Guy Fawkes UKC Article

http://www.ukclimbing.com/news/item.php?id=67724

"Font8A in less than 2 years of climbing is massively impressive"- UKC User (Snoop6060)

My Chemical Romance and The Black Parade (Font 8A/V11)

I returned to Portland two days after my ascent of 'Guy Fawkes' (see post below) and had a go on 'My Chemical Romance' and 'The Black Parade' (both Font 8A); I came very close but couldn't quite figure out the last section on this very reach dependant problem. I had also returned to do 'Guy Fawkes' again for some photos.

James got a repeat on 'Guy Fawkes' too.

Latching the crimp after the dyno.
Photo by: James Squire

The Best way to End the Year- 'Guy Fawkes' Font 8a (V11)

After the Brean trip being cancelled on Thursday 27^th, due to the person who I was going with picking up an injury the day before the planned day trip, I was worried that I wasn’t going to get another outdoor session in before the end of the year. On Friday feeling a little worried about not being able to finish the year with a cool route/problem I decided to do some training and went out for a long trial run (with some of the steepest hills I’ve ever ran up). Later that day I received a text about a possible trip to Portland on Sunday due to a short window of good weather on the isle. So obviously I took this opportunity and on 30^th December 2012 I was heading to Dorset for my final session of the year.

After an early start and a journey into Totnes, to meet Dan and Andy, I was feeling very tired but extremely psyched to try and get the most out this session, especially because it was my last session of my first complete year of climbing (I started climbing February/March 2011, so only did 10/11 months in 2011). After a 2.5 hour journey I had finally arrived on the Isle of Portland for my first time climbing in Dorset. I had originally planned to try ‘Fighting Torque’ F8a but when we arrived e decided to just boulder (due to low temperatures and high wind speeds) meaning not too much time would be spent standing around belaying or spectating.

As we headed towards The Cuttings Boulder field I spotted a section that I had previously seen in photos, the classic ‘Stompin’ with Bez’ was. I knew that a problem which I have always wanted to do ever since I started climbing was nearby and maybe worth looking at. This problem is the very highball font 8a (V11)- ‘Guy Fawkes’, originally climbed by Jim Kimber in ’99 but has had big hold broken off since and was reclimbed by John Gaskins and then after a few more repeats was given benchmark 8a (v11) and supposedly the hardest established problem in Dorset. ‘Guy Fawkes’ was the first ‘difficult’ problem that I had heard about as I newbie so has always been a problem which I was quite keen to attempt when I got the chance to go to Portland. So we scrambled over the bank and had a look along that wall where Dan and Andy decided to try ‘Stompin’...’ and I was going to have a few attempts on ‘Guy...’ to see what it what it was like. To be honest my initial impression of the problem was that it looked rather hard and pretty high. I think that my opinion on its difficulty was due to the two awful hand-holds that were in front of my face when I stood next to the problem.

We decided to get warmed up on a nice looking traverse that the guidebook appeared to show as V2 but later we found out it was V8 (so not the most appropriate warm-up).  I had a few attempts on ‘Guy Fawkes’ still feeling a bit cold but thought it felt a bit hard. I decided to have a flash attempt on ‘Stompin’ with Biz’ but didn’t quite manage the flash, straight after my attempt Dan found new easier beta though!

Back to ‘Guy Fawkes’ and after figuring out all the moves but one (which I hadn’t tried) the rain started to pour down on us making some holds on the problem a little wet, I had a long rest while waiting for the rain to stop; eventually it did and I started to try the problem again. I brushed all the holds and thought they were now dry enough to use, this saw me back on the problem trying it from the start where I fell from the move that I hadn’t yet tried (a heinous move from a poor side-pull to a horribly polished crimp with left hand, while on an okay two finger undercut with the left). After around 2 minutes rest I quickly got back on the problem and stuck the move, now all I had to do was two hard moves and I would be on for the race to the finish. I did the first hard move... Then moved out comfortably left for the next hold, as I grabbed the crimp my hand slid straight off and I was now lying on my back on the floor. My screaming after that was compared to Adam Ondra’s when falling off of the La Dura Dura Project (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stQhEZn4RE0).

After 20 minutes rest I went back on and stuck the move I had previously fallen from but as I did the first of the easier moves I popped and again had been spat off this problem. 

Feeling a little annoyed I went for a walk, thought about the problem and went through the sequence over and over again in my head. After 15 minutes I was back and ready to finish this problem! I did a little warm-up in between spotting Dan on an interesting problem that he was trying- ‘Fire starter’ V5. I put on my shoes, applied some Liquid Grip, thought through the sequence one final time and pulled on to the starting holds, into the undercut, side pull, switch feet, big throw over to the crimper, out left to the next crimp then high feet, drop-knee and big throw out to another poor edge. Cutting loose, I managed to hold the swing but didn’t quite catch the hold right and had caught it as a 2 finger half crimp instead of the 4 finger full crimp which I was hoping for but somehow pulled through! All I had to do now was remain calm and composed and climb the V5 section to the top. After a lot of hanging around and worrying I moved up feeling slightly pumped from hanging around on the pinch and crimp hesitating whether to move out to the gaston but I soon went for it and somehow pulled through and matched the soaking wet finish. I had done it, ‘Guy Fawkes’ Font 8a (V11), my last boulder problem of 2012 and a very good one at that!

Feeling very pleased I packed up and heading home. The remaining one day will not be used for climbing (mainly due to a lack of skin) but I’ll use it to train be going for a run and doing some core training. I’m very very excited about what awaits me in 2013 and I hope I and everybody has a great year.

Thank you to strong local climber and photographer Tommy for the photos.

Thanks for reading,

EllisJ

 

Images coming soon...

Christmas Sessions...

On Thursday 20th I travelled up to Birmingham to stay at my Dad's over ther christmas period and this also gave me the opportunity to train at some different walls too. I arrived at Birmingham New Street train station, got in a taxi and went straight to Redpoint Climbing Centre, on Thursday I had a couple of hours to climb and did some nice font 7b+'s and some endurance training on the roof too.

The following day I was back at 9:00 for a long training session... I took a long time to get completely warmed up and got on a black circuit (font 6b-6c+), onsighted all of these and then got onto the barrell section of the wall and started to work through the problems on this wall. Soon after I had done a few font 7b+'s and some font 7c's. I then realised that there were graded problems on the roof and started to get working on a nice font 8a, I quickly got all the moves done but sadly my skin was hurting too much to go for the full link. So I decided to go for the font 7c+ but was too short to do the moves from the sit start but did it from standing which was maybe soft font 7c+/hard 7c. I attempted to onsight several font 7b+'s but fell from the last couple of moves on almost all of them! I then decided to do some fingerboard and power endurance training, after this I was ruined but did laps on some problems in the roof and the some easy problems to complete the session. After 8 hours of almost non-stop climbing my skin was ruined and my toes was in a lot of pain...

After a day of complete rest I travelled south towards Gloucester to compete in a BMC Leading Ladder round at The Warehouse Climbing Centre. I onsighted up to F7c (including F7c) and thought the F8a was very very hard, much harder than any other F8a's I have tried indoors. I finished off with an extremely pumpy F7b going through a roof and then a journey back to Birmingham.



Just starting the tough F8a at The Warehouse.
Photo by: Justin Barker

I will be having a short session tomorrow and then I'll be heading to Brean Down on Thursday 27th if the weather allows us too where I am hoping to try 'Black Snake Moan' F8a and then 'Brean Topping' F8b.
I have also found a partner who is keen to try some hard  Dartmoor trad in the new year, he is very experienced and has lead E8!

 http://javu.co.uk/Climbing/Articles/HardGranite/index.shtml

Merry Christmas and thank you for reading:)

Bristol Weekend

On Saturday morning I woke early and headed into Paignton where I met Andrew (Andy) Haley where we got on a train and headed up to Bristol for the TCA (The Climbing Academy) Redpoint Bouldering Competition. We had finally arrived at Temple Meads where we met fellow Base Cubic athlete James Squire and shortly after arrived at TCA. I was quick to get climbing and started to warm up on some easy problems; then I got my score-sheet and got going on some of the easier looking boulder problems. I swiftly completed 18 of the problems and just had a few tougher ones to do. In the end I finished having topped 21, fell from the last move on 3 and only reached the third/fourth hold on my remaining which was extremely hard! After an interesting final the results were announced and I had finished in third place with James beating me by one hold!

After the comp there was a lengthy journey back to James’ were we had food, watched climbing films and slept to recover for our attempts at soloing ‘The Prince’ (F8b) the following morning.

Me sending 'Mouldy Rain' V9
Photo by: James Squire

We headed out to Avon Gorge for 11:00 to discover that ‘The Prince’ was absolutely soaking and not a single section of the wall was dry… So we headed to an eliminate cave called Gollums Cave (see video below) and did some training there. My plan was to try ‘Mouldy Banana’s’ (V10) but one of the main holds was soaking; so James did the first ascent of a nice variation to ‘Mouldy…’ called ‘Mouldy Rain’ (~V9) and I quickly got the second ascent. After that I did ‘Gollums One-Armer’ (V10), I’m not certain if I did it off the right hold but the hold I used was the poorer of the two possibilities, so obviously the harder option. We tried another (even harder) variation to ‘Mouldy Banana’s’ but the session came to a premature end due to heavy rain closing in on us.

The approach is down a steep muddy bank, so obviously reversing this to get back to the car was extremely dangerous in the rain. After lots of falls and slips we were back at the car drenched and muddy.

I then got on the train and headed back home after a great weekend climbing.

I am now also supported by Infinity Pro (http://uk.infinitypro.com/).

Thanks for reading,

EllisJ

First trip to Fontainebleau!

Day 1

Tom on 'L'Y'
Photo by: Martin Wright

After a late night of watching climbing flicks and preparing for the trip to Fontainebleau I woke up in Hackney at 6:00 am having had very little sleep. We (Myself, Martin and Tom Wright) quickly packed the VW and were soon on route heading for our first trip to Font’.

We arrived at the campsite at around 14:00 and hurried to set up the tent in order to have some daylight remaining to squeeze a couple of hours in at L’Elephant. Arriving at the area for around 16:30 we decided to jump on something easy to warm up on and get our first taster of ‘bleau sandstone. The main feature at L’Elephant is a huge boulder called Elephant (aptly named with its elephant-like features). It is a beautiful boulder with several low grade problems- Tom went first up ‘Trompe Elephant’ 4c; I followed with a great degree of difficulty almost dropping the top out! We moved around the corner to ‘Surplomb Elephant’ 6a+, I still haven’t done it… Next to ‘Surplomb…’ is ‘L’Y’ 6a which I fell off around 3 times before I managed to top it.

Barre Fixe 7b+
Photo by: Tom Wright

We then moved to the Lepreux boulder where I onsighted a nice 6a and quickly did ‘Le Lepreux Eliminate’ 7a. We then had a quick play on a 7b roof which revolved around a painful (but crucial) fist jam but swiftly moved due to the pain. We searched for some classics and found ‘Figure de Proue’ 7a which is a giant 8 metre highball slab and decided to skip it. I went to look around and found a really cool overhanging pocketed wall. After about 5 minutes of working I had topped it- I later learnt that it was ‘Barre Fixe Assis’ 7b+.

We jumped in the van, drove back to the campsite, ate and slept looking forward to the day ahead.

Day 2

I woke up fairly early feeling psyched to get back in the forest; I had a walk into the small town of Nemours to get some food, and then got back to get ready for the climbing which waited.

We got back to L’Elephant where Tom had ‘Barre Fixe Assis’ to finish off and I was eyeing up ‘Barre Fixe Droite’ 8a to the right which then links into ‘Barre Fixe’. I got on ‘L’Aiglon de Droite’ 6a and once again fell off another 6… It did go on the 3^rd attempt though. Then up a really nice 4c and then headed up to Barre Fixe. The sequence was fairly straight forward and simple but quite difficult to pull off. I had an attempt from standing and fell from just a few moves from the top, and then started to work the sit start, I fell from the first few moves several times but it soon went and I had done it. I’m not sure that it deserves 8a, 7c+ would probably be more appropriate.

Later that day we headed over to Franchard Cuisiniere. We had lunch in the car-park and headed to the boulders (getting lost along the way). The aim- ‘Karma’ 8a+ awaited, I quickly got in this desperate classic and fell from the first hold; back on and I found some better holds for my feet and gave a big throw up to the lower sloper and got close but not close enough, after around 20 attempts it became apparent that I was going to be too short to reach the higher (and better) right hand sloper, so I gave up feeling rather annoyed and helpless. Tom was trying a powerful 7a arête called ‘Bizarre bizarre’ to the right of ‘Karma’ so I did this in a few attempts then moved on and fell off of another 6a.

Day 3

We had decided that we would go back to Cusiniere and possibly check out the infamous ‘Duel’, a remarkable 8a slab which for most people involves finger-nail crimping. We made the trek through the woods and finally found it and decided to warm-up on some easy slabs in the other area; we rapidly rushed up several easier problems; ‘Dans la Patisserie’, ‘Sans Sucre’, ‘Cerise’, ‘Gateau de Noel’ and a very fine 6b+ lay backing arête- ‘Tranche de Lard’.

'Sans Sucre'
Photo by: Martin Wright

After this we headed over to search for ‘Beatle Juice’ 7a+ and ‘Excalibur’ 7a. Beatle Juice is a lovely boulder which a juggy roof to start and finishes with some crimpy side-pulls, pinches and a then to a sloping top out; to add to this, it is slightly pumpy too. There were several people working the problem so I watched and they later talked me through the beta which was my call to go for the flash attempt, I climbed through the first crux and felt okay then suddenly got very pumped and dropped it just before setting up for the final moves. I had a few more attempts on this but felt exhausted and extremely tired so moved on to try ‘Excalibur’, which I had a few attempts on but was feeling too tired to even get close.

I walked back up to ‘Duel’ with Tom (a friend from London whom I met at Anstey’s several weeks back) and we quickly found the beta which lead us 2/3’s of the way up the wall and just about to set up for the final move out to the top of the lip. Soon after; it started to get dark so we headed back to the campsite to rest for Franchard Istatis the next day.

Day 4

Another early morning and I followed the usual morning routine then headed over to Istatis where I wanted an easy days climbing because I felt very very tired and a little ill. So I did loads of easy slabs and a nice 7b+ roof called ‘Divine Decheance’ which many people were trying. I went looking around for some easy problems to do- Meanwhile Tom Wright was trying ‘Rataplat’ 7b which he later topped and claimed his first font 7b!

I continued to rush round topping tonnes of 5 and 6 slabs. I went to bed quite early that evening hoping to feel a little better for the final day of the trip.

Scoping the top-out...
Photo by: Tom Wright

Day 5

I woke up feeling really psyched and incredibly motivated to leave Font with some classics ticked and having thoroughly enjoyed my first climbing trip abroad- This day did everything to ensure that that happened…

We arrived at Bas Cuvier for around 11:30 and headed straight over to ‘La Marie-Rose’- The first 6a in the world. Sadly I didn’t get the on sight or the second attempt but did manage to send it on my third try.

I decided to check out a 7c classic named ‘L’Aerodynamite’, the problem started with a jump to the starting hold which is quite an awful sloper, then you have to campus to another (and slightly worse) sloper. After a few tough moves you come to the most horrendous top-out I have ever experienced! I had quite a few attempts on this but decided not to waste all my energy on it. I decided to have a go at a 7b+ just to the right called ‘Aerosol’, I set up at the base of the problem and soon had onsighted the problem- This was my first 7b+ onsight!

Feeling very psyched from the onsight I moved on to the famous ‘L’Carnage’ 7b+, this was the most painful problem with the awful condition that my skin was in, the holds on ‘Carnage’ are very polished and quite difficult to hold, they’re also really difficult to keep your feet on. After quite a few attempts, I had topped it and now it was time for the sit- ‘L’Carnage Assis’ 7c. This went fairly quickly after the stand start and was a very enjoyable problem to tick despite the pain of my rapidly diminishing skin.

We then headed over to a slab which I had liked the look of earlier that day, the slab has three difficult and technical problems on graded 7c+, 8a+ and 7c+. We cleaned up the left hand 7c+ and quickly got onto working it, after around 20 minutes of working Tom had topped the problem and sent his first ever 7c+, my attempt after Toms successful ascent saw me repeat the problem too. I was quite pleased to claim a 7c+ SLAB (probably my weakness) on my first visit to ‘Bleau.

After this we had a play around on some other problems and then as daylight slowly faded I felt this huge urge of motivation to do ‘L’Aerodynamite’ and make it my last tick of the trip. The sun started to quickly disappear and rain started to fall… Everything was against me to do this problem; I fell from the final move three times within around 10 minutes. I had my last opportunity to do it- It was now or never. I hit the penultimate hold and kept slipping from this hold, I fought with everything I had left and topped the problem! This was the best feeling I’ve had through climbing… It wasn’t the hardest problem which I’ve done but the chances of success were so little that when it went I was so pleased. Absolutely amazing!

'L'Aerodynamite' 7c
Photo by: Martin Wright

This was the last problem I did in Fontainebleau, the trip was now over and I was left feeling really happy and excited to return next Easter. I learnt a lot from my first trip to the forest and was very sad to now be leaving.

Thanks to Martin and Tom Wright for everything and making the trip happen.

Well done to Tom Wright on your first 7b and 7c+!

Thanks for reading,

Ellis.

'Five Days in Fontainebleau' video.

Video credit: Tom Wright

BaseCubic and British Championships

After a good evening out with a friend on Wednesday 3^rd, I got home to another sponsorship deal… ‘BaseCubic’, a new bouldering company whom are soon to release their new boulder mat/pad. The pad has been designed over two years of hard work and a huge amount of dedication from David Cross. BaseCubic currently have a fantastic range of chalk bags and buckets, which also followed the same long and fierce testing process as the new bouldering pad which should be available for purchase within the next month. I am extremely pleased to be supported by BaseCubic and I look forward to building a relationship with them and using their high quality products.


BaseCubic Logo

At around 6:30 on Friday 5^th October I was awake and getting ready for my 9 hours of travelling to Edinburgh via train. I used the time on the train to watch ‘On the Circuit’ several times, catch up with college work, start editing a video of a friend of mine getting the fourth ascent of Paciencia plus some second ascents on some easier problems and I manages to get a small amount of sleep too. I got off in Edinburgh Station almost without fellow southern friends (Alex and Phil Waterhouse), whom almost missed the stop, we then travelled to the hotel where we were staying, had some food and got an early night for the following morning- BLCC’s (British Lead Climbing Championships).



College Work on the train...

 Another early start on Oct’ 6^th in time for British Championships at EICA (Edinburgh International Climbing Arena), saw us arriving at the competition venue at around 8:30 for registration. After registering I collected my comp vest and warmed up on the freestanding boulder which started off feeling like I was holding on to blocks of ice, I was absolutely freezing! Eventually the wall warmed up and I managed to on sight a V10 (more like V6 though), then did a few V6’s and V7’s which left me warm and feeling recruited for the hard routes which were about to follow.

Ready for my attempt on the first route I was a little anxious to whether I would get anywhere near the top or whether I’d drop the first couple of movements. As I started up the wall, I realised I was slowly getting higher than I first expected. Near the top and approaching the upper crux I heard somebody shout “speed it up”, which I then stupidly lost focus and rushed the next few moves. After a couple of hours of waiting for the next route I jumped on and did the sequence wrong in several places which lead me to reversing moves and wasting a lot of energy and time. I was soon off when going for a powerful move to a side-pull. I learnt a lot from my experience at the BLCC’s and have realised that my greatest weakness is probably the mental aspect to the sport and will be working on this a lot in order to get stronger in lead climbing competitions. I need to retain focus after a blunder on route and learn to efficiently deal with errors. Overall I came 15^th which I wasn’t too happy about but wasn’t expecting a great result as I’ve been training bouldering a lot recently in order to be on form in Fontainebleau. After the competition I had a good evening with everybody and was left feeling psyched to improve my lead climbing competition ability and overall aptitude in competitions.


EICA Competition Walls
Photo Credit: Phil Waterhouse

 The next day I spent another day of climbing, watching senior British Championships, Junior BSCC’s (British Speed Climbing Championships) and struggling up some routes with awfully sore skin. I managed to do some cool boulder problems and some really nice routes too, abit of finger boarding on the Beastmaker 2000 and ruin some more skin.

Now I am on the long train journey home feeling very happy after a brilliant weekend and looking forward to travelling to Birmingham next Friday to meet the BaseCubic owner, do some bouldering and compete in my first leading ladder round with Orrin Coley (British Speed Climbing Champion ’12). Then the following weekend I will be heading out to France for a week in Fontainebleau with Tom Wright.

Thanks for reading,

Ellis.

No Pain, No Gain

An early start with a lack of sleep was the morning of 2nd June, when I had planned a trip up to Bristol's elimination cave- Gollums Cave in Avon Gorge. I met Tom at Totnes to catch a train to Temple Meads where we would meet James Squire.

After a pleasent train journey we arrived in Bristol feeling pshyced to get on James's problems, with the goal of the day trip being the second ascent of 'No Pain, No Gain' Font7c+...

The day was coming to an end after around nine attempts and my chances of getting it on my last attempt were looking very slim. Just before my final attempt, I felt this huge rush of determination to get the send.

On my final chance, I gave it everything and pulled it off!


Here is a short video of the send:

Bloodlust V6 6b at Clodgy Point