Roadrunner

About 8 ish years ago some cunt burnt all the road building materials under a little cave know as Roadrunner, this set the hillside on fire and ruined the cave.  We went looked and left, never again would we sit getting stoned by the busiest road in North Wales between bouts of going up or down round and round with occasional Police visits asking what the hell we were up to. I was an addict more involved in there than I have ever been with any other bit of rock before or since.  Shortly before the burning I was swinging off the top of Diana From 3 separate starts the sit, an un-repeated 8a+ , at the time (probably only 8a really).  A reverse of the traverse V8 into said V12, and The Kung Foo Start again About V11/12.  Then the roadmen came, and work started for mouths on the tunnel or something, I went for a look but it was all dusty with roadwork ming.  Never mind I thought, they will fuck off soon and I will go back clean it and finish them all, it will be great.  Only it was not meant to be.  The bastards couldn't be arsed to clean up properly so chucked a match on it, imagine that , most of the time you walk away from your project thinking "its not going anywhere" well 3 of mine did, plus a few hundred hours of working moves. The shield to the right of Diana, we had only just started to progress on it, now it was gone.

Fast forward to about 3 -4 years ago I decided to clean it out, a few trips later it was in a climbable state, but I never finished it, this summer I went back and tried again, I re climbed the lines that were Diana, The Chauffeur and Beep.  The rock is still cracking but I came to a point where I realised that the more  I attacked it with a hammer all I was going to get was more cracking.  Then I realised it was always a bit chossy anyway.  The corner to the right fell down and in theory ruined the traverse before years before I ever climbed there.  Anyway I write this because someone was interested in finishing the job, good luck to them I say, I would like to think I would put the effort in but in all honesty if I was going to do it I would have finished it by now.   Here is some footage of the latest incarnation of the cave:

Hope springs eternal

At last a decent weather forecast that coincides with my days off.  Its been a while all December and most of January in fact.  The return from training sessions to good days was about 2% and that has been pissing me off.   I have one project that was within 3-5 mm of being done at the end of November which has been wet ever since.  Another that is proving too hard in an annoying way, (flexibility not power) and the desire to climb Malc's Start has been coming on strong again in recent months.  For the last few weeks not a lot has been happening, had a trip to Stanage with James the highlight was doing Deliverance again, what a stunning problem that is.  He got all excited about Big Air as it was fully padded out, unfortunately he didn't commit to the last move instead jumping off a couple of times.  Round this way as i said I have been on Malc's a couple of times and think its getting ready to go, a bit less mincing and a bit more focus now.  The wall climbing is slowing down to try and take advantage of whatever good days come along and hopefully I have done enough to make a difference.  


You know you read various bits and pieces about these wads training routines, it struck me that virtually the only thing they all had in common was they do pull ups lots and lots of pull ups, being a great one for over simplification and given the fact that I probably haven't done 1000 pull ups in total in the last 10 years, I decided that it couldn't be that hard.  Error it is, about 2 hours and 500 in I gave up, which brings me to an interesting point, that being I GAVE UP, now I made up reasons like...

• I don't want to hurt myself 
• It might be sunny tomorrow 
• My skin hurts
• Better to break in gently

But the fact is I GAVE UP.  Word has reached me from on high that it is piss and I am right, I am being a wimp.



I guess weakness like strength is 70% in the mind.  Must try harder,  I am sure when Caff was coming into the Mill and campusing and doing pull ups after a session at LPT this summer his skin was shit, but his eyes were firmly where they should be on the prize.  So 6 days of no wine now, 1.5 kg down, eyes on the prize...

New Year New Psyche Old Problems

Its been a while, mainly due to the fact that its been wet so nothing interesting is happening.  Mainly I have been climbing in the Indy and the Mill, occasionally between the showers I have headed down to Jerrys roof, and a couple of trips up to the top of the Little Orme. 


At Jerrys I finally managed to stop falling off the end of Wurzel Gunnage and compleated the second asscent.  Gradewise I think soft 8a+, very similar to Mr Fantastic, however it seems that Mr F is probably going to be downgraded to 8a, so once again I am wrong/disagree. 

 The little orme spanked me on Weirdo and the broken Grass Moustashe, it was a little frustrating as I was really close to the Moustache this time last year, utilising a high foothold. This year I failed to even get the foot on and pull in, which made the move to the sloper too wild to hold. Should have tried more last year I guess, only thing I can think is I was doing about an hour of Yoga a day, cos I had quit smoking and stopped sleeping, guess this helped.












A couple of days ago a big team headed down to Porth Ysgo with a basket load of psyche to get on dry rock. Given the fact the day before I had driven down with Chris only to end up not popping out the grey into dry nice weather as so often happens but starting to walk down as raqin fell harder and harder so we just did one and went back to the Mill. Anyway I tried the little slopey prow on the far right of the beach, and it haad magically gone from no foothold to a big shelf, this made the previously nails slap far more ameanable and more 7 than 8 which was a nice suprise.
    Picture Si Panton http://www.northwalesbouldering.com/

Like I said though mainly it been the mill.  I am about 5-6kg heavier than when we got back from Austria, I feel like my bodys adapting to this now and the only real diffrence is in catching holds, I can lock deeper, train more (13 days on and still feeling fine) jump futher and my feet dont come off as easily.  So at present I am attacking my fingers with a vengence, using the weight vest on the 30 board and starting a bit on the campus board.  If I can just trick them into getting some contact strength I can stay heavy if not I will have to start cutting down the vino and eating less which always sucks.  

next years tick list!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ag_Q7tFm2QsidHc4cGY4Tnl0bEhfSnZveFRweEhlN0E#gid=0

Best in the world?

Please please please...

There is some twitching on the interweb about winter climbing although I have no interest whatsoever in that the last couple of years while the red faced tired looking people gather in V12 for their apres session coffee, I tended to be midway between a project and a mill session or vice versa.  I am hoping the same will happen this year and as the clouds lifted from a ill advised day off booked on the spur of the moment because I spent too long talking to that man Davies.  "But I want it to be dry it will be dry" repeat ad infinity it might come true but no.  At 10 am I was reassuring him mission one was out, he seemed to think the Ogwen would be dry, watching the rain fall in Beris I was sure it wasn't.  Eventually after some questioning he claimed it was dry down the coast, surprisingly when I got there an hour later it was wet and it turned out i was only an hour ahead of the worst of the weather.  Was it wet all along, I wonder?  This is the man who once told me it was mint in Yorkshire for me to drive there, when I arrived we visited Almscliffe, Ilkley and Earl had a pint and drove home in convoy without pulling on.  When I questioned Katz later he laughed and said it was raining at 8am when he left for work.  

there be snow in them hills...

Anyway what I am hoping for is that all the wet in the world will be absorbed by icicles and snow leaving me in a wonderful white world where everything is dry and cold.   Snow is after all better than rain isn't it?

Dodging the rain

Went down to jerrysthis morning and managed a new locals linkup. Starting on Huffys before moving into Wurzel Gunnage Stand Start, grade wise about 7c+ or 8a.  At the moment I have gone for 8a as I think both halfs suit me as opposed to them being easy, time will tell I guess. Then it started to rain again, whoppee back to the mill.