2009-2010 Winter Season

Early AM on a Sunday, now generally the only day I have for my bouldering session. I now have a new position at the University of Colorado Denver School of medicine in the department of Neurology, my employer Randahl Cohrs is interested in Varicella Zoster Virus the causative agent of Chicken Pox and Shingles, it is a sweet job but requires a daily commute to D-town so I have less time now. I am already thinking about the 2009-2010 season, what it might entail, although now employed full-time I have a faculty posting so I have 4 weeks plus vacation each year with all the holidays too, this opens up some travel opportunities that before did not exist as I have a salary more than adequate. Of course I have Ouray 2010 as a goal, probably no qualifier again this year as the sponsoring entities do not want this as then non-sponsored nobodies tend to eliminate the sponsored “athletes” who then miss the final on Saturday. This omission of the preliminary has been attributed to volunteer burnout but if 45 people sign-up and each pay $40 to be in the preliminary you would have $1800 in which to compensate judges, belayers and so forth so I don’t see the issue as such. In the last four years I have done 10 different winter climbing competitions, I enjoyed all of these immensely except for Bozeman 2008 when I got paired with the illustrious Jim “The Spud” Earle who hadn’t tied into a rope in two years, it was amusing to watch him flail on some of the dry-tool routes but I took a no-score rather than end up 15th behind the legally blind-amputee breast-cancer survivor climbing squad, I do possess humility but sometimes you just have to throw in the towel. I may do Bozeman as an open entrant this year so I can visit Simone my daughter in Bozeman who will be a freshman at Montana Sate University, I will of course bring my own partner to avoid the inevitable Joe Josephson voodoo manipulations of teams and starting assignations, Joe is a great guy but utterly from another era, doesn’t understand modern mixed/ice and cannot help but meddle to have the comp’ come out the way his dated sensibilities dictate, anyway the organizers of this event are too concerned with turning a profit with their clinics so people are herded around like cattle from clinics to coma-inducing slideshows. There are actually some very good routes in Hyalite both ice and mixed although mild/dry autumns the last two years have meant lean conditions and on Saturday last year the routes were in sorry shape as the Chinook blew big-time, all this after a brutally freezing day on Thursday. I hope Festiglace du Quebec returns in 2010, hopefully Eric Leclerc will return safe and sound from Afghanistan those fuck-head Jihadists having missed him and his mates with their roadside bombs and mortars. Otherwise I might like to do Europe again, I was invited to Gorzderette last winter by Stephan Husson but could not go this year for sure I will go if asked. Also I would like to do the Lake City, Colorado Comp’ if that is happening, I really think this event has potential. I doubt I will do the Ice World Cup as this would involve dealing with the American Alpine Club an organization I loathe with their fossilized thinking and geezer-hierarchy, if I do I will join the Italian Alpine Club and compete as an Italian, I can't bear the thought of handing the AAC my money so they can give it to some drip like Kelly "Mangina" Cordes for his summer vacation. So I train and dream, dream of winter and those freezing, adrenaline-drenched moments, for now trying to stay strong and not eat so much ice cream and drink so much beer. This spring has been terrifically wet so hopefully this will translate into much seepage this winter, Rocky Mountain National Park was poor this past winter, there is much potential there if only the moisture would occur, maybe this is the year. Finding people to go will be another issue, always a problem here in Colorado where everyone is a climber but no one actually goes climbing, that would require effort I suppose.

Off Season

Officially I am off-season now, winter is over and for now there will be no alpine season. I begin a new job 1 June so there is much to do in terms of mental preparation. Really, I can use a break from full-time training and climbing to let my body recover, I have had some lower back issues plus my elbows are always one set of pull-ups away from tendinitis. July and August are typically too hot to do much, I use these for weight-training or general conditioning but by late August I start to anticipate the autumn ice and begin to prepare more. This summer plan to do more with re-structuring my indoor dry-tooling wall so I can train more effectively, be less bored, I suppose...

This is an interesting video, watch for the clip where my belayer fails to push up some rope causing me to fight for the clip. Later as I reach the ice he fails to leave a belly in the rope which puts back-pressure on me, I have to pull rope out to relieve this drag wasting more energy. Would I have made the route without this energy being expended? I actually sent this one earlier in the year when it was leaner and harder so probably, I just mention this to illustrate how a belayer who is bored/inattentive/disinterested can screw with you, I was profoundly frustrated by this failure, my tenth lap that day.

What a great place! Let's FUCK IT UP!!!

I took an hour or two of yesterday to get out crimp some stone, a long winter of cranking in my home dry-tool cave leaves me a little loopy at times. From my home Land of the Overhangs is a about 10 minutes, I pull in for a little early-season. Having forgot my pads I head straight down for some inadvertant high-ball, what greets me there underneath the big overhang is sickening. Some assholes have built a fire ring right under the big overhang, not satisfied with this desecration they have broken all the bushes off in a thirty foot radius and burned them in the fire. Ah, there's more... Several 64oz. New Belgium returnable beer jugs have been left as well as other sundry trash, they have courteously thrown their Mickey's 40s away nearby so I get to pick up the green broken glass using a pair of zip-off pants legs also abandoned as gloves. After sending my routes I lug this pile of rubbish out and up.

Note: If you are reading this and these are your NB bottles please get in touch if you would like them back, getting them out of your rectum afterwards might be a problem though...

I find this a cruel cosmic prank given that I was just at the Larimer County meeting April 7 to discuss the fate of trail work at Rotary Park, there I had stood up and stated in no uncertain terms that I knew much of the destruction around the RP boulders was the direct result of climbers breaking brush, pruning and blazing trail to facilitate a more "tame" setting for their "climbing". This assertion was not terribly well received, at the meeting there was much talk about "hikers" and other incidental riff-raff being largely responsible for RP having become a complete tip. I first climbed at RP in 1992, have lived here in LaPorte since 1993 so what goes on at RP and the other bouldering areas has been the subject of keen interest for me.

In short, climber activity is a certain culprit in the profound degradation that plagues areas like Rotary Park, people using these areas for climbing simply have no respect for the land, the climbing, the boulders themselves. Having pimped-out the Rotary Park for a variety of commercial ends like magazine articles, guidebooks, and the Horsetooth Hang many "activists" move on to greener pastures (i.e., Boulder), not me though, I'm stuck here, this is my home.

For example when I brought up at the meeeting that the slopes around and below RP were the site of many nesting songbirds, a yellow-breasted chat nests there as well as spotted towhees, rock wrens, there was more than one smirk in the room. Most visitors are concerned mainly with not getting poked by a plum bush on their 400th attempt on Moon Arete or avoiding having their expensive yoga-bra hung-up on a mountain mahogany whilst sitting there looking soooo hot beneath Meditation.

Mind you I am not saying climbers set this fire, but these were not children partying here, few teenagers hang around outside New Belgium with their returnable beer jugs waiting for a likely patron to head in and score them a refill of Fat Tire. There is plenty of new chalk at LOTO, someone is climbing here which is fine, there is about 150 feet of shoreline left here so once it falls into the reservoir that's it and destroying the brush holding said shoreline in place is a pretty good way to accelerate the process to oblivion.

To call these activities VANDALISM is a good start, that way you can't say you are some sort of hero/activist clearing plum bushes from around the boulders so you and your pals can top-rope in safety problems you should probably either climb unroped or just stay the fuck off of. Rotary Park isn't a gym, no one comes by to vacum up after you, your tape, cigarette butts, plastic water bottles, your dog's shit, all this stuff is your responsibility, as they say your mom no longer works here.

The new plan of course seems to be to build yet another gargantuan trail down to the reservoir through RP, ostensibly to divert all the riff-raff away from the boulders. This will create a dog swim/party beach so wasted sorority girls in their flip-flops can readily stagger down to the water their doughy neo-con fascist boyfriends in tow, what an innovative solution to the problem of Rotary Park being converted into a suburban bouldering ghetto that is.

We have a saying around my house, anyone first arriving in Colorado faced with such natural beauty has a similar reaction, "What a great place! Let's FUCK IT UP!!!" This isn't limited to climbers who cut trails, place gobs of shiny bolts, and let their mutts defecate everywhere, where the buffalo once roamed we have Super Target, bloated mega-menopause mansions and garden-variety sphincters blasting down every road and lane in Hummers, Suburbans and F350s on the phone fairly shrieking "I'M BUSY GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY!!!".

No Rotary Park is an island, the same slacker/trustafarian/gym-rat mentality has despoiled many areas, Hueco Tanks, Mount Evans, Rocky Mountain National Park, my all time favorites being the lard-asses too lazy to carry their pads up and down the trail so they leave them stashed in situ, howz about I leave my broken down '68 Ford Galaxy in your front yard "stashed" as it were hommies, huh? How would you like that?

Much of this is about having respect for the resource, if you're too much of a lame-ass to carry your rope, pad or whatever up and down the hill en-route to making your latest video then, please just stay home, go to the Spot, shave yourself, whatever. I'm not likely to come to the premier of your new bouldering video, I don't read climbing magazines so your latest test-piece does not concern me, I'm simply not impressed.

All I seek is the chance to go boulder in relative solitude amid the shade of a Squawbush, listen to a bird-song not your dumb-ass dog barking at me ("Oh, he's friendly!", really?). I don't wish to boulder in squalor for all time, I want my son to be able to climb here, maybe even his son or daughter.

Rotary Park, Land of the Overhangs, these are great places, so don't fuck them up...

Beating the Level

My son has an Xbox360, it is a remarkable machine that permits us to play a variety of games. As You winnow through the various games you may "beat the level" or acheive a chekc-point, often times this takes a fair amount of perseverence as you get rubbed out again and again. I had switched over to Bear-back, meaning no heel-plate so had gone back to try some of my earlier sends sans eperon one route Quasimodo had gone fairly quickly but another Svengali, both in the Belfry at Vail had resisted my efforts, I had made it to the ice on several frustrating occasions only to get spit off, dang!

Some cold weather blew in last week, Vail seemed feasible again, we were surprised to see just how well the place was holding up. I had gone with Cormac and Adam the place being quite a scene with climbers flying off ice routes making a a racket in general, we retreated to the Belfry. There I noticed immediately a slender dagger had formed on Svengali, although a bit sun-rotted and poorly adhered it occurred to me that if I could make the ice maybe the route would go. Adam led up the pencil sank a couple screws up there for me, I put the draws up and the rope in the draws, then it was show-time.

I ripped through the dry-tooling so fast I hardly noticed, up and out walk feet on inner edge, then a decent move left to right over left Yaniro (figure 4), scrum the foot against the ceiling, grab the left tool up high rock, rock, then WHAMMO out to the lip to an occult divit.

Which I promptly missed. But the pick held long enough for me to crane out and look to see where the hold in fact was, 3 cm to the right so I jumped the tool into the hole, made it. Then left over right Yaniro kick the left front point into the slender dagger while in the Yaniro thus stabilized reach back for the other tool, pirate this tool with grip over my right shoulder, unload the Yaniro and gently kick into the dagger. Now hold breath swing at ice tool sticks, just.

No need to rush now, I won't have the steam for another try so I finesse my way up the hollow icicles pick my shots, take my time I clip one of the screws Adam placed but the route sucks me off up left up a fragile curtain so I twist one in, clip, life begins anew.

So that's that, I beat the level, all those futile attempts to try and climb a whole new way. Two years ago I ran into Jeff Lowe at the Ouray party, he could just stay vertical if he leaned against the counter. "I missed the leashless revolution" he told me staring off into the near distance, his MS having visibly ravaged him. I had first met him in 1995, the year everyone was repeating Octopussy, he was with then wife Terri Eble, still vital, powerful, at the height of his powers. he had watched me do Octopussy wanted to know what sequence I was using, I told him so he went promptly up there and sent the thing handily.

Well I'm not about to miss any revolutions, leashless, spurless or otherwise, if it involves ice tools I am all over it. The Bear-back thing is an immense amount of work until suddenly it becomes the norm then the norm becomes easy, you have beat the level.

Some time after my worse day climbing this winter (one of them) I took this photo, I had just patched up my Fusion tools for another go, was glueing the sole edges of my Dragon Boots back on, a sunny day on my deck I took this photo of my gear.

The gear is me really, battered, patched back up, ready for more.

I need sometimes to remember that mixed is alpinism you need to wait for that alignment of factors, I trained for weeks after my failures, the ice grew there, spring came. I plan to go back but maybe not to that climb this spring, ice cannot be squandered.

Neptune Show March 12

I will be giving my first slide presentation in 10 years at Neptune Mountaineering at 8PM Thursday March 12, this is in Boulder, Colorado. Paying attendees will receive a raffle ticket for the end-of-evening give-away for a three-pack of Ice-Holdz, these are sweet modular holds for indoor ice-climbing and dry-tooling, I would certainly relish having these Holdz on my wall so whomever wins this is going to be one lucky dog!

The show is entitled My Life as an Ice-Climber: From the Bronze Age to the Ice World Cup, I will attempt to discuss in one-hour my personal experience with the evolution of ice-climbing from my early efforts in the 1970s using primitive wood-handled tools on up through my current interests in competition winter climbing and Bear-Back mixed, obviously this is an enormous amount of ground (and ice) to cover so this one promises to be an insightful ride.

Topics to be covered include 1) How climate change is affecting the winter-climbing game; 2) The role of competition climbing in defining the ethical parameters of winter climbing; 3) The myth of "real" climbing (gravity will always whup-yo-ass); 4) The Mixed Euro-scene and why THEY are so good; 5) Indoor Mixed and the future of the winter game.

Attendees are encouraged to stay after the presentation and air their personal views on spurs, leashes, bolts, competitions, rock n' roll accompanied mixed climbing performances and whatever else burns yer butt. Profanity will not be tolerated but otherwise have-at!

You can bring beer so come early and socialize. ALLEZ!!!

Photos: Left; RCC competing in the 2009 Ouray Ice Festival, the shooter is Rob Fullerton. Right; Rob Cotter on Les Droites North Face, Mont Blanc Massif, 1988. The shooter (was) the late Mark Bebie.

Neptune Show: aftermath...

I had exactly 19 people come to my show, that is 19 paying attendees. "They all came to see you!" Susanne assured me, I am really not sure whether to be depressed or elated. I showed 100 slides, there was some hassle with the connector in that I had neglected to bring mine and the one there was incompatible, so off to the Mac store uptown to buy a $19 connector ( I later packaged this one back up and returned this for a refund, I'm sure come one will get excellent use from buying this later.)

The show went well, I was ruthless in selecting slides and staying on message, next time I would like to have more video footage, no small feat given it has been hard to find partners this winter let alone anyone to film. The show is in the box though and may reappear next autumn in some incarnation.

My own impression was that 1) Ice/mixed climbing is at a nadir here in the US, popular interest has diminished greatly in winter climbing, the major climbing publications rarely cover this subject (except to pronounce this type of climbing dead, of course.) 2) There are too many people/athletes/personalities/whatevers touring and giving shows these days, people have slide-show brain-freeze plus the well-reported on climbers (i.e., the ones in the Patagonia catalogs garner the Lion's-share of notoriety. 3) As some one once told me, Americans go to McDonalds because they don't like surprises, they want their Big Mac the exact same way every time, so doing a very different type of show (as opposed to travelogue, slides/music, etc.) isn't going to go over big.

So what's next? I really can't decide if I had a good season or an awful one, I covered very little new ground in terms of routes or areas visited, no truly hard sends, on the other hand I felt like I climbed well, in particular getting a handle on bare-back technique which will come in handy next winter for competitions, if I do any that is. With that said I had some nice days on the hill, did not sustain any injuries, pulled off a few good sends and did not embarrass myself at Ouray, could I have climbed better?

Yes, absolutely, one can always improve of this I am certain...

What I Have Been Up To

First of all thank any and all of you who have been fans, followed my writing, befriended me, given me beer, listened to my ale-soaked ramblings, mercie beaucoup...

What I have been up to is working, trying not to get divorced, climbing, training, skiing and raising my kids, although not necessarily in that order. The work has been sporadic, the climbing dismal, the skiing better, raising my kids a challenge (but rewarding), the divorce business, well, horrific...

Enough grousing, I will be at Neptune Mountaineering in Boulder March 12, Thursday evening, courtesy of Ice-Holdz. By way of acknowledgment Terri and Jay have been very supportive, their Ice-Holdz product is not only innovative but awesome for indoor mixed training, many a dark evening or bleak winter day I have found solace in cranking around the woody nailing succulent slabs of plastic, some good tunes, a glass of ale and off you go, stretching, situps, pushups, love-grass...

Late winter here, there is snow to ski on, ice to climb, I have been active at Vail but rather stalled on a project, doing two short but spicy mixed roofs back-to-back bear-back. I have done one of the problems Quasimodo bear-backseveral weeks back but my attempts to climb it several days ago ended in stalemate at the dagger, it was my tenth lap and was too wasted to get a good stick, shit!

The other route has seen varying degrees of success, I have made the ice twice. Myabe that is completion in itself, to climb as well as you can, as hard as you can, I'm not sure anymore. People try to justify their leisure by placing artificial parameters around what they view as accomplishments, we got to here so that means what we have done on our holiday is relevant, nay, important. To each his or her own I say.

I had started the day well, one bloke was struggling on his ice route, taking quite a while, I was fresh up the hill so I walked over, went up Esmerelda solo even though it is only an M5 or M6 right now, but you would be pretty busted up if you fell off this so there is merit in having the presence of mind to not fall off, to climb well in the process too.

Then Quasimodo refused entrance as a further warm-up route spat me off twice. I switched to the current project but could not make the dynamic throw, when I finally did make the stick I had fought back on after a slip, I made the ice but blew a heel-hook badly instead of dropping another Yaniro the final moments were ugly to say the least. Frustration built, I am a human being, a mere man, I let my self-control go, lost focus.

Each attempt started with the best intentions then fizzled out, a slip here, there, finally I just lost steam, no more gas in the tank so to speak. From 9 to 4 I banged away, valiantly, fruitlessly, I had resolved tp die in battle, so I did. I went through a curtain head-first putting my Stunt helmet to the test, I bashed my shin, threw my one tool at a second lodged in the roof, I cut my scalp on a tree branch on the way down.

Humility, bad...

People pronounce "ice is dead", "mixed is dead", they are the ones dead, from within. They gave up when the leash, or the spur or whatever went out of fashion now The Game offers no further incentive, they want to leave and take the marbles with them if they won't play nobody else will.

Good and bad days, at the crag as in all things, sometimes the "bad" day teaches you the most, a foundation upon which to build further accomplishments, if you are not failing perhaps you are not improving? So I had a "bad" day, got beat-down, if there is value in that then I will maybe cruise the project next try? Always there is another day, walk away with maybe a few cuts and bruises, come again leaner, fresh with the craving, no need to get angry, just get even.

And then some...

Bear-Back

Yes I know it's spelled Bare-back, I was just thinking about what a "bear" it is to climb roof routes without the spur! But what fun, too. I got thinking about bare-back climbing after the 2009 Ouray Ice Festival, I kept thinking afterwards "Shit! I could have won that thing!" if only I had trained-up bareback beforehand, more Monday-morning quarter-backing I suppose.

Yet it got me thinking about bear-back, the first day out I went without the spur but brought them in the pack, just-in-case. Day two I left the spurs behind in the car, by day three I had taken the heel-plates off so only the three bolts remained, I was hooked on a now more potent blend of The Junk, than ever. Suddenly routes I had sent many times with the spur now seemed utterly questionable, clipping became an act of pure gravity-defiance, I am happy to report that I have sent exactly two routes in twice as many outings.

Maybe though that is not the point, conceivably the climb-well movement needs for mixed to come in line. I say this because this winter when I watched friends climb with spurs, spurring tools, bat-hanging hands-free I thought, "that IS aid-climbing", to some extent anyway. Finally seeing it done in a fluid manner by the likes of stephanie Moreau, Jeff Mercier and Evgeny Krivosheitsev last winter made me take notice, this was the way forward.

After all leash-less just happened and their are plenty of hold-outs out there, I see them on every outing blasting away at some hapless flow.