rginns blog

Ok, so it's been some time since I've updated this blog so I thought i'd better put something down. Work has been manic of late, and having to work away 3 or 4 days out most weeks has meant that I've been unable to get much climbing done at all. During the brief spells of awful weather however I have been up to the Wiltons, W3 mainly getting some leading in.  I've also been walking a fair bit, and have just come back froma weeks walk with my Dad on the first half of the Coast to Coast. On this first stretch we managed 86 miles from St Bees to Kirkby Stephen in about 4.5 days, four of which were knocking on 20 miles. The weather was extremely difficult, with almost constant rain for 3 of the days, which even in good waterproofs resulted in very wet clothing at the end of the day. The route was periodically changed due to being unable to cross swollen rivers, and sometimes losing the route, but on the whole we followed the Wainwright book with back up from the 1:2

OK, I just thought I'd post up a link to the charitable trust below, it's to raise funds for Hannah Hunt, after she suffered what sounds like a bloody awful accident earlier in the year when a pull up bar gave way and she broke her back. This has particular resonance for anyone who uses pull up bars or training boards as I frequently do and has made me recheck the fixings of my own board... if you can, you might want to chuck a few quid their way... http://www.heatfund.org.uk/ http://ben2blancchallenge.wordpress.com/ Original source... http://ukbouldering.com/board/index.php/topic,20498.0/topicseen.html

4 x 35 move, 1 x 28 move endurance before fail. 4.5 min intervals.

5 x 30 move 1 x 25 move endurance circuit before failure. 5 min rests Mega.

It doesn't seem like it will ever stop raining, weve just had the wettest June on record which doesn't surprise me in the slightest. This combined with the fact that I've been working away again recently, this time in Poland, means that my level of outdoor climbing has been Practically zero. I have however recently decided to rejig the board, which now has a new set of wooden jug/crimp holds and I've set a 25 move endurance circuit ready for if I ever manage to get out on some trad at some point. Endurance has always been something that I've been weak on, so I've decided to do something about it. The first week was just spent tweaking the holds so it felt at an even level, tricky to do on such a small wall, then once I'd got it wired I've been doing sets of 3 to 5 runs until I can take no kore. Initially I couldn't even finish one set, but by week 2 I could do it a couple of times and tonight i comPleted 4 sets of 30 move circuit and 1 set of 25. I n

I've been pretty lax at blogging recently, but here's a bit of an update as to what I've been up to... End of April.... So I've been working in France all week, all over the shop really, but this morning I was in Velizy, east of Paris. I got done relatively early, and had time to shoot  further south to Font. I had put my boots in on the off chance... :) The weather was iffy when I pulled up at Franchard Isatis, and raining on and off. I walked in and climbed a few of the blue circuit and a few tried a few problems from the off circuit book. Because it had rained, all of the tops were really greasy, and the atmosphere was pretty claggy so topping out on anything was quite tricky really. I then went over to Beauvais Est and climbed a few things. including a couple of the blue circuit and then a 5+ on the red circuit (red 2) which felt desparate, as I needed to cut loose. At least I think it was the red 2 problem, it was pretty difficult to locate the problems to b

well it's been 6 weeks since I last posted, for a few reasons really: I have been in Font for a week, but I've also been abroad with work quite a bit, it's just getting busier and busier, with virtually everything except work and family having to take a back seat for the time being. In terms of climbing, before Font I managed to get a further few sessions in on the board, trying to increase the intensity. I have added a few difficult moves to the circuit of usual problems, and the target is to eventually be able to flash them one after the other. Unfortunately I'm a fair bit off that, but having a benchmark gives me ssomething to mark progress against and I could definitely feel gains with each session. So it was with some trepidation that I went to Font, the first visit with the future wad. She is just over 16 months old now, so has just started running about everywhere. I was interested to see how the trip would go, as it's soo far removed from having gone to Fon

This weekend saw a couple of good board sessions of about an hour a piece which were unexpected. I was due to be pretty busy all weekend, but I managed to sneak a bit whilst the little one was asleep. Again, pretty haphazard approach, trying the usual set, then trying hard moves at or just beyond my limit. It may sound obvious but I concentrated mainly on working the fingers, crimping mostly, which highlighted the fact that I have few slopers on the board. I think I'll be shelling out soon. Open handing crimps just doesn't seem to have the same effect as a few good slopers. Actually it's probably a good time to review the board to see if I need to make any changes or improvements. On a different note, we made dinner for 8 of us last night which consisted of 2 curries, a Methi and a sort of Limey Balti, both from scratch. I made some awesome onion Bhaji's, I'd forgotten how easy they are to make.

Not posted for a while, no reason other then I've been pretty busy and not been doing much anyway. I have however been getting on the board a bit, albeit not for long sessions. The opportunities tend to be relatively frequent but short. Anyway, last night I went to mcc as Taffa was heading down. I was looking forward to getting some chuffing Done. I put the feelers out to the usual suspects, but all were busy. Now bearing in mind I've not been leading for probably about 2 years, I was pretty pleased to get a 6a done especially as head games have always been an issue for me. Yesterday though it was different, I felt Psyched and everything felt easy. Ok, so no great grades but for me it was good. If I was inclined, I could really get back into roping, it was after all my first intro to climbing, and I think it's good to reconnect with your roots sometimes... This was followed by a good board session tonight, although I could really do with some more resin slopers...

I ended up going to Preston anyway last week in spite of my foot hurting quite a bit. In mitigation, I strapped it up all day and wore big boots in the office. Apart from looking ridiculous, they did incredibly well in taking the pressure off the toe - ironically the way rockshoes have a tendency to keep the feet compacted, it actually helped wearing them as well. The idea was to see how it went and stop if it started hurting. As I was with JB, and I fancied doing a bit of roping I warmed up on a couple of easy routes. It felt ok actually, so I jumped on a 6a+, but I wasn't warmed up properly. I cruised it, but felt buggered for a bit afterwards, and my foot started to ache. I always seem to run before I can walk... I need to learn to step off the gas sometimes! So, by the end of the night I'd climbed up to 6b+, which I felt pretty good about in the face of a knackered foot. Towards the end I had a boulder, and climbed V4, and also got to the last move of the red V5 in the ca

29/01/12 - I've somehow managed to get my foot damaged... I have a red painful swelling on the ball of my foot that has got progressively worse since Thursday. I don't remember knocking it or straining it or anything, and it feels like it could be an infection or something. Nice. Am seeing a doctor this afternoon, so we'll see what happens. Walking is painful, annoyingly. 30/01/12 - edit: it appears I have a probable stress fracture of my second toe. Nothing can be done about it apparantly, just follow the 'if it hurts, don't do it' advice. Going to see what it stands up to on the board tonight before deciding if I'm going climbing tomorrow... I'm hoping it'll not be too bad, but too much landing on it may be counter-productive. I'm pretty sure I know when I did it too, it must have been on last weeks installation - I had to jump off some racking and landed a bit awkwardly. I'm surprised I didn't get any real pain until the next day thou

I've been listening to the audio cd of Alan Partridge's autobiography recently with immense enjoyment. Perfect driving listening. Anyway, this week I've managed to get on the board twice, for about 45 minutes each time. No great training sessions, but enough to feel like I'm making forward progress, that's for sure. Consistency is key to this, so I need to keep it up. Aside from the circuit of usual problems, I pretty much just randomly try moves that I think I can't do, then link them with others, making it up as I go along. Whilst this is enjoyable, I fear the lack of structure may be inhibiting... So how do you effectively train on a woody? I guess each session needs to concentrate on one particular set of moves or position (i.e. open vs twisting, crimps vs slopers), or maybe a set duration i.e. repeaters of 25 continuous moves (about 6 laps of a board this size!!!) or something of this order. I don't know, but at the moment I'm quite happy to just m

So tonight I went to West View with JB. It was good to catch up , and the order of the day was mileage, no particular aims. Now its been probably over a year since I've tied on, so it was refreshing to have a change of scene. We warmed up on lots of easy routes and as the evening wore on it became increasingly busy. I haven't been to WV for quite a while, and in spite of it being rammed it was still relatively easy to get to routes. Having warmed up, I was quite pleased to get up a 6b+, without it feeling particularly difficult at all- ok, so it was on a rope, not leading, but I'm happy with that. After an hour or two we did a bit of bouldering, doing a few V2 and 3s I managed to flash both a V4 and a V5, the first time I've ever done that I think. Looks like the board may start to be paying dividends... Then time was called and we left ... All in all a good evening, good climbing and some good company. .

I've had a couple of fairly fruitful board sessions over the past couple of weeks, having made a concerted effort to try and get on the board even if it's only for half an hour or so to get the arms going. The result is that I've got a reasonable circuit going that I can get on relatively regularly and this should start to bring gains in a couple of weeks or so. Anyway, I managed to get out up to Knowle Heights quarry yesterday after a cracking forecast. R-man and GCW were both busy, so I headed up there on my own, arriving later than anticipated. The weather was baltic, but the crag was actually in full sun, so although it was chilly, it wasn't too unpleasant. I set about trying the overhang which was the main aim. The crux seems to be going from the undercut crack (of which the right hand hold is now wider due to crumbling rock) up to a high small crimp, matching, and then somehow getting a high foot to go for the break. This felt nails to me, probably as it targets m