Ho ho holds! & I'm dreaming of a white christmas BOARD!

I spent all of November working in Scotland, bolting bits of steel together. In total I climbed twice through the month; once to check out the new Climbing Academy in Glasgow and once to compete in Climb Newcastle's winter series. The Climbing Academy is a really good wall, very impressive and to my eyes the biggest bouldering wall in the UK. They've certainly got tons of space should they want to go even bigger!

The Climbing Academy, Glasgow

The comp at Climb Newcastle was fun, though I was pretty tired after working a full day humping steel in Glasgow then driving home before the comp. I also had a horrendous blood blister from dropping a large bit of iron on it. (Winge winge excuses excuses). So after getting my excuses out, I managed 2nd with Nigel Callender coming first.

Oww! Mega blood blister

As for real climbing... It's been very few and far between.

After watching Chris' vid:

Chris Graham's crazy toe hooks! Good effort Chris.

I got psyched and went to try prep H at Hepburn. I spent quite a long while trying to use his beta before realising it was crazy and sacking it off. I kinda figured out my own sequence I think but ended up too tired to make any serious headway. Will have to go back for another session on that one.

Heading south, we had a fun day at Caley the other week. I was keen to try Zoo York. After much ado about toe hooks (I'll come back to this) I found a sequence I could do that didn't use any. I was really psyched to get it done in a day for two reasons:

1) I've never done an 8a in a session before
2) Caley is rarely in a condition you can climb on it

I didn't manage it. I just felt too tired to link it. The moves are awesome and I'm really keen to get back again for the link. So keen in fact that I returned the day after next... to find the top of the problem literally soaking. I spent a while drying it to a reasonable level (though my hands were very wet after the test climb). This was my best effort of about 4 goes:

Chubublu, The heel goes UNDER the hand dumby!

I felt even more tired than I had done at the end of my first session! Weird? Oh well one for next time it's dry down there!

TOE HOOKS:
I can't do em. It's always been in my mind that they're not my strongest point but only recently have I noticed just quite how bad I am at them.

In the second round of Climb Newcastle's winter league there was a problem with only toe hooks on the arete for the start and it really stumped me. I found it really really hard and didn't even do it never mind flash it! Two days later I was at Zoo York figuring out the moves. I think it is customary to toe hook at least once on the problem but I just couldn't get them to work! Thinking back there are a long list of problems where I couldn't get anything off the toe hook and ended up trying to find a different way or just simply not doing it: Zoo York, Queen Kong, La Pelle, L'apparement, Prep H (Chris' method).

Out of these, L'apparement is the only one where you really need to toe hook. Unfortunately I really want to do that problem so I better work out how to train to get better at it!

Now, to address the title:

I've taken the Christmas break as a good time to refurbish the board. It's been stripped:

Painted:

and I've starting making some new holds

including a mono-pinch!

I'll post a pic and maybe a video once there are some holds on it! Just a case of waiting for the paint to dry...

Here is a vid of my previous hardest problem before the big change up:

Lots of coaching at Durham

The staff and management at Durham Climbing Center have been really proactive of late to try and improve their clients' experience of using the wall. Although this wall maybe doesn't have the highest volume of climbing in the UK it is really good to see the team trying to give their customers a great experience. Once a wall is established then regular high quality route setting is the most important thing in my opinion to keeping people coming back and Durham have recently been employing myself and Mick Page quite a lot to ensure that this is the case. On top of that there have been a number of events such as adult and junior competitions, informal Tuesday night coaching and also a workshop on how to use their latest bit of wall, the "Beastmaker" training board.

When I was asked to put together a 2hr coaching workshop I was at first a bit daunted, however, after taking the first step of putting pen to paper I was amazed at how much I had to say about the subject - maybe using all my spare time researching the Internet for training advice over the past 10 years wasn't such a waste of time? I kicked the session off by gathering the group round my laptop screen for a youtube viewing of Splinter (below).



With everyone suitably psyched, we went through pretty much everything to do with using this style of training device, from the blurry distinction between "training" and "climbing" as the video of Malcolm displays so well, to the relative merits of training on a board rather than other tools such as fingerboards or campus boards and not forgetting the specific aspects of actually training on the board itself! The session went really well and I think everyone came away a lot more confident to take a more structured approach to their training and start really getting the most out of this great bit of wood!

Michael Daglish was also on hand playing with his cameras as usual so lookout for a bit of footage from the session soon...

Additionally I've also been at Durham for the past couple of Tuesdays to lead their informal, open to everyone coaching sessions. The relaxed atmosphere with these session doesn't really make them feel tat much like work but I suppose thats an advantage of your job also being what you do in your free time anyway! It is really cool to be able to help people out in such an informal manor, with different people after different levels of coaching ranging from beta / demos of a problem to specific advice on how to address their weaknesses. This all being in a friendly chatty atmosphere makes it great fun and I look forward to doing more of these in the future!

Website is live!

I've been meaning to get this sorted for a while now, so it's great to finally get a website uploaded to the internet. http://www.michaelstainthorpe.co.uk Lots of work still to do but I think it's a good start!

An evening at Shaftoe

Last month I went out to Shaftoe and managed to get these two problems on video. The quality seems to have been reduced by vimeo for some reason. I'll try and get it sorted for next time.

The Wainstones

Today me and me da headed up to the Wainstones. Steve and Karin had mentioned that there had been a flurry of activity recently. I always like to try out new crags and this place is only 45 mins away from my house so we thought we'd check it out. For some reason I never head down to the moors but I might start checking it out more.

The problems... We warmed up around the boulder with the easy crack (pic) problem on it, doing some fun eliminates and sit starts. Notably just to the left of the crack, the left arete/pillar climbs really well. I then did Redhead's roof, which is fun and necky. Very good at the grade - 6bish.

Then it started raining so we hid under the bivvy roof. A local lad, Sam had told us of a problem coming out of here at around 7b which I then flashed. Start on the bloc in the back of the roof with hands and feet. I then went straight to the lip but there was chalk on an undercut in the roof if you're that way inclined. Throw your heel round and a bit of a thrutch and bobs your uncle. The wet slab topout was interesting! I thought 7a for that one. EDIT - Just found this problem in this video - "Hand to hand combat"

I then tried The Hollow Sit Start from this video. Nice little prob, around 6c or + To the left of this there is a problem called the finger (pic below). At first I thought it was nails and couldn't do the first move into the mono. [I've since found out the established prob starts at the mono, not the ledge.] I thought I might as well try the move from the mono and got it about 3rd go. The pic was meant to be a vid but dads can't work cameras :p In my opinion there is a good crouching start at the lip which I tried a bit but couldn't work out the move to the mono. Someone taller would be able to lank it with their feet under the roof but I couldn't reach, maybe 8a ish from there?? I think the grade is a bit of a purely belter, about 7b from the mono. Fat fingers need not apply! Someone had also started cleaning a problem to the left again. I had a quick feel but couldn't work out a sequence. It felt hard. The ground was really boggy underneath so I didn't pursue it.

We then walked down to what was to be the main event... The big prow thing. 7a+ on one side, Cruel Intentions - 7c on the other (also featured in above vid). Unfortunately the rain came back and this time it was heavy so we had to bail. Fortunately though, this group of boulders are at the bottom of the hill so next time the walk in will be a little bit easier. Hopefully get back to them soon!

New sets at Durham and the Matrix

Last Friday I'd been asked to do a reset at the Matrix in Sheffield. So Thurday evening I travelled down for a quick session at The Climbing Works, it's always nice to check back in and see what's changed since my time there. Not finding anyone I knew to climb with I got stuck in on the comp wall. After about an hour and a half I was totally spent, having despatched a fair number of the 7's (though I avoided the hand jam yellow) and thoroughly enjoying the death star volume bloc through the roof. Anything that goes feet first gets my vote!

I was up bright and early the next morning and working by 7.30!! I met up with Kook, Diego and together we stripped and reset the wall. 75 probs in total. Not bad for a days work. As it's the first set of a new university year they had requested an easy set but I did stick one 7b+ in there on the woody ;-)

Yesterday I was once again up bright and early and setting at Durham by 8am. Thankfully no stripping to do here... and a good job too as I moved a load of the volumes around before setting 35 problems ranging from 4-7c This bell curve of difficulty for this set is once again shifted to the right (they're all harder than last time), however, there isn't anything as hard as the two hardest problems from the last round. So if you're looking to maximise your score, it's concentration and session stamina that are important rather than maximum strength. Have fun, any feedback welcome and encouraged...

The last couple of months...

It's been a fair while since my last blog. Here is a round up of what I've been doing over the last couple of months....

Firstly I sold the van. Sad sad times but after a little bit of renovations I ended up making a slight profit on it, just like property ladder but with vans!

Rosie was accepted to Durham University to study a masters so that meant we had to be located in the North East for at least the next year. With this in mind we swapped wheels for walls and moved into our quaint little bungalow in the suburbs. I've been keeping busy doing various bit of renovations and such like.

Not long after I'd been home the management at Durham Climbing Centre contacted me about building a symmetrical systems board in the centre. Training on boards has long been the secret of the elite boulderer as revealed in Jerry Moffat's autobiography - revelations. After deliberation on the all important angle, the board was built. 45 degrees and 8ft wide. Hayley, the manager had asked me to set the board so it was perfectly symmetrical which was something I'd never done on this scale before but was up for the challenge. The holds were delivered by Dan Varian from Beastmaker on Friday ready for a full day setting on the next Monday. After lots of measuring with tape measures and spirit levels (not the usual tools of a route setter) I finished it and set some preliminary problems. I'm rather pleased with the result and have regularly been lured out of my own garage to train on it, high praise indeed!

One of the sample problems I set

Soon after the board was finished it was time for Durham's summer bouldering ladder. Round one kicked off with a delivery of some brand new volumes. Myself and Michael Page set the 35 problems which competitors then toiled away on for the next few weeks. I have since set the next two rounds on my own and have been pleased with the feedback from the competitors.

People trying the comp problems

I've also been training fairly hard, and eating hard too. I've gained about 5kg which I'm happy with. The standard train heavy in the summer and climb light in the winter technique will hopefully pay off once the weather turns cold.

The project, more on this later...

Oh, and I heard the weather man say it's officially autumn in meteorological terms. Woo woo! not long till this dastardly heat buggers off, what what