Episode 49: A Better Strip of Wood with Tension Climbing

Tension Climbing makes wooden climbing holds.  Why wood?  That's exactly what I wanted to know.  I've long known that I'm a fan of climbing on wooden holds, and I have my reasons, but I've never put even remotely close to as much thought into it as the guys over at Tension have.  

In this episode, I sat down with Will Anglin (from Episode 12) and Ben Spannuth (who also designed the "bam! board") to discuss their products, the reasoning behind their shapes, what their favorites are, and more.  They just released two new hangboards: "The Grindstone" and "The Grindstone Pro."  If you're in the market for a board, you want one (or both) of these.  Trust me.  We go in depth on these two boards as well as their brilliant travel/warmup board "The Flash Board," their campus rungs, and even touch on their upcoming "Tension Board."  I had to stop Will from saying too much... he's just so excited.  

Tension Climbing is giving our listeners a discount! 
For a limited time only, take 15% off of any regularly priced item in their shop.  Simply use the code powercompany at checkout.   

Like what you hear?  Subscribe to The Power Company Podcast on ITunes, Google Play, or Stitcher Radio, and leave a rating and review!

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

Kris Hampton  00:31

What's up everybody? I'm your host, Kris Hampton. Welcome to Episode 49, we are almost to 50, of The Power Company Podcast brought to you by Powercompanyclimbing.com. I almost lost my place there because, well, A, I don't write anything down. I'm sort of like Jay Z in that respect. But we're almost to fifty episodes, that seems insane to me. You know, I wasn't even sure this thing was gonna keep going when I started it, so huge thanks to you guys for supporting it the way that you have. Every time I ask for support in a specific way, you've turned out for it, so thank you a ton. I really, really appreciate that and we're trying to make this as much as we can. One quick piece of business and then we're gonna get straight into this interview. Coming up in August, I've mentioned this to you guys before, August 17th 18th 19th, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin at Adventure Rock, Nate and I will be there. Steve Bechtel will be there. Justen Sjong will be there. Arno Ilgner will be there. We'll all be running workshops during the Midwest Training For Climbing Conference. It's the first of its kind. I'm really excited about it. We've had several conference calls with the guys and and we're all really excited about this. And we're we're all working together to try to give you guys something really unique and really cool. And if you sign up soon, I believe there are, I believe there's a few days left, by the time you're hearing this, then it's a little cheaper than if you wait until later. So go to the website, Midwesttcc.com. So head over to the website, sign up now, save yourself some money. Sounds like a good idea to me. Nate and I are going to be there debuting one of our new workshops on effective body tension, which is basically a really in depth look at rooting, which is something you guys have heard about here on the podcast, and I've gotten a bunch of emails from people wanting to know what rooting is. This the first place to really find out in depth. So head over there, check it out. Recently, I was contacted by Tension Climbing, Will Anglin in particular, and you've heard Will before on here, I believe Episode 12 with Rowland Chen, the "Position Over Everything" episode which is actually one of our most downloaded episodes. So people really like it and love what Will has to say, as do I. And Will contacted me and asked my opinion on hold sizes and and just the design of a hangboard and we talked for a while about it and then very shortly after he sent me a hangboard to test run. And and honestly it's it's one of the best hangboards I've ever used. I gave him my feedback on it. They they made some changes based on my feedback, based on other people's feedback and they've really turned it into something cool. So that's what I really initially went in to talk to  Will and his partner Ben Spannuth about and we ended up looking at so many cool things that Tension has that I just wanted to get a feel for what their whole line is, what it is that they're doing. And that way you guys have a good feel for it too. So let's just jump on into this.

Will Anglin  04:16

Because it doesn't matter if it's warm or cold. The wood is gonna be slippery. Hahaha You just got to grip the crap out of it and that's really where I find the training benefits.

Kris Hampton  04:44

But we do sound good so far.  Ben, talk in there for me a little bit.

Ben Spannuth  04:49

Testing. Chewbacca test. 

Kris Hampton  04:51

Chewbacca test

Ben Spannuth  04:52

Chewbacca squeak gun.

Kris Hampton  04:53

Yeah, give me some Chewbacca squeaks.

Ben Spannuth  04:55

Come here Rorydog. 

Kris Hampton  04:56

Rory is all about the Chewbacca It's sort of a it's a discolored Chewbacca? I don't know.

Ben Spannuth  05:05

 Maybe it's a Wookie. What's the difference?

Kris Hampton  05:08

Chewbacca could be a different Wookie, you are right.

Ben Spannuth  05:11

Chewbacca is a specific Wookie?

Will Anglin  05:12

Yes Chewbacca is a specific Wookie.

Kris Hampton  05:13

It was gonna cost too much to license Chewbacca so they just took another Wookie. Hahaha. So I think we're good here. So I'm sitting here in Tension headquarters. Do you have a name for this place? Is it like 

Ben Spannuth  05:30

The Shop

Kris Hampton  05:31

The Shop? Okay, sitting here in The Shop, which is Tension headquarters. I'll just go ahead and call it that. And I've seen... I've been here for like 15 or 20 minutes, and I've seen more cool mind blowing shit than I expected to for sure. And I'm sitting here with Ben and Will. Are you guys owners? Co-owners? What's the

Ben Spannuth  05:55

Co-owners with our other buddy Gabe.

Kris Hampton  05:58

Okay,

Will Anglin  05:58

So three of us. 

Kris Hampton  06:00

Cool. 

Will Anglin  06:01

Gabe will come by if he gets a minute.

Kris Hampton  06:03

How did you guys come together for Tension?

Will Anglin  06:08

That's a long tale

Ben Spannuth  06:11

How long have we known each other? Rory, quit it. Rory's also here.

Kris Hampton  06:16

Rory needs the Wookie, Ben. We should just give it to him.

Ben Spannuth  06:19

Well, we'll do that one more time and then give it to him haha.

Will Anglin  06:23

Ah well, Ben and I met in..... 2007? 

Ben Spannuth  06:31

Ah.....

Will Anglin  06:32

2006? I think it was 2006. I think it was like the 2006/2007 semester.....no

Ben Spannuth  06:42

I think it was later because I was helping with the Collegiate Climbing Series

Will Anglin  06:45

Well no it was senior year of college, or junior year of college,

Ben Spannuth  06:48

I think it was like 2009.

Kris Hampton  06:49

You guys met when you were 10. 

Ben Spannuth  06:51

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  06:52

On your bicycles.

Will Anglin  06:53

Haha well we met when like the CCS first started up. Ben was a Regional Coordinator for the Collegiate Climbing Series. I was running the Climbing Club or not, I don't even think it was called the Climbing Club. I was doing something at Western State

Kris Hampton  07:10

Where either of you involved in making holds or

Will Anglin  07:13

Oh no, 

Kris Hampton  07:13

Or you know, that kind of stuff.

Will Anglin  07:14

No not at all. Well, I had made... I made wooden holds by hand for the system board at Earth Treks in Rockville, Maryland, when I was in high school, and those were kind of the first wooden holds that I made.

Kris Hampton  07:28

Right.

Will Anglin  07:28

Which I still have, and they're on the Blackboard in Golden now, and they're fantastic. They're made of mahogany. 

Kris Hampton  07:36

It's gonna be it's gonna be a specialty thing, eventually, through Tension for Will's. handmade wooden holds.

Will Anglin  07:42

They are still, they are still some of my favorite ones. We haven't like reverse engineered them yet to get machined, but I'm sure at some point, that'll happen. But yeah, well, Ben and I met, like late in college, and then just started climbing together more often and talking about business ideas in general. I think we're both fairly opinionated about certain things. And we took a...was it like two months? In the van.

Ben Spannuth  08:23

Uh...maybe like six weeks? 

Will Anglin  08:23

Six weeks. Something like that. 

Ben Spannuth  08:25

Yeah. 

Will Anglin  08:25

So when you

Kris Hampton  08:26

Did you just bitch the whole time about all the things that were wrong with all the other companies.

Will Anglin  08:31

We played a lot of Settlers of Catan haha

Ben Spannuth  08:32

Haha yeah we mostly played Catan and bolted routes.

Will Anglin  08:35

Yeah we bolted routes and played Settlers of Catan and had always talked about doing some sort of business, Like, we looked into a lot of different things. And for some strange reason, we decided to make wooden climbing holds. Which is definitely...um... probably a bigger initial risk than some of the other things we had been talking about. 

Kris Hampton  09:07

Yeah.

Will Anglin  09:08

It's definitely.... I don't I don't think there's any other wood hold company out there who's operating in the way that we are?

Kris Hampton  09:17

Not that I know of, for sure.

Will Anglin  09:19

Yeah. So...yeah

Ben Spannuth  09:24

Maybe internationally. There's some others that

Will Anglin  09:26

But they are all... I don't think anyone is is machining them in like a mass kind of production way.

Kris Hampton  09:33

Right. That's how it seems to me, but again, I haven't looked at ton into it. So you said that you guys were opinionated about things and I think that's a good, a good place to start when coming up with a solution for something, you know. Some people are very opinionated, just because they like to complain and bitch and they never do anything about it, but was Tension a solution to something you saw out there? Was it, could it make things better, in your opinion?

Will Anglin  10:07

Yeah, definitely. I mean, my a lot of my motivation was pretty selfish, because I have really, really bad skin. And, and especially when I moved to Colorado, I was working a lot and still work a lot and so I don't always get to go climbing kind of whenever I want to. And so I spend most of my time climbing in the gym training for those, you know, one or two days that I do get to go out. 

Kris Hampton  10:40

Yeah.

Will Anglin  10:40

 And I noticed that if I spent all week training on, like the systems board with plastic holds, and bouldering on plastic holds and all that, that by the time the weekend rolled around, and I had a Saturday and I was like, Okay, I'm going to go climb, my skin was already shredded. And I would go out and try and climb whatever boulder I was trying to climb and try it twice and be bleeding and be like, well, I guess we're going home now. That sucks. And so a lot of a lot of this just kind of arose out of that as a way to be able to train and go hard, and be prepared so when you do get time to go outside, everything, everything can line up, including your skin condition,

Kris Hampton  10:53

Right

Will Anglin  10:58

Because a lot of.... bouldering really is, I mean, all of climbing, I guess, is condition dependent, and, and skin dependent. If you have thick skin and it's cold out, you can grab some of the most heinous things you could think of, and they're fine, and they actually don't feel all that bad. And then as soon as your skin soft, and it's 20 degrees hotter, like that holds impossible and you can't even hold on to it. So, just trying to help make training more effective, more efficient, and help you be better prepared for the objectives that you're actually training for.

Kris Hampton  12:07

Yep, I've always liked wood for that reason. You just said something, though, that I think is interesting that climbing is so condition dependent. What about the argument that people might make over wood is harder to hold on to in the gym? I mean, is it more condition dependent, or, you know, where what's the trade off?

Will Anglin  12:28

I would say that it's almost less condition dependent, because it doesn't matter if it's warm or cold, the wood is going to be slippery. And you just, you just got to grip the crap out of it and that's really where I find the, the training benefits, because you can take a hold that is a pad deep, but it's wood, and you have to grab it so hard to hang on that it you know, it could feel like the difficulty of a quarter pad sharp plastic hold. But at the end of the day, you're grabbing a bigger hold, it's less tweaky on the joints, and it's not tearing into your skin.

Kris Hampton  13:17

And I think it prepares you better as well. You know, I,  coming from the Red, which is where I learned to climb, I was very, very used to just letting my skin hang on to the holds. 

Kris Hampton  13:29

And that's what all the work is. And I can climb that way inside as well, most of the time. When I climb on wood, I really have to grab it. And then when I go places like Hueco, or Wild Iris and I really have to grab the holds because they're slippery and not, you know, they're not giving me anything back like Red River holds do, then I'm a lot better prepared when I've trained on wood. Ben you were involved in the Bam Board. So you had some background with wood holds as well. Is that where it started, was the Bam Board?

Will Anglin  13:29

Oh yeah.

Ben Spannuth  14:08

Yeah, that was sort of the first thing that I designed or made and definitely from there wanted to keep producing and designing more more things. So yeah, there was sort of always an idea to add holds and other hangboards, and balls and rungs and all that stuff. But that was definitely the first one where I sort of saw the actual potential for what it could be and then yeah, sort of built it all from there.

Kris Hampton  14:41

Why did you choose wood for that one? It seems like it would be just as easy to make it out of plastic or 

Ben Spannuth  14:49

Yeah, definitely the material is more like what you want to be using when you're using it not like from the manufacturing perspective. 

Kris Hampton  15:00

Right. 

Ben Spannuth  15:00

So it's easy to make really any of this stuff out of plastic. But it's really when you're using it that you want it to be that material. And to be honest, sometimes like climbing, I often climb at CATS, and really old plastic holds kind of have a similar feel. 

Kris Hampton  15:18

Yep. 

Ben Spannuth  15:18

And aren't as textured, so they don't wear your skin off and that can be good too. But obviously, wood sort of starts out and stays that way.

Kris Hampton  15:27

Yeah. How do you, how does wood age if it's in a gym, or if people are climbing on it for a long time? What's your experience with how it holds up?

Ben Spannuth  15:38

So so far, I, I kind of like, initially, until the chalk wears into it or like to say like, seasons it, it can be a little slippery, but we've definitely chosen wood types that, I'll say it again, season well and get almost more tacky with the chalk. 

Ben Spannuth  15:55

So things like poplar and cherry do a really good job of that. We've definitely veered away from maple and ash and some other wood types that don't season as well. More long term, like they can you definitely get shoe rubber on them, but typically, if you just brush it off, it does okay, and worst case scenario, if you just sand it a little bit, it's like brand new. 

Kris Hampton  15:55

Okay

Kris Hampton  16:18

Sure. Yeah, I hadn't even really thought of that. Todd Skinner's old wall, which the family just gave to me to put in the gym whenever I get it open in Lander

Will Anglin  16:30

Awesome

Kris Hampton  16:31

 Will be, it was a wood, largely wood, holds and a bunch of really old Yaniro pockets. And but those wood holds have held up really well. And but they had the rule of no climbing shoes. You always climbed barefoot on that wall and it was because of the rubber you know, making the hold slippery. Hadn't even thought of just a little bit of sandpaper would take that right off. 

Will Anglin  16:58

Yeah, so I've, the the oldest wood holds that I have are a little over 10 years old now. And they're you know exactly the same as they were when I first made them. But with the shoe rubber, because we've had wood holds on the Blackboard at Earth Treks for three years now and we've set some wooden boulder problems in the main bouldering area at Earth Treks which sees a ton of traffic, and the the chalk buildup is really easy to deal with you can if you just brush the holds. Just like with anything, they stay totally fine. If it does get pretty caked I've been using just a soft brass wire brush and it takes it right back to essentially brand new. And like Ben said, if if it you know if you don't brush them and they get gnarly and you've got you know, kids with pizza hands grabbing onto them

Kris Hampton  18:00

RIght right. 

Will Anglin  18:01

You can you can just

Kris Hampton  18:02

Does Ben come in here with pizza hands?

Will Anglin  18:04

Ben has pizza hands 

Ben Spannuth  18:06

I always have pizza hands haha. 

Will Anglin  18:10

Yeah, just like a little a little, a little sandpaper in there and then they're like, full on brand new. The the shoe rubber does discolor the hold, and it'll like work into the the grain of the hold and and you'll be able to see it. But my experience so far is that it doesn't actually change the texture of the hold in any sort of way that that would be detrimental. 

Kris Hampton  18:35

Yeah. 

Will Anglin  18:36

Because we have wood footholds also.

Kris Hampton  18:39

 Right.

Will Anglin  18:39

 And those are fantastic.

Kris Hampton  18:43

Yeah, we like to... so the system board I built, the Mirror Board up in the Engine Room, we used wood for the for the feet, just wooden rails. And I get a lot of complaints about it, because they're so hard to stay on, which is exactly the reason I use them.

Will Anglin  19:02

Exactly

Kris Hampton  19:02

You know, which I think is a really good thing if you're training and, you know, you have to apply attention to the wood for it to work in your favor. So I think that's a good idea to have wooden footholds as well.

Will Anglin  19:19

And they really, so we picked the wood footholds that we make are poplar and poplar is just an awesome wood. We use it for a lot of things because it it has this kind of soft texture to it that gets really nice and grippy with chalk. And even for the footholds, especially the little incut footholds that we have, you can toe in and pull in on them and use them in any way that you would normally use any other foothold. But they definitely do require a lot more attention, like how much pressure you are putting on them and in what direction and if you stop thinking about your feet, you you pop right off.

Kris Hampton  20:04

Right.

Will Anglin  20:05

Which is, in my opinion, is a good thing. And especially as, as a coach, when I work with people I, I always at some point will put them on wood holds on the Blackboard, because when you watch someone climb on holds without texture, I, the metaphor I use for those, it's it's like a highlighter. If there's something that you're deficient in, if you're not driving into your feet enough, or your hands aren't accurate enough, or you're not in the right body position, you'll know immediately, because you won't be on the wall anymore. 

Kris Hampton  20:46

Right. Right. You can't let the friction do the work.

Will Anglin  20:48

 Yeah, you've got to be.... it is this, it makes you kind of climb in this really accurate, like aggressive movement style that has, in the past three years, has really changed how I've climbed and in like, a really good way. And I notice it every time that I go climbing and and I really, I know it's it's a little biased, because it's my company, I'm trying to sell these things, but the straight up like the reason that I climb that way now is because of the wood holds.

Kris Hampton  21:31

You know, it makes sense. You look at, you know, the guys in like, The Schoolroom, and you look at Todd Skinner had his woody down in Lander and all of those old school climbers climb with that very aggressive, powerful sort of.... I don't know if I want to use

Will Anglin  21:52

Precision

Kris Hampton  21:52

Powerful precision. Exactly. I was gonna say powerful smoothness, but but yeah, it's I mean, that's the style, they all climb in and they're known for and climbing on wood as their training might have something to do with that.

Will Anglin  22:07

I would I would be surprised if it didn't.

Kris Hampton  22:11

Well, can we talk a little bit about some of your products that you guys have? You know, I'm, I'm stoked on a lot of it. Everything I've seen, I'm stoked on. So if we can talk about what you guys have got out right now and maybe hint at some of the things that are coming, that'd be great. You've got holds, obviously,

Ben Spannuth  22:32

Yeah, it kind of all started with, before we were like willing to launch it, we wanted as diverse and like, as broad of a spectrum of holds as possible.

Kris Hampton  22:42

 Right,

Ben Spannuth  22:42

 So from, like incut crimps to slopers and pinches and finger buckets and all that, it's a pretty well rounded set. And then from there, or kind of at the same time, we were doing campus rungs, hangboards, yeah, we kind of have the whole the whole gambit now.

Kris Hampton  23:03

So with the holds, how would you suggest people, you know, let's let's look at the home user first. Would you suggest they get you know, look into having a selection of holds? Do you have holds that are your favorites that you would suggest for home users?

Ben Spannuth  23:22

It definitely depends on the wall angle and the difficulty that they want, but I'll pick two favorites.

Kris Hampton  23:28

You look very happy about choosing favorites of your own holds.

Ben Spannuth  23:33

The small large crimp, or sorry, the shallow large crimp, 

Kris Hampton  23:37

Shallow large crimp.

Ben Spannuth  23:38

 And the small finger bucket are my two favorite holds, I think. 

Kris Hampton  23:41

Okay,

Will Anglin  23:42

Those are good ones. Yeah, so let's see. Yeah, when because we've we've helped a lot of people with home walls kind of pick sets and like come up with hold orders based on you know, how hard you climb now? How hard do you want to climb? How big is your wall? How steep is it?

Kris Hampton  24:03

So if people out there want to reach out to you and say, "This is the wall I have. Here's how I climb.", you can help them pick the right holds out? 

Ben Spannuth  24:11

Oh, yeah,

Will Anglin  24:11

Absolutely. Yeah,

Ben Spannuth  24:12

Will's done that dozens of times.

Will Anglin  24:14

I love doing that. 

Kris Hampton  24:15

Cool.

Will Anglin  24:16

 It's awesome. But my I would say my my favorite holds... have a favorite hold. My single favorite hold is the wide shallow pinch. It's like a, yeah, like a half pad pinch.

Kris Hampton  24:34

It's like a half inch tall block, right? 

Kris Hampton  24:37

Right.

Will Anglin  24:37

Yeah it's just awesome. You gotta get mean with that thing. And that's uh, yeah, I really like I really like holds like that. It's very much like I refer to them as like, like the two crux holds on Black Lung where you just have to squeeze so hard with like your fingertips and your thumb.

Will Anglin  24:43

 And yeah, it's just a cool hold type, I think. It's one that I find outside a lot, like that crimp pinch.

Kris Hampton  25:09

Yeah, I think that I think, again, the wood makes a big difference there because a pinch on plastic, you can do a lot with the friction. 

Will Anglin  25:18

Oh, yeah.

Kris Hampton  25:19

You know, and

Will Anglin  25:20

Sometimes you don't even have to pinch it. You can just like, get to the side and like lean on it. 

Kris Hampton  25:24

Yep.

Will Anglin  25:24

 But yeah, not not with these. You gotta

Ben Spannuth  25:28

They make you engage little more. You gotta squeeze it a little harder.  

Will Anglin  25:31

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  25:32

Yeah, I think that's really important, especially for the sake of training. You know, if you're interested in getting stronger, why not use the tools that are going to make you stronger? Okay, those are, I'm excited to see this shallow...which one of these is the shallow large crimp?

Ben Spannuth  25:48

Oh, that...its right.....right to your right.

Will Anglin  25:50

Yeah. You see that one in that box? 

Ben Spannuth  25:51

It's cherry, kinda sticking out of that bin? 

Kris Hampton  25:53

This one? 

Ben Spannuth  25:53

Yeah. It's kind of a basic hold. I just like the profile of it. 

Will Anglin  25:57

It's really, really comfortable and it scales super well. Like that's a hold that, especially if you have like an adjustable wall, or something that really allows you to scale the difficulty in a pretty linear way. 

Kris Hampton  26:12

Yeah.

Will Anglin  26:13

Some of the, like, the flat edges, for instance, and stuff that's slopier, when...it's more of, like an exponential increase in difficulty as the angle steepens. 

Kris Hampton  26:25

Yep. 

Will Anglin  26:26

Like, like it just gets, the difficulty goes through the roof, like every 10 degrees. Where something like that that shallow large crimp, it's got, like, just a nice shallow kind of smoothing cut. It's about like three quarters of a pad. Just perfect training edge for basically any angle. We use those a lot.

Kris Hampton  26:49

Yeah, I like the way this feels. And it definitely feels like, you know, it's just the right edge depth, and angle that as it gets steeper, you just need more and more and more from your feet, you know. You're gonna be able to hold it. Most people are gonna be able to hold this edge. It's just going to be a matter of how much tension can you apply while you're holding it, you know. So very cool. What was after holds? Did you go straight to campus rungs at that point?

Will Anglin  27:19

Well, the rungs they, they were kind of simultaneous. We've definitely we knew we wanted to get into rungs. That's something that I had very strong opinions about initially. I really disliked basically every campus rung that I ever

Kris Hampton  27:39

Disliked basically everything.

Will Anglin  27:40

Yeah, every single one. And I, and I'm the kind of person I really, I really need campusing. I am not very powerful. I've...that kind of upper body explosive strength has always been something that I've struggled with, and I so I see really good results when I'm able to campus consistently. But the rungs I was using, just... even though they were wood, which I didn't get, I was like, "How are they tearing up my hands if they're wood?" And so we started developing ours and playing with different angles and edge round overs, and just really took it back to the drawing board and tried to make something that was super comfortable. Because if it's comfortable, you're going to be able to use it more often and not have to stop because like your skin is burning.

Will Anglin  28:39

You stop because you did your last rep and now you're done. And it's it's to the point now where like, if I....I won't campus unless they're on our rungs. I like can't bring myself to do it because they're just way more comfortable. That and putting the curve on the front and laser engraving the numbers in there so that you always know where you are. It's just just stuff that I was like, "How come no one, how come no one's doing this? This is this would be way better."  Like why are people having to draw in Sharpie on these new rungs that they just bought just so that they are functional? Like, why don't they come with numbers?

Kris Hampton  28:39

 Right right .

Kris Hampton  29:20

Yep. You know, I think what it comes down to is that all this stuff was so I guess elementary is the word I want to use when it first came out. Like everyone could just put up a strip of wood, you know, so someone had to come out with a slightly better strip of wood. So I don't think there was a whole lot of thought put into it as far as how comfortable is it? You know, how does it feel when you're campusing on it? How long can you campus before your skin gets destroyed? My guess is there wasn't a lot of that thought put in it was just, "Let's make a slightly better strip of wood."

Will Anglin  29:58

Yeah,

Kris Hampton  29:58

So that we can sell it for more money. 

Will Anglin  30:00

I think I think we definitely made the best strip of wood.

Kris Hampton  30:04

Hahahah

Ben Spannuth  30:04

Hahaha

Will Anglin  30:06

 It's definitely a strip of wood, but it is awesome strip of wood.

Kris Hampton  30:11

That's perfect. That's what this episode is gonna be called. "The Best Strips of Wood With Tension Climbing"

Will Anglin  30:16

 That's right. 

Kris Hampton  30:18

And then you've got, you know, you've got size, big size, you got a bunch of different sizes, you've got the big, big slope rungs.

Will Anglin  30:24

Yeah, this so this I like, I like to tell the sloper rung story because it it's just, it's fun. It's fun to me, it kind of represents a lot of what we're about, so

Kris Hampton  30:36

I notice there's no grip tape on them, first off, which,

Will Anglin  30:39

Well, yeah,

Kris Hampton  30:40

I'm super stoked about

Will Anglin  30:41

 No grip tape. That would be crazy. So these are not...there's a number of ways you can get sloper rungs and one of those ways is you get a big dowel of wood, and you cut the back off of it and now you have this like kind of juggy sloper rung.

Kris Hampton  30:58

Right

Will Anglin  30:58

 But we didn't like that. 

Kris Hampton  31:03

Why not?

Will Anglin  31:04

 Because the way that when you take something that when you take that cylinder and you just cut the back off, when it's that big, the way it pushes out the center of your hand, creates this funny kind of wrist angle that is uncomfortable. And my wife has had some wrist problems and I know a couple people who have struggled with that. And so again, we just started from the very beginning of like, Okay, well what is going to be, what's the most ideal shape for sloper campusing, or sloper jug campusing. And we had access to a 3D printer and so we played with different different edge profiles and printed them out and felt them until we got to a point where we liked it. And then we had custom tools made so that we could cut the wood exactly how we wanted it. And that is how we got these reversible sloper rungs. So one side is harder and definitely more slopey and one side curls in the back and is definitely a lot more of a jug and it has a flat profile on the front so that when you actually hang on it, your your wrist, more or less stays straight. And so it kind of eliminates that that wrist issue. 

Ben Spannuth  32:31

We did similar stuff with like campus balls and all the spheres, so instead of it being in like an actual ball, it's kind of like a compressed.

Kris Hampton  32:40

Oh, right. Yeah, it looks like it's been smashed down.

Ben Spannuth  32:42

Yeah, for the same reason so that you don't have your wrists like cocked out when you're grabbing it and it's like more comfortable.

Kris Hampton  32:47

Oh, cool. Yeah, I've never been a big fan of sloper campusing largely for the weird position it puts you in when they're on these giant PVC, you know.

Will Anglin  33:00

Yeah, it's it's uncomfortable on the wrist and, and a lot of the sloper balls that are out there, you end up just hooking them and wrapping them around the side. 

Kris Hampton  33:10

Right.

Will Anglin  33:11

 And that's also, like Ben was saying, that kind of flattened profile. It encourages you to grab it straight on the front and not wrap around the corners, 

Kris Hampton  33:21

Sure, sure

Will Anglin  33:21

Which is a peeve of mine. And so we just did away with that.

Kris Hampton  33:26

Do you have a lot of pet peeves Will? It appears that

Will Anglin  33:29

Hahah yeah. Too many.

Kris Hampton  33:32

Well, I'm glad that you do because you're fixing things here. You're creating solutions and that's a good idea. Yeah, I'm gonna have to try those out. I've never been a big fan of campusing on slopers. But looks cool. Looks like a great idea. When did the Flashboard come in? Was that right after the campus rungs? Or was there something in between?

Ben Spannuth  33:58

That was maybe..... so we've been around coming up on two years, and it's probably like a year into it. Maybe? Maybe over a year into it? It's not very old.

Will Anglin  34:12

It's...noo, none of none of  this stuff really is.

Ben Spannuth  34:14

Maybe nine months ago, something like that. 

Will Anglin  34:17

Yeah, that that's kind of one of my favorite things. That's something I've been thinking about for many years and was like, how come no one has made this?

Kris Hampton  34:32

 Did you conceptualize it as a warm up tool? As a training tool?

Will Anglin  34:36

Yeah, specifically, so specifically as like a warm up and an on the road training tool and from the very beginning of thinking about it, I was like, it's a cylinder. Like of course it's going to be a cylinder. It makes so much sense. The whole thing becomes a pull up bar. The way that the suspension system works, when you use the cylinder and you cut that flat face into it, it prevents it from rotating and tipping all over the place.

Will Anglin  35:03

 And what I really wanted was just something where, like, if, again, because my skin's terrible, if you hike....you've got to hike all the way to Upper Chaos or something and you're trying to try your project and it's, you know, some hard grade and there's the next easiest boulder is, like 600 yards away through the talus. It's like, I just want to warm up and do this problem.

Kris Hampton  35:03

Right.

Kris Hampton  35:34

Right.

Will Anglin  35:34

 You can do that. And why.... I also travel a lot, like if I have to go coach at comps or anything like that, and then you're stuck up in a hotel and they have three treadmills and a 50 pound dumbbell. It's like what am I....like, I'm a climber too. Like, I know I'm a coach but you know, I can't just... I don't want to... I'll go crazy if I have to sit on my butt for a week.

Kris Hampton  36:00

 Right.

Will Anglin  36:00

 I'd be insane. And so yeah, having a hangboard like that to take around and you can just hook it up on any pull up bar. You can do, people were calling them "no hangs", where you like attach weight to it and pick it up and use that center edge. It's incredibly versatile and it... yeah, I just I take it everywhere so I never have to be without a hangboard.

Kris Hampton  36:26

Yeah, we've been using it quite a bit, alll the guys have. And and I think all of us have, except for Paul. Blake, Nate and I all used it largely as a warm up tool. It was especially key for me this last fall, because I was in the Red and I was trying to just do the short bouldery stuff I had ignored for years and things that were really hard right off the ground. And that's my absolute anti-style, you know. I suck at really pulling hard right off the ground and several of them had tiny little crimps really close to the ground. And it's so hard for me to get warmed up for tiny little crimps in the Red, you know. There are no tiny little crimps on anything under 13b or c, you know. It's all relatively big holds. So I would take the Tension board up with me, clip it to a first bolt and hang on it and play around on it until I felt ready to crimp. And once I was able to full crimp a few times hanging on the Tension board comfortably, then I was ready to go, you know, and that was huge for me. Paul has used it. He takes it into the gym with him when he's training and they don't have a hangboard there. But he does his, you know what Steve Bechtel calls "integrated strength training", does his heavy workouts mixed in with his heavy hangs on the on the Flash Board. And so he uses it specifically for training in a in a space where he couldn't otherwise incorporate hanging.

Will Anglin  38:11

Yeah, I think it definitely shines for that, especially the integrated strength stuff from from Steve, because I know at least I was struggling with it because you, you get the squat rack all set up and then you do your set and then you go upstairs and then you do your hangboarding and then you come back down and someone else is on the squat rack and now you're like aw man.

Kris Hampton  38:37

If you even have that in your facility.

Will Anglin  38:38

Yeah, if you even have it and then so yeah, just being able to hang the Flash Board up right there and, and just get it done. It's amazing.

Kris Hampton  38:46

Yeah, you could carry that thing into Gold's Gym 

Will Anglin  38:49

Straight up

Kris Hampton  38:49

And yeah, most likely no one's gonna say anything to you. 

Will Anglin  38:52

Yep. And and really and for like the apartment crowd, which I'm also a part of, not having to drill into your wall, just getting one of those pull up bar things that hangs from a doorway and just hanging it from there and now you've got you've got a hangboard at home. No problem.

Kris Hampton  39:08

Yeah, we've been absolutely loving that thing and I've recommended it to I can't tell you how many people. You know, I was just I was in Rifle not too long ago and I was talking to Sam Elias and Joe Kinder. And, and Sam was using a different board to warm up and I'm not going to name any names, but but Joe basically just said, "Why are you using that piece of shit? Where's your, where's your Flash Board?" And Sam said he had to sell it to somebody when he was in Europe because everybody wanted the thing you know. So he sold his and came back to the US and still needed to pick up another so. And he called it, he called it a work of art and and I agree completely. You know, I think there's... it's one thing to just attach some strips of wood to a board and call it a warm up tool. It's another to put a lot of thought into the sizes of the edges and what it's going to be used for and the suspension system that keeps it from rotating and, you know, it's obvious that a lot of thought was put into that. Have you guys ever thought about... Nate's one complaint about it was that he wanted to have a bag, some sort of bag to put it in? It might just be Nate's OCD.

Will Anglin  40:29

We we actually we looked into bags, but never, never found one that we really liked. And then just didn't pull the trigger.

Kris Hampton  40:39

 Right. 

Will Anglin  40:40

But bags are a part of the future, for sure.

Kris Hampton  40:48

And then you guys have got some pretty cool things coming down the pipe. I don't know how much you want to say about any of those. This episode will come out probably a few weeks after we're recording it here. Do we want to talk about the hangboard that's coming out?

Will Anglin  41:09

Yeah. Yeah, give us a primer. Ben, what's up with the hangboard?

Ben Spannuth  41:15

So we've been playing around with a few different ideas. The base is, is basically just a board that has small increments of change. So originally, it started off with two millimeter increments. But now it's most likely going to be two different boards with five millimeter increments. 

Kris Hampton  41:36

Yep. Which I just looked at and, and I tested the, the original and love it. And but it makes a lot of sense, I think to have the two different, one slightly more difficult, one slightly easier board with the five millimeter increments. So and I just looked at those and I think they're great.

Ben Spannuth  41:54

Yeah, and those should be ready in the next probably two weeks. We kind of are just just doing the harder version today actually, and dialing it in.

Will Anglin  42:06

So probably out when this airs. 

Kris Hampton  42:10

Yep.

Will Anglin  42:10

 I'm sure I'm sure they'll be out and up on the site.

Kris Hampton  42:14

We'll we'll time it that way. I know the guy who puts these out, so...

Will Anglin  42:16

Sweet. Yeah, so so y'all can go to our website, tensionclimbing.com. Go and buy about 20 of them apiece if you want.

Kris Hampton  42:29

Yeah. Let's talk about the holds that are on these. The jugs are going to stay the same on the small ones. 

Will Anglin  42:37

Yep.

Kris Hampton  42:37

 And everyone who's hung on the board is like, these jugs are amazing. You know, it's it's hard to 

Ben Spannuth  42:45

We definitely try to make 

Kris Hampton  42:46

Make the jugs better ?

Ben Spannuth  42:47

Make things as comfortable as possible, regardless of

Will Anglin  42:49

Comfort over everything.

Kris Hampton  42:53

I generally don't like to do just pull ups on a hangboard. But the pull ups on those jugs are so much nicer than on a pull up bar that you know, I think that's the way to go.

Will Anglin  43:05

Yeah, we're pretty happy with that jug. That turned out nice, for sure.

Kris Hampton  43:11

Is the easy board all edges? Jugs and edges, is that right?

Will Anglin  43:15

Yep. So we're calling it the Grindstone. A pretty classy name.

Kris Hampton  43:22

I like.  Are they both called the Grindstone or just the easy one?

Will Anglin  43:25

So we'll have the the Grindstone and the Grindstone Pro is the harder version.

Kris Hampton  43:30

Nice. I like being a pro, so

Kris Hampton  43:32

Yeah, and I'm a big fan of that, frankly. That's, you know, especially if they're big pockets, if you're training like a two-pad two-finger, there's no reason to just have a two pad deep hole. You can you can do it on a on a large edge.

Will Anglin  43:32

Yeah, exactly. Gotta get Pro hahaha. So so the Grindstone basically, it's super simple. It's got the jugs, and then it just has a series of edges from 35 millimeters to 15 millimeters in five millimeter increments. So 35, 30, 25, 20 and 15. And then in the center, you've got your 50 millimeter edge for doing some one arm hangs and also in the center is the 22 millimeter edge. So just a series of edges. The question I get asked all the time with that is like, well, "What if I want to train pockets?". Then just put two fingers on the edge.

Ben Spannuth  44:40

The only exception might be the mono, which on the other board is has a bit of a modified profile, again to make it a little more comfy.

Kris Hampton  44:48

Yep. So with the... you know, are these are both these boards gonna have the cell phone pocket as well? 

Will Anglin  44:54

Oh, yeah.

Kris Hampton  44:55

 Okay. I didn't know. I didn't know it was a cell phone pocket when I first used it, but now that I do, my phone's been in there constantly so. So the top will also, instead of just jugs on top, there will be a slot that your cell phone can fit in and angle down towards you?

Will Anglin  45:14

Yeah, that's, that's actually probably my favorite thing on the boards. I've seen some pretty hilarious and creative ways that people have got their interval timer to be near them while they're hangboarding. A friend of mine, I just saw, has a plastic baggie screwed to the wall and he sticks his phone in this plastic bag. I was like man, we gotta we gotta fix that, because that's not a good solution. So yeah, there's a slot cut in the top middle, and you just stick your cell phone, any kind of cell phone or whatever in it and it tips and points straight at your face, and you get your interval timer going and it it's great. Simple, but good solution.

Kris Hampton  46:01

Yep. Why no slopers?

Will Anglin  46:03

Why no slopers? So this, this is another thing I get asked all the time and strength on slopers is kind of not really a thing. Climbing on slopers has so much more to do with body position, and how you're actually moving around those holds. 

Kris Hampton  46:31

Yep.

Will Anglin  46:32

 Like no one's grabbing really slopey slopers at Horse Pens and sticking to them because they're gripping them harder. Like it doesn't work like that.

Kris Hampton  46:41

I was so hoping you would say this so that I didn't have to argue with you.

Will Anglin  46:45

Yeah, it that's that's just not how slopers work. So just, yes, there's there's a strength component involved with your hands, but you're training that when you're training on edges also. It doesn't....you don't need the slopers and especially in a hangboard situation, that's, I mean, that's all about.... that's friction, you know.

Kris Hampton  47:07

 Yep.

Will Anglin  47:07

That's not, you're not training your muscles to do anything harder. You're just sliding off or you're not sliding off. And so we just, in an effort to make the board just have an efficient use of space and basically give you what you need and not all kind of the frilly things that no one ever uses on a lot of those other hangboards anyways, we just got rid of them. You don't need them and same and you know, same idea with the pockets. That's why, for the most part, the hangboards don't have any pockets, because you really can just put however many fingers you're trying to train in the same spot where the  four finger edge is and get exactly the same thing out of it without having to add all that space on the hangboard.

Kris Hampton  47:58

Right, right. Now the odd man out there seems to be the 22 millimeter. Is that just a popular size? Is there a reason you chose that?

Will Anglin  48:06

Yeah, so we chose a 22 millimeter because some of the more popular hangboards out there, people really like the the particular edge on them. And for the training nerds out there who want to be able to compare board to board, there's your 22 millimeter center edge.

Kris Hampton  48:27

Yep. Cool. Yeah, I think that's smart. Let's look at the Grindstone Pro, then.

Will Anglin  48:32

Yeah. So So this one has... is an exception to the pocket rule. We....so the the one thing I will I'll give everyone who's losing it right now when I said that pockets don't matter on a hangboard. Yes, monos are important. Because the way that like a mono pocket kind of supports the side of your finger is definitely important and so

Kris Hampton  48:57

Particularily when you're starting to train monos if 

Will Anglin  48:59

Yeah,

Kris Hampton  49:00

 If you, I mean, if you're super strong on monos already, you can train them on edges, but most people can't do that.

Will Anglin  49:09

Yeah. So so this this one has a mono. It's 45 millimeters deep, so it's pretty deep, but we.... Ben figured out this awesome like interior edge profile for the mono that I have been just geeking out on.

Kris Hampton  49:30

 Oh, yeah, I'm pretty amazed by how nice it feels actually.

Will Anglin  49:33

Yeah, it's insane. I've never I've never grabbed a mono and been like, "Man, this is comfy. Like, I could hang on that". And, and I, I the first time I grabbed that thing I was like, "Oh my God. That's amazing. That's perfect. That's exactly how it should feel".

Kris Hampton  49:52

And I've been in mono training mode for Wild Iris and that was my my biggest criticism of the original board you guys made, was that the mono, while it had this nice round radius, that radius seemed to seemed to hurt my skin a lot more than I expected it to. Just the way it was pressured when I was hanging on the monos, and this one feels like, I mean, it's it feels ridiculous. It's, it's so cool. I never would have imagined having that funnel shape and it 

Will Anglin  50:28

Yeah, crazy.

Kris Hampton  50:29

But once you grab it, it makes so much sense. 

Will Anglin  50:31

It's yeah, it's this weird combination of the edge roundover that's being used and this 20 degrees slope. Like the whole pocket isn't sloped, but it's got this this contour around the edge of the pocket that just, it just fits the way that your finger bends. It's, it's perfect. Yeah, yeah, it's a lot of it's not just as easy...you can't just make something out of wood, and then say it's skin friendly. Like you can you can make bad wood holds,for sure. You can

Ben Spannuth  51:10

We definitely spend a lot of time trying to make them comfortable haha.

Will Anglin  51:13

Yeah, Ben's

Ben Spannuth  51:14

I've made a lot of uncomfortable holds that we've got rid of haha.

Will Anglin  51:20

Yeah, it's, yeah, it really, man, I could go on about this pocket. But but Ben nailed it. It's the best mono pocket ever. So we'll move on. There's also a two finger pocket on it, on the Grindstone Pro. Mainly just because I wanted to give a slightly bigger hold for training two fingers at a time but I didn't necessarily want to put a whole nother four finger edge on the board to take that much space up because it's definitely the more advanced board. It does have like a 35 millimeter edge to warm up on, but basically you jump right into 20 millimeters and then it goes 20, 15, down to 10 millimeters in those five millimeter increments. So you can train a progression on that and then in the center, there's a 30 millimeter and again, that 22 millimeter edge. Not that you couldn't hang one hand on on any of those other two handed edges if you were strong enough. But then the the kind of the nice little addition to this board too is 

Kris Hampton  52:35

I like this addition a lot.

Kris Hampton  52:36

 Right. 

Will Anglin  52:36

 Yeah, yeah, the good stuff. It's this seven millimeter 15 degree little incut edge. This actually, I, it, we pulled this for the most part off of the Whetstone, which is another hangboard that we designed that we actually kind of discontinued for the moment while we redesign it. It was a two piece board but we're gonna kind of take that thing back to the drawing board too, and make some improvements that we've learned from this board. But the main thing that I really liked about the Whetstone was this little, little seven millimeter incut that.....when when the wood edges get really small, so there's some plastic boards that have really thin edges down to like six millimeters or less, and you really, if you if you take wood down that small and you keep it just a flat edge, you really just run into kind of a friction problem. Like they're not fun to hang on to.

Will Anglin  52:43

But what we found with this little seven millimeter incut is you, by putting that little incut in the back not only does it make it a little bit easier to hold, but it makes it really good for training full crimp. And I'm definitely a big believer in if if you're gonna be full crimping, then train your full crimp to help to help be ready for it. Like it's it's kind of becomes injury prevention at that point. If you in a controlled setting can like very incrementally increase your exposure to that grip type, then 

Kris Hampton  54:19

I agree

Will Anglin  54:20

Then you can be more solid on it. And that little incut in the back, when you roll up into that full crimp, that gives your fingertips somewhere to go. And that's what I always felt was missing when I tried to train full crimp on like a flat edge. When you roll those knuckles out, the end of the finger feels wrong, because you don't usually crimp a flat hold in that way. Right. Right generally had that little incut and we kind of realized that that was why those felt right. And so we added that onto the board to to give you know more advanced hangboard is something to really bear down on

Kris Hampton  54:56

Right. Right 

Will Anglin  54:57

Crimps generally have that little incut and we kind of realized that that was why those felt right. And so we added that onto the board too to give you know more advanced hangboarders something to really bear down on.

Kris Hampton  55:03

Now, the board is at least partially asymmetrical. Why is that?

Will Anglin  55:10

Yeah, so the the little incuts and the big 35 millimeter edges are not asymmetric and that had a little bit more to do with the design and spacing of the board and just those edges in particular, like the way that you grabbed them, having them a little narrower and a little wider, just felt more comfortable. But all the other edges are asymmetric. And really all.... the reason for that is it keeps each grip the same distance apart as you move down the board. So you don't have to a grip that's too narrow, and then other holds that are too wide. They're all going to be the same distance apart as you train each one.

Kris Hampton  55:54

Yeah, I've wondered for a long time why no one is doing that and I'm glad I'm seeing it now. Are both boards the same way? Both boards are asymmetric?

Will Anglin  56:02

Yep, totally the same. 

Kris Hampton  56:04

Cool. You know, I know you changed something about the depth of the level that the monos are on? 

Will Anglin  56:15

Oh, yeah,

Kris Hampton  56:16

That's something that I've had complaints about on other hangboards, that you can't effectively use the small pockets because your knuckles get in the way on the level below. If there is a level, some of them try to do it on a flat board, and it just doesn't work. So talk to me a little bit about that.

Will Anglin  56:33

Yeah. So Ben, Ben toiled over this today, and got it figured out, which we're really psyched on. So the

Kris Hampton  56:42

What we're hearing here is that Ben is really good at figuring things out but he sucks at making comfortable holds.

Ben Spannuth  56:48

Hahah no it just takes some trial and error.

Kris Hampton  56:51

Hahaha.

Ben Spannuth  56:52

Yeah, it definitely doesn't come out of the machine the first time comfortable to grip.

Will Anglin  56:56

No, it's a it's definitely more difficult to make all of this stuff than, than it looks. And yeah, I wouldn't want anyone other than Ben programming that because, yeah, if it if it comes out, and it's not right, he's like, "This is not right." 

Ben Spannuth  57:14

It's obviously not right. 

Will Anglin  57:16

 And then he fixes it.

Kris Hampton  57:17

That's good you don't get attached to your creations like that. 

Will Anglin  57:21

No, you can't. We want it, we want it to be as perfect as we can make it.

Ben Spannuth  57:26

It's normally really obvious. It's like, this just isn't right yet. We got to tweak these couple things and then then we'll be happy with it.

Will Anglin  57:34

Yeah, that so the way they look, the two different hangboard are, they're essentially the same layout. But the big difference, right off the bat, when you look at it is this center row of holds, between the center and the bottom row, there's a way bigger offset on the Grindstone Pro, the harder one, because the mono pockets are on that row and same with the two fingers. And so we adjusted the height of that, to give the rest of the knuckles that aren't actually in the pocket plenty of place to move around in space underneath those pockets. Because that definitely, you can you can make a great pocket and like the profile, everything can be perfect and we we had it that way at first and, and like it, it's still wrong. And it was because we had the offset wrong and there wasn't enough space for those knuckles. We switched it and now it's great.

Kris Hampton  58:35

Yeah, no, I agree completely. You know, I've I've definitely battled with the idea of why aren't people testing their hangboards. You know, if I've hung on several that had a mono that I liked, but I couldn't use it, because there was no room for my knuckles, you know, and I'm like, it's impossible that they made this and hung on it. They had to have just thrown it out at the market, you know. So I'm glad to glad to see that there and that you guys have put a lot of thought into that.

Will Anglin  59:05

And that's why we that's why we did that initial prototype of this board. Got it into the hands of people like you and Steve Bechtel and and people who use these things a lot. Know it works, knows know what the typical problems are and we really, definitely spent a lot of time on this thing trying to get it exactly where we wanted. Take into account the user experience. Everything, wverything about the board, I think is really well thought out at this point. We're definitely happy with it.

Kris Hampton  59:45

Yep. Yep, I think it's, I think it's a step up, for sure. I know when Steve got a hold of his he he immediately said this the best hangboard I've ever seen and I think you guys have just improved it with this secondvvariation. So, you know, I'm stoked for it to get out on the market for people. What else is in the pipeline? Can we can we whisper about the board? 

Will Anglin  1:00:12

We can whisper about it. The big, the big thing is we're

Kris Hampton  1:00:17

And we are gonna have a whole nother episode talking about this. 

Will Anglin  1:00:20

Yes,

Kris Hampton  1:00:21

Once it's all finalized and figured

Will Anglin  1:00:22

 We'll delve into it. We'll go real deep. But right now, just just a teaser. So the Tension Board is what we're calling it. Super creative name.

Ben Spannuth  1:00:35

Haha not to be confused with all of our hangboards.

Will Anglin  1:00:41

 Yeah.

Kris Hampton  1:00:42

I'm trying to call the Flash Board the Flash Board.

Ben Spannuth  1:00:44

Yeah,

Kris Hampton  1:00:45

I definitely catch myself calling it the Tension Board. And then I'm like, no now there is a Tension Board

Ben Spannuth  1:00:50

We definitely get requests for the Tension Board and we send it over, it's like, Whoa, this is a very expensive hangboard. 

Will Anglin  1:00:53

Hahah Yeah.

Kris Hampton  1:00:56

Hahahaha

Will Anglin  1:00:57

Do you want a , yeah, do you want a $2,000 to $3,000 hangboard? Oh, that's not what you were talking about? Sorry. Hahaha. So, so the Tension Board is a, this is a mirrored training wall, like so it's, it's as simple as that. But it what has gone into it, and kind of the whole spirit behind it is definitely a lot more complicated than just a mere training wall. So really, a lot, the the whole, it's really what we're, we're based around, like, the whole, the whole company in a way, like the reason we made all of these different, wooden hold shapes and got into this is so that we could produce this board. And so I've been, I've been coaching for over a decade now, which is a little bit insane to think about, actually, I don't even remember when I started, but all that time, I've been fortunate enough to be in a position at at Earth Treks to be setting up the system boards at the different gyms that I worked at. And so I've been setting up these mirrored training boards for over a decade now too and 

Kris Hampton  1:02:26

Which I'm a big fan of, as well.

Will Anglin  1:02:28

They are....yeah, the just having that, that symmetry really allows you to do a lot of interesting things with with practice, coaching, training, the whole the whole deal and, and so we really wanted to incorporate the wood holds into that. The wood holds are in my opinion better for training than plastic and I also feel that a mirrored training board is more effective for training than an asymmetric board. And I and I climb on both all the time. And and I love my asymmetric board too but if when it when it really comes down to like I need to train this specific movement pattern or this specific hold type or whatever it is, can't can't beat the symmetry of the mirror or being able to go from one side to the other and work exactly the same move in exactly the same way. 

Kris Hampton  1:03:26

Yep. 

Will Anglin  1:03:28

And there are a ton of other applications for it but the the whole board is standardized. So similar in concept to the Moon Board, where you're going to be able to use an app on your phone to pick out boulder problems, share them with other people. We have the full LED harness and everything. So it's gonna have you know, Bluetooth compatibility, the whole deal there.

Kris Hampton  1:03:57

I'm gonna cut you off. 

Will Anglin  1:03:58

Yeah,

Kris Hampton  1:03:58

 Because if I don't, you're gonna tell the whole next episode.

Will Anglin  1:04:03

Okay, I'll slow it down. 

Kris Hampton  1:04:05

And I think that's I think that's all people need to know right now.

Will Anglin  1:04:08

I'm just excited.

Kris Hampton  1:04:09

 I know I am too. I just I just got to see the thing. I think it looks amazing. I'm super stoked to come back and climb on it when it's done and then we'll talk more in depth about the board, why you chose i,t why the layout is the way it is, how people can progress problems. We'll we'll go over all of that. 

Will Anglin  1:04:32

Totally. 

Kris Hampton  1:04:33

So save that.

Will Anglin  1:04:34

I will I will save it all. I have I have a really hard time not just going off on it. I freaking love it. But we're definitely we're we're already in talks like, gyms are already incorporating it. If people are interested in knowing wall dimensions and T nut grid and layout and all that stuff to be ready for it when when it does drop, they can just shoot over an email to us here, info@tensionclimbing.com and we can send them all the pertinent stuff.

Kris Hampton  1:05:10

Cool. And for all of the stuff that's currently in your catalog, you guys said you had a discount code you wanted to give to listeners.

Will Anglin  1:05:24

Yeah. 15% off anything on the website. The code is powercompany. All lowercase. All one word. Done. Just type it in at checkout.

Kris Hampton  1:05:36

Cool. Awesome. We appreciate that a ton. And thank you guys for sitting down with me. This is very last minute. I was walking into Chipotle and was like, Hey, what are you guys doing? You guys want a burrito? 

Ben Spannuth  1:05:47

We're just cutting hangboards.

Kris Hampton  1:05:49

Yeah and I just swung by. So so I appreciate you having me over show me everything. I'm I'm stoked with the direction everything is going and I'm glad that you guys are doing it, that somebody is, so thank you a ton. And and thanks for the code for all the listeners.

Will Anglin  1:06:07

 Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  1:06:08

We'll be back for the Tension Board soon.

Will Anglin  1:06:10

Excited.

Kris Hampton  1:06:11

All right. Thanks, you guys. 

Ben Spannuth  1:06:13

Yep, thanks. 

Kris Hampton  1:06:15

Sorry that I had to cut Will off there. He was, he was getting a little excited and rightfully so. I saw the the Tension Board and it's, it's pretty amazing. I think they've put a whole lot of thought into it and gone through several iterations and I can't wait to get back and climb on it. You know, if you're a fan of the Moon Board, which a lot of you think I'm a Moon Board hater, but that's not the case. I'm just a Moon Board Instagram hater. But you know, that's either died down or I've successfully blocked everyone who's posting Moon Board videos all the time, so it's all good with me. And you know, I like the idea of a mass produced bouldering wall and I think this Tension Board is going to address some of the issues I have with it. So, but that's in the future. For now, like they said, 15% off if you use the code at checkout, powercompany, all lowercase, all one word, and that's 15% off any of their regularly priced items. That doesn't include anything that's already on sale. Please go check out those Grindstone hangboards. I think you're gonna be really, really impressed. It's the best hangboard I've used for sure. So go check those out. Check out everything else they've got. I was really surprised by the amount of thought they put into everything even the sloper campus rungs which never even occurred to me. So yeah, I think these guys are doing good work. So head over to their website tensionclimbing.com. Check out what they've got. And I will see you guys hopefully, in Milwaukee on August 17 18th 19th for the Midwest Training For Climbing Conference. And yeah, hit us up Powercompanyclimbing.com You can find us on the Facebooks. You can find us on the Instagrams. We're even on Pinterest, but we are not and never will be on the Twitters because we don't tweet. We scream like eagles.