DMM offsets. Am I missing something?

My rack consists of a hodge-podge of gear, especially my wires. I mean they seem to consist of a wires picked up from here there and everywhere. I think something like a third of them have actually been found rather than actually brought. I think the problem began when I first started buying a rack and I brought something like 1 or 2 nuts each week in a effort to build it up with each paycheck. At the time I didn't really know any better and a nut was a nut as far as I was concerned. Over time my rack grew and I eventually forked out for a set of decent nuts, metolius curve nuts. Not the lightest nut on the market (at the time) but they looked different and I was willing to try them out (plus they came with a free nuts key, back when they were cheap). Having used both DMM wallnuts and WC rocks before it was a welcome change to use the curve nuts.

Over time my rack grew still. I doubled up on a few sizes of curve nuts and replaced things a I dropped, bailed or welded them into place. Eventually my defining feature for what nut I'd buy was the price because well curve nuts had gone expensive and wallnuts/rock were cheap. My rack of wires now sits at around 40 depending on the last count. At least 9 of these nuts have been found over the years and at least 9 are also small wires, either made in brass just really tiny (that are sub about 3kn). 

I actually own a few specifically offset nuts, 3 brass offsets (the smallest sizes) and a yellow alloy offset. Again price was the defining feature in thier purchase (alloy) and because I couldn't find anything smaller (brass). But I've still never found myself wanting an offset nut. What am I missing? Offset nuts seem to have a sort fo cult following in the British climbing world. I know quite alot of people who swear by them. In fact it really annoys me when people start recommending them to new climbers, raving on about how awesome they are. I think part of the problem (my lack of offset nut love) comes from having WC single wires (slightly offset in shape) and the Curve nuts that make for the basic of my rack. 

I'm still not sure whether I'm missing out of something revolutionary, but with 40 wires on my rack (that I can't seem to trim down) I can't really afford to add another 5 heavy offsets. 

Anklular update

I'm back at work. This is a good thing as far as I'm concerned because there is only so much sitting around at home I can do. I'm not saying that I don't like sitting around at home, but I'd much rather be at work, that's all. I feel bad for having time as it'll just make things harder for the rest of the team I work with. 

Having not been off work before in like an official capacity (I've been ill for like a day once or twice) I had to have my "back to work" meeting. This was basically a are you fit for work and is it going to cause you any problem being back. Well I want to be here, but my foot still hurts. Notice I said foot, my ankle is actually alright. It's a little swollen but the ankle is quite good and I've got like 95% movement in it. The only reason I don't have 100% movement is because the small damage section is still swollen. I made the mistake of mentioning it to my line manager, and thus I was sent back to the doctors.

After the chop-shop of City Hospital A&E going to see my doctor was a blessing. Ok, so he did the same poking and prodding and bending my foot and came to the conclusion that 1; it's not broken (yay!) and 2; the ligament hasn't snapped (even bigger yay!). What I have done is damaged my tibofibula (?) ligament, which splays out across the foot from the ankle. There is a possibility that I've torn a few strands of ligament tissue but the whole injury normally take 2 to 6 weeks to heal. I've still got 3 weeks left so I'll be taking it easy. I also found out what the pain is in my foot. It feels like I've dropped a brick on my foot and the pain is like a searing deep pain across the bones of my right foot. 

Apparently I have tendonitis. This is not cool but manageable. I foresee some physio in the near future.

Helium Friends? were they worth making?

Since the patent came up on double axel cams there seems to have been a minor revolution within the cam market. It seemed very much 5 years ago that the British market was dominated by DMM 4cus, Wild Country Tech Friends and then BD camalots. This wasn't a bad thing as each offered a significant difference when compared to the others. 4cu's had extendable slings, useful to those hardcore trad climbers but wanted to save weight. BD camalot had increased range and there for usefulness. Tech Friends it seems just sort of set the bar as to what a decent cam should be.

Then the patent went [on double axel designs] and it's sort of opened the doors for a wide range of new cams. It's not just the patent going world wide either, but little things like CCH Aliens which stopped being shipped to Britain leaving a gap in the market place for the microcam market to develop. Wild Country Zeros and Metolius Master Cams have a new lease of life and seem to be doing well, but it's DMM who really hit the nail on the head.

BD camalots are good. No-one can ignore it. They have a smooth action, they are reasonable stable. They're made with hard wearing components. DMM dragon cams are just even better. They have the same smooth action, but are lighter. The metal and plastic components are hard wearing but the slings are made of dyneema. Is this a big problem? no! because DMM have offered to resling the cams as and when needed. They also have an extendable sling, something that is a real benefit for trad climbers in Britain. At places like gogarth where routes wander all over the place, lessening rope drag is a real bonus. I like dragon cam, I think they are a really well though out product.

I thought I was a die hard wild country tech friend advocate. I've got like 11 of them, all battered and scratched, most with repaired cables (one with a paper clip) and 1 with a tied cord as the sling worn out. I thought that I'd never replace them, until a climbing partner left one in a belay and it was never seen again. I'm not laying it on, but it was my favourite cam. It was my red size 2, the one I'd carry everywhere. I can still see the pattern of scratched on the lobes of the cam. Meh, it's gone but instead on missing n old friend (literally!) I took this opportunity to try something new, and cheaper. 

I brought a red dragon cam. It's awesome, simply awesome. I don't need to say anything else. When I retire my tech friends, or loose them, I'll just replace them with dragon cams. It is really that simple. They are also light enough I'd carry them in winter. 

The thing is, DMM have clearly put alot of thought into the dragon cam. BD clearly though long and hard about the Camalot and the old tech friend just sets the bar for what a good cam should really be like. The new helium cams just look crap. They don't strike me as a great step forward in cam production. For the same weight you can get the equivalent size Dragon. They feel clunky and heavy. They don't have such a smooth action and the thing that is most annoying? It just looks like Wild Country have just on the hot forging band wagon (following DMM) and made forged cam lobes and then stuck them on a BD camalot stem. 

All I'm saying is, was it really worth putting the money into developing them, let alone trying to sell them?

Abseiling...

So it's been a while since I've done any climbing. Well it's been about 2 weeks, which as far as I'm concerned is a more than long enough! My ankle is taking it's sweet time to heal and now there is an odd lump on the ankle bone itself (off to one side) and still painful bruising over my foot bones and my lower leg. I can't believe all this has come about from a simple trip. I've also been off work, which at first was fun and now I just want to get back so I have something to fill my day with.

Talking on filling my day, I went up to Stoke to help out with the SUMC abseil. I actually went up to hang out on a roof all day, drink tea and maybe do a little abseiling or rigging. What actually happened was that I ended up spending 8 hours dangling over the edge of mellor (the building) operating a safety rope with my friend Tim (he was the SPA). This wasn't exactly something I'd planned for but we made the best of it; drinking tea all afternoon and getting clients down safety. The highlight of my day (well there were 2) was that a couple of disabled people turned up. After a brief discussion downstairs well they made it to the roof (without wheelchairs) all kitted up and ready. It did mean that we had to close one of the lines so that one of us could abseil down next to them should anything happen, but nothing did. Everything went really well and one of the girl actually came up and did it again because she enjoyed it so much. All in all it was a pretty awesome day, and it didn't rain.

The night before I'd also been asked to put my sony vegas skills to the test and produce a short "trailer" type piece of promotional material  for the SUMC to play on a laptop at thier stall, hopefully in a effort to generate some enthusiasm. I kind of threw myself into it because it's the first time anyones actually asked me to put something together for them, rather then me just playing around and making climbing films for youtube. Here is a copy of the trailer:

a long interesting weekend...

I guess the best place to start with long and complicated stories is at the beginning, and in the beginning I woke up at 0700 on saturday monring, hurriedly packed my kit (throwing in my bivi bag for the first time in ages), jumped in the car (sans breakfast) and tanked my way up to stoke. I ended up waking Matt Snell and Ronnie up, but at least it meant I got a cup of tea. Eventually Matt, Stuart Ivory and I set off across the Peak to go to Curbar. It seemed like as good a place as any for a days climbing. Hell even the weather looked good.


We headed straight for Avalanche Wall (HVS 5a) for Snell to lead which he did. He'd actually commented on the walk in that he wanted to start on something easy and then work his way up. I don't think he'd led HVS before that day. He lead the route well, placing less protection that I'd have put in but I'm not critising him for that. At the end of the day he got up, so good job. I then went to lead Pea Pod, but someone was already on it. I say already on it when in reality he'd thrown his rope at the base of the route so no-one else could lead it, then decided to get on his gear (slowly) while making others wait. Instead I went and lead Maupassant (HVS 5a). When I compared this to Avalanche wall, I'd say it was much much easier, but what do I know. It's described on UKC as a thrutchy jamming crack but it's all actually on nice jams and good bridging. The final layback is awesome as well because it just doesn't look like it'll go, until you commit to it that it, then... boom! you're at the top!

So 2 routes down and we could see Toaf, Tim, Ronnie and the rest playing on the boulders below the main edges. Infact Tim came up too see how we where getting on and to head off for a short routes past avalanche wall. It was not Stu's lead, and his first on grit for a while. He picked L'Horla (E1 5b) part of three routes all together (the others being Maupassant and Insanity). I actually looked forward to having a crack at insanity afterwards because when stu got up that would have been 2 of the three done. Clearly a gaunlet if I ever saw one. #

But Stu didn't get up it. Infact we didn't do anymore climbing for the rest of that day, or that weekend. Stu was climbing well down on the Limestone and confidently jumped on L'horla with no apprehension what so ever. There was the usual discussing of rackage and laughing and joking below the route. Snell even took up the mantle of camera-man to film Stu's climbing. 

From the get go Stu was shaky. I'll appreciate that the small holds and lack of decent footholds didn't do much for an easy start but it was a while before a rest and his first piece of gear. Needless to say he carried on up, I would have. As he got higher ne managed to get another small wire in but when he move out left, the shorter runner pulled the wire into a different angle. I could hear some of the panic in Stu's voice. I'd heard that before with various partners when I've been climbing. I've also been in the same position myself. I was just waiting the exhausted yelp and then the slump onto the gear. 


But that top nut was crap, not worth waiting and Stu was panicing more now. I started talking him down the route, getting him the place some gear the only piece I could make out was a slot for a small yellow cam he had on his harness. He got that clipped but wouldn't come down instead making it up to the jug by the route. He was doing so well but I could see the effort was starting to take it's toll on him. Hanging from the jug he was scrabbling with his feet to get purchase, his left foot swinging helplessly beneath him. Then he was off.


I locked off the plate but it was no use. The gear didn't really do much when he fell. He just hit the fall, back first. He immediatly rolled over and groaned before trying to get up. I pinned him down and yelled to Snell to get Tim. I knew we needed more people to help with this. Deep down I knew that he'd done something bad to himself. So we covered him up, bivi bag and all. Removed most of his gear and kept him awake and talking. I felt his back, ribs, pelvis and legs  but there wasn't anything I could feel. There was no blood, but he didn't exactly get up and walk around after 10 minutes so we called MRT. By this time a very nice chap up was a surgeon or a urologist had come over and taken charge of his pulse. 


In the end it took about 2 hours from the fall, to get him choppered out. MRT turned up and gave him oxygen and morphine. Then as one massive team, (MRT, Stu's mate and anyone else who came to help) all carried the stretcher out and loaded it onto the waiting chopper. Me, Toaf and Ronnie spent the rest of the day at Northern General in Sheffield. In the end they said he'd fractured a vertebrae in his back. We got to bed at 0130 that night, after Ronnie cooked me pasta, veg and chinese prok chops. 

I guess it wasn't the best day out climbing ever, but it happens I guess. Even with the best will in the world sometimes bad stuff happens. Anyway my weekend of accidents wasn't over as monday night saw me in A&E for 6 hours after tripping up walking off the astroturf pitch after monday night football. I'm now on crutches, with a torn deltoid ligament. 


Paula at redpoint point just said "you're crap on the flat" apparently. 

Esoterica (the first)

Every time it I plan to go climbing in the peak district and it rains, my thoughts slip to bad places. A very certain bad place inparticular... The esoterica section in "On Peak Rock". See I've been meaning to try and tick all of these off since I read about them in the first place (I have a similar ambition with the "Rock Bits" section) but I haven't actually done anything about it. Well today was different as although it threatened rain, Rachel and I set off with a plan to climb Elbow Ridge and Matterhorn Ridge in Winnats Pass.

The day started off well, considering that the weather report said it was going to rain. As we drove past Ramshaw I pulled over and parked up. I can't remember who mentioned Louie's Groove (E1 5b) to me or when but the route has been eating away at the back of my mind for a while. What the hell I thought, I may as well just climb it. We still had loads of time to do the ridges and the chance of a grabbing an E point wasn't bad. We ran in and found the quite obvious groove and I geared up and set off. The first section was alright but once you placed your final pieces suddenly the meat of the route was there in front of you. I actually found it quite hard to work out what I had to do. Soon I was smearing and bridging (probably what the yanks referre to as "stemming"?) up the little groove to slape the top. This was my first E1 for quite a while and I still felt the psychological weight of the silly little "E". I guess I just need to keep climbing more!

Rachel quickly seconded this and we bugged out, running back to the car and heading off up the buxton road. When we arrived at Winnat's Pass we had a good look a the ridges and cliffs (and caves high up) on the sides of the pass. Sadly we had to pay for parking at the base of the valley and this wouldn't have been a problem... expect for the complete lack of change. It's funny how something little can mess you up like that. That was probably the turning point in the day as we either needed free parking, change or an new objective. For those who have read the esoterica section you'll know that there is another such objective, with free parking, not far away...

I pulled the car into the little parking space near the gate that shut off the old Mam Tor road. Mam Tor has to be one of the coolest places in the peak district, mainly because it looks like it's been hit by a hollywood earthquake! Our new objective for the day was now Mam Tor Gully, graded "ungradable" and gived a little skull and cross bones symbol in the guidebook. After reading the National Trust rules and regulations that had been taped to the back of a sign we wandered off path leaving our gear in the car to go for a little recon mission. We got pretty close and Rach fancied just carrying on and trying to get to the top without our gear but I wasn't having any of it. My fear of loose rock extended to my head mostly and there was no way in hell I was setting foot in that gully with out my helmet at least.

After a quick trip back to the car we were off again, this time actually carrying some gear but also worried that it might rain while we were on route. Running (well walking quickly) we got to the base of the gully (around grade 1, in winter!) and put on helmets and harnesses. I also fed the rope into my bag so that it'd be ready for use. Rachel opted to climb first, stating that if I pulled a load of stuff down and fell off I'd probably take her out in the process but if she fell off first, I could probably grab her. It sucks being the heavier one sometimes. 


We plodded up and up and the climbing gradually turned from bumbling up and very loose scree slope to actually having the climb (of a sort). I pulled into the main gully, when Rach called for the rope and I looked around for something to belay off. Ha! I must have been joking. Maybe if I'd thought to pack a warthog and a peg hammer I might have had something resembling a safe belay but as it happened good old hope and will power would have to do. I sent the rope down and she hurriedly clipped in and I started waist belayin. My belay literally consisted of my feet braced on some crumbling shale. Being honest, I was quite scared.


When Rachel arrived at my "belay" I had her stand on a ledge off to one side. This ledge was still crumbling away, like most of the stuff we where on but it was at least crumbling significanlty slower than the rest. Both slightly paniced but trying to retain some composed I assured her it would be alright as I flaked the rope into a neat pile at her feet. I then set off trailing rope from my pack but the final section. I didn't dare head up the gully direct as the fridge sized blocks above us looked like they'd squish Rach if I was dumb enough to disturb them. Instead I skirted around them and up the grass, clinged to great clumps of it as handholds and my footholds crumbled away beneath me. Scrambling desperatly I mae it too the top and shouted I was "safe!". Was I really safe? no. Instead I found the best braced stance I could and yelled for Rach to climb when she was ready.


Rach headed straight up the gully and tackled said loose blocks carefully climbing and trying not to dislodge them in the process. I though I was going to be in alot of trouble for suggesting this as a route but she arrived at the top almost shaking with fear but smiling broadly. She'd loved it. I voted we rest on the tope for a while before packing up the gear and descending back down to the car. 


Not a bad route route for a consolation prize!

Wings of Unreason (finally)

Last year I had a crack at Wings of Unreason at the Roaches Skyline. For those who don't know this semi iconic skyline route it takes the middle of a short slab far up on the skyline. It's called "wings..." in reference to the final moves than need to be done to complete the route, a total psychological crux headgame. It's truely an awesome route.

Last year I jumped on wings with Rach belaying. It was a miserable day and ultimately ended in failure because by the time I'd decided that I wasn't going to do the final move, the weather was turning and Rachel was getting very cold belaying. On re-treating I tried not to weight my gear but that wasn't going to happen so I semi-climbed/fell down the route. 

I think I should mention the final move. There are 3 little holes in the middle of the face, or pods as it were. One takes your gear and you have to mantle into them and then position yourself for the final move. The gear it literally at the level of your feet and you then need to make a dynamic move to slap for a glorious jug. When I reach up I'm only 5/6 inches short, but at that moment that distance seems like a million miles away. Everytime I stared up at it it was like watching the hitchcock zoom.

This time it was different. Summer is over and autumn seems to have taken hold with a rapid efficiency. Every morning I've gone downstairs to go to work the wind has been blustering through the trees, whipping leaves and little along the pavement. There's a distinct chill in the air and Rachel actually put the heating on the other day. I can feel winter coming in the air, as it slowly closes it's grip on the world. I can't wait for the first frost, the first snow. And climbing during this autumnal period it my favourite time of the year. My lightweight summer climbing fleece have been removed from it's hollow at the base of my pack to be prplaced with my winter belay jacket, warm leather gloves and a hat (or two). My flask has been cleaned and my hot food carried made ready. I love climbing at this time of year.

And so it happened, we had a slow start to the day, eventually a bunch of us had mobilised and headed up to skyline, some wanting to have a go at Prelude to Space (solo) and some just wanting to be out. I wanted to try wings. 

We'd set up beneath the slab with Toaf's new massive eldride pad as Ronnie soloed Prelude to Space. I then geared up as best I could and went through all the little rituals of starting a hard climb; tying in my chalk bag (even though it's virtually empty and it's a freezing dry day), pulling on my tight shoes and lacing them, selecting the small amount of rack that I'll need, tying in to the lead line, cleaning my shoes with a little spit till the rubber is sticky and finally chalking up my hands. I couldn't really put it off any longer. 


I actually asked Toaf not to bother belaying me till I'd got some gear in, but mainly because I expected to blow the first set of moves (the technical crux) but this time I didn't. I still thought I was going to even as I grasped the hold I was reaching for with my finger tips and felt my foot stick to the small hold as I rocked over. I gave up trying to fiddle a piece of gear in here, instead relying on not falling off and the massive pad beneath me. On gaining the pockets I plugged in a cam (a red dragon cam if anyones bothered). I tried to fit one in next to it but I didn't have the right size and Toaf lobbed my up another size 2. It was all going so well.


I remembered the move to gain the pocket, and my final decent footholds but it required me to take out one of the cams (eek!). I didn't really have a choice so I removed the one, rocked into the pocket and then replaced it blindly so it stuck out at an odd angle. It didn't really matter as there wasn't any retreating from the move now anyway. Then I hit a wall. Not a physical wall (obviously) but a massive mental wall in my mind. I scanned the wall infront of me, running my fingers over everything, every ripple, every change in slabs angle, every bit of grit with slightly more friction than the one next to it. I was trying to find that good hold that didn't exist or that little crimp that I'd missed before. Christ I was so close. It was literally inches to the final hold but it may as well have been miles. 


I must have gone on like this for ages. I don't know how much time had passed but I know it threatened to rain at least once and I got offered rescue at least once too. I also tried to retreat and reverse the last move, but when I couldn't I knew I'd have to just do it.


In the end I just did it. I don't know how I managed to convince my brain to do it but it just worked. I think I probably closed my eyes when I did it too but within seconds I was pulling up over the top and rolling onto my back to stare at the sky. It was over, all over.

Grooved Arete... (again!)

I went away with Mr Holloway jr.. This is Chris's little brother who's been at Worcester uni doing a a course on outdoor ed and who's been climbing loads over the past couple of years. I've climbed with him before once and he impressed me so we ended up on a weekend away to wales. We had good weather on the saturday so we headed up Tryfan to go Grooved Arete, a route which Simon had wanted to do for ages. Then on the sunday we took advantage of sleeping in the pass to climb Skylon and Wrinkle, before the afternoon weather hit and we got soaked on the walk out. Not a bad weekend as far as I'm concerned.

Quartz Staircase...

A couple of months ago I gave a 2 friends and climbing partners a very quick intro into dealing with loose rock. We climbed a route that had a massive loose flake on it but along as you pulled down it wasn't a problem. It scared them both half to death (the flake was a man-squisher) but it also taught them both a valuable lesson. Loose rock is a part of climbing. Yes I know a lot of people might never encounter loose rock climbing (especially if they spend their time climbing at nice neat little gritstone edges 10 minutes from the road) but if you climb on mountain routes, limestone, sea cliffs or in winter (or on the Lleyn Peninsular) then you'll be bound to encounter something loose once in a while.

My climbing over the last year seems to have had an awful lot of loose rock in it, and there's been many moments when I've been praying not that I won't blow the move, more that the hold won't blow off.

So with all this in mind Me and Rach, on a short trip to wales and in an effort to find some good weather, found in Pete's Eat's new routes book "the best diff ever". It was on a sea-cliff at Rhoscolyn and therefore we couldn't not do it.

 

The weather was awesome when we arrived at Rhoscolyn, sunny, dry and with a strong onshore breeze. What made it even better was that when we looked back towards land the mountains were shrouded in cloud and rain. We walked in quickly and then found out that getting to the base of the route would probably be the crux. The onshore wind was providing a great swell that stopped an clambering in and sea-level traversing to the base of the route. Instead much wandering along the top of the crag led me to find a nice slab that allowed us to abseil in. 

The route itself was quite clear (both from the top and base of the crag) but what my view from the top didn't tell me was quite how steep it was. The angle of the line was awkward to say the least. That didn't stop us and I set of anyway. The route itself was pretty good going. Like most lower grade routes (Diff and VD) there wasn't actually that much gear compared to the nature of the route. It's also a second ascent on a sea-cliff and you'll know what that means... loose rock. This will be an awesome route when it's been done about 10/15 times. It'll go really well with Bagger's and Symphony Crack that are in the same area but at the moment it's a little chossy. Having said that the route was still awesome with a definite crux at the top (pulling up on a loose block). Both me and Rach removed as much loose crap as we could within the realms of "cleaning" rather than just destroying the route.

I don't know about best diff ever, but this one is defiantly going to be hard to beat at the grade!

No update over the summer...

Today was the first day back to work and also possibly the first time I've seen 0700 for a long while. To be honest it was awesome. I had toast and a cup of tea and didn't get caught in the cross city traffic. It also smelled like autumn when I got outside. Today was a good day.

Don't worry, this post isn't going to degenerate what suddenly went badly wrong during my day. Infact my day went pretty well so far. Being back at work (even if I currently have very little to do) has been nice and it's already making me appreciate being at home. This was more of an apology to anyone who does read my blog to the lack of posting in the last 6 weeks. I have been writing honestly, but I've not been posting. I've not been out climbing as much as I normally do, due to lack of partners, bad weather and a finger injury but that hasn't stopped some awesome routes being done. 

The last things that I posted over the summer (to do with climbing) was about my finger, which I managed to royally screw up. I ended up at the docters and poked, prodded and bent the finger around and confirmed my suspicions that I'd damaged my pully tendons. Infact I've managed to damage A2, A3 & A4 but it's not the end of the world. Dave Macloeds blog is pretty good for finger injuries and if you follow what he written then you'll be ok, but the main thing is stay off your finger at least for the first few weeks. It needs time to heal up and for the swelling to go down. 

Then when you get back to climbing, be gentle with it. Instead of jumping on the bouldering wall and trying to crank on those powerful moves drop your grade and run laps on easier routes. It's been 8 weeks since I damaged my finger and I still suffer alot bouldering even if it's taped up well. So instead of bad sessions bouldering I just climb routes at my local wall and train for stamina instead (much better off for a trad climber anyway). I've also changed how I use my hand to grip holds. I might seem silly but a little thing like using an open hand crimp instead of a closed one, takes alot of strain off your fingers and very quickly becomes as strong as a closed crimp. Take your time with it and you'll get there eventually!