Battling the alps and global warming (Part 2)

We got back to the flat in Courmayeur from the failed Mont Blanc attempt around lunchtime. I headed upstairs to try to get some sleep - it took a while to doze off but in the end I got about three hours shut-eye before it was time to grab a quick shower, re-pack my rucksack, and head down for dinner. We took it easy for the evening and left for Pont around 11.30 with an air of expectation in the car - I felt determined that this time I wouldn't be turning the group around.

Leaving the car about 12.30 am, we headed a short walk along the road to where a track began to zig-zag up a steep hillside. Andrea strode to the front, and I automatically tried to match his pace. It didn't take long to realise that I wasn't going to keep that up easily though, and with the rest strung out behind there wasn't much point, so I eased back to a steady plod.

We reached the Rifugio Vittorio Emanuele II (2,735 meters) around 3.00 am and sat outside for a while eating breakfast, until someone wandered in and discovered the staff were already up preparing for the guests to arise, and happy to make us a coffee.

One latte later, I was feeling pretty good as we headed out back onto the trail. It didn't take long however till I started to experience the first signs of gastro intestinal distress. Soon, I was farting about every 10 steps - clearly there wasn't much blood flowing to the upper intestine so I was already struggling to provide my brain and muscles with the required level of oxygen. This didn't particularly worry me though; I've been through it before in training for long distance triathlon so I figured as long as I kept the pace steady I'd be fine. The rest of the guys slowed to my pace and we kept a steady plod up through the darkness, the head torches of the first guys to leave from the hut twinkling below us. A little later on, I started to notice my breathing getting worse. I couldn't drink from the hydration pack without stopping while I sucked on it, and even then I had to take a few breaths before I was ready to resume walking. Nevermind - I wasn't going to let myself be the weak link again tonight!

Around 3400m, as it was getting light, we reached a point where the route dropped down towards the bottom of the glacier to our left. Nic had been scoping further up the ridge we were on however, and found a shiny new via ferrata in place. All I had with me for protection was slings, and I was acutely aware of the danger this presented in the event of a fall, but the ridge looked a fairly gentle angle so I reasoned a factor 2 was unlikely. I was feeling wobbly enough not to really trust my judgement by this point though, so I asked Słavek and Fats (who were coming behind me) to just keep an eye, and yell out if I did something stupid.

The climbing was a pretty straightforward traverse so I was able to forget my discomfort at climbing on slings (and even grab a couple of pictures of the other guys), up till the end when it turned up a set of ladders on the wall. For the first time I began to doubt the sanity of carrying on - if I didn't trust myself to climb a ladder any more, what was I doing up here? But I looked over my shoulder to the summit and thought "Fuck that, we're too close for me to pull out now", took a rest for a short while to gulp down some air, and climbed out. Sitting down to put the crampons on and get roped up for the slope to where we would re-join the main route, I started to feel a little better.

For a short while I had the feeling it was all going to be fairly straightforward to the top, but then the breathing difficulties got worse again. I was on the back of a three with Nic and Andrea, and moving so slowly we were almost stationary. The guys kept turning to offer encouragement and ask if I was OK - I stopped speaking in response, and began resorting to a thumbs up and wave to carry on up the hill. I couldn't waste precious breath on words any more. I remember thinking to myself "What the fuck is going on? This isn't fucking everest, why are you walking 10 steps and taking a breather like you're up in the himalaya?" I'd been to this height by ski lift many times in the past without issue, how could it be so difficult now?

Suddenly, out of nowhere, I had tears welling up in my eyes. I fought them back down and wondered where they were coming from. I was suffering but I didn't feel particularly emotional, in fact I was settled into one of those comfortably numb states I use to get through long hard bike or run sessions - switch off and keep putting one foot in front of the other. The tears came again, and I pushed them back, but when they came for the third time I thought "Fuck it, let them go".

Within seconds I was sobbing... and then suddenly I felt a second wind. "It's now or never" I thought, and picked up the pace to what felt like a sprint - but was in reality no more than a normal walking pace. I must have looked a sight, tears streaming down my face, snot and dribble coming from my nose and gaping wide mouth as I gasped for air like a fish out of water. With about 100m to go, my throat began to constrict and I developed an asthmatic wheeze, but I figured if I stopped now I might not be able to start again, so I kept going.

This last push was the hardest thing I've ever done - finishing the half ironman was a walk in the park in comparison. I arrived at the queue for the last few meters of rock an absolute wreck. I couldn't speak for a couple of minutes, but as I began to come back to reality I realised just what I state I was in. I had massive pins and needles - my hands and feet felt like balloons. There was a bitter metallic taste in my mouth, and the world was slowly rotating around me.

After a bit of a break, we began scrambling up the the statue of the madona on the very summit. My balance was all over the place, and I really though I was likely to topple off. I considered untying from the rope to avoid taking anyone else with me, but in the end it seemed like too much hassle... better just to do my best to stay on the ridge.

Eventually we made it up to the statue, grabbed a couple of photos, and got back down to the top of the snow field. I remember musing to myself that I should be feeling elated, but was mainly relieved that the ascent was over, and dreading the walk back down. Now that Nic had realised what a bad state I was in, he was keen to get me down as quickly as possible. I wanted to wait at the top of the glacier for Fats and Słavek (who'd been quite a bit behind us to the summit), but he was insistent we should get moving after just about long enough for me to catch my breath and cool my head in the snow. At the time I felt critical of this decision, but with hindsight he was absolutely right - I was not just exhausted, I was ill and staying at that height longer than necessary could have had serious consequences. Even lying still in the snow I was struggling a bit for breath.

Going back down by the normal route there were a few crevasses to get across, and it was hard going in the sun softened snow, but we made it down the glacier without incident. Nic headed off down towards the hut, and I waited with Andrea for Fats and Słavek to arrive. The break was welcome, and for the first time in about three hours it felt like there was enough oxygen in the air.

We took our time down the rest of the way to the hut, where there was a welcome freezing lake for weary feet, and some hot food. On the way, I began to think about my behavior on the way to the summit. I have a very stubborn streak under pressure, which can be very useful in an individual pursuit such as a long distance triathlon, but in a team event such as this it was not fair for me to hide my condition from the rest of the guys. You need to be able to make an informed decision on the hill, and I witheld that information from the people who would have had to look after me had things got any worse - they should have been allowed to fully understand what continuing upwards meant for us all. Arriving at the hut, I apologised to Nic for this, and resolved not to let it happen in future.

The last steep slope seemed so much longer than it had in the darkness the night before, but eventually we arrived back at the car, a full 19 hours after we had left it.

The day after I noticed I had very swollen ankles (peripheral oedema) and for the next couple of days I felt quite short of breath - both in Courmayeur and down in Turin, but by the time I landed back in London I was back to normal again.

At the time, I was immensely proud of myself for pushing through to reach the top (OAPs and children on the summit not withstanding - it was a personal battle to get there). Looking back now though, I realise it was foolish. I didn't really understand the potential consequences at such a relatively low altitude. Since I survived to tell the tale I'm kinda glad I proved to myself I could do it, but in future I think that level of commitment at altitude shall be reserved for when my survival - or someone else's - depends on it. One thing's for sure though... any time from now on I think I can't do a last few lengths of the pool, or another lap of Richmond Park, I can think back to that day and know that I bloody well can!

The glacier we skipped on the way up

Andrea on the via ferrata at 3500m

Slavek and Fatima

Nice views

Nic and Andrea just below the summit

From the top

The queues for the very summit

On the top with Andrea, photo by Nicola Ciancaglini

Battling the alps and global warming (Part 1)

A couple of weeks ago, I jetted off to Turin to join a cosmopolitan team of would be Alpinists in Courmayeur. Nic and Sławek were to be our guides, having a fair bit of alpine experience between them, but I'd never climbed anything outside the Scottish highlands, and Andrea not even that - although this was to prove to be no hindrance to the machina! Completing the team was Philipino cranker extraordinaire (and Słavek's better half) Fatima.

The weather was fantastic when we got there with the sunshine splitting the trees. Too fantastic in fact - the snow and ice were melting rapidly, making conditions difficult. The initial plan had been to take the normal route up the Grandes Jorasses, but after consulting with the local guides Nic informed us they were no longer taking clients up there due to the ever widening bergshrunds - it wasn't particularly dangerous, just becoming increasingly difficult to negotiate. So it was decided that after an acclimatisation trek to the futuristic Gervasutti hut, we'd make make an attempt on Mont Blanc the next day, before conditions deteriorated any further.

The warm up got roughly as far as the first stream we had to cross... I sat down to get my boots off where the path crossed the water, and when I looked up a couple of the team were heading up the hill. Presuming they would come back to the crossing point if there wasn't something more suitable close by, I carried on and forded the stream, then turned round to see if anyone was going to need a hand across. Except everyone else was now climbing directly up the wrong side of the water. Ah well, I figured it would be best to just follow the path and keep the same height as the rest of the group until such time as they found a crossing point and came to join me. I was chuckling to myself as I watched them struggling up the scree whilst I wandered up a nice firm path, and enjoying myself in the sunshine as I sat down to have some lunch, when I got a call to say "trip abandoned, we can't get across, we're going back to the car". This pissed me off for two reasons - first we were missing out on any sort of acclimatisation (and the chance to properly test my new boots) before heading for Mont Blanc, and secondly I was annoyed at myself for not getting a map of the area we would be walking in, so I could carry on solo. Although the path was marked out with yellow paint dots on the rocks and there wasn't a cloud in the sky, I've seen conditions change and paths look different on the way back down often enough to know it's not worth being on a mountain you don't know without a way to locate yourself. So off I trotted down the hill fairly disgruntled. Lessons learned though - always carry a map whether you're leader or follower, and if the group does something strange go back and join them - even if it means a bit of extra fucking around in icy water. Anyway, with good weather, food and company in Courmayeur, it's hard to stay disgruntled for long.

The scree slope that defeated us

Next day we started out on the Italian normal route to Monte Bianco. This involves a day's fairly flat trekking up the Miage glacier to the Gonella hut at 3072m, and an early start up the Dome glacier to join the much more frequented French normal route. The first day went fairly well, right up till the last half an hour. We'd taken a fairly gentle pace to save ourselves for the next day, but all of a sudden I found myself struggling for energy with the end in sight. I was also ducking for cover from the sun at the slightest patch of shade, this should have been a warning sign - I've suffered heat exhaustion on several occasions before (and twice I think developed into heat stroke), but for some reason it never registers it's happening again.

Moraine on the Miage Glacier

Approach to the Gonella hut

Arriving at the hut I felt awful, but I didn't want to ruin it for the others any more than I wanted to abandon my own attempt, so I decided to keep it to myself until after dinner - giving me time to recover and giving the rest time to firm up their plans for a summit attempt before I announced I would pull out if it came to that (although there had been a couple of patches of snow on the way up, they were pretty flat and had very clearly defined crevasses, so there was nothing that wouldn't be easily negitiable on a solo descent).

Fats and Słavek on the snow plod below the hut

In the meantime, the news from the hut staff wasn't good - apparently everyone who'd left that morning had phoned to say they would be going down the French side and getting a bus back to Italy - the conditions on the glacier were not good, and with the freezing level at 4,600m they weren't going to get any better before the next morning.

The Dome Glacier, where the route was apparently getting a bit dicey

I went upstairs and tried to get some sleep. I dozed for a while, but every time I woke up the room was spinning slightly, my head was pounding and and my heart was racing; I checked my resting pulse rate - 104! It was another sign of heat exhaustion that I missed - I assumed I was reacting badly to the slightly thinner air. I did find this perplexing, having spent hours at a time skiing above 3000m in the past. Struggling to just rest at that height didn't make a lot of sense, but in my dazed state it seemed the obvious culprit nonetheless.

I headed down for dinner hoping that would sort me out, but I found it difficult to get much down, and it made me feel worse - I could now add nausia to my list of symptoms. So I dropped the bomb to Nic - I'm not fit to go for the top tonight. There was already some unease at making the attempt in the group, with half the teams in the hut having decided to abandon their attempts and the rest still debating, but despite insisting I was happy to go down on my own, I couldn't help but feel I was the catalyst for the subsequent change of plan - half an hour later we were all coming back down in the morning. I could see Słavek was disappointed, and I felt responsible. I sat outside watching the sunset, feeling pretty dejected despite the stunning surroundings.

As the temperature began to drop, I started to feel better. I thought "Shit! I bailed out too soon!". Even then, it wasn't till Słavek said "you were probably just cooked" that I realised what had been going on. I started checking my pulse - it was already below my earlier resting rate whilst wandering around, and steadily dropped throughout the evening to around 80 - the same is it is now sat at my computer. But the decision had already been made, and declaring my fitness and willing to have a go was not going to make a difference. The fact that retreating was probably the right thing to do didn't really help - I felt we were abandoning for slightly the wrong reasons, and that if I'd just kept my mouth shut a little bit longer we might have been going for a few hours sleep before breakfast at midnight.

Sunset from the Gonella hut

On the way down the glacier the next morning, Nic announced a plan to get us a 4000m scalp. He was going to head for the Gran Paradiso car park that evening and do an all-nighter to the top. Whoever wanted to come was welcome. I hesitated initially, not wanting my weakness to get in the way of another group attempt, but reasoning that we'd be climbing in the cool of the night so even if I wasn't fully recovered any problems with the sun would occur after the summit, I threw my hat in the ring.

The fun was about to begin...


 

Why?

"What the fuck am I doing this for?" was pretty much my first thought this morning - when my alarm woke me up from a kip in the back of the car, in a car park down a country lane somewhere near Swanage, at 5 am. One breakfast, a drive to the town and change into tri-suit later, I was still thinking pretty much the same thing as I brought my bike down to transition. Once everything was set up, I had my numbers drawn on,  and I'd queued for the pre-race lightening of the load in a portable toilet ritual, I set off across the sea-front to the start area for the sprint swim. As I looked out across the sea at a beautiful sunrise, I remembered what the fuck I was doing it for.

Seeing the town before it wakes up, getting in the sea as the sun rises, and then sprinting out onto the bike to make the most of the country roads before the traffic gets on them.

It all started just a few days ago, when Ramon said the guys were going deep water soloing in Lulworth for the weekend, and asked if I'd like to come along and do some easy stuff. As tempting as it was, I didn't trust myself not to push to hard on the still mending finger, so I declined, planning to stay in london for one last weekend. On second thoughts, I needed something else to do to get me out of here. A quick look on the web revealed the swanage classic sprint triathlon - just 17 miles down the road from where they were. Totally under-prepared and under-trained, it would surely be enough activity to tire me out for the weekend, and the rest I could spend on the beach watching the guys freezing and/or hurting themselves.

I haven't really done any open water swimming in ages, and not much in the pool either, so standing with the 50-odd people in wetsuits that comprised wave 2, waiting to jump in for a 750m swim across the bay, there was a lot of nerves mixed in with the excitement. In the pool, I've been working to increase my stroke rate recently, but in short sets so I'd told myself I must drop back to my old pace... but as we bombed out into the sea all thought went out the window, and I went out way too hard. For a while I thought I'd got into a good rhythm, breathing every second stroke and cruising along quite nicely, but about half way across I suddenly realised I was close to vomiting. I eased off the pace, but I wasn't relaxed and it kept creeping up again when I wasn't looking. In the end I made it through the swim, but it was with wobbly legs that I ran up the beach, down the road and into T1.

The bike leg started out with a long slow hill climb, and again I went out a bit quick. Fortunately this time I realised it early on, and dropped down to my lowest gear for a while and just made it to the top of the hill. A couple of guys on road bikes went past me, but that was fine - I'd recce'd the bike course and I knew there was a nice flat section coming after (with great views down to Corfe Castle) so the tri bike would soon take me past them again. After that it was a technical descent, followed by rolling hills the rest of the way round. I settled into a good cadence and made it round the bike course fairly uneventfully, if not blisteringly quick. Coming into T2 I was feeling pretty good, but that was about to change.

I'd gone with the vibram five fingers shoes for the run, and my calves were not happy with the transition from bike to bare-foot style running. I hadn't done a recce of the run course, but as it turns out that might have been a good thing... I may have got back in the car and gone somewhere else. A kilometer or so in, just as my legs had loosened and I was starting to pick up the pace, the signs pointed us off the road and onto a track that went straight up the side of a hill. There were stone stairs in place, and after running the first third of it I was forced to back down and walk the rest. Coming over the top, the path then continued down a wide curved ridge, with stunning sea views - or at least they would have been stunning if I wasn't in so much pain. As soon as I'd started running again I got a massive stitch. I tried to run it off, but soon I was bent double, so I went back to a walk for another couple of hundred meters. As I cranked it up again we were approaching the steep descent, from the bottom of which it wouldn't be all that far back to the waterfront, so I resolved to grin and bear it - thankfully I didn't have to test my resolve, the 200m walk had done it's job and the stitch was gone.

I was really pleased to finish the run in better form than I'd started it, in the end coming down the road to the line at quite a good pace, overtaking four people in about the last kilometer and probably the closest to a sprint finish I've ever done. 1:54:08.48 wasn't quite the time I was hoping for, but it got me 37th out of 108 entrants (and 11th out of 20 in the Male 35-39 category), so all in all I was pretty pleased. No doubt tomorrow I will suffer for my over-enthusiasm in the face of ill-preparedness, but that'll be worth it... it's great to be back racing again!

Time out

Three weeks ago, my climbing calendar was rudely interrupted.

Riding home from work one evening, I got as far as Hyde Park. I was going round the cycle lane at a fair lick (25mph+), when a young lad on a boris bike, meandering around on the pedestrian area, decided to cut onto the lane without looking. I was right on him as he did it, and with a girl coming the other way I had nowhere to go. I managed to avoid striking him directly, but hit his front wheel. Both feet popped out of the pedals, and I skated on for 5 or 10 meters, then hit the ground pretty hard on my arse.

Initially, I thought I was in trouble with an excruciating pain in my lower back, but it was just a bit of a jolt from the impact and subsided quite quickly, so I gingerly got up to my feet, thinking "whew, I got away with that one". Then I looked down at my hand.  My little finger was pointing out sideways at about 45 degrees - I must have snapped it on his handlebars on the way through. It wasn't sore (yet), but all I could think was "FUUUUUCK. MY SUMMER IS OVER". The young lad tried to apologise, but I didn't really want to listen. The young girl who was with him kept saying "I'm really sorry, he wasn't looking where he was going, are you OK?" over and over again. I was livid, but venting my anger wouldn't have done any good in the grand scheme of things, so eventually I managed a scowling "No not really, I've got a broken finger, but I'll live" in response. Looking back, I wonder how I managed to be so magnanimous.

After a rather painful evening at the St Mary's A&E, where they sent an incredibly cute young doctor to do the reduction - surely a deliberate tactic to keep the screams down (and quite a successful one, I sweated and shook, and almost vomited on her, but I didn't make a sound) - I got an appointment to see the plastic surgeon a couple of days later. The initial consultation wasn't too promising. The cute doctor had apparently done a great job of setting it, so surgery wasn't immediately necessary, but due to the location and severity of the injury it was going to have to be totally immobilised and monitored closely. On top of that, they reckoned I wouldn't get the full range of motion back when it did heal.

Initial x-ray showed I'd done a pretty good job on it...

At first, I'd started making plans for one handed training regimes and fingerboarding sessions with the pinkie out of the way (taking a bit of inspiration from this man), but now I had two fingers set in a plastic splint at 90 degrees, for the next two weeks at least so fingerboarding was out, and warnings of surgery if I did anything daft so I had a rethink. I hadn't had a substantial break from climbing/training since last September, and it's good to have a proper four week rest once a year, what better time to do it than when you're not going to be able to go cragging anyway.

Three weeks into my recovery, and things are going pretty well. The break didn't move again (despite another bike accident at two weeks, so much for not doing anything daft), and although initially excruciating, I went at the rehab exercises like a man possessed, and already have most of the range of motion back.

The rest of me feels pretty good too - the tendinosis that's been upsetting my right elbow for some time has calmed down, and after the usual painful adjustment period to life without a heavy daily load, my back feels light and refreshed.

I got the go-ahead to start swimming again this week - which felt pretty weird to begin with, as if the finger was actually being bent around by the force of the water, but now it's getting used to a bit of work again it really seems like I'm getting somewhere with the rehab.

I'm a few weeks away from getting back onto real rock yet, but another week and I'll get back to the controlled environment of the climbing gym to start building up my strength again, so when I do get outside I should more or less be able to pick up where I left off.

No doubt there's a bit of pain to come as I begin to load the finger again, but i should be back on it in a few weeks so all in all I guess I was pretty lucky to get away with a minor injury that's healing pretty well - even if I didn't quite manage to see it that way at the time.

But FFS HURRY UP AND LET ME BACK ON THE ROCK!!!!

One step backwards

It had to come one day I guess. But after four months of rapid progress on trad, I really wasn't expecting the step backwards.

Arriving in Pembroke this weekend, I was psyched to get on something hard again, but when I started climbing I found myself quite nervous. Even seconding routes I was getting gripped. Ah well, bit of falling practice should sort it out?

Nope. Made me relaxed about falling deliberately on easy routes but I still felt uneasy at the prospect of getting on something hard.

On Saturday afternoon, Ramon pulled off an onsight of the stunning line Bloody Sunday (E4 6a) at Huntsman's Leap. His performance was juxtaposed with my struggling up on second. The hard part of the route is near the bottom, and following Ramon's beta with my rather different physique turned out to be a bad idea. I knew I wanted to lead this line, so in my mind's eye I was struggling like this on lead, near the ground, and I was terrified. By the time I reached easier ground higher up I was a wreck.

In the pub that night, things back in perspective, I was keen to get back on for a lead next day... but in the morning I started to get scared again. I really couldn't work out why - the moves are hard but the gear is good and there's more than enough of it. Huntsman's leap is an intimidating location, but I'd been there before, and there's always the option of jumaring out.

As we descended back into the leap, I had just about convinced myself I was going to do a less exposed E3 corner climb instead. But Ramon was going first, and he wanted to do an E2 which unfortunately had the sea still lapping at it's base. I wanted to wait half an hour till the tide went out, but he was keen to get cranking and wanted me to belay from a few meters away. There were good directional belays at the bottom, but I couldn't justify putting all that slack in the system for the sake of my dry feet so off came the shoes and into the cold water I went. The longer I stood there, the more pissed off I got. By the time I was drying my feet of to get the climbing shoes on, I was about ready to chuck it all in for the weekend, and struggling up the tricky first few meters with totally numb feet slipping off holds didn't do much to change that. But as I got higher up, and started to get into the climb, I began to realise two things.

1) I was looking for excuses to avoid getting on Bloody Sunday

2) I wasn't really pissed off at Ramon, I was pissed off at myself for looking for excuses to avoid Bloody Sunday.

I topped out into the sunshine, had a quick whinge about the belay conditions, and went about sorting my head out. It was pretty obvious there was only one thing for me to do, and that was get on Bloody Sunday, and work it from the ground up, taking falls from hard moves (if they came about) rather than controlled conditions.

I took a couple of falls at the first hard move, before I worked out some new beta with a rather satisfying finger lock and a balancy, tenuous gaston. This gained a big hold to place two good wires to protect the second hard move. I got that one second go and placed another couple of good wires, but suddenly I was doubting them. There was one more hard sequence to go before easier ground, and it seemed like if these wires were to fail I'd be quite close to the ground. They were bomber, but I was now doubting my own judgement on them, for no other reason than I didn't want to commit. After a bit of faff, I did commit and finished the route clean from there. I still felt pressure all the way up, but the higher I got the more it was accompanied by a sense of achievement. My head my have deserted me, but I'd shown myself I have the will to get through it. And that feels very important.

Brave New World

I've talked the talk about learning to fall on gear since I started this trad climbing business, but the lowly three falls I've taken thus far show I haven't really walked the walk.

This has to change, a fact that was brought sharply into focus by my first lead this weekend. Between the sport climbing trip to italy, bad weather, and unreliable partners, it had been a while since I'd done any trad. With Ramon back from Spain and the weather looking good, we headed off to Pembroke on Friday night pretty psyched. Ramon took the first lead, then I got onto the classic crack climb First Blood (E2 5c). By the time I had climbed the juggy start and placed my first three pieces of gear, my calves were pumped - I was clearly stressing pretty bad and standing right up on my tiptoes. I had a good rest position so I took some time to compose myself and then headed up into the crack. I came to the first hard move, and found myself totally gripped - the hold I needed was right there, but my position felt a little tenuous and I couldn't bring myself to take my hand off the rock to go for it. I backed down a couple of moves to give myself a talking to. The gear was good but I'd been afraid to commit, so there was only one thing to do - climb back up and jump off. This settled me a bit, but I knew I needed to go further this time so I took another two falls, getting progressively longer, and then cruised up the rest of the line pretty relaxed. I took another lob nearer the top for the sake of falling on a different bit of gear.

Next, Ramon went for Brave New World (E4 6a). There was a soaking wet, unprotected off-width to start, leading into a nice safe stance under a roof to arrange good protection, then round the roof onto a well protected crack line. As I watched him climb, I could see the same blind terror stopping him as I'd felt half an hour before. He arranged, then rearranged his gear at the stance. And again - taking an age to commit to the roof. Once out onto the face, he got two bomber wires in place, but couldn't commit to the crack. Slumping onto the rope, he looked down and asked "do you mind if we leave the gear here and come back for it tomorrow?". With the rising tide about to cut us off I had a decision to make - relaxed from my falling practice it took about 10 seconds to make it. "I'll lead us out"

I left the ropes up so the wet off-width was on top rope, and proceeded round the roof onto the face. I ended up getting stupidly pumped sorting out a couple of runners below the crux, so as I went for it my fingers gave out and off I came. After a bit of a rest, I cruised up the main crack, feeling really good about my climbing and the situation. From unable to commit to the crux of an E2 to relaxed on an E4 in one easy step. Proof, if proof were needed, that falling practice not only works but can give very quick results.

As we discussed the days events over a pint of seafarers, we came to the conclusion that falling practice on the first route of the day, every trad day till it's comfortable, should be the way forward. We didn't discuss it again in the morning, so as Ramon headed up his first lead, I wondered if he was going to go for it - he's not as comfortable falling on bolts as I am, so if it's hard for me on gear, it must be torture for him. Half way up, he stopped and spent some time looking out to sea, so I knew he was psyching himself up. A couple of (I presume) catalan swearwords came out, and then he threw himself off. Another three of four falls followed, none of them looking very happy, but the proof of the pudding would come a bit later, as I knew he was going for another crack at Brave New World.

This time he breezed up it - no shaking, no stressing, and no backing down. He then followed up with an arguably even more impressive onsight of Howling Gale (E3 6a) - making several meters of tenuous moves past an old rotting peg to reach the easier ground at the top, which I almost came off on second.

Significant progress for both of us then, and all it took was a bit of commitment to the brave new world of falling on gear.

D'OH!

After a couple of months of only trad climbing, I'm off to Finale Ligure this weekend for a sport climbing holiday. I couldn't risk putting in any training beforehand, what with the recovering from overtraining and all that - but I figured I'd better wake my arms up a little bit to what's coming so I went down to the westway on Wednesday evening for a couple of hours of bouldering.

This was a mistake.

48 hrs later and my forearms are on fire.

Ah well, DOMS shouldn't stop me climbing - it probably means I'll have to take it easy in the first couple of days though if I want to climb right through the whole week.

It's highly unlikely I'll manage to persuade myself to take it easy, but we shall see. If all else fails, I know I shall eat well and drink well in good company by the beach :-)