hunohio, sorry for the delayed response. When climbing or descending the tree I put my forearms on the padded seat with my hands gripping the back corners of the seat. I am 5' 8'', 155 lbs and have no problem going up and down the tree in this manner. The only thing I can come up with to compare this to would be to kneel in front of a chair and try to lift your legs off the ground using the same technique described above. As I stated above, this is my first climber so I can't compare to others, but I would not call this work.