Cold Fusion Blog

Tuesday 10th June. After taking a day off work I was hoping to feel psyched to train to get Full Tilt done but it never happened. A combination of heat, humidity, deteriorating shoes and diminishing returns ended a couple of sessions before they’d properly begun. Still on Tuesday morning I felt psyched leaving the house for Kilnsey with Michael, like a proper full timer. On arrival at Kilnsey it was feeling warm with the crag just out of the sun. I ended up hanging back until 5pm before I started warming while Michael tried other things.

In the evening the wind picked up and the route began to feel sticker as I’d hoped. After a quick bolt to bolt I went for a redpoint. After so much time on the route I’d definitely found my pace sprinting between brief stops. Pulling through on the crux everything felt positive with plenty to spare before taking the kneebar rest. Pulling out I’d never felt as fresh into the crux. Slapping at the sloper finger tips stuck, just, requiring a final udge home. Confident this was it I went to pull through only to hit the wilt of doom before hitting the final jug. So close… On the next redpoint I got wrong handed on the final clip and wasted vital seconds getting back into sequence. It cost me that go. The next redpoint ended in the same place. With another training day before a return weekend visit I was confident I’d finish the job.

Saturday 14 – Sunday 15th June. Thursdays training at 11.30pm just didn’t happen. I waited too long for conditions to improve and feel asleep again. I’m really starting to feel a drop in PE and stamina from these missing training sessions that will cost me redpoints on the crag. Keen to resolve the problem and get my training back under control I went ahead and bought an AC unit off ebay. Hopefully this will help improve matters.

It was back to Kilnsey again for the weekend this time with Niall. Conditions felt brilliant with an October like air temperature. Skipping his usual neck straining warm up Niall cracked on and bagged Full Tilt and Urgent action after a quick dog up both routes. Inspired I got redpointing but just couldn’t stick that last move after two redpoints. The tape over a flapper from Tuesday was slipping each time making it a two rather than three finger move. I took myself off for a walk to reflect on what action to take, to have another go or rest for two attempts the next day. By the time I was back at the crag I still hadn’t decided. In the end I though one more try and I’d be too tired to try the next day, a good way of escaping the pressure.

After the now usual time stalling chat at the base of the crag I pulled on and began. Moving through the crux I felt tired but held it. Moving onto the jugs arms felt pumped. Annoyed I cursed my lack of fitness that how the f&*k I was ever going to climb this dam route when I was always so unfit. Wobbling to the final clip and into the knee bar I felt like I’d climbed 30m rather than 10m. With arms and legs burning I looked at the draw and wanted to grab it. My glassed scraped some grit into my eye and it seemed as good an excuse as any. But I held on. The press right had felt easier. I stabbed and twisted my greasy taped finger into the hold, got setup for the throw and stuck it square on. Wasting no time I pulled through to stare at the final hold thinking failure but fingers slotted in perfectly and I was finally done. I revelled briefly in the success I wait so long to achieve. It felt good!

We finished the day by eating pasta and noodles under the crag and drinking red wine (Niall was well prepared) before taking ourself’s off to the pub for that long awaited redpoint beer.

On Sunday Niall dispatched Grooved Arete and Subculture quickly style before final declaring he was knackered. Meanwhile I had a dog up True North again to asses how much training needed to be done.

The last few days on Full Tilt have been an interesting journey. Its nice to complete routes feeling trained up and fresh. This is when they should go but more than often don’t. Normally as tiredness kicks in a bigger push of determination does the job. By this time technique is refined and muscle capillaries are fully dilated. Every once in a while the subconscious comes into play to carrying a drained body and battered psyche past the finishing line. Like a magic trick the one last go when climbing contains the true prestige. I’d rather be climbing my routes as of the first instance, but its the last that seems to draw me to climbing the most: what can be achieved by pushing through the grey area between success and failure.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 17th, 2008 at 1:47 am and is filed under Sport, Motivation. 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.