Fig. 1

Sport climbing improves the speed of normal walking and fast walking. Box plots for each test point (before the intervention = baseline, and after the intervention = after 12 weeks) show the respective median, minimum, maximum and the first and third quartiles of the walking speed in meters per second in 22 Parkinson’s disease participants (H&Y 2–3) after a 12-week sport climbing intervention (SC) compared to a control group of 24 PD participants (H&Y 2–3) who performed unsupervised physical activity (UT). The SC showed a significant increase in speed during normal walking (baseline: 1.2 m/s, 12 weeks: 1.3 m/s, p = 0.003) and fast walking (baseline: 1.4 m/s, 12 weeks: 1.6 m/s, p = 0.001), while the UT did not (normal walking baseline: 1.2 m/s; 12 weeks: 1.2 m/s; fast walking baseline: 1.5 m/s, 12 weeks: 1.5 m/s). H&Y, Hoehn & Yahr stage; SC, sport climbing group; UT, unsupervised control group; **p ≤ 0.01. *p ≤ 0.05; n.s., not significant