The Summer is Gone

Well, I haven't posted on here in a while. I guess I have just been getting lazy. I had a pretty good summer of climbing this year. Climbed some hard routes and did more trad climbing than ever before.

I had a bad fall on Yamnuska doing the route Bottleneck 5.8. I grabbed a hold that decided it didn't want to be a hold anymore. I ended up with a slight concusion, injured tailbone, and a hyperextended tendon in my heel.

I recently had the time and interest to put together a video from footage that my friend Robin and I shot of us on Yamnuska. We climbed the route Grillmair Chimneys 5.6. Here is the video:



Yam Project from MikeG on Vimeo.


 I plan on taking it easy from climbing for the month of November. Then will start doing some training again in December to get ready for our annual trip to Red Rocks, Nevada. 

Climbing!!!!!

Wow, I have definitely been slipping when it comes to updating this blog. I've also been getting lazy when it comes to taking videos and pictures. I guess I've just been busy. Got a new job a little while ago. Also, that time off with my shoulder injury kind of made me forget about my drive for updating my blog etc.

Anyway, I've been trying to get outside and climb more! Yesterday,  my friend Claire and I were going to go out to Lake Louise to climb. We soon discovered that the further we drove west the worse the weather got. We ended up turning around and checking out a place that neither of us had been to before. We went and checked out Cougar Canyon. I thought it was quite a pleasant place! There are some fun routes and a good variety of climbs. Comparing the Crowbar Crag to Poolside or Cosmology.... it's hard to believe they were all at the same "crag". The weather was good, the routes were fun. I really enjoyed it.

I climbed a few routes - my favourites being at Cosmology crag. I onsighted Redshift 5.10b - a really cool long route with multiple cruxes that I highly recommend. I was also able to onsight Outer Limits 5.12a. That was a prett sweet onsight. I was extremely happy to top that one out first try. There were a couple of dicey spots but it all came together! The route has fairly descent handholds but the feet aren't always the best.

I wish I had pictures or video but alas - I don't.

Till next time.

Recovering From Injury

A few weeks ago I was route setting in the gym and messed up my left shoulder. I went to the doctor who believes that I tore my rhomboid (the muscle between the shoulder blade and spine). It's an injury I've never heard of a climber getting before but I suppose it doesn't seem to far fetched either. I've been icing it and "taking it easy" for the last 3 weeks or so.....

Workin the Proj and a Climbing Trip

I started working on a new project out at Barrier Mountain on saturday. It's called Kiwis Fly (5.12d). It's a pretty sweet route with a tough crux. I just worked it for the first time on Saturday and then returned on Monday for some more. On Monday I was able to get all the way to the crux in one go which felt pretty good. The new guide book Bow Valley Sport Climbs says to cut left at the roof (crux) but my beta goes straight over - cutting way to the left seems a bit off route to me. Here is a picture of my hand after getting owned at the crux.

My fingers were bleeding quite profusely but I just kept chalking 'em up and and kept climbing. It seemed to stop the bleeding after a while. I think I'll be able to do this route. It's just a matter of time. 

On a completely different topic. I am gonna be going to Skaha for 4 days. Should be a blast. I will mostly be focusing on onsighting, which is what I usually do when I go on a climbing trip. So, we'll see if I send anything awesome. 

I'm going with a bunch of people that I recently met at the climbing wall. I haven't done that very much (tagged along with people I don't know very well on a climbing trip) although I've had people tag along with me before. It should be an interesting time. 

A Short Post

This isn't about climbing so much, but I'm graduating from university! That's pretty exciting. I'm gonna have an engineering degree. I majored in civil engineering with a minor in structural engineering.

Hopefully I'll get a decent job in the near future.

I was just thinking tonight that after I get a job I would like to purchase one of these:

http://www.toolnut.com/Bosch_11536C_1_36_Volt_Lithium_Ion_Hammer_Drill_p/11536c-1.htm

Maybe contribute to the climbing community a little bit in the future. In the mean time I'm thinking this summer maybe I'll borrow a drill and start the learning process.  

That Guy

So, I was thinking today about my recent climbing adventure at White Buddha. I realize that I was dangerously close to being "that guy". I had just come down from doing my project (Yay!) and I was kinda just sitting there watching these other climbers trying to do a boulder problem that (I think) I had done before. I was tempted to go over there, strike up a brief conversation, and then give the problem a try - assuming of course that I would crush it and may even be helping them out by showing them some beta. Then I realized that that would be (pardon my french) a real dick move. So, I didn't do it. But realized that I was pretty close to being that guy.

It reminded me of this blog post from a couple of weeks ago. It is a pretty good blog post and I recommend reading it. It's good for a short laugh until you start seeing yourself in the various climber personalities that he talks about.

I remember when I started climbing - watching

Tick on the Cleaning List

Today I was able to clean up one of my leftover projects from last summer. That always feels good. It was a boulder problem that turns into a route at White Buddha. The boulder problem is a V5/6 called Trout Fishing in America that turns into a route called Brown Trout (5.12c). It was weird because I did the boulder problem like a year ago (no rope) and then was unable to do the route until now. The route adds like 2-3 moves that are a little tough (not nearly as hard as the previous boulder problem) and then it's pretty much smooth sailing from there. I honestly think that I just had bad luck in taking so long to do it. I had bad weather and injuries occuring at the wrong moments for it all to come together. I also had issues forgeting my beta for some reason which was pretty strange for me. I remember cruising the start one week and then coming back and barely being able to get my butt off the ground - the problem was where I was putting my feet.

Well, I got it now. No video and no pictures. I do have a video of my failing horribly on it somewhere... I probably won't post that. Well... maybe I'll include it as part of another video or something later.

If only I can now clean up the rest of my list from last year. That would be fun.

Injuries and 2012 Goals

I recently read this little blog post by Dave Macleod. He talks about how much you may or may not need to break from climbing due to tendon injuries. He has some interesting ideas that contradict the conventional wisdom on the subject. I recently injured my tendon pulley on my middle finger of my left hand... the article gave me a little bit of hope.

On a quite different subject, I would like to mention some of my goals and projects for 2012. I previous years I have made a list of 10 routes that I would like to do that year. I usually end up doing very few of them. I get to the crag and see other stuff I want to try or I don't even go the crag cause I'm wanting to climb a new project I found or I just don't have enough time! So, this year I'm gonna do things a little differently. I still have a few projects (or routes that I would like to do that I hope don't become projects) in mind though.

It Is Warm Enough to Climb

So far this year I've probably gone climbing outside around 5 times (in Canada). So far I've only been to White Buddha and the Big Rock though. For those in the area who are wanting to climb the early season, here are few places that CAN be good in the early parts of the year:

1) White Buddha - it gets sun all day and is just oddly warm... even when places nearby are not. This crag has both bouldering and some short sport climbs.

2) The Dust Bowl (Moose Mountain) - not far from and similar to White Buddha

3) The Big Rock - a bouldering location near Okotoks. This place can be really nice early in the season. Look it up in the guide book "Bouldering in the Canadian Rockies".

4) Barrier Mountain - This place gets sun in the afternoon. It will get nice a bit later in the season than White Buddha but early than some of the other popular areas like Heart Creek or Grassi Lakes.

5) Wasootch Slabs - not far from Barrier. This is a destination that is mostly geared towards the beginner.

6) Bataan - This place gets a lot of sun and can be very climbable early in the season. That being said, I must give the usual warning that it does have a bit of a hike to get to the climbing. Also, I think the easiest route at Bataan is 5.10a and there aren't very many 5.10s either. So be warned.

7) Big Choss - I've never bouldered here but I'm thinking it could be doable in the early season. Someone let me know if they've tried!

There are a few other places to go to as well. Frank Slide might be a doable bouldering place this time of year and there are a couple other places in the Bow Valley but they are smaller/obscure.

Happy hunting!

Vance's Blog and a little bit about recent climbing

Here's a link to a blog with an eerily familiar sounding name! http://thealaskanclimber.blogspot.com/ 
It is a link to Vance's new blog. He's a guy we met in Red Rocks in January (see Red Rocks 2012 video below).

On a completely different note... I can't believe how warm it has been here this winter. Last weekend I went out to the Big Rock near Okotoks and bouldered for a few hours. It was so warm it was ridiculous for February. I'm hoping to get out to do some sport climbing here in the near future. Hopefully the weather stays awesome. I do have a week off of school soon. Maybe we'll be able to get out to one of the early season crags in the area. White Buddha, Moose Mountain's Dust Bowl, or Bataan. Maybe even Barrier Mountain. We'll see. :)

Red Rocks Climbing Trip 2012

Well, I made it out to Red Rocks near Las Vegas again this winter break! It was awesome. I went with my friends Claire and Tim, and our friend Kami met up with us down there. Claire had her hardest onight yet - Back Gold 5.10b at the Black Corridor. Tim learned how to lead climb, his first lead was on Brief Encounter 5.8 at the Panty wall. And I onsighted another 5.12a which was pretty sweet. I was also able to onsight some pretty cool 5.11s. I decided that like my trip to Skaha I was not really going to try to redpoint anything. I decided to focus entirely on onsighting - that way I get more routes in, instead of tiring myself out on one route. I made a video to document some of the awesomeness of the trip. It's a little bit long (20 minutesish) but I think it's pretty good and gets a bunch of the highlights in there.

Claire was complaining about how she hates the font "Comic Sans" so I made all of the fonts Comic Sans (alhtough I think I forgot to make the credits Comic Sans). I hope you enjoy it Claire! And I hope everyone else who watches enjoys it too!

We met a guy named Vance on the trip. I told him to check out my blog in like a weeks time. I included his TR ascent of Rebel Without a Pause 5.11b. If you ever see the video Vance make sure to leave a comment!

Without further ado, here's the video:
PS: If you watch the video from Vimeo's website you can watch it in HD!!! :)

Red Rocks Climbing Trip 2012 from MikeG on Vimeo.