The Chalk Bag

My fingers are extremely sore and a little swollen.

After talking about a Climbing Plateau I felt like I had reached, it seems as if the natural progression of things has started pushing me on to the next level.

For starters, I have met and developed some great new friendships with a group of people who climb on a regular basis, and I climb with them at least once, if not three times a week. I also get together with them for non-climbing activities, which has resulted in the busiest and best social life I’ve had since graduating college three and a half years ago.

Back to the gym. Ever since returning from my injury in May, I had been focused solely on climbing routes. I learned how to lead climb, which opened up the entire gym. I’m now setting my sights on some of the hardest routes set in the gym because, quite frankly, I want to see if I can do them.

Last night I led a pretty tough 5.10 out of the cave. I worked it on Thursday of last week, but realized later on I had cheated towards the top, using a couple of holds from a 5.12 of the same color tape that tops out next to the 5.10. So I got on it again last night and sailed through it.

If you’ve kept up with any of my new videos (the new iPod Nano is GREAT for shooting little videos at the gym), you’ll see me lead climbing my first 5.12. I have began to realize that my two biggest strengths are the gym are REALLY small crimps, and arête climbing, which is exactly what that 5.12 was comprised of. I led that 5.12 again last night, and while it wasn’t quite as pretty, it didn’t work me quite as hard as I was expecting.

With an hour of climbing left before the gym closed, I decided to get over into the bouldering section by myself and see what kind of damage I could do. I started out working some V4s and V5s, but wanted more of a challenge. I worked a V6 for a while, but couldn’t lock down the sequence. I can make the holds, but my feet still need some work to keep me from peeling off the wall.

Then I spotted a V7+ marked in black tape. I don’t know what it was, but something about that problem just screamed my name. This problem was littered with absurdly small crimps, and some cool traversing that really required watching your transfer of weight. It took me one or two tries to make the second move in the problem, but once I did I sailed through the route (with a little grunting and screaming here and there). I will try and get a video of it on Thursday.

In addition, I locked down another V7 next to the black V7+, and a V6 on the 45 degree wall. On my project list is the V6 I mentioned above, and a V7 with a start that is going to take some serious work (comprised of two small crimps about 10mm deep, on a slight overhang).