Honesty in Death or A line´s history...

Some of these days I actually find the time to write a blog post, not for a general lack of time but rather related to the fact that I chose to spend my free time in a different manner, that is either climbing or hiking in my new home, the Frankenjura region of Germany. This night brought generally miserable sleep and a cold, so instead of being in school teaching I´m sitting at my desk, drinking coffee, pondering chicken noodle soup and busying myself about school I have some time on my hands. Go back in time a little more than a week. A friend of mine was planning to celebrate his birthday and since he´s a good friend, I decided to make the drive, despite being not psyched to drive at all. I had something on my mind besides just attending a birthday party, something that I had invested some time into during the summer. Go back in time a notch further. This spring, my landlady died of cancer after battleing it for a long time, died at an age where death is unfathomable and even more tragic than it usually is. Around that time, I showed a line that to a friend that had broken and hence deemed not climbable anymore by me. Considering that Tom climbs 8A/V12 on a regular basis, things would maybe look different from his point of view. Tom climbed the line, pulling the small holds and making the desperately long reach after a couple of tries the exact number I have forgotten, stepping into the upper wall section and making the FA of the problem since the breakage. In memoriam of my landlady, who was one of the most modest and honest people I´ve known, we renamed the problem to Honesty in Death. Honesty in Death originally is a Paradise Lost song. The song came out this spring and would soon become my song, actually became my song of the year 2012, since it helped me and sort of emotionally channeled me in a year that was - retrospecting from this morning´s point of view - to be a year of death, redefinition and preservation of core values I have chosen to hold on to and will more aggressively hold on to in the future. I tried the line for about three days in summer, coming close on my third day but ripping a huge hole in my finger. Since the line´s holds are really sharp and aggressive, particularly the starting crimper and the left hand pocket you stab to, I also didn´t have a lot of goes each sesssion. Frankly speaking, I also was overpacing things. I really wanted it. I gave it too many attempts in too short a time, always splitting my right hand tip in the end. Then I moved. Did a lot of bouldering in the Frankenjura, sent some hard stuff, found out how to improve after close to 12 years of climbing and vowed to return. I hiked up two pads. Gave it too many goes in too short a time. Saw myself walking home without the problem again. Had a Rockstar energy. Chalked up, pulled on - had it but slipped, this time without ripping my finger. Chalked up again, hit the pocket exactly right and climbed it. Done. In amidst the anguish, my only prayers are to myself... To me, Honesty in Death is the epitome of bouldering and one of the best lines, if not the best line, in the area. It would be classic in every area I´ve visited so far - and I´ve seen some. The line starts with both hands matched on a crimper, busts out a hard move to an intermediate glassy crimp which allows to gather what core strength there is and then stabs for a good three finger pocket. After that, you have to hold the swing and then negotiate the best BRCM topout. To glory. To relief. To whatever. It´s a proud line, it was demanding for me in particular because of its crimpy nature and a psychological process as well. I´ll return for pics. It won´t matter much but I just want some. Tom has climbed it about 40 times for training purposes. Some of Tom´s friends from Innsbruck have done it and all put it at the grade now known. I don´t know if I did the 5th, the 7t or maybe the 4th ascent. I don´t care. I wanted to climb it and did it. There are a few lines up there I really want to do. The BRCM were my playground from 2007-2011 and a part of me lives and stays up there. I´ll return. Peace!

Gorges du Tarn

I´m sitting at my desk, should probably check exams but can´t bring myself to do so...oh well, if all else fails, it´s gonna be a night session. I woke up to be enormously relieved this morning when I realized that Barack Obama has been reelected President of the United States. I seriously don´t even want to think about what would have happened if Mitt Romney had won, so we´ll keep it at this. Barack, the following four years are yours! Final term, get ´em! On Saturday I returned after a short but fun trip to Southern France, my favorite sport craggin paradise to be precise, that is Gorges du Tarn. I´ve also climbed at the neighboring Gorge de la Jonte a bit and it´s on a par. I´ll return. I just love it. I managed to send an old project I had started in 2007 and didn´t get to give Bar Bitturique more than one go, a go which actually felt really good! But I was showing people around...this seems to be my usual pattern and it is fun, but my next trip is definately not gonna be like this. I´ll go there over Easter, with clear objectives and a sharper focus on myself. But: I managed to climb some good things and three albeit amazing ones, so all´s well, especially considering I had only 5 and a half days. Enjoy some pics!

Bolting and establishing new lines...

Since 2007 I´ve increasingly been interested in etablishing new lines and routes. I´ve had my go at bolting a couple of times before, bolting a route here and there but things took on momentum when I moved to the foothills of the Alps. Not knowing anybody, nevertheless desperate to climb, I started looking for boulders since the established areas were out of reach since I couldn´t afford a car back then. I found a nice cluster of boulders, established an area so to speak, with problems within my limits or maybe a tad beyond that and had great times, great memories and a lot of fun. The same year, I also established a DWS in Southern France, horribly overgraded it out of fear, numerous falls and no top rope inspection and got really into the whole searching and finding thing. Things in my local boulderring spot took on more pace when I introduced one of my best friends these days to the area. New testpieces got cleaned and done and Tom made an amazing contribution to recleaning a lot of climbs, cleaned and scrubbed a ton of things himself and more thorough than I ever had. I did two of my hardest FAs in the area, Philipp Marlowe SD, only repeated by Tom and Yankee Bayonet, which in my mind still stands as prolly my hardest boulder and which is currently still to see a second ascent. Now things come and go, same goes for motivation. The past years I´ve been increasingly more psyched on routes, still bouldering of course but with changed focus. I talked a lot about getting back to bolting, ordered bolts, checked out walls and then finally got to the job together with a friend of mine. We´ll keep the place secret, the routes secret as of now but I have to say that I´m hooked. We bolted some amazing lines and I was fortunate enough to bolt a line that is on a par with classic enduro pitches in for instance Gorges du Tarn. I also bolted an amazing and hard little bastard of a steep project, 7 bolts and an anchor of a power pinch and pocket fest and am damn proud of it. It will for sure be one of my hardest climbs and the fact that it actually goes, completely fits my prefered style of climbing and is completely natural completes the picture. There will be more to come! We have to take pics, I have to get a Bosch drill, I have to continue...no, I actually don´t have to. I want. And that makes all the difference. Peace!

Couple of days to go...

So there only a couple of days left before I´ll make it into my first summer vacation break as a teacher...well deserved and most definately needed. I´ve had a major bill on my car, something on the engine had to be fixed and I´m quite desperate for chash as of now...with my salary, a close to 400 bucks bill is a punch hard to shake of. As of now, I have thus canceled my holiday trip to France and am gonna sit it out climbing locally, hanging out and getting my due rest. I have a fall break of ten days, which should be enough to wrap up my projects in France, so I guess it´s climbing all my local projects, makeing a couple of Frankenjura trips and so forth...I´m not ruling things out, it´s just that I´m quite psyched on my local stuff as of now and saving some money which I can spend when things get all nasty in here makes sense...why blow it when summer actually seems to have finally arrived? I´ve also ordered a substantial ammount of bolts, actually they have been delivered to me already, so I´m really looking forward to some bolting as well. School was a lot of fun...there´re always minor setbacks and disturbances, some frustration and some anxietey add to the mix as soon as you make it into a new job but on a whole, things were fun! This morning I said goodbye to my 7th graders and I´ll embark on a field trip with my Q 11 senior highs on Monday, sorta to properly finish the term. No photos...no climbing photos...hopefully there´ll be some, I ticked a couple of amazing routes the past weeks and definately need some pics! I also need a ton of sleep...and have a school party to attend in a couple of minutes. I somehow weaseled out of the teachers´ soccer team (smart move I guess) and am actually looking forward to watching the rest of the team get killed ;)

Wrapping up...

So I have to admit I´m tired...the tiredness I´m talking about is the one that makes you fall asleep on the train, drains your energy and generally puts you down...and there´s two ways of reacting: succumb or try to get as much done as possible while not overstraining yourself. I´ve chosen the latter...I have to fix my classes grades, my car´s engine has been ruined to some extent by a ferret (quite a bill coming my way...) and it´s just 3 three weeks before I finally will get some rest...if this is reading somewhat uninspired, I´m tired...I wish I could sleep in tomorrow...but I can´t...

Happy times...

Okay, so I got a car...named it Cartman...here we go! Finally I´m free to go where I want to go...climbing! YAY! No more gritty crimper crap, steep stuff, big boy climbing, here I come! So much to do...so many projects! All I gotta do is do well in an upcoming exam on Monday and then it´s seriously on... "RESPECT MY AUTHORITY"!

At the end of my rope...

There are things in life that will indeed follow strict mathematic rules, despite the fact that life in general is mysterious and by far not as calculable as some would like it to be...one of these universal patterns (simplified, I will admit to that) actually explains what is happening around me, what´s happening at the gym I´ve been working at for four years now and what´s increasingly taking it´s toll, even though I´ve been hesitant to admit that for quite some time...I´m a climbing coach and I´m at the end of my rope!
One of these days, someone is going to get hurt, there´s no way around that and any attempt to either shrug off that realization or dismiss it as maybe just a tad exaggerative in the end only contributes to the whole problem. Increase the number of people participating in a certain activity and the number of folks so blatantly ignorant of what they´re doing will increase as well, it´s simple mathmatics applied!
Soccer moms go for lead climbs in between Latte Macciatos and ignorant and numbskull boyfriends take their naive, admiring or alternativly just plain scared girlfriends to the gym. Toddlers mistake the bouldering area for a playgound and any complain will be dismissed as a manifesto of how narrowminded and impatient grown ups can be by super-moms and super-dads defending their bratish little monster and his/her friends. Not to mention the fact that these parents are actually relieved to have the kids torture someone else...As a coach, I have to talk to people in all these cases...there´re things such as the Good-Samaritan-Law and even though I won´t go into any more legal details, well, you guys shouldn´t be doing that. Take a class or at least consider it...
Topping this seems hard but, yes, it can be done! Not only has sportclimbing boomed to an extend that no one could expect, it has also sparked a need for more coaches...which means that pretty much everybody can become a coach nowadays. What´s making this especially worse is that a ton of people for some strange reason consider themselves competent enough for that. Now everybody needs to get started at some point but if you can get a license that easily, something is wrong. Recently I was present when one of my former teen teamers was prolly leadscared for a while while doing lead-fall-practice with another coach...after slamming into the wall, the poor kid sat on the couch for an hour, holding her ankle and holding back her tears. Fortunately I was around since that particular coach didn´t even realize what had happend-no ice, no comforting talks and no apology. Competence in action! This doesn´t mean that I don´t like these people on a personal basis, most of the coaches working for the gym are really nice...it´s just that being nice doesn´t qualify you in my opinion...you´ll have to add sound knowledge about training and injury prevention, excellent skill on all levels of climbing and a ton of experience for situations both already there and about to unfold, and yes, that calls for intuition!
With all this, someone is going to be seriously hurt these days...it´s inevitable and I´m not a cynic. I`m just really happy to make it into my real job as a teacher next week. Less days spent at the gym decrease the probability of being on the spot when the whole nastiness will unfold.
I recently told someone his rope was damaged and had to be replaced...and got told that he never takes a fall...Spinners anyone? Footslips? Questions anyone?
Now one could actually ask why all these people are let into the gym in the first place...but hey, we all know the answer, right?

Top 5...

Okay, making lists is fun...at times!
So here´s my Top 5 boulders and routes...doesn´t include projects...
Boulders:
Seven Spanish Angels, Bishop/Buttermilks
Circus Trick Right, Big Bend
Army of Darkness, Big Bend
The King, Yosemite
Essential Peabody, Bishop/Buttermilks

Routes:
Murati, Gorges du Tarn
Action Discrete, Gorges du Tarn
L´heure d´ete, Gorges du Tarn
Sennerin, Dietrichshorn
Supernase, Frankenjura

So in case you can get out there and try them...do so!

Some vids...low key stuff...

http://vimeo.com/33956543

http://vimeo.com/35217141