Swiss recollections and Cave Season

Swiss Recollections

Having waited an eternity to get the photos of the Switzerland trip that myself, Andi and Mark went on, I had lost the desire to post about it but the photos are now finally up on facebook for all to enjoy.

To summarise the trip it was a good laugh with fantastic weather until the penultimate day and a lot of problems were ticked. I wanted to spend the time climbing as a group, willing each other on, so not much time was given to projecting during the 10 days.

Highlights included warming up on day 1 with a few flashes of 7's before doing Hohenrausch in a couple of goes (having had a bit of a whitey on the flash attempt staring at the top)! What a great sequence of moves with a bit of commitment needed at the end.

I was made up to get Supernova finished off in a couple of short sessions having tried it With lore a couple of years ago. I got Jack the Chipper done on the same day after taking some performance enhancing pro plus and Coolpresso!

Other notable problems were Man of Cow, Foo Fighter and Goldfisch that all went down in 2-3 tries and the amazing Blown Away! It has to be the best 7B I have ever climbed and worth the trip alone.

I would have been content to just tick 7's with a few 7C's but on the 2nd to last day, rain forced us down to the Bruno block and I couldn't get on Cote de Seshuan due to rivers of water running down it. In the grim rain I headed around the corner and saw a group of people trying Never Ending Story part 2. I had tried the first move the day before for 5 minutes in the dark and almost held it...

3 campus attempts were all it took to hold and lock down that high edge and with a wave of energy I crushed the fuck out of it all the way to the finish screaming more out of suprise than any feelings of difficulty or fatigue.

It was a great way to end the trip for me as the last day was a washout where I played on Astronautfieber, Nothing Changes and NES pt1 doing all the moves on the latter 2 in a matter of minutes. Fatigue and general wetness prevented linking them and I kind of regretted not having tried harder problems earlier in the trip (as I had decided not to gamble and just get a lot of classic 7's done incase the weather turned).

Mark did well in the Woods considering he hasn't really bouldered much back home in the UK and he almost punched way above his highest grades doing the hard part of Fliegen Erlabut only to fall off on the technical ledge pulling ;)

Andi had a bit of a slow start but began to tick over towards the tail end of the trip getting Red Roses done after puntering it up hard for a couple of earlier sessions. He ticked through a fair few 7's and I'm sure he'll be getting into the harder 7's when the next opportunity arises.

Back from the trip I now know that I could have climbed at least a few more problems in the 8's and I regrettably didn't even pull on to Octopussy fearing failure. Next time will be different and weather permitting... I will get to work on these great problems and send them into space :)

Cave Season

Conditions at the moment are starting to get better as temps drop and the skies stay dry over the Orme. Unfortunately I have been unable to get to the cave since getting back from holiday due to a heavy workload on Tuesdays. This will change next month and hopefully the month of Power endurance training will start to take effect on Pit of Hell and Halfway House. These problems are high up on the wishlist along with Mr Fantastic and are all very doable in 2 halves. I am hoping doing 20-25 move circuits in the crypt roof will help and that I haven't lost too much strength in the meantime by neglecting the 45 board.