I am looking for any tips, tricks or tidbitts on ways to improve the blood circulation in my arms, (forearms).  I pump out so quickly and I am in very good cardiovascular shape.  I have to shake out on every hold, and this is something that has just started to happen after years of climbing.  Diet Suggestions?  Training Suggestions?  Kleenex?

Yea, Chris has good suggestions– warm uip is crucial.

But the real way to avoid pump is to train for it.  In a proper training cycle, the beginning phase is endurance.  You do loads of climbing at a level that does not produce pump, then you mix in bouldering (power) and later hard projects (power endurance).  At the end of a cycle you shoudl have pretty good endurance and strength.  Read Performance Rock CLimbing by Neuman and Godard for how to do this (Read ch15 and 16 first). 

If you lived in Squamish and coudl get outdoors for training, your routine would be something liek this:  in April, you do loads of long easy routes (e.g. you do 3 Apron routes in one day twice or 3x/week; and when doing them, you practice moving smooth, perfect footwork etc).  After a few weeks of this, keep doing the same, but add a short bouldering circuit twice a week after your long mellow training.  Later, get on some projects that are 4 grades above your onsight level.  Take 2 weeks off in July, and repeat.

On 8a.nu on the Canadian articals (worlds too) there was a artical about getting pumped and how to avoide it (if i do recall), it is under ‘training’.

http://www.8a.nu

Suz–

Actually, most athletes (i mean, fit people) *are* chronically undernourished.  You could read Neil Colgan’s Optimum SPorts Nutrition (2nd ed.) for the scoop.  This is a very complex topic.  Basically, when you overlaod any part of the body (muscle, or cardio) you break bits of it and rebuild them (if you are recovering properly).  The problem is that…each person’s biochemical makeup is different and so is their diet. 

Also, vast amounts of things that used to be part of a healthy balanced diet sinply canot be obtained form our diet, and you have a recipe for depletion.  Colgan for example talks about trace elements like zinc (I believe– I don’t have the book in front of me) which you cannot replace from soil once extracted via nitrogen-overload factory farming and which is no longer naturally present in north american food. 

Most pro athletes are regularly blood tested for nutritional purposes; the top end guys like lance armstrong etc get customised vitamin and element boosters tailroed for them personally.

You are however right on one point: it is almost impossible to accurately self-diagnose any kind of deficiency or other.  For thsi you need blood testing etc.

The person who wanted info on avoiding the pump can consult the many boosk on the topic.  It has 95% to do with training; the rest is rest and hydration and loads of warm-ups.

Yea, supplements are mostly BS…like I said, the people who really use them well are those who are tested and whe get specific ones built for them.  But Colgan is very very clear– a well rounded diet is simply insufficient in micronutrients for most athletes.  E.g., the RDAs for most vitamins and minerals were basically guessed at by the FDA (based on vastly different lifestyles etc) in the early ’50s and havn’t changed since.  Read his book– fascinating.