2016

Holy cow its been a long time since i've blogged, not that anyone actually reads these things, but I actually miss it. Climbing is in a weird place for me right now, somewhere between confidence and doubt, feeling strong and feeling fat, feeling injured and feeling healthy... I'm too deep into analyzing the facts to get an accurate reading on how my body is doing. I climbed a new number this year, but it doesn't feel like it, I don't know why that it, maybe because the sends came randomly, or because the boulders aren't actually hard, I do not know. I feel like I climb my best when I can work on something alone because I don't judge my performance based on others, but also I can't be too impressed or satisfied by my own performance because I might just be climbing v8 and thinking i'm cruxing out on v12.

The only real sign of my strength was doing pressure drop, a dumpy v10 that always felt super hard for me. I did that one and actually felt a tangible difference on the holds. So that was good. However it was my 63rd double digit boulder problem so maybe it should have just felt easy to begin with.. I'm not sure.

44 Flies on Leashes v10 FA Charlemont. 

Anyways, i've actually had a lot of fun not chasing grades this season. We developed a pretty cool mini area in Charlemont, which is really cool, as of right now there are three v10s, three v9's, three v8s, four v7s and a couple dozen easier climbs. Its rare to find boulders with several hard problems on each side, so we definitely lucked out a bit. More importantly, the rock quality on some of the problems is absolutely immaculate, in my opinion the best rock at charlemont is just about as good as the best great barrington gneiss. As to why rooftopia is blowing up and not this zone is beyond me, but there are vague directions on mountain project, so check it out if you're in the area.

Cloud Wisperer v9 FA

I've also spent a bit of time around great barrington checking out old projects, and trying to look at established boulders with fresh eyes. So far i've done the FAs of Rail Tale v8, Delicate Thug sit v9, Evil Boy v9, The Cloud Wisperer v9 and Lightbringer v10. Its hard to not be biased, but I think The Cloud Wisperer is in my top three favorite climbs of the grade i've ever done, due to perfect rock quality, good landing, interesting moves, highball top out, etc..

I also put a hard thug-style boulder at Farley called "Judgement, Gossip, Ethics" which had been done from higher by others using a manufactured hold, I didnt really know people chipped boulders that are clearly possible in 2016... that aside, my boulder climbs from a sds and refuses to use that hold.

Delicate Thug Sit v9 starts sitting under the overhang. Swirly Gneiss

 Maybe someday the glue will break
and the hold will fall off and it wont
 be "contrived." Despite that its
actually a really nice, progressive
 compression bloc with a good mix
 of precision and burl.

Now its really summer again and i'm trying to figure out the best way to get fit before colorado in a month, so I came here to read my old blogs on breathing and trying hard in hopes of learned something from my past self. Hopefully i'll make blogging a habit again.

-Kai