Another Nemesis in the bag

It has been a good week since the previous Roche abbey visit. I've managed to get in 3 campus sessions and a lot of core work + climbing on the 45 board.

I'm starting to notice an improvement in body tension from the last few weeks of climbing on a board again and striving to avoid using drop knees/toe hooks/heels..etc

The weakest links at the moment are definitely my creaky fingers and slightly strained left bicep (which is fine when climbing). I had a short beastmaker session on Friday morning and it definitely felt on the edge, so I cut it short and just did more corewoirk instead.

Sunday 21st Nov

We were going to head to the South Lakes and myself and Sean got very excited for Wheelbarrow and Iron Man only for Owen to change the plan to Rotherham. I was partially worried about another shutdown on Ebola and the South Lakes meant avoiding the issue, which was why it was quite appealing.

It was a good venue for Mark and little Hoppo as they hadn't been before so there were some good 7a-7b ticks to be had. We met Tony at the carpark and walked in to the wave area which was drier than we were expecting.

A brief warmup included getting Twenty Four Point Nine done first try today which is a nice sloper traverse into the finish of Alpha at around 7b. Then it was back to Ebola. It was a bit wetter than last weekends session, so I wasn't too hopeful of success.

I worked out how to do the finish and changed both my foot and hand sequence yet again on the bottom section due to a lot of the footholds being wet and to avoid using the wet crimp out right before the pinch.

Fast forward about 2-3 hours later and I finally puntered my way up to holding the swing off the crossover without spinning off. The crimps at the finish were wet but I managed to get the heel on and crossover to the finish of Resonate and then cross under to match praying for my hand not to fire off.

It's such a great problem with each move being unique and hard enough to make it a fight to the end. It would be nice to find it in perfect dry conditions just to enjoy it a little more!

We moved on to Roche Abbey to finish off and myself and Owen had a play on Fallen Idol ss. The pull on was ok and I could get the right hand crimp well only to slide off it trying to match due to the rock getting very damp. The stand up still felt desperate but conditions were far from good. This nemesis will have to wait till next time.

Monday 22nd Nov

Me and Mark hit Tesco early doors and picked up a Christmas double deal on the Krispy Kremes (so we got 24 for £12!). We then picked up Sean and got over to the Wirral to Mike's for about 10.45. We tried to ring but got no answer so knocked on the door to be informed by his mum that he was still asleep! We remarkably got away with Mike onboard at 11 and headed into Llandudno to get a coffee and hit the Orme which was covered in beautiful rays of sun (which seemed to disappear 5 minutes after we arrived).

I did my bit of cardio for the year by running up to Clutch to see if the holds were dry, shake my head, then run back down the hill almost out of breath! A circuit of Star jumps, theraband and Gripp ball were up next and then a painfully cold warmup (for the feet) which kept going white every few minutes.

There were a few wet patches so the warmup was a bit shorter today consisting of a bit of shuffling then Lipstick RH, clever beaver, lip service and a failed attempt on rockatrocity in baggy moccasyms.

I thought I would see how far things had regressed and padded out In Life start. It was quite suprising to get through the start and across the arch with both feet swinging about, in a vain attempt to get them on the sidewall. Even though it was fairly cold, the two slopers didn't feel great and I was sliding about on them on the next redpoint, so decided to leave it for today.

Sean managed to get Cave Life Short done using another new sequence somewhere inbetween my own and Owen's which looked quite steady but a bit more shoulder intensive.

I watched Sorle do Oppotrocity and soaked up the beta. Something short and hard was quite appealing, so I quickly did all the moves in about 1-2 goes and had a rest. First go I fell off coming through to backhanding the flake as I didn't pull hard enough on the left arm.

Next go was surreal as I floated to the end of the problem feeling strong until the very last moment when my right arm failed to keep locked in the last pocket and my hand dragged out of the finish slot. I wasn't expecting to get that far and relaxed a bit too much on the end.

It was a bit dismaying to be doing all the hard climbing yet again and then failing on the easy finishing move on yet another problem!

I guess 8a in a session wasn't to be as I dropped the last move another 2 times and then gave up as it got too dark to see the footholds after 4pm!

Mark managed to crush Lipstick RH first attempt and then Lipstick in about 4 goes in the dark and we bailed back to the pool tucking into the Krispy Kremes and then a chicken bake from Costco before more Krispy Kremes!

I think the next 2 days are going to spent stretching and detoxing from the previous week of doughnuts/red wine/pizza..etc and hopefully I can get Oppotrocity in the bag on Thursday, before getting back on In Life.

Here's a little video for some inspiration http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whj9G0xhYNU

:)

Intensive

Sums up yesterdays session at Anston Stones, where I basically climbed all out for about 5 hours or longer without stopping to eat or drink, trying to beat moves into submission and see if I could be close to actually getting an ascent of anything.

It was the usual scenario with a brief warmup and a couple new 7a's. Then straight to work on the stuff that should go down in a session but somehow never quite happens.

I tried in vain to get beta off Owen for Alpha but there wasn't any forthcoming so I pulled on, went wrong handed first move and failed to get the crimp out left. Next go I went straight to it off the pull on and the problem went down this go. Rookie!

Back to my long time nemesis of Ebola and unsuprisingly, I had to work out every move again as it had been a long time since I tried it. I got thoroughly knackered working out where to have my feet for every move and almost got lucky climbing through and catching the crossover move only to fire off two damp holds whilst my legs swung back in.

I had another brief go but didn't get the small pinch and moved on.

Black Crow was the next thing that caught the eye and I got out to the two holds near the lip with my feet set on the first attempt, only for the left hand to fire off soaking wet. This was the same case on two further attempts despite futile drying attempts inbetween.

I did the moves on Dark Art apart from 1 (the only hard one), then continued my beta workout left of Bullet on some reachy eliminate line inside the arete. This was proving a bit hard, so I decided to just try something even harder and got on Revolver.

I wasn't expecting much but managed to get all of the moves apart from the crux slap over in about 1 or 2 attemps on each. The body tension fight to keep feet on the back and get them across was proving a bit hard after 5 hours of horizontal shutdowns but I was glad to have had marginal success on them.

I awoke feeling completely ruined today... so I assume it was a good workout! There is the possibility of a return journey on Thursday if John gets the day off and I think the plan is for a Sunday trip also, which means a chance to have closure on Ebola. Hopefully Black Crow will have a drier LH hold and more progress can be made on Revolver and Dark Art.

Knackered

I've recently been doing 100% of my climbing indoors and slowly upping the number of sessions per week to see how my weak carcass handles it before trying to up the intensity/difficulty.

Saturday 6th Nov

I had a great weekend down in Cardiff with Owen visiting his family and watching Wales take on a sprightly Australia side who had a terrible pack but were fantastic to watch on the attack!

My choice for MoM definitely goes to the Mexican assassin who was lightning, full of trickery and nearly scored an amazing solo try from just over halfway.


In action!

We went out for a lovely Japanese meal in the evening and had a good nights sleep ready to destroy Dinas Rock in the morning.

Sunday 7th Nov

The drive through the valleys was beautiful with a cold chill in the air and the sun rising up, slowly bringing some warmth to the day.

The rock at Dinas looked nice and solid with some good lines but sadly, every single problem we had in mind to try was suffering from heavy seepage from the cracks up above, so any effort to dry holds became futile.

Kev and Liam showed us where things went and we had a coffee break to see if the sun would be able to help out. We got back about 45 mins later and it was getting no better due to clouds coming over, so headed to Boulders in Cardiff instead.

There was a mini comp on, so we joined in for the day and really enjoyed the circuit of 30 comp problems. The whites were all easy and very well set as were most of the blacks bar a couple.

I was having major greasy skin problems on a couple of the harder ones 28, 29 and 30, so had a break and pottered about on some off circuit stuff. I managed to get 29 using toe hook, skipping two holds and a massive span compression to the volume. I walked my hands up the edge and held the swing to get both hands on top of the finishing hold in control.

Problem 30 had spat me off earlier on in the session on my 1 attempt. So I wasn't expecting to get much further after 4 hours in there. With the heaters now on full blast above the bouldering area and the strict tops off policy it was truly tropical but I managed to get through the bottom really easily and then snatch the finishing hold by going left hand over the top and holding the flag position before matching, a great problem.

We had to leave soon after so I didn't get back on to 28, which would have been ok save for greasing violently off earlier on. The vertical wall black 24 was nails and i'd love to see how its done.

Monday 8th Nov

Myself, Mark, Sean and Sam headed over to the Depot to have a try of the new comp wall area and the British team training black circuit problems.

I felt pretty battered from yesterday but managed to slowly warm up without having the usual shooting pains in both arms I used to get from 2 days on. The stop off at Asda to eat Southern Fried chicken from the hot counter was a bad shout and I felt a bit ill trying to climb! The thing I like most about the depot is the cold temperature compared to other walls, which means it suffers far less from grease issues.

To sum it up, the new comp wall is a good angle and the blacks were fierce. After getting a bit of a shut down, me and Sean just went around and tried to do the yellows instead which were good fun if you stayed away from the crimpy horrors.

I think by the end of our 5~ hour session I had climbed at least another 40-50 problems after the 40 the day before. Thats more than I did in 3 trips to font this year compressed into two sessions!

Tuesday 9th Nov

On the Monday drive back from Leeds, we had been informed that the new bouldering section at Liverpool was open, so agreed to have an afternoon rock scaling session on Tuesday.

As it turned out, I had a session with Dave and Jay as Sean was too busy playing Black Ops or sleeping. The new barrel roof is very good indeed and the problems up to v6 were nice and reasonable. Then suddenly the Black V7 was about 5 grades harder than any of the 6s. Either that or 3rd day on had taken its toll. I struggled to do more than 4 moves of what is an 8 move problem so moved on to the white and green. I got to the last move on the flash of the white but couldn't figure out how to get the last hold. I imagine it was set to put your foot inside your hand and lock in with your knee above your ear?! I eventually managed this after climbing 3 moves in to it but not from the start. The green was ok in 2 halves but I was way too gone to link it in 1.

I've felt pitifully weak in the Depot and Liverpool over the last 2 days so hopefully it is just the body getting accustomed to multiple sessions back to back, as V7 shouldn't be an issue but seemed to be the living end.

I'll probably fit another session this week, then rest up for Sunday where weather permitting, we will get out on grit and get schooled by Dolph!

Motivated

After Sunday's board session I was super psyched today for some Peak Grit action but when we awoke it was dark/gim and the forecast was for bad weather sweeping across West to East by 12. The plans were changed and I met Dave down the wall a little later on.

I was keen for another session on the 45 to see if i could be a little less of a punter today and remembering to bring some Dragons in and sack off the solutions was a great idea! I could do a few moves on screwons and my feet occasionly remained in contact with the board.

I didn't really have a structure to the session other than make a few things up and then attempt linking them once I had the moves down with timed rests of about 3 mins between each attempt.

My skin was nowhere near as bad as on Sunday so I could spend more than a second on things before exploding off. It was good for Dave to notice my susceptibility to unconsciously dropping knees or twisting on the board, so I did attempt to climb as open as possible on most things today and I noticed a little improvement.

I also littered the board with a few more 2 finger pockets and stood aghast as the Pinn cruised around the board like a silver maned Iker Pou! I don't know if magaluf is quite ready for this tempest!

Anyway I guess I haven't written anything related to the title of this post.. so in essence i am psyched to be on the 45 board again without my fingers screaming/swelling or hurting too much. My shoulder stopped aching today too which was nice and I may have another session tomorrow seeing as all trips to the cave are off!

I don't think the board climbing is going to relate to things I'm working in the cave but it may give me the extra bit of strength & body tension necessary to slay some old nemesis' this winter such as T crack and Brad Pitt and with any luck some short testpieces in switzerland and font at the end of the year.

As the light fades

It seems nonsensical to have projects anywhere other than the cave.

I'm super excited for Wednesday to see if I can get a third cave 8A/+ 3 weeks running but things will no doubt become trickier having no more daylight hours redpoints.

It's been a fairly lazy week since last Weds. I had a couple of rest days in a row and woke up with a weird shoulder niggle on the right on Saturday morning. I decided to theraband in the shop and had a light session on the stepped wall of justice in the evening, projecting the red and salmon v7's on the far right (they seem a bit poor value after 3 sessions working and no tick!).

It was feeling mildly better yesterday so I had a session on the 45 whilst watching the Pinnmeister seemingly attempt to snap all of his fingers doing pocket style ladder training on the campus board. No doubt he will rock up to the Laboratory and make a mockery of these foreign grades!

With regards to the board session, it went ok but I was having a super greasy skin session where I could literally pull on then fire off any hold at random. It was fairly productive highlighting again my weaknesses on any angle between a roof and a slab.

I definitely need to work on:

- Feet/body positioning
- Climbing more open
- pinch strength
- contact strength
- locking holds down
- getting less sweaty skin
- wear dragons/teams/v10's and not solutions that are too tight and rounded on the toe

I'll try and get a couple of sessions a week in on the board as I think my general redpoint fitness for longer problems is ok... but I'm definitely lacking in the basic strength department.