Training up a Storm!!

Training, training, training. Some of us really love training. Tuesday night training with Paul and James at the Barn: now that is hard work. Every now and then when I feel like sharing my punishment with others I'll give Paul a call and he's one of the few people out there who can punish himself as much as I can, so long as we push each other. No exception this time.

Warm up began with about some work on the rock rings and the campus board to get the contact strength up. Moved up to the cave and began a session of add on till we reached 20 moves. After this we it was time for a bit of intensity stamina training. By using one of Paul Brouard's programs we mapped out this 20 move problem and then repeated it 9 times with two minutes of rest in between each attempt. Fun. Especially the style of the problem. Very gymnastic, lots of rotations through the roof, very dynamic. The culmination of the problem was dropping down into an undercling at the end! Booya! Awesome! The problem took us each about 50 seconds to climb without any shakes. That's kind of the objective with this type of training. You need to push yourself to the limit and realize that the limit is only in your mind. Things like sweaty hands and hot conditions should not restrict your ability to perform. Everybody uses these as excuses but if you practise these less than ideal circumstance then you can use them to your advantage if you find yourself in them in a competition or when you're pushing yourself to the edge of your ability.

After a 15 minute break, the three of us headed down the the campus board.
Paul has a different size of board than the one I normally train on. 13cm between rungs instead of 23cm. This leads to a variety of options for training.

3-7-11 Success
3-7-11 Success
3-7-11 Success
3-7-11 Success

3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 Success
3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 Success
3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 Success
3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 Success
3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 F7 continued though and finished
3-7-11-7-3-6-9-12 F7 continued though and finished

3-8-3-8-3-8-3-8-3 success
3-8-3-8-3-8-3-8-3 success
3-8-3-8-3-8-3-8-3 mono with leading hand success

3-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-3 L success
3-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-3 R with 5 second deep lock at end success
3-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-3 L with 5 second deep lock and 5 push ups on rail success
3-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-6-8-3 R with 5 second deep lock, 5 push ups and a 8 second lower off and pull up.

Rope ladder skipping rungs --> at least I tried, not used to his like Paul and James are.
Rope ladder skipping rungs and bouncing up. Lower 3 rungs as a time. TOTAL FAIL! tough work.
Undercling rope laddering --> just punishing.

5 front levers
40 pushups
1 min of core stars

The result of this session was that I was so stiff on Wednesday that I could not train. I did manage to go for a bit of a run on Thursday, but my arms were so stiff that I didn't feel the urge to punish them further. In retrospect, I wish I would have as I felt tired and underpowered on Saturday while I was working Stormwatch at Fernkloof. I did however have a great deal of meetings and work to do for my master's degree on Thursday and Friday, including a short presentation to the current master's group about focus groups and how they will be involved in the up and coming focus groups this month. These two days were far more tiring than any training session could ever be...

Stormwatch was opened by Roger Nattrass in 1990 at the grade 31, when the hardest line in the country was 28. Roger is a climbing legend having climbed with some of the top climbers in the USA, including Tommy Caldwell and Todd Skinner. Roger is still going strong now with a recent repeat of Gravity's Rainbow (30) and a long-awaited redpoint of Up For Grabs (31). I have been working Stormwatch for about 5 days over the last 5 months, which has been quite to my detriment owing to the extremely sequential nature of the climb. One thing that is for certain, it is the hardest 31 that I've ever been on! The opening crux of the route feels like a Font 7B+ which is very tough on its own. It then links into a route that is probably a tough 28 with no significant shakes or good holds. The moves are all very gymnastic, which is my antistyle. I love being able to do moves statically as my contact strength tends to be lacking compared to some of the stronger boulders that I know.

My personal crux on the route is clipping the 3rd draw which is from this tenuous finger slot which puts 90% of your weight on to your left index finger leaving you shreeking from the torn skin on top of your finger. After that is a series of dynamic throws to pinches with alternating hands until you reach a mediocre kneebar before the very run out race to the finish which leaves me panting every time! I feel so inspired watching Colin, on his 53rd birthday, gliding through the sequences that leave me frustrated and sore. He fell off one hold before the good shakes at the top of the route. Something tells me that this coming weekend is going to see us celebrating his hardest redpoint. Even after 4 full burns, 3 to the chains and 1 falling off at the last draw, I still managed to walk over Vandals direct. I've said it once and I'll rant it again: two more moves don't change this from 26 to 27. Those two extra moves certainly make it a better route, but definitely don't change the grade at all.

Sunday I found myself at eZemvelo Nature Reserve with Schalk. We started off by working Animal Planet (7C) which I found myself very close to sending but just not enough energy. We moved on to the planetary boulders and a problem called Meteor (7B), which is brilliant! Took me 3 goes to figure out the sequence and then I found myself at the finish dyno with a bit of a grunt! Very cool problem. Schalk then took me down to a project of his which we worked for 3 hours. We were trying everything, getting it all wrong! After a while of being frustrated and a pebble being dislodged to present us with a new hold, I suggested we try a totally silly sequence which turned out to be the way to climb the problem. After at least 20 burns, I kept on finding myself on the last move which is a massive throw to the right, from small crimps to a really small crimp with only a left foot to keep my body on. I can touch the hold with two fingers, but that is simply not enough. If I'd have to guess, the crouch start that we were working will be somewhere around 7C/+ and the sit extension (which adds only two moves) may be close to 8A. The line was very inspiring as it is not a lowball problem: the topout is up around 4m high and the throw for the elusive right hand crimp leaves the climber with his feet 2m above the ground before take-off. FUN TIMES...

One of the best parts of eZemvelo, other than the bouldering itself, is the vast game population. We must have seen 50 wildebeest, 150 springbok, 5 Zebra, 40 impala, and a dozen hartebees and warthogs. The tranquility and safety of the surrounding is very inviting. I'm looking forwards to the time when the area will be officially open to the public with the bouldering campsite nearing completion. Until then, I'll just have to be happy going along with the developers of the area to ensure that there are no further complications like last year...