Yikes! I wear bottom-shelf shoes too, but that's because A.) I can't afford expensive ones and B.) I'm generally just leaping around, rather than technical climbing!

  • @MPHshoots

    @MPHshoots

    2 жыл бұрын

    Have you tried the La Sportiva TestaRossas? I know you just said aggressive pairs are hard on your feet, but if you get the chance let me know if they fit well or not. That was my daily driver for the past 5 months or so.

  • @MPHshoots

    @MPHshoots

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag lmfao the shoes I just mentioned to the OP were in the vid at 2:56. Good taste in shoes and a good selection of vids. Well done my friend :)

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@MPHshoots Amazing

  • @alexbarcovsky4319

    @alexbarcovsky4319

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@MPHshoots I can attest to that, I have had 6 pairs of climbing shoes and Testarossas were a gamechanger for me when it came to comfort/performance ratio. People who say agressive shoes are uncomfortable just havent found the right one, that is a reality I come into contact daily. For example, one of my bouldering shoes, Evolv Phantom, dont really fit me THAT well, they are a bit too tight on the sights and I cant get my toe as curled up as much as I would like, and instead I have a huge amount of pressure on my pinky toe. They are great in overhangs, toehooking and heelhooking, but edging, at least for me, is really shit, and Testarossas are my go-to for that. My friend, on the other hand, that has the same shoe size as me, has it the other way - phantoms fit him extremely well while testarossas are painful - he has a long big toe and narrow foot, while my foot is wide and square. TLDR: Lots of nuance, just try a bunch of them and eventually youll find the one you fall in love with. PS: Scapra Veloce are also amazing for wider feet, very comfy yet performing well.

  • @egondugas
    @egondugas3 жыл бұрын

    So wonderfully detailed, and this one was funny!

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 жыл бұрын

    Egon Dugas thanks brother! Glad you enjoyed!

  • @kreshnikswag
    @kreshnikswag3 ай бұрын

    really good video!!!

  • @Olivia-W
    @Olivia-W Жыл бұрын

    But so do other sports require eqipment to make them possible. One example- skiing. Sure you can kinda slide down ackwardly on your feet, but what's the point of that? Or swimming. Who wants to swim without goggles?

  • @Hannah7Banana
    @Hannah7Banana Жыл бұрын

    Bro i have no clue what this man just said he sounds like an ai

  • @christopherwaller2798
    @christopherwaller27988 ай бұрын

    The secret is that climbing shoes are commercially available and the average gym climber has access to the same shoes that the professionals have! There are equipment controversies for long distance running and swimming as well, but I'd say that overall climbing has a avoided those kinds of issues with the clothing. It's more around bolting and aid. Historically many of the hardest big walls were considered impossible to free climb (so people would place gear and pull on it for hard sections), but now those routes can be free climbed by sufficiently skilled athletes, and the rope and placed gear is a safety backup. Aid climbing is still an option for the average big wall climber though! It's worth highlighting that as well as being an alternative to large boots which are more suited to hiking, it could be said that climbing shoes are inspired in part from the practice of wearing "slippers" (or what British people would call "plimsolls") to protect fragile southern Sandstone.

  • @legostud3892
    @legostud389211 ай бұрын

    the music is way too loud :(

  • @FrostyTooSweet
    @FrostyTooSweet3 жыл бұрын

    I'm all in on a completely nude climbing league.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 жыл бұрын

    Frosty Bowden Training starts on Monday. Bring your chalk bag.

  • @alexbarcovsky4319

    @alexbarcovsky4319

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag chalk is aid

  • @ratnakordosshu6291
    @ratnakordosshu6291 Жыл бұрын

    I have wide foot. 2 month ago 1st I went rock climbing class. And the teacher just told me to wear those shoes a climb a little. That shoes was narrow as hell. I was bad pain after 7 days in my toes. Climbing shoes are not good for foot 🦶

  • @rando4221
    @rando42212 жыл бұрын

    If we should abstain from equipment use, what professional sport is pure?

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    Swimming I guess? There are probably more...

  • @rando4221

    @rando4221

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag but even then you have goggles and swim caps to help you see and glide better. Also specialized swim jammers, briefs, etc. Definitely an interesting thing to consider

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@rando4221 Right! Shall we start the naked olympics?!

  • @rando4221

    @rando4221

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag😂 seems to be the only solution. And everything is done with natural, unaltered rocks. additionally, trails must be trodden by foot

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@rando4221 And no chalk!

  • @BibleStorm
    @BibleStorm5 ай бұрын

    The most expensive climbing shoes could never put a beginner on the same level as a pro.

  • @TalesIncs
    @TalesIncs Жыл бұрын

    Hey, i was searching around google whether anyone has thought about these questions and also expressed it on the web!

  • @TalesIncs

    @TalesIncs

    Жыл бұрын

    Anyway i tried to show a link here and youtube didnt warn me and deleted it. Anyway i wanted to say i also do functioinal climbing stuff and was experimenting barefoot and no crashpad climbs! could we connect and i hope we can discuss and collab on ideas in the near future! Please let me know where should i connect my social media with you all.

  • @chachan4142
    @chachan4142 Жыл бұрын

    I love your take on this. It's a very interesting observation you made about how we create tools to better satisfy ourselves in the games that we ourselves created. As much as I love climbing, I prioritize my foot health and I refuse to wear those horrendous shoes 💀💀💀

  • @jules1129
    @jules11292 жыл бұрын

    I like your editing

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    Thanks! I appreciate that

  • @trevor_corey8037
    @trevor_corey80378 ай бұрын

    No tape for crack climbers!!! 🪧

  • @mksnavsystem
    @mksnavsystem3 ай бұрын

    Bros camera quality got me wondering if it he is real or ai

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    3 ай бұрын

    I'm Bing

  • @micahpeters1232
    @micahpeters12322 жыл бұрын

    What? This applies to every sport. it is disrsctfull to climb without shoes or chalk because of the sweat just to name one reason. also what is a shoe going to do in a comp spring you to the top?

  • @Fuzzira

    @Fuzzira

    12 күн бұрын

    I think it's a rather funny argument to claim it's nasty to climb barefoot when no one thinks twice about handsweat, skin and blood that gets rubbed into the holds on the daily. Just don't lick your fingers before washing your hands. I mean compare it to a swimming pool where alot of people just completely forgo the responsibility to wash themselves before heading into the water and it's way worse since once in the water all that dirt gets mixed around.

  • @bionickchief
    @bionickchief Жыл бұрын

    the how about we add some actual hooks at the heel and the upper toe part of the shoe?

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    Жыл бұрын

    Aha yeah it would definitely be interesting to see what could be done

  • @bionickchief

    @bionickchief

    Жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag im joking 😄 that would be hax

  • @fadhlysukawidjaja174
    @fadhlysukawidjaja174 Жыл бұрын

    Considering alot of pro climber fav shoe are the Moccs back in the day (a flat, stiff and comfortable shoe) id say you're objectively wrong. I mean if you gave adam ondra a slightly shittier shoe I would say he would still climb as hard. It's an optimisation if anything; the climber makes the shoe and not the otherway around

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    Жыл бұрын

    You should have watched the whole thing! That's the point I made ;0)

  • @SuedeNWings
    @SuedeNWings8 ай бұрын

    Charles Albert that is all

  • @martinbugge6220
    @martinbugge6220 Жыл бұрын

    So what's the secret?

  • @donovandownes5064
    @donovandownes50642 жыл бұрын

    so wait, what is the secret?

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    Depending on your view the secret is either that they allow you to climb stuff you could never climb withoutthem, or that they actually change the whole sport of climbing for the better because they permit more variety and therefore actually increase challenge

  • @uploadsnstuff8902

    @uploadsnstuff8902

    11 ай бұрын

    Getting more views

  • @snusmumriken5607
    @snusmumriken5607 Жыл бұрын

    There are some videos of some people climbing skyscrapers barefoot. But climbing nude you say...

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    Жыл бұрын

    Aha let's do this!

  • @madeline569
    @madeline5692 жыл бұрын

    I'd like to see a former ballet dancer try climbing barefoot. They strength train their feet 4 hours a week

  • @madeline569

    @madeline569

    2 жыл бұрын

    Or someone with extremely dextrous feet

  • @Fuzzira

    @Fuzzira

    12 күн бұрын

    Ballet shoes are designed with the same principles though, scrunching your toes together to provide a more stable surface to apply pressure through. In fact if you compare the feet of a ballet dancer and climber they would usually look equally mangled unless they take very good care of themselves. I used to also think I had to downsize my climbing shoes alot but I've realized that a more relaxed fit will actually improve both my ability and strength instead.

  • @andrewscott5059
    @andrewscott50592 жыл бұрын

    I'll be honest, I think this video is a mess for a whole lot of reasons. The biggest of which, it doesn't mention the fact that there are barefoot climbers, and they're really good. there have been barefoot ascents of many incredibly technical, difficult boulders, up through ~V15 (Just look at Charles Albert). Climbing shoes aren't necessary for some climbers, and so your argument that they provide some magical superhuman ability falls flat on its face. I'll agree that they enable a wider variety of climbing routes and styles to be opened up, as I can't imagine anybody being insane enough to try to send a big wall without them, but that's a far cry from magic. It's also clear you don't really know the big innovations of climbing shoes that have made them better than just a tight rubber sock. Those being tensioned rubber (to create different shapes and force profiles along the footbed), toe and heel rubber (for moves that require the use of something other than the toe box itself), and innovations in closure systems that allow for more comfortable fits that perform just as well as a tighter uncomplicated shoe. We've taken shoes so far from what they were even twenty years ago. This leads to a more diverse set of shoes being sold, generally performing slightly better or at least being more bearable than historic counterparts, which are the real comparison, not bare feet. As for restrictions on shoe design, there is one and only one requirement from my understanding by IFSC: the shoe has to be commercially available. If you can make it and sell it, you can wear it. This restriction does put an end to most shenanigans though, since you'd probably have to get a large company to agree. For example, I've always joked that a bolt hole shoe would be an optimal design, a shoe that just has a long nail like steel protrusion out the front to stick into bolt holes and make great feet everywhere on an indoor climbing wall, but that design isnt practical because you do have to start with your feet generally on prescribed holds in IFSC, and again, so company would make these commercially. Basically the sport itself limits ideas like that. You also proposed why there arent sticky crimp gloves. The answer is basically that humans are better than any glove could do, because the thickness added by a glove would drastically reduce the ability to crimp hard. I am putting aside something like a metal exoskeleton for this analysis though, but that would be at the very least a different sport, as we do have aid climbing as an already existent activity that it fairly similar to just having metal helpers. And No, the reason we have usable climbing shoes is not to make more routes go. It's because climbing would be so unbearably painful if we didn't, that almost nobody would want to do it, stopping the sport in its tracks. we keep adding new gear to our arsenal to push the limits of climbing (just look at the phonebooks people are using to put in massive kneebars on a potential v17, the big Island Sit), however shoes were there from the beginning of the sport, with more thin and light shoes/barefoot climbing being a new activity. I'd argue that the reason we use shoes is because people who started the activity wore shoes, and it's a drastic increase in comfort. Look, this video made me think, but mostly because I just strongly disagree with a lot of what you said. I don't think you really did much research into the history of shoes in climbing, the innovation of them, or the alternatives to them that are modernly used.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    I think you've massively over estimated the seriousness of this video. No I'm not a pro climber or a climbing historian... It was just a quick reaction to a fun conversation I had at climbing one day

  • @andrewscott5059

    @andrewscott5059

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Seektag That's fair, not everything has to be an incredibly well researched content piece. Maybe my expectations were a bit higher than they should have been, given no prior knowledge of your channel.

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    I think you might be right, maybe it's not for you! Really liked finding out that some people can climb at high level with bare feet though... Wish I had known about that when I made this

  • @average-team-kid
    @average-team-kid10 ай бұрын

    So you're saying climbing shoes are aid.

  • @grantschlindwein5624
    @grantschlindwein56242 жыл бұрын

    Click bait thumbnail...

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    2 жыл бұрын

    The thumbnail states the opinion that the video examines

  • @jordanwelsh8644
    @jordanwelsh864415 күн бұрын

    Why does bro look AI generated

  • @Seektag

    @Seektag

    15 күн бұрын

    Bro is well lit and nervous af

  • @marcosjuan3142
    @marcosjuan3142Ай бұрын

    this is pointless because in every sport there is equipment that facilitates and improves performance... that's why soccer players don't play barefoot on the grass, for example?

  • @CptAngelADVlogs
    @CptAngelADVlogs7 ай бұрын

    There is NO reason that I can see to destroy your feet with climbing shoes if you're not a professional or an extreme tryhard. People have been climbing barefoot for millennia and the only reason they don't do it anymore is weakened feet from modern life and supportive shoes. I wanna start climbing with Vibram FiveFingers or some Sock - Shoes like Skinners. That's so much more appealing to me. Feel the climb with my feet and use toe strength just like you use finger strength. Should be so much fun!

  • @Johannes1321

    @Johannes1321

    4 ай бұрын

    Good luck on those small chips. smearing might be fine though.