June already

...And nothing of note achieved. I've been mainly working in the shop lately and nursing yet another left arm injury, so after an unproductive session at Pantymwyn belaying John up Grand Canyon, I took a couple days out and then spent the rest of the week carefully fingerboarding and seeing where I was. The result was weak in the fingers and unable to 1 arm deadhang!

After the last fingerboard session being pain free, I decided to test out the level of injury on the rock as myself, O, Pete and Si drove through torrential rain to a misty but dryish Llanberis pass. We warmed up around the roadside and I managed to just about beat the pump to crush Cave Route and Roadside Basic which both felt desperate!

Luckily the arm didn't seem to suffer other than a mega pump, so after a break to stare bemused at a large bus load of Polish tourists who ran about the boulders taking photographs of cloud and drizzle, I had a play on Diesel Power.

Despite having seen Mike climb it in about 20 mins last month, Owen didn't remember any beta at all, so I just got on with failing on every move for a good hour. I skipped past the first move as I didn't know the rules about where you start and also couldn't figure out where to put feet for most of the moves! By the end of this rather poor showing I had managed about 3 hand moves. It was quite condensed on the rock with the low clouds but I am in dire need of some foot beta and body tension.

After a bit of lunch I went over to spot Pete and Andy on Bus Stop. Pete managed to crush the first 2 moves but was struggling on the finish. I did it from a move in to try remember things for him and then decided to try something on Mr Fantastic that Dobbin had posted on his blog a while back. When bringing the left hand across to match on the Bus Stop holds, I kept my left foot pasted on the ledge and then brought the right foot across and pressed it into the roof just above the LF. This allowed me to easily take my left foot off and place it on the good spike and then bring the right foot down on to the polished dink and do the first move on Bus Stop (totally removing the desperate leg swing I had previously been fighting with!) . To try and keep things positive, it was shoes back in the bag and down to Pete's Eats for cake and a coffee.

Really struggling with motivation at the moment with being injured and weak most of the time and unable to train as it results in aggravating the left arm. This means when I get out, I'm generally pretty crap and feel like I'm going backwards from last year as opposed to improving.

I might take a big break during World Cup time and hopefully this will clear up lingering injuries so I can start training afresh after. News of a new dedicated bouldering wall opening in Liverpool is fantastic and it can't come soon enough!