Cold Fusion Blog

Sunday 25th May. Last weeks spanking at Malham finally got me motivated back into my old biweekly training regime. After two sessions finger boarding, circuits and stamina work I knew where I stood. It seemed a few more weeks improvement are needed to restore PE and stamina to the levels of last September. At least I was starting to develop a proper pump again instead of just flailing off after two laps. After getting really close to completing Full Tilt F8b at Kilnsey last September (2nd last move) I’ve been waiting patiently to return. Free of expectation I headed back to Kilnsey again with Owen and Nick to commence summer battle.

A dry and windy Kilnsey.

We found Kilnsey bone dry on arrival, more so than I’ve ever seen it. Conditions felt great in the strong wind, at the detriment of keeping warm and staying attached to the rock! After getting uncomfortably pumped on a couple of dirty mid 6’s I got my rope back on Full Tilt. Putting the clips up the moves felt good. I made another attempt at getting Alan and Malc’s knee bar to work but it didn’t feel effective. I opted for my old method with knee pad again. Later I pulled the rope for a redpoint. Everything felt good up to the mid way crux before I found myself pumping out. Linking to the top I was again stopped by bad endurance.

Feeling the send was off for the day I continued up True North. Last year I couldn’t do the first crux after the FT belay. This time my fingers felt stronger and I was chuft to link the moves through from the FT belay into the next rest at Font 7a+. Continuing I was blocked by a nest and a broken hold leaving the route for 6′2 members only! I had seen a hold in the grass with some glue on it earlier thinking unlucky to whoever is trying that route! There looked like some loose rock higher up on the left that might be glued together to make some holds. The move still might go dynamically. Either way extreme difficulty this high on the route probably warrants an upgrade to F8c+.

I persisted on the final moves and linked the sequence through to the final jug. The numbers for the route when back in action look F8b for FT, then F8a+/b to the top. After the FT (30 moves) its straight into a Font 7a+ boulder problem, then a good-ish rest (35 moves) off the left hand two finger and right hand pinch. Pushing on its a big reach for a flat hold and undercut cluster and then a big reach/slap to the good hold on the lip (42 moves). A final slap or crimpy cross through leads to the jug (50 moves). From here there’s the final push into the groove of Urgent Action (F6c) (80 moves) to finish. Awesome!

I had a final redpoint on FT but hit the same PE limit at third height. After watching Nick I adjusted some of my sequence which felt better. Linking out of the jug I had a swing at the next crux and got half way through! Keeping my feet low worked very well to get the first hold, but I found the left foot barn door hard to hold for the next move. It looks like I’ll be trying the high left foot next time.

Its been another exhausting weeks training and driving for eight hours respectively for two redpoints. I still feel psyched to complete Full Tilt. After that the plan is to try True North (if its fixed or another F8c) on the cooler days and some of the other routes on North Buttress. I’m psyched for the PE training this week to start crimping out some progress.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 26th, 2008 at 2:01 pm and is filed under Sport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.