rginns blog

Last night saw a relatively rare visit to Preston, Darryl is about again in the week so I mentioned that I should be heading over there and GCW was up for some climbing too. It was busy when I arrived and only got busier. After getting lost several times Darryl had eventually made it in and was talking to Mad Tony and Alison from the club near the entrance. It was nice to see them again actually as I've not been getting out on the meets as often as I'd like. I warmed up on a few of the V2s and 3s, then tried a few of the v4s. To my surprise I flashed them all. I then tried one of the V4/5s and got up that first time too. I wasn't feeling too bad. Darryl was also going well in view of having been off climbing and injured for 6 months and got up a v4. If he loses a bit of the padding and starts training he'll be strong soon enough. GCW was putting on a good show too, eventually pulling a V6 out of the bag and looking strong on everything else, even managing to heel-toe ma

Last Wednesday I managed to get an hour free to nip up to the roaches quickly and I had only one aim: staffordshire Flyer. Time was short, so the priority was to find Doxeys pool as I'd never been before. I started up to the Upper Tier and slogged my way along. I'd forgotten how good the bouldering is on the upper tier, but I didn't have any time to stop so I kept going. The path finishes, so I carried along the broken edge for a few hundred yards before heading up and over the Upper tier to find Doxeys. I hadn't realised how far it would be, but got there eventually, after getting somewhat misrouted. Without further ado I got straight onto Staffordshire Flyer. The problem takes a rail up a roof to a dynamic move left to a hold on the arete, then up right, and goes at about 6b. Although it was fairly wet, it wasn't too bad, and there were some large stones so my mat didn't get too wet. The first move is ok, getting established on the rail, if a little off balanc

Yesterday I managed to escape work relatively on time, and as GCW and Nik were on duty and I was on the clock I decided to head over to Broughton. Unsurprisingly there was noone there, as is so often the case, but this is sure to change when the clocks go back. It's usually quite busy by mid-winter. I didn't really warm up, as everyone knows warming up is for gays, so I jumped straight on to a 5c. Normally at any other wall, or outside on a 5+ or 5c (which roughly equate to the same thing) I would probably flash it, or get it done on the second or third go. Not at Broughton. This got me thinking about grades, and place, and I wondered whether it was for the fact that I'm less used to this style of climbing (overhanging, crimpy in nature, limestoney). I can discount this based on the fact that overhanging crimpy style climbing is pretty much all I've been doing lately. In addition to this I'm definitely feeling stronger because of it. I couldn't really put it dow

Thursday saw a Wall of Burl revisit, with Nik. UKBs Gremlin was keen to get some training done, so he was round to be initiated into the WoB too. The 'footwork King', G-Lah had submitted a rather poor excuse and was nowhere to be seen however, so it was the three of us. Memory man Gremlin was given some excellent pointers from Nik-should-have-been-a-coach-at-work, and in spite of a woeful ability to remember more than two holds in sequence, he did well. WoB is a bit of a baptism of fire and he didn't hold out too badly for his first session, he'll come on quickly I reckon if he concentrates on his footwork and finger strength. Nik was looking as strong as ever in spite of the split finger, hope your crook wrist is better soon beast. I on the other hand felt a bit weak to be honest. I wasn't really thinking properly and ended up failing a lot on the same move without changing anything or trying to do it any differently. Bit lazy really, so it wasn't the best sess

Internet musings... Well, I've come to the position that I can no longer support UKC as I have done before. I came to this decision after reading this thread on UKB. Personally I've had no reason myself to take issue with the emporers of UKC in spite of the stories I've heard and their wish to influence other websites, but the POD debarcle seems to confirm what I thought. Dubious ALLEGED topo theft by the other company doesn't help matters, especially as they're full of inaccuracies anyway. So I've decided to delete all photos and everything on my profile if I can't delete the profile itself. I doubt I'll be visiting the site any tme soon and have effectively stopped using it a while back UKB is by far a better forum, and I shall be sticking to that from now on. Vive la revolution. Let's hope the Insect Overlords can do all they want to do with the site. Anyway, it's not all negativity, I've made a little game for you all: Hangman! Here'

Just a short post totally unrelated to anything... . I woke up this morning and thought that the fence was on fire - in fact the sun had just come up and it was in the overnight condensation steaming off as the sun hit it - it looked awesome though, so here's some footage... Quite cool.

I was planning on being out climbing yesterday, the weather was good, but in the end various factors conspired to ensure it didn't happen. Most of the afternoon however was spent cooking curries from scratch as we had friends over - the first time I've cooked vegan curries, but they were surprisingly easy, and tasty... We met up at the strawbury duck and went for a brief walk around the reservoir, and after a pint, we headed back via the scenic road to Belmont. After a good night of curries and merriment I was surprisingly feeling ok this morning. After everyone had gone, I decided to head up to West View as it had ben raining for most of the day. I've not been to West view for ages, and it was nice to refamiliarise myself with it and it was busier than I thought it would be.. Happened to see Gremlin from UKB there avec friend, and from what he is saying it seems brownstones is back to being a swamp again at the bottom end. Ah well, default situation really... I wasn't