More Yorkshire biking

Last Saturday I went biking with Nicky on a lovely loop from Clapham (a village off the A65). It was classic dales riding with stoney tracks and some great views. Blue skies and a pint of Golden Pippin made for a great afternoon's ride.



Unfortunately my brakes needed some attention as by the end the front brake lever would pull to the bars without any contact between the pads and disc. I spent a couple of hours on Monday afternoon with syringes full of brake fluid getting them bled properly so they felt solid again. Even with a new sequence meaning each end only took one go it still took twice as long to bleed 2 disc brakes as it took me to change the oil, oil filter, air filter and diesel filter on my car that evening.

After a hot and greasy couple of hours bouldering at Snowden Crag last night with Matt I thought it really was too hot for climbing so decided to go out on my bike today. I started in a lay-by off the B6160 near Bolton Abbey, rode down the road into Addingham, then out up a minor road and then off-road towards Skipton.



I planned to avoid the busy B6265 to Rylstone by going over Sharp Haw and up some quieter back roads, which meant all the height lost descending into Skipton (which was great - rocky and rooty) had to be regained before going over Sharp Haw.



It looked much worse than it was.



The bridleway doesn't go to the top of Sharp Haw but for some reason the track I followed did. The view across to Rylstone (the next climb) was great.



The descent to Flasby was good and not too boggy and the roads to Rylstone were quiet - the few minutes along the B6265 confirmed that avoiding it was a good plan!

The climb up onto Barden moor wasn't as bad as it looked and was all ridable (apart from when I had to push past some sheep who kept zig-zagging in front of where I was trying to ride).



Then it was (sort of all) downhill to Halton Height with views back to Rylstone



and across to Simon's seat.



A bit of invisible bridleway meant it took a bit longer to find the gate (that was unlocked and didn't have PRIVATE signs on) into the woods above Bolton Abbey than it should have but I was soon back to the road.



A quick spin down to return to my car 4 1/2 hours after I left. I got back to Burley just as it started pissing it down which seemed like great timing until I remembered I had to wash my bike. A meal and a couple of pints in a pub in Otley finished off the day.

Back in the saddle

I've not posted for a while mainly because I've been busy reading papers and looking for jobs. Last week I went to the Depot for a proper power-endurance training session (with a stopwatch and everything) which left me broken for days. I've also been out running a few times with Nicky.

In preparation for Chad's stag do this weekend which is going to involve biking, I decided to go out on my bike. Stage one was to replace the sealant in the tyres which was pretty hassle free - the tyres re-inflated 1st go and they didn't lose air overnight. Today I biked around some of where me and Nicky ran on Sunday on Middleton moor. Some of this is possibly a bit cheeky but I met a few walkers and they were all pretty friendly - even holding open a gate for me on one of the climbs.

It was pretty windy so uphills with a head wind were even harder than when running on the weekend but the stony descents were much better on the bike. When I came back I couldn't remember why I don't go biking so often but after all the post-ride cleaning faff I could! Running is just so much less hassle...

Here's a couple of pictures:



Obligatory bike leaning against stone shot



Quality singletrack on the moor

Power is nothing without endurance?!

Since coming back from Fontainebleau I've not been out much mainly because my middle left-hand finger was feeling pretty sore after pulling hard on the starting pocket of Carnage. I went up to Fairies Chest and did Pixie Tits from standing - which has a pretty scary mantle above a crap landing (even with the 2 pads I'd lugged up there) but the hot weather and sore finger meant I couldn't manage the sit start. The next day I had a sociable evening at Caley with Matt, Johnny and Dom but didn't do anything hard and Matt missed the pads falling off the top of the Pinch and hurt his foot which looked very nasty.

Escaping the Royal Wedding I went to Guisecliff armed with my copy of the new Yorkshire (moorland and esoterica) Gritstone Bouldering guide. This was great as it's easier to identify where all the boulders are in relation to each other than it was from a handful of printouts from yorkshiregrit.com. It started to rain when I got there and was a bit humid but I had a few goes on Pok-a-Tok and went up to Trust - which looked great but I wasn't sure how to pull on.

I was at Matt's for his birthday BBQ on Wed that week and had drunkenly agreed it might be time to go sport climbing. Matt txted me on sunday to make sure I had remembered and so we headed to Troller's Gill on Monday afternoon. For the last few years I've only been bouldering so it's almost 4 years since I actually tried to climb anything hard on a rope and since then I've got a lot stronger but have no stamina at all. I thought it would be a bit of a depressing experience and I was right. After Matt put the clips in the Jim Grin (7a/+) by pulling on the draws and resting on every bolt I had a go on top rope. Predictably up to about 3 bolts I was thinking "this is piss all the holds are huge" then I got pumped and suddenly I couldn't pull on anything. I managed to do all the moves with a lot of rests but didn't really recover even after I was on the ground for a while. I did go up it again on top rope (again with several rests) but wasn't feeling recovered at all. The next day I felt totally broken in a completely different way to how I feel after a hard bouldering session.

I guess that I need to work on my power-endurance (I've never been very inspired by long stamina routes and most UK sport is short and cruxy) or go climbing at the right hand end of Raven Tor if I want to improve my sport climbing grade. Unfortunately training power by working lots of hard boulder problems is fun but training power endurance means pain! I knew this would be the case as I've been bouldering several times when women who've done 8b were trying the same problem and it's obvious a) that they aren't very powerful but b) they can apply the same amount of power every single go for many more attempts than I could - which clearly illustrates you don't have to be able to pull *that* hard to climb power-endurance 8s...

In an attempt to get a bit more volume to my climbing I went up to High Crag on Ilkey Moor and ticked 3 3s, a 4, a 5, 3 5+s a 6A and a 6B+ in about an hour but then got sucked into the "classic of the crag" a 7A+ on slopers which felt desperate in the heat (and I think I might have been eliminating an undercut that is allowed). I tried to focus on doing easy problems with the minimum amount of effort which was hard on some of the dirty top-outs!

Yesterday I went back to Guisecliff armed with video beta but the undercut needed for Pok-a-Tok was filthy and I didn't have a proper brush to clean it. I went up to Trust and tried pulling on with the high foot method I'd seen in a video on UKB but this was so contorted that I needed to bounce off my left foot to get it off the pad. I then tried rocking up off a lower left foot hold without "french starting" off the pad. Eventually I could do this and hold the side pull and 3 goes later (including an exciting out of control fall bouncing off the edge of the pads and tumbling down the slope) I'd done it. This gets 7B but it's a bit odd as I found getting off the ground without bouncing off the pad is the hardest bit. If there was one good foothold just a couple of inches above the ground to start on it'd be a lot easier. Certainly if you were tall enough to pull on 1 move higher (which I could do off 2 stacked pads) it'd be a gift for 7B (Matt are you reading this?!)

Here's a picture anyway

Sept B plus dans la Forêt

Just back from a quick trip to Font via Kyloe In and Edinburgh. Conditions were pretty hot and sweaty for a lot of the visit. I surprised Chad and Humble by getting up early on two days to find good conditions for crimping hard but unfortunately even with spotting/encouragement from Humble dragged out of bed at 8am for the second session I failed to keep my feet in contact with the rock on what should have been "the go" on Rubis sur l'ongle. It's a stunning line and I will definitely go back for it.

The day before that after a leisurely extended warm-up at Rocher Canon and some scary falls off Rêve de Pierre (thanks for catching me when I totally missed the pads Chad!) we headed to Cuvier. It was the quietest I've ever seen it and conditions felt perfect. I watched someone having a few goes on the sitter to Carnage and when he got it done and left there was no-one under that wall at all (anyone that's been to Cuvier will realise how rare that is). I moved the pads over and some other people also came over for a go. I started like they were - pulling on with the hold to the right (on la Bérézina?) but although I was easily making the distance to the crimp I wasn't hitting it properly. I was surprised by how good a hold it obviously was - well I suppose if you're going to chip a crimp you might as well make it a good one....

I then tried a couple of times with the jump start method and on the first time I held the crimp I moved my feet up and pulled though to the first sloper which was a whole lot better than I expected so pulled my feet up and went for the next hold which also felt huge. My feet cut loose and after a vague attempt at putting them back on I just campused up to the boss, matched it and reached up to the incut finishing holds hardly believing I'd just done one of the most famous 7B+ problems in Font in about 10 goes.

Unfortunately my crack spotting team were busy climbing elsewhere (although Chad did see me top out) so there's only this picture from Chad of one of the earlier attempts to illustrate the moment...



Really pleased with this because although I've climbed a few 7B+s in Yorkshire, I've never done one so quickly (i.e in a session) and to do it in the forest was an unexpected bonus.

all gone a bit quiet

Just realised I've not posted on here for a while. This is because instead of doing much climbing I have been mostly writing/editing a paper.

But it's been submitted now so I guess I should say what else I've been up to. Caley early morning raid (too warm at 9 am is not a good sign). Thought I'd done some random 7B prow at the Chevin but it felt like I hadn't really finished it (I knew it doesn't top out) and it does finish one (tricky) move higher. Lost a lot of skin slapping for sharp holds. Brimham (not so) secret venue trying undoubtably one of the best 7Cs on grit but nails for those without a big wing-span.

That's about it really.

Birthday at Earl Crag

I've been out a couple of times since I last posted. On Friday once the mist had cleared I headed up to Caley. It was damper than I hoped but I got most of the moves done on Ju Ju Club depsite the slopers at the top being greasy and damp. I'd forgotten how much this problem trashes my skin and elbows though. On Saturday I went over to Rochdale to go out for Thai with some of my friends and on Sunday I got a tour of the classic problems at Hobson Moor quarry from Jo and Ben. Some of these were very crimpy and felt pretty hard in the sunshine!

Today it's my birthday so I headed to Earl. After the usual warm-up I wandered over to look at Superfly, but the monos were hurting my finger and the ledge you top out on looked very green. I then spent the rest of the afternoon falling off various combinations of holds on Lager, Lager, Lager/Dave's groove. I need to decide on a sequence as at the moment I can either go with my right up to the sloper and then fall off bringing my left into the groove or cross through to the good bit of the bottom of the groove and then fail to hang the sloper with my right. It's a brilliant problem so I'm keen to get it done before it gets too hot.

Sunny Widdop

I was going to go to Earl today but as I got to Cowling I decided to carry on and head to Widdop. It's always dangerous driving for an hour to go to a crag where there is only one problem you want to do but today was especially so as my car exhaust is blowing and I discovered the boy-racer loud roars were accompanied by exhaust fumes coming into the car. Sunroof and windows open seemed to stop me feeling too light headed though!

I got to Widdop and conditions were perfect, sunny but with a breeze to keep the temperatures down.



Fight on the Black both had chalk on and was still in the shade. After a few easy problems to warm up I pulled on. First go I held the break and put my hand up to match. This wasn't as greasy as last time but still didn't feel great so I dropped my hand back down and moved my foot up. As I rocked onto my right foot I realised the next hold was a bit further away than I thought and so I only just got my finger-tips onto it. Fighting the panic that I was going to blow it I bumped my hand up shedding lots of skin and an exciting top-out later it was dispatched. No self timer glory shots I'm afraid - just this arty pic of the starting hand-hold.



I then wasn't sure what to do but the sunny boulders on the opposite side of the valley looked lovely so I slogged up there with 2 pads. I did a couple of nice roof problems, wandered along to look at Last Boy Scout which looks great but is pretty high with a not-great landing - definitely not a good place to fall off on your own! I staggered further to Boggy's Roof which looked good but hard and then saw Dove Stones in the distance. This was too appealing to ignore as there's an amazing picture of this 7A overhanging prow in the new bouldering guide.

10 minutes of bog trotting later I was regretting not having spare shoes and socks in the car and a bit later I got to the crag. The prow, Pro Diablo, was as amazing as it looked with big moves between large edges. After working out a crafty heelhook I quickly got it done and then all that was left was the long slog through the tussocks and heather back to the car.