Those of us in the north are wrapping up our outdoor climbing season about now.

The weather has turned. It’s cold, it’s wet, and the damn time change has shifted our daylight hours, making it difficult to get outside after work.

When you can’t get on your project, you have to do the next best thing—simulate the challenges of the route indoors. In Washington State, between November and April, we train at climbing gyms.

This is a great time to look back on the season and reflect on the progress you’ve made. It’s also a great time to start looking forward to next season, setting goals, and developing your training program for the winter months.

If you’re truly pushing yourself, you should have unfinished business, projects you didn’t finish in the short window of the season. As disappointing as this may feel in the moment, don’t let it get you down. Instead, let it motivate you to train.

There are natural cycles in projecting: you work on a project, come close, but reach the limit in your current program (plateau). The antidote is to regroup, train, get more power, and attack it next season.

You can turn your unfinished projects into specific training goals because by now you should have a clear idea of what you need to train. For most people it really comes down to fact that you need to get stronger.

Look to your project for feedback. Analyze it, break it apart into its components. What is the movement like, how long are the sections between the rests? What is prevented you from sending? What do you need to work on? What is failing first? Start viewing your winter training program as an opportunity to address these variables.

Be thoughtful in your training and, most important, stay psyched and stay healthy so that you can get out and crush your project next season.