Learning Dynamic Moves: Deadpoint vs Dyno, and When to Go for It

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You're stuck on one move. The next hold is ten centimetres beyond your straight arm. You stand up slowly, lock off, reach, and by the time your fingertips touch the hold, your arm is done. The person next to you walks over, sinks their knees, pops, and they're on it.

This post is about that pop. Everything from the earlier posts on footwork, balance and holds and grips still applies; the tempo just gets faster. If you haven't climbed in a gym yet, start with the beginner's guide to climbing.

Power training (box jumps, explosive pull-ups, campus boards) is out of scope; a later training module will cover it.

First, the names: slap, jump, dyno, deadpoint

Chinese-language teaching in Taiwan mostly calls all of this 動態 ("dynamic") or just writes "Dyno", for example HANCHOR's bouldering column and Kirara's technique guide (both in Chinese). English sources split it more finely. David Flanagan's Bouldering Essentials sorts moves by how many points stay on the rock:

flowchart LR
  A["slap<br/>quick reach<br/>at least 2 points"] --> B["jump<br/>one hand stays<br/>both feet off"] --> C["dyno<br/>whole body airborne<br/>0 points"]

The deadpoint isn't on that axis; it's about timing. Flanagan's definition: the instant your body is moving neither up nor down, which is the perfect time to grab a hold.

Neil Gresham's Climbing.com article on dynamic climbing teaches it as a move in its own right: slapping for a hold at speed at that instant, usually staying on the take-off footholds. Dynos are for long reaches; deadpoints are mostly for when you're too weak or too pumped to hang on one hand long enough to reach the next hold statically.

So this series uses the words like this:

• deadpoint: feet stay on, catch at the top.
• dyno: all four limbs leave the wall.

The ideal moment to catch is the same for both: the top of the arc.

"Zero acceleration" at the top?

Some articles say your acceleration is zero at the deadpoint, so you weigh nothing. That's wrong physics: gravity is accelerating you the whole time. What is zero at that instant is your vertical speed. You feel weightless because your hand doesn't have to stop a body that's already falling. Remember it as "speed hits zero, you feel weightless".

Something you can do tonight: Standing on the floor, toss a ball straight up and watch it hang at the top. Next time you go dynamic on the wall, think about making your hips "hang" like that, just below the target hold.

When static stops working

Gresham thinks static climbing has its place: easy terrain, or hard sections where the protection is poor and you can't fall. But locking off and moving in slow motion to every hold on cruxes and sustained sequences, he says, is pouring away energy.

Situations that push you toward dynamic movement:

• The hold is too far: arm straight, standing as high as you can, still short. That's dyno territory.
• You're too tired or the hold is too poor: the lower hand can't hold on long enough for the other to reach slowly. That's deadpoint territory.
• Some problems only go this way: Flanagan notes that some problems are only possible by slapping, jumping or dynoing.

There are also times not to go dynamic. Flanagan lists three:

1. When a fall would be dangerous, the extra effort of doing the move statically is worth the control.
2. When the target hold can only be held in a very precise way: small pockets, narrow slots, clusters of crystals.
3. On sharp rock, where catching holds at speed shreds your skin.

Point 2 matches the pocket rules in the previous post: don't lunge for small pockets.

This is also why the balance post treats "three points of contact" as a beginner rule: a slap keeps two points, a jump keeps one, a dyno keeps none.

Something you can do tonight: Before the move you're stuck on, pause and ask: can I not reach it, or can I not hold on long enough? Can't reach: think dyno. Can't hold on: think deadpoint.

Three phases of a dynamic move

Flanagan breaks a dynamic move into setup, launch and latch. Physical therapist Jason Hooper describes the rhythm of a deadpoint in four words: sag, launch, float, catch.

Setup: sink

Flanagan's points:

• Choose the lowest footholds that still let you keep one or both feet on.
• If the footholds are tiny or awkward, just use the best one rather than forcing two.
• For long moves, feet at staggered heights work best. Gresham agrees that one foot higher than the other usually works best, and if using both feet feels unbalanced, take one off and flag.
• Bend your legs and straighten your arms to sink down. The further the target, the lower you sink.
• Lock your eyes on the target. In Climbing.com's dyno master class, 2020 US bouldering national champion Natalia Grossman also says that people often miss completely because they weren't looking at the hold.

Whether to pump up and down a few times before launching, Flanagan says, has no consensus. Gresham's view is that one small bounce can work, but never more than one.

Launch: legs first

USA national team head coach Josh Larson says most people focus on pulling hard, but the movement should start at the knees and ankles: push through your feet, then pull with your arms, leading with your hips. Only once your legs reach full extension should your arm move toward the target. Flanagan's image: your arms are a pivot, your legs a spring.

Gresham gives the release timing: let go with the lower hand about two-thirds of the way through the pull. Let go too early, or move too slowly, and you won't get the height; hold on too long and you lose your momentum, so you're already dropping when you catch the hold.

He also teaches three ways to build momentum:

Latch: stop at the top

• Your hips should finish directly below the target hold. Gresham: too far in and you'll swing out after grabbing it; too far out and you'll miss.
• Straight arm or bent arm depends on whether you need to stop the swing. Flanagan suggests catching at the top with a straight-ish arm; Larson adds that a straight arm lengthens the swing, while locking off or pulling up as soon as possible helps check it.
• Press down through your feet. Flanagan: as your weight transfers to the target, push hard on the footholds so your feet stay on.
• After catching with one hand, Flanagan recommends matching the hold as quickly as possible.

Something you can do tonight: On an easy vertical problem with big holds, pick a move that's only just out of reach. Keep your feet on: sink, push with your legs, release at the top. Do it five times, and each time say whether you let go at two-thirds of the pull, too early or too late.

Getting your feet back after they cut loose

On steep walls, a dynamic catch often sends your feet flying. Flanagan says sometimes reaching the hold is easy and holding the swing is the crux. The bigger the horizontal gap between the launch footholds and the target hold, the bigger the swing.

His options:

• Pull your knees toward your stomach, or arch your back toward the rock and let your lower legs swing out, to reduce the swing.
• Core strength is key to holding the swing.
• If you can't stop it, use the momentum of the swing to get your feet back on the rock.

Gresham adds that feet cutting loose at the catch is nearly always a coordination problem, not a weak core. His fix: "drill" your toes into small footholds and tense your hamstrings and core at the moment you latch; think "feet" at the same moment you think "hands".

Something you can do tonight: A drill from the Climbing.com dyno master class. On a wall overhanging around 45 degrees, find a juggy V0–V1 problem. After each move, deliberately cut both feet, then snap them back on as fast as you can. Once your feet come back cleanly, start trying real dynamic moves.

"Dynamic climbing is dangerous"?

The common line is that dynamic moves get people hurt, so beginners should stay away. That's half right.

Done well, dynamic moves aren't necessarily riskier. Hooper argues that when done well, dynamic climbing can be more efficient than static climbing without increasing injury risk. Gresham goes further: he thinks locking off statically on every hold puts unnecessary strain on your tendons. Both are coaches' reasoning, not measured comparisons.

But catching at speed is a real load. Flanagan warns that catching a hold at speed puts very high load on the fingers, arms, elbows and shoulders, and you can land awkwardly. Mena and colleagues (2024) surveyed indoor boulderers in Brazil and found that a dynamic climbing style was associated with a feeling of shoulder instability at the front of the joint. It's a cross-sectional study of 35 people, so treat it as a warning sign, not proof of cause.

Jumping high enough is easier on the fingers. Fuss and Niegl (2006) measured with force-sensing holds and found that the higher a climber jumps in a double dyno, the lower the reaction forces on the fingers, and so the lower the injury risk.

The half-committed attempt is the worst case. Grossman says a halfhearted dyno is often worse than going all in and missing, and you're more likely to hurt yourself. An article from Power Company Climbing passes on an even shorter line from climber Rowland Chen: "Either go dynamic or go static, but you can't do both. Make a choice." Gresham says the same: there's no such thing as a half static, half dynamic move.

You'll also hear "dynamic is more efficient". That's the consensus among coaches like Hooper and Flanagan. Hooper's reasoning: doing the same move statically means intense muscle contraction the whole way, and it gets harder as your joints move into weaker positions. Flanagan compares it to pedalling down one hill so you can coast up the next. No study has yet directly measured the energy cost of the same move done dynamically and statically, so treat it as coaching experience, not a law.

In one sentence: the risk isn't in going dynamic; it's in half-committing, launching too early, or trying moves too big for what you've built up.

Something you can do tonight: Before your next dynamic move, say "static" or "dynamic" to yourself. If you said dynamic, launch all out. If you want to bail halfway, let go and drop to the mat rather than trying to catch yourself on one hand.

A progression that starts small

Hooper's advice: build strength and stability in your muscles and joints first, start with small moves to hone coordination, then increase the distance over time. Flanagan recommends experimenting at a quiet indoor wall with plenty of big holds and good mats, and warming up your shoulders and fingers first.

An order you can follow:

1. Small deadpoints: vertical wall, big holds, feet stay on, only slightly beyond static reach.
2. Touch, don't grab: in the Climbing.com dyno master class, coach Alex Stiger suggests mimicking the body position and trajectory of your target move. Just touch the target hold at first, then grab it once the motion feels familiar.
3. Feet-back drill on a steep wall: the V0–V1 jug problem from the previous section.
4. Bigger deadpoints: add the hinge, pendulum and rock-over.
5. Jumps and dynos: only now let your feet leave the wall.

The landing zone for a bouldering dyno is large. Flanagan notes that spotting a dyno is hard and the spotter can be at greater risk than the climber, so agree on the landing zone beforehand.

Something you can do tonight: Do step 1 ten times and note which attempt felt lightest. The depth of that sink and that release timing are your starting point next session.

Practice: four scenarios

The answer is under each question. Think first, then check.

1. A friend says he just "dynoed" a move, but both his feet stayed on the footholds. Was it a dyno?

2. Every dynamic move you try, you reach the hold, but you're already dropping when you catch it, and it wrenches your hand.

3. On an overhang you catch the target hold, but your feet swing off and the swing peels you off the wall.

4. The next hold is a shallow two-finger pocket, just out of static reach. You're thinking of jumping for it.

Next

Once you can move both statically and dynamically, the next question is what to do when a boulder problem won't go: how to break it into moves, change your beta and decide what to change on the next attempt. Read on: bouldering problem solving.

References

• Bouldering – How to Dyno (David Flanagan, Three Rock Books, excerpt from Bouldering Essentials)
• Want To Be a Better Rock Climber? Learn to Climb Dynamically. (Neil Gresham, Climbing.com, 2024)
• Dynoing Master Class (Ari Schneider, Climbing.com)
• Uncoordinated? Here are Three Drills to Improve Your Dynamic Movement (Josh Larson, Climbing.com, 2021)
• Debunking the 5 Most Malignant Myths in Climbing (Hooper's Beta, 2023)
• Plugging In To Climb Better (Power Company Climbing, 2024)
• Fuss FK, Niegl G. Instrumented Climbing Holds and Dynamics of Sport Climbing. The Engineering of Sport 6, 2006
• Mena L et al. Prevalence and Risk Factors of Upper Extremity Injuries in Indoor Bouldering. Cureus 2024
• Climbing positions overview (阿倫抱石教室, HANCHOR) (in Chinese)
• Climbing techniques illustrated (Kirara, climbingninjette.com) (in Chinese)