Especially after V6, progression is not linear and each grade is approximately twice as difficult as the previous. Many people never get past V6, V7 or V8. The timeframes below apply to indoor bouldering. For someone who is non-athletic but of normal fitness and not carrying excess weight, and who is climbing every second day or so, general consensus is that V1 to V3 progresses at about a grade per month, with V4 and upwards taking longer. For example, at 3 months, one is starting to have success with V3.
However, as you will see below, there is a lot of variability in these timelines. Climbing VB and V1 in the first few sessions, and V2 by the 4 th to 5 th sessions, seems to be about average. The move up from V2 to V3 starts demanding better technique and endurance. It can take 3 to 6 months to be confident at V3, although some strong and fit people can achieve V3s by the end of their first month. Outdoors is more challenging and can take twice as long.
V4 is where good technique starts to be essential. Unless starting out fit and strong, expect V4 to feel unachievable for a while. One commenter noted that he could climb most V4s after a year of 3 times per week bouldering.
Another suggested dedicating the first year to perfecting technique on V1-V3 problems, for a good solid foundation before making a start on V4s in the second year. It can take up to 2 years to do V5s confidently.
In other words, going from V4 to V5 can take a full year. There is a lot of variance, of course. Some people will achieve V5 within months of their first bouldering session, others will never reach that level. Going from V4 to V5 is challenging because it involves a significant step-up in difficulty. At V5, body tension becomes important, there are smaller and crimpier holds, and the sequences tend to require specialized techniques such as flagging, drop-knee, heel and toe hooks, foot matching, and dynamic moves.
The commentator mentioned above says that after a year of 3 times a week bouldering, he is successful with one third to half of tried V5s. The V5s he is not able to finish have a lot of crimps and involve a serious amount of core strength. It can take from one to three years to get from V1 to V6.
If starting off in decent shape and at close to optimal weight, with a bouldering schedule of 3 times per week, getting from V1 to V6 can sometimes be done by end of the first year. Again, V-grade progression is not linear. One person took only 9 months to get to V5, but then it took another year and a half to move up from V5 to V6. Getting from V1 to V4-V5 can be quite fast, some even achieve this in the first few months.
However, plateauing is common when approaching V5 or V6, and going higher than V5 or V6 requires a doubling down on training and technique. Plateauing is where one is stuck at a certain grade, unable to break through to the next one.
See this article for more on this. How long it takes to move through V grades depends on many things, from natural affinity and ape index to how hard your particular gym sets its problems. Baseline physical fitness has a significant impact. Coming to bouldering with good general fitness, especially from doing a variety of sports, leads to faster progression. Sports that promote good balance, like gymnastics, are particularly helpful because good balance is more important than brute strength in bouldering.
People who have a history of athletic activity will progress much faster than those coming from a non-athletic baseline because they bring a variety of skills that benefit bouldering, such as hand-eye coordination, quick reflexes, and the ever-important core strength, crucial at higher grades. A high muscle-to-body-fat ratio is also a bonus.
Every 10 pounds of excess weight lost will boost progress. Bouldering at least 3 times a week allows for muscle memory to develop. Climbing with V7-V10 climbers is excellent for picking up good habits and techniques. Lessons from an experienced coach are extremely helpful for getting techniques down pat.
Having extra-long arms is generally considered to be a benefit in bouldering. If your ape index is a positive number, your wingspan is wider than your height. Having a positive ape index means that your arms are longer than those of an average person of your height. The first example above, the ape index as a number, is the one most commonly used by climbers when reporting their ape index. Whether it is reported in inches or centimeters depends on location: countries using the metric system will use centimeters.
In one gym, you find that you struggle to do V3s, but in another gym you can sail through V4s and V5s. With this sort of inconsistency, how can you figure out your actual V grade level? The best way to gauge your true level is to test yourself on an outdoors boulder that is confirmed for its grade. If this is not possible, try several bouldering gyms to see how a certain grade feels in different locations, to develop an instinct for detecting soft and hard grading.
For example, a V1 problem may be labelled as being V2. Gyms will do this to encourage new clients to feel capable and successful, which makes it more likely that they will return.
Higher grades, perhaps V4 and up, tend to be more accurate because the people climbing at higher levels often have outdoor experience and a better idea of true grading. There is no need to follow official regulations when bouldering for recreation. However, problems with grades easier than 3 are rarely found. The Font Scale is similar to the V Scale in that the higher the number, the more difficult the bouldering problem.
At this point, rather than simply increasing the number when a climb gets more difficult, the scale adds certain suffixes to the number to indicate changes in difficulty. The first suffix is one of three letters: A, B, or C. The later the letter in the alphabet, the more difficult the climb. Thus, a 6C is harder than a 6B is harder than a 6A. The presence of a plus means the problem is more difficult than the same number-letter combo without a plus.
The Font Scale is the predominant grading scale in Europe and parts of Asia. It originated in France in the magical bouldering forest of Fontainebleau , hence the name. At higher grades, the Font Scale and V Scale become almost directly translatable. B3 was a climb that had only ever been done once. Following this system, John Gill , the father of modern bouldering in America and creator of the B Scale, intended the grades to increase with difficulty as the sport progressed.
However, the B Scale never caught on since it required problems to constantly be regraded and thus made comparisons difficult. For more fun, check out Gill exercising in his eighties.
Now THAT is impressive. The B Scale was the first scale ever used exclusively for bouldering problems in the United States. It was developed by the Gill in , and it included only three grades: B1, B2, and B3. Here is a map of the world indicating which countries use which bouldering grading scale. Two graded climbing routes at an American climbing gym.
One has a grade of 5. Bouldering and sport climbing are two related but different disciplines and therefore different grading scales have been created for each. The rule of thumb is that a V0 boulder problem is roughly comparable to a 5. However, this is almost never true at climbing gyms. Possibly outside this rule of thumb holds true, but — in my experience — indoors a V0 is similar to a 5.
Regardless, anyone who has both bouldered and sport climbed will know that the sports are complementary yet still different. Sport climbing routes require lots of endurance while boulder problems typically call for more powerful, dynamic movements.
This claim comes from countless hours spent at climbing gyms and crags over the years, watching other climbers and noticing which grades most of them never reach. But, almost without fail, whenever they try bouldering they can barely climb the easiest boulder problems in the gym. Check out our list of the hardest boulder problems in the world for more info. Replicating this difficulty indoors would be discouraging. No one would come back, let alone buy a membership. So instead, gym owners and routesetters simply delay that feeling of discouragement until your first trip outdoors.
From all my years of climbing and all the research I put into this article, my greatest takeaway is this:. There are some issues with bouldering grades and paying too close attention to a subjective and poorly designed system can detract from your enjoyment of the sport.
Pushing yourself too hard to reach the next grade can lead to serious injuries and cause you to spend inordinate amounts of money on the most expensive bouldering shoes. Try to lightly acknowledge the numbers and enjoy the challenge of bettering yourself each time you climb. Contents What Are Bouldering Grades?
How Are Boulder Problems Graded? What is a good bouldering grade? Is bouldering harder than sport climbing? What is the highest bouldering grade? Why is outdoor bouldering so hard?
The Bottom Line Related Articles. Warming up on a V1 5 outdoors. About the Author: Alex Beale. Alex Beale is 99Boulders' founder and editor-in-chief.
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