A rare day of success!

Cave in the afternoon

On a whim, I decided to go to the cave Friday day time before the Stoke bouldering competition even though the forecast was for humidity, rain and no wind.

My psyche clearly rubbed off on Laura who decided to come along for moral support after finishing uni early.

We found the cave quite greasy but fairly busy with a small group of die hard locals and visitors playing on various things.

After warming up slowly I had a decent first go on In Life getting to the two slopers and taking my feet off very easily totally killing any swing but locking off too hard and not being able to rotate my feet round! I hung this position for several seconds before letting go bemused.

After a couple of close attempts Laura managed to get into the high sidepull and then to the glorious high finishing jug on Bust Lip for her first non slab/vert 7A+ tick! It was great to see her trying hard and being seemingly unaware of the possibility of a foot lock staying in above head height should she have failed to grasp the sidepull :)

The second redpoint on In Life saw me grasp the pinch on Left wall but then fall trying to go through to the fingerjug with the holds not feeling very dry. I feared the worst so had a longer rest than usual and fanned air on to them as well as chalk.

Laura tried to get Parisella's original done but couldn't quite hold the foot swing from releasing the heel-toe. Her efforts inspired me to pull my finger out and on the 3rd redpoint I managed to fall into the fingerjug screaming and slap out to the sloper. I scrambled across to the low flake almost falling at every move as my fingers unravelled and arms lost all feeling but thankfully the sanctity of the kneebar rest came just in time!

I didn't hang about too long and got the job done not feeling too bad on the end section and letting out a sigh of relief that I wouldn't have to crawl into the dirt any longer! Joy.

The sending spree gathered momentum and shortly after, Ducko breezed across Rockatrocity making the end look piss and not suffering the fate of many others on that horrid last hand move :)

Comp in the evening

We went directly from the cave to Stoke wall to see Youngy and have a play at the winter bouldering league. I always love going to new indoor walls almost as much as new outdoor venues as change is always a good thing and keeps things interesting.

After feeling pretty heavy on the warm ups I gradually got into things and had managed to flash 21/25 by about 8.30. With an hour left to try the last 4 I had to start resting for long periods of time just to summon the energy to pull on and make more than a couple of moves! I clawed my way to a couple of the bonus holds but fell off a couple I am sure would have been flashed had it not been such a long double day session.

The atmosphere at the comp was really nice and the locals friendly. There was a good bit of banter with the fellow comp hustlers from Stockport and even though I had puntered up at the end, I managed to sneak victory by about 10 points from one of the Stockport crew.

Needless to say after a victory beer, I slept like a corpse!