Spain, my first 8a!

After all the awful weather in England, I couldn't wait to go to Spain! I was to fly on the Sunday morning and the day before was my British Team medical at a hospital in Sheffield. The journey over the snowy roads to Sheffield was proving treacherous! We spent 20 mins pushing a big van up a hill then we were on our way. I spent the day catching up with the team and doing various health checks required by the IFCS to show I was physically fit enough to compete. I had a late night packing and an early morning flight so Sunday was spent digging my toes in the sand and picnicking on the beach, which was an enjoyable contrast to driving over snowdrift-covered roads.

On the first day climbing, we went to Wild Side, a crag that is in the shade all day. This is such a good crag because it has loads of hard routes in the 7’s and above. There is a 6c+, but our old guidebook didn’t have this route in it, so I warmed up by traversing along the bottom of the crag then onsighted a 7a called Sit e Dicen Que Cai.

I then started to look at Ergometria, a 26m 8a. Good job I was keen to test my stamina!

The route can be broken up into 5 sections;

-A V5 boulder problem start,

-Followed by super easy juggy tufas to the first comfy knee bar.

 -Then the heat picks up with another harder section with lots of useless chalked up holds to confuse you leading into a painful knee bar.

-Bridge style climbing takes you to another painful no hands bridge rest,

-And a steadyish burn to the top has a hard, awkward cross through move that finishes you off!

Figuring out the boulder problem beta took me a while with various Spanish makinas (machines) shouting various powerful methods at me, which I had to modify to make work for me.  The trick ended up being to step right through next to a left heel hook. I loved this foot sequence! Sieving through the many holds was my first challenge and it took me around 4 goes over a few days to figure out the moves; and nice moves they were! :)

I took a rest day then found myself climbing the boulder problem crux first go which surprised me. Now I had to concentrate, and execute the moves I had practiced, reading the route a few moves ahead when I could. I started to flow through the moves, knowing exactly where my next hand and foot were meant to be. I only broke focus when I was at a knee bar rest and while I had time to think, the grade and the possibility of success starting to creep into my head. I told myself to ‘shut up and concentrate’ ‘hold it together’ ‘you can do this!’ A few deep breaths and I got back into my zone. I found myself clipping the chains with a massive grin on my face!! My first 8a, sent on my first proper red point!

The same day I flashed a 7b+ called Oceano. I was absolutely buzzing! I had climbed my first 8a and flashed 7b+ after just coming back from an injury :)

After one week back home, I went up to Ratho, to the EICA (Edinburgh International Climbing Arena) for a training weekend. This is the venue for the first European Youth competition at the start of June so it was good to get some practice on their steep competition walls! I was training with 5 other guys who were all just as psyched as I was to work hard. The weekend gave me an opportunity to give some technique tips and help them out with their routes. Having received so much help over the years, it was nice to give a little back. It was an awesome weekend, I managed to pack in 3 days of training, at the end of which, my skin was trashed!

So my injury had completely stopped troubling me, and I had climbed my first 8a. I felt like I had a strong clean slate to start training from. I’ve got the Europeans to look forward to and my next trip to Ceuse!!

Another Triple Date to Font! (This time much colder!)

Another triple date to font! How exciting! Well I was very excited but going in February is a risky time as it could be wet or wonderful!

After settling in to our gite it was time to go and check out some rock. It was cold so friction on the rocks might have been really good if it wasn’t covered in snow.

We spent the first few days searching around for some dry rock and trying to whip stuff dry. As the week went on the weather got hotter which caused the snow to melt and drip down the rock making everything wet! But we still managed to find some low overhanging roof which wasn’t too wet and just enjoyed some classic Font climbing (until we got to slapping the top and falling off with a wet hand!)

I had just started climbing again after a shoulder injury so was slightly apprehensive because I felt like while I was still recovering it might have been easy to injure it again.

In the last two days I did the most climbing, with the best conditions. My favourite problem I climbed this trip was Tentation, 7a at the 95.2 area, I had so much fun working this problem because it wasn’t my style. It got me frustrated but hooked because when I first pulled on all the moves but the first one seemed impossible for me. I had to spend a long time working it and figuring out exactly where I wanted my feet and my body down to the smallest, most precise movements. But I wanted to climb it because I thought it looked cool, around either side of a boulder leading to an ultimate spiky spine edge. I had to guppy this then figured out my own beta of going to a really small sharp flaky crimp then popping again to a small sharp hole with some off balance feet. This was a very satisfying problem for me :)

Here is the link to watch on your phone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nwsq5JgoNQ0

We had to move out of our gite on Saturday so the other people we were with left and Cliff and I went climbing. We went to Roche aux Sabots and I did two 7a called l’Oblique and Le Jeu De Toit, I really enjoyed working these problems by myself (Cliff was resting). Unfortunately, our camera ran out of battery so we couldn't film Le Jeu De Toit. 

Here is the link to watch on your phone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVhnWzuphHI

This trip got me psyched and discussing it with Cliff I wrote a list of things I needed to do to get fit while getting back into training, I was already running twice a week but I decided to make my running route longer and attempt a core workout that was set up to do every day for a month. My first workout was on the ferry while getting strange looks, 20 reps of 4 exercises x3, after a week it was to go up to 30 then the next week was 40 then killer week 50.

Our ferry landed at 7 and as soon as I got internet I tried watching my bro James in the final of the CWIF but for some reason my phone didn’t like it. I was already really happy for him and proud of him for getting in the final after a discussion at the start of the year when he had been really ill with man flu. He thought he had no chance of being selected to go to the European comps, and after being selected for some he then came 3^rd in the CWIF! Well done James!!!

Very psyched after this enjoyable but weak week in Font!

Singapore Worlds; Overcoming Competition Nerves

I have always had problems with nerves before major competitions. Especially in Linz, Austria where I made a mess of my 1^st route when I accidentally missed a clip and got pulled off by the belayer!  So I knew the World Championships in Singapore was going to be a big challenge for me, both physically and mentally.

Sentosa is a theme park island of Rainy Singapore, a really clean place, so clean that you can get fined for dropping chewing gum and litter. The place has a real western feel which surprised me as I thought it would be more cultural. The comp wall had been built on the beach which was really cool because it was a pleasant 5 minute walk from our hotel. Sentosa Beach Resort hotel was awesome too, built surrounding the swimming pool which was massive and all eco friendly by recycling the water.

I was prepared for the humidity of Singapore, but had no idea it would rain so much! Almost every section of the comp was interrupted by torrential rainfall followed by hours of waiting for the holds to dry. This didn’t do much for the bouldering warm up wall which was constantly covered in wet sand, and that’s no good when it gets between your toes!

However my mood was lifted when I recognised a load of the holds which helped me to read the routes. There was also some massive red toilet seat double pinch that I managed to get a cheeky knee bar and no hands rest in!

This was an amazing competition to watch climbers like Momoka Oda (who had just won the Worldcup in Imst, Austria!) climb the final routes that snaked all over the wall with spot lights following. So inspirational!

There were only 6 of us in our team making a more close-knit group than usual which gave a pleasant sense of friendship.  Ian Dunn and Ruth Dunne did a great job of looking after us during our stay ensuring everyone was kept happy and prepared to compete.

I ranked in 22^nd overall which I was happy about because normally I get really nervous and my head goes blank and my climbing doesn’t flow and it feels alien. I basically just “brick it” and end up hold on too tight because I don’t want to fall off which makes me more pumped and I fall off! I also had an aim with my coach Paul to get into the semi-finals which I did and I managed to combat some of the nerves that were trying to take over me :)

The rest of the team did really great too, an awesome effort from everyone, especially William Bosi coming 4^th and Molly Thompson-Smith qualifying in joint 2^nd for the semi-final then overall 7^th!!

Thanks for an amazing trip and awesome experience!

The Team (from left) William Bosi, Buster Martin, Dom Burns (Irish Team), Jonny White, Tara Hayes, Molly Thompson-Smith and me

Triple Date to Font! :) Sept 12

So... Off to Fontainebleau for a late summer holiday with my boyfriend and two other couples.  It was a beautiful sunny day when we arrived so I wasn’t expecting to be climbing anything too hard as friction was limited and most things are pretty slopey. This created a great opportunity to get some mileage in on easier (still class) stuff, I was also slightly apprehensive about being there again as last time I was carried away from the 95.2 boulders with a broken ankle.

We stayed in a beautiful gite a few miles outside Milly which was handy to get the daily Pain aux Sexual (chocolate and almond croissant-highly recommended!) for some pre-climbing energy!! J

Most of the week was spent doing mid range red circuits which was so much fun! Font has everything from dynos, crimps, slopers, mantels and everything is enjoyable despite the grade J It was amazing to escape from training on plastic and just enjoy climbing on some real rock while having a great holiday in the forest with the sun!

A highlight of my holiday was receiving an email telling me I was going to get a load of prAna clothes!!!!! Sooo much fun looking through their website and filling in an order form!!! I’m so excited and can’t wait for stuff to arrive!!

My brother James had been competing in the Paris World Championships and he came out to meet us after ranking 67, good effort to him and the rest of the GB team! It was cool to watch him crush some problems and show us all what’s possible. He did this really burly compression 7b+ roof which was so inspiring.

I managed to send a few really cool 7s including the following;

Some extension ‘sit start’ that got 7a using the beta my friend Easy had figured out (thanks J). It only took me couple of goes, however, he was quick (and quite rightly so) to point out that my bum wasn’t the last thing to leave the floor and I had to repeat it to get the tick. This was a good lesson for me in bouldering ethics and highlighted some bad habits (that I blame on indoor climbing).

Grande Marche 7a+ was a really steep powerful side pull crack that was totally dependent upon one heel hook (love them!) I managed to manoeuvre up through the crack with a lovely sequence on the send go but was surprised to find myself desperately wriggling like a salmon on the top out. After my sketchy sloppy top out James then kindly demonstrated a textbook mantel to send the problem, thanks!

The main one for me though was the Cul de Chien roof (Toit de Cul de Chien) 7a as I had tried this years before on the broken ankle trip so I knew it would be a good test for me! We went to Cul de Chien on the last day when it was soooo hot we were greasing off warm up problems! Some random French guy had a homemade remote control helicopter with a camera on it and an audience had gathered. When my left heel popped out the back, I managed to quickly fire my other foot in the back to stop me swinging off and I knew that now I had to commit. I found myself topping out to the buzzing of the helicopter and the applause of a crowd. Scary fun and classic!

After a great week of holiday sun fun climbing and hanging out, eating cakes etc it’s time to get back into training and I’m psyched! Refreshed with some outdoor skills, I had a break from training and had a really great time with my friends!

...and after climbing these amazing rocks, what would the Font trip be without climbing through some rocks...

...and making use of the trees.