These folks went up to Newfoundland to climb icebergs. Their story is here. I like this quote:
“I realized that what I had to do was to fully commit and quit worrying about how dangerous this all seemed. Hesitation and fear was not what was needed to mount this iceberg.”
And this one:
“Each swing still made that familiar high pitch crack from the 15,000-year old high pressured air trapped in the ice.”
This is the seeker of all knowledge.
The photo of Jenny and Anthony in the posts below, were taken on this climb. Here’s a 5 minute video of someone else climbing that route.
This was Friday at Taylors Falls. Knowing she was being filmed, Lisa was very efficient in setting up a top rope. Ask her to show you how she does it.
Lisa, Ron, Peter and I had a quiet day of climbing at Taylors on Friday. Photos below of Lisa climbing and Peter leading on Wisconsin side.
Dean Potter’s recent video explains why he likes to climb with just a parachute.
N.B. He’s the guy who climbed the Delicate Arch in Arches National Park which was quite a scandal a few years back and became a rap song.
This site has over 1,700 videos and photos with the beta on bouldering routes at Fountainbleau in France. Here’s one example. With the ubiquity of cell phone cameras, this is easier to do now than ever before.
I think the “Green Cow Stomach” dish might be tasty. Although, I’d be hard-pressed to choose between that and the “Beef Throat.” Here’s a report on climbing in China and a short video.
“At nearly 12,000 feet Shuanqiao Valley is stacked with hundreds of pitches of ice. Similar to Cody, WY the majority of the climbs cascade down through gullies from the mostly unclimbed high peaks that form their backdrop. The majority of the routes are in the WI4 vicinity yet more difficult lines do exist. ..Typically I get board rather fast with WI4 terrain but the combination of being in a foreign country, at altitude, and climbing either heavily aerated or compact dry dinner-platting ice, kept me on my toes on the easier terrain and had me working on the harder routes. Not to mention the difficulty of physical recovery when eating yak kidney, chicken feet, boar hoof, and stomach lining for dinner! Mmmm, seconds please!”
“With normal use and proper care, the life expectancy of your harness is approximately three years, and can be longer or shorter depending on how frequently you use it and on the conditions of its use.”
Lots of information about cleaning your harness and testing off belay loops at the link above. The only thing I know for sure is to make sure the colors in your harness and your shoes match.
Genevieve, Fabrice,Peter and I climbed at RW today and it was hot. The temperature was at 96 when I left about 3. I made a list of some of the good and bad news about Monday.
Good news - it was cooler in the shade
Good news - it was warm enough for shorts
Good news – it was too hot for wasps on the sunny side
Good news – there is a window of comfortable weather in Minnesota; temps just so, humidity low, no biting insects
Good news – we had lots of chalk
“To be sure, many of the colorful figures of modern alpinism have graced us with anecdotes of their training regimes: Lionel Terray’s tales of humping huge loads of ammunitions to the gun emplacements during WW1 can easily be considered training; Ceasar Meastri famously claimed to do push ups while making love to his wife. But he also cycled to distant climbs, both of which contributed to making him one of the strongest climbers of his generation; Walter Bonatti carried snowballs in bare hands and surely this helped prepare him for the rigors of winter bivys that killed several less well prepared partners. Reinhold Messner spent untold hours traversing back and forth on the side of an old stone building to build finger strength for his early important climbs in the Dolomites. When Messner transfered his energies to the Himalaya he did timed uphill runs throughout the same mountains, often boasting about vertical-climb rates (800-1000 meters/hour) that remain impressive even today. But other than colorful allusions like these, modern alpinists have had no distinct role models to follow: No Roger Bannister or Michael Phelps to lead the way to breaking new barriers through careful application of athletic training principles.”
Here’s part of his rock climbing program. Read his blog for lots more details.
“Living near Smith Rock state park, I go to the lower gorge, a place stacked with 5.10 cracks. There I do as many routes I can in one day; often the sun is the limiting factor, especially in the summer. My aim to get at least twenty pitches in and will try to climb many of them wearing a light ten-pound pack.”
Steve House has this post about resting, including this bit:
“But objectively, how do we know when to rest. Here are some methods I’ve used, from simple to sophisticated:
Waking heart-rate.
I started doing this when I was a teenager training for cross country ski racing. My coach had me take my pulse for 10 seconds as soon as I woke up. I’ve been doing it so long, I don’t even have to count. I can feel whether I’m rested or not. Slow, and ready to train again is for me around 36-42 beats per minute. Not recovered, fast, for me, is anything higher than 48, but usually if I’m tired I’m most often at 52.
Box-Step Test
Another, more objective method, is the box-step. I like this because I can do it in base camp where the waking heart rate test can be thrown-off by the altitude. For this test you need a heart rate monitor. Find a step a little lower that knee-height and step up and down rapidly. Push hard for 60 or 120 seconds, get your heart rate high, maybe as high as 170. Then stop, lean against the wall, walk around, do whatever you do to recover as quickly as possible. Note both your Max HR and your HR after 30 seconds. If I’m rested I’ll go from 170 to 70 in thirty seconds. If I’m still tired, it will stay between 100-120 after 30 seconds and maybe after a minute it will drop below 70.”
As usual, Will Gadd has a lot to say about training and how it relates to mountain sports.
“We all choose to train three main performance components (our skill, muscles, and head); how we perform is the test. An athlete's performance will generally depend not on which one of these three are the strongest, but which one is the weakest…But, and this is the almost funny part, the easiest things to train are muscles, so that's where most people focus most of their time while trying to get "better" at a mountain sport. I really believe this physical-centered approach is wrong for most athletes in the mountain sports I know… In my experience the fastest performance gains for athletes are usually made when they train their sport-specific weaknesses, specifically skills”
Here’s what he considers the threshold strength levels for a few mountain sports:
Alpinism:
- Hike up 3,000 feet in under one hour, 5,000 feet in under three (Messner could reportedly do 1,000M/3,200 feet in under 30 minutes or something...).
- Do 10 pullups (not because pullups are necessary, but because anyone who can do 10 real pullups is sorta trained up)
- Do "Angie" in under 20 minutes if you think you're "elite."
- Climb grade IV ice all day on minimal gear and be relaxed about it, lead 5.6 with a pack.
Technical rock climbing at a solid 5.13 level
- Do 10 pullups on a half-inch ledge.
- Hang a 1 inch ledge for 5-10 seconds one-handed.
- Campus up the smallest rungs in your climbing gym.
- Climb ten 30M pitches of modern mid-5.12 a in a day (all different pitches, no laps).
Trad Rock climbing 5.10:
- Do one pullup on a one-inch rung.
- Do three pullups on a bar.
- Hike 1,000 feet vertical in 30 minutes.
- Climb all day on 5.7 and still think it's fun
According to Mountainproject.com, “
This is the story of two climbers who climbed this route in Zion during Easter weekend of this year. They got about halfway up the first day and had to descend because a team of slow climbers was ahead of them. The second day, they had it all to themselves.
Last year, we hiked up to the top of this buttress on a paved trail. That was tough enough.
Dave MacLeod recommends a “middle way” between a modern style of leaping and yelling and an older, more graceful style.
“The popularity of bouldering and the influence of famous climbers has tended to make climbers move faster and more aggressively, with less foot moves per hand move. What does this mean? It adds efficiency because you get through the moves quicker and more momentum is used and more aggression is good for realising the maximum force you can produce. But it loses efficiency by getting less weight on your feet throughout the whole move or sequence and adding a lot of swings into disadvantageous positions that must be countered with muscle power.”
So he did. A 13 year old just summited on Everest. I liked this part of his interview: “I just want to do something big and this is something I wanted to do for myself.”
Not to build awareness for anything. Good for him.
From the ground, what they see is a small pile of rocks, at the left. From the air, it looks different.
Here’s the winner’s photo.
A competition in Boulder. CO called “Battle in the Bubble” took place last weekend. It was sponsored by this climbing gym. Don’t know if it’s obvious in this highlight video, but they had a parachutist deliver the starting hold. I wonder how they’d do that at VE.
Here’s some video of the first world cup bouldering competition of 2010 that just ended in Switzerland. The video is over 9 minutes.; What’s interesting is the split screen so you can watch the (slightly) different techniques of each climber. The women’s winner was Alex Johnson and here’s an interview with her. Part of her training regimen consists of “...drinking Oreo milkshakes.”
Hmmm, I could do that.
5 reasons to use a GriGri are listed here. This is my favorite:
“You take Butter Cup to the crag, she doesn’t really want to go, and doesn’t climb that often. She agrees, only after some pestering and a promise you will take her out for dinner and a movie. You’re all saddled up, you give her your Reverso, or ATC Guide, or whatever, and she is anchored - just in case you fall. You’re clipping away, showing off, no shirt, and go for the last killer dyno move you’ve done like a bazillion times before. This time you slip, catch Butter Cup by surprise, she freaks, and you hit the ground. No dinner, no movie….”
Sounds like a win-win; you didn’t have to spend money on the GriGri and you didn’t have to spend money on the dinner and movie.
Maybe this T-shirt is perfect for this situation:
J
The weakest link for completing a move is, generally, maintaining the crimping angle at the lower hand. The higher you try to lock of with your arm or the faster you push, the more force is loaded onto the chosen crimping angle and eventually the chain will break. Hopefully you are already grabbing the next hold in control. If not, you will land dynamically and if it is a small hold it is about maintaining the crimping angle again. If it is a large hold, your success depends on your courage to test your open hand friction strength. In most of the cases, you will actually take away the hand as you are afraid of the pain from cutting loose from the friction. As you are working a crux move, you learn to optimize the finger angle and the load you are challenging it with. Often your mind is visualizing sticking the next hold, but instead focusing on locking your gripping angle might do the trick. "I lock my crimper with a key, then I go to the next hold", is a successful concept of Maja Vidmar. The picture tries to explain that we in general use and are stronger in three different finger angle positions.
(I think it means, keep contact on your previous hold until you have a good grip on your next hold.)
But mostly I think we should take note of this young climber's confidence building routine. I am going to start the day with this. I think it will help.
“This year's Cheung Chau bun festival has a record number of female entrants all eager to be the first to the top of the bun towers. The dash up a 15 meter tall tower covered in lucky Chinese buns is a century-old folk custom for the former pirate enclave of Cheung Chau.”
“Plastic lucky buns will cover the entire bamboo structure for the final event, and competitors must grab as many of them as they can within three minutes. Buns located at the top of the tower are worth nine points, while the ones near the bottom are only worth one.”
He said, “That route’s just like the routes of the Verdon Gorge in France.” Only about 600 feet shorter.”
So you don’t need to travel to France to climb some of the most famous rock in the world.
A 3.5 minute video about packing for a climbing/camping trip and the drive from L.A. to Joshua Tree. Very cute.
“and don’t forget the camp chair.”
Usually we read stories of incredibly hard climbs, with super human feats of derring-do. This is a story of someone’s first 5.7 multi-pitch climb at Red Rocks, Nevada. Something well within the range of us mere mortals. This quote is a little over-the-top maybe, but I like it:
“Multi pitch climbing is like a song, each pitch a stanza and each belay station a chorus.”
And this quote:
“I didn’t want my first multi-pitch experience to be tainted by any leader fright. Besides, leading is overrated.”
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Similar looking rock but this is located in Indonesia.
“Roughly 800 feet of granite/basalt with cracks from base to summit waiting to be climbed. Only reason I didn't establish any routes this time is the rain, but I'll head back in March.
The place is surround by hot springs. These were the biggest pools and longest waterfall flowing directly from the hot springs I've ever seem. As impressive as what i saw in New Zealand.”
It is showing locally on May 21-27 at the Landmark Lagoon in Minneapolis.
At least that’s what this video says. I’ll never look at sit-ups the same way. Although, I doubt I’ll be able to find another man to do them the way they show in this video – unless I’m in jail. C’est la vie. (That’s French, you know.) Very bouncy music.
You can find a new rock cliff and put up some new routes. Which is hard here in the prairie. Or, you can donate money and dedicate a climb. Mike Endreezi does most – all? – of the bolting at Red Wing and Sandstone. You can contribute to the costs of putting new bolts and new anchors at his site. Or, he’s got a bunch of routes you can sponsor. Info here. Info on what goes into safe bolting is here.
If you climb a lot at Red Wing or Sandstone, shoot him a few bucks. I know Mike N. gave him a bunch.
The Access Fund supports access to climbing areas all over the U.S. – including supporting the MN Climber’s Association. Here’s a DVD they’re offering as a fundraiser.
“The Petzl All Access DVD contains ten amazing short climbing films. One hundred percent of the proceeds from the sale of All Access goes to the Access Fund and their revolutionary Access Fund Land Conservation Campaign, a multi-million-dollar revolving fund that helps local climbing organizations secure access. Petzl America covered the production costs for the DVD, while the filmmakers donated their work. All Access is an entertaining way for climbers, climbing filmmakers, and Petzl to work together in supporting the access cause. Price: $10.”
“You can get a copy at either the Access Fund Store or on Mountain Gear. Here is the list of segments being featured:
- Catching Reality – Emil Sergel
- Hey Presto – Paul Diffley, Hot Aches Productions
- Infinity Lane – TLC Productions
- Medeoz – Guillaume Broust
- PURE: Sonoma County with Kevin Jorgeson – Chuck Fryberger
- Steph Davis – Sender Films
- Steve McClure, Hubble – Ben Pritchard
- Weeks Before Winter, featuring Chris Sharma – Mike Call
- Plus a bonus film, Blind and Naked, by Cedar Wright, and an Access Fund message from Big Up Productions’ Josh Lowell.”
I grabbed 3 minutes from a TED talk by Nathan Myhrvold on a machine designed to track and kill the malaria-causing female mosquitoes with a laser. The entire 15 minute lecture is here.
Dave MacLeod talks about the art of pacing when attempting to redpoint a route.
“The basics of pacing are that it’s a good idea to climb fast; as fast as possible without sacrificing accuracy. But even this isn’t so simple as occasionally on steep burly climbs with big positive holds, it can be better to err more on the side of speed even if accuracy is sacrificed a little bit.”
“Here is a video of yesterday’s efforts of mine on a long project (estimated grade V14). It’s about V12 to just before my failure point and the next few moves are the crux, so I need to have plenty left in the tank to make any more progress.”
An article about Blue Mounds near Luverne, MN.
“Blue Mounds is well known in climbing circles. We get people from Colorado who come here to climb for a different experience, as well as people from all the surrounding states. We give out approximately 1,000 to 1,400 rock climbing licenses each year, at no charge. We just keep tabs on how many we get on an annual basis.”
The bison herd is expanding on a daily basis with about a dozen babies already and more expected.
“May is the ‘Month of the Red Calves,’ in another language,” noted White. “We should get about 20, give or take two or three. We don’t give pregnancy tests, so we don’t know exactly how many to expect.”
Blue Mounds offers people a chance to see “a wild herd in a domestic setting,” and there are usually between 85 and 111 bison in the park.
I was amazed a few years ago when I discovered that women could climb. This video shows that even Moms can climb. Who knew?
(P.S. In the video, he asks them to check to see if his buckles are good. I did. And his buckles are F i i i i i i i i ne! If you know what I mean.)
Sure, he’s on a bike. But, still, no crash pads.
The 1st 1.5 minutes are a little slow – just scenery. FF to the 1min 30 sec mark and you’ll see some great bike bouldering.
Why bother buying hundreds of dollars of specialized gear, when you can just grab a used inner tube and go over a 100’ waterfall. K.I.S.S.
I’ve grabbed the sassiest 2 minutes in the video below. The whole video is here. More on that waterfall here.
Assuming you are doing roped climbing and are tied into the rope – a mistake I’ve made more than once – here’s a descriptive article on belaying.
The five most important, ranked parameters that decide the softness of the fall are;
1. The belaying technique: Moving inwards can prolong the fall by meters but if you instinctively sit-down you can instead reduce the fall by some -20 cm.
2. Rope condition: A worn out rope can easily reduce the softness by a meter or so.
3. Rope drag: A fall, especially high up, gets harder by the level of the rope drag.
4. Belay device: The ATC may increase the softness by 20 cm.
5. Weight: Lighter climbers will get harder and more static falls.
So you want a heavy climber and a light belayer using an ATC on a newer rope with minimum drag. (Although, as the article points out, the actual belay device plays a minor role.) So, those of you lighter lead climbers out there – bulk up. Those of you heavier belayers out there – start leading.
And you get to travel in this big red truck with its own climbing wall.
Eliot leading up "The Chamber of Secrets" Larry De Angelo Route, 5.7 in the Radcliff Area, Black Velvet Canyon
Tunnel Vision, a squished belay with a party of four
