Quest for Pump

I tried to find the PUMP climbing wall in Akabane, Tokyo. Unfortunately I chose the wrong direction out of the station and we saw lots of residential Akabane instead. It was interesting. Many vending machines later we found the bridge across the river. The climbing wall was just the other side on my little map.

It turned out to be a very big bridge across a hugely wide river. Oh for a bit of scale on the map/leaving the station at an exit with a location board. Doh. We had to leave the climbing and return to Kazo for the technical meeting.

Nikko, Japan

I managed to fairly easily navigate my way into Tokyo and out the other side to visit Nikko. A tourist town with temples, shrines, a pagoda and a whole lot of stunning scenery and wildlife.

Glad I didn't meet any of these in the flesh


An elaborate drinking fountain.

More guards

Lots of bright shiny gold gateways

And intricate gateways

Carvings of a dragon

A shrine at the top of a hill, after lots and lots of steps.... I've still no idea what anything says

Five storey pagoda

Unfortunately we ran out of time to see the lakes and the wild monkeys. I wanted to see the monkeys... I could hear them. I was hoping to learn some new techniques ready for the comp!

:-)

Alter Rock

I recovered slowly from CWIF to have a good session on Wednesday. I did some routes on Friday night - getting pumped/improving my power endurance whilst trying to find a leading head ready for Skymasters. A big session for me.

Refuelling after routing, last thing on Friday, I bumped into Rob Napier who had been setting a comp at Alter Rock in Derby. I didn't know about the comp previously, but looked it up on t'internet and was there the next morning bright and early (well, 10am). 20 blocs and 4 leads/4 top ropes depending on your ability.

The comp was great. Well supported by sponsors, well set up, food and good prizes (including Rab jackets, Orange house weekend, DMM kit, Evolve/Merrell shoes), but unfortunately not much competition. The event was well attended by lots of strong youths. However there were only 3 adults - 2 men and myself. We teamed up for the leading. A truly sociable day out.

I got all but 2 blocs. One of the ones I dropped was a £50 prize bloc which I was close to getting and should have got, grr. Thank you for a good day out climbing.

CWIF

Just over a week before CWIF I was feeling really good. Ready for the marathon bouldering day. Then the lurgy hit yet again. I cannot believe the number of bad colds I've had this winter. This one took me out for the week. I folded in half coughing if I tried to do anything. It had to be man flu!

By the end of the week, I was just coughing periodically and I could breath, so figured I was well enough to do the CWIF. I had a short session at the Foundry on the Friday night just to get moving again.

The qualifiers (cough) went (cough) well. I qualified 7th behind Mina, Leah, 2 French and 2 Dutch. I hadn't climbed tactically. I wanted to use the comp to climb all blocs as well as possible rather than just try and qualify.

The semis - arghhhhh. I hit the proverbial wall. I had nothing left. The few holds I got to felt good enough, the moves mostly looked like ones I should be able to do, but my arms were not responding to my head. I was so disappointed. And the blocs looked great.

Thankfully the rest of the team powered on through with Leah and Mina coming 2nd and 3rd. An awesome effort by all.

Seaside and TCA Bristol

I had a lovely weekend in Torquay with Pete and the 'in-laws'. Fresh sea air, some sunshine and good food.

We went to The Climbing Academy a new bouldering wall in Bristol for training. Lots of fun blocs, colour coded into circuits. We had a warm welcome - friendly staff and locals, and underfloor heating.

Absolutely no need for my leg warmers.

I tried several of the blocs on the hardest circuit. Quite a range of grades from easy flashes to long, hard thuggy ones that I couldn't quite get. Can't comment on grades as I'm naff at that. A good variety of styles. I decided to do several of the blocs with 'bunch of grape' style sloper holds and enjoyed swinging across the long roof.

SWBL

I had a good Friday night league comp at the works coming 2nd on the night. This placed me 2nd in the SWBL and 4th in the works league having missed a round. I got furthest up the Percy's special women's problem, but didn't top it so no £50 spot prize :-(

A team training weekend at the Awesome Wall Stockport followed. We did super hard problems on the Saturday and had a mock comp on the Sunday. The Earl set some fun blocs to break ourselves on. I won the semi and the final. I'm nicely tired and achy now :-))

Has anyone got any spare fingertips?

Foundry League

It was the last round of the Foundry League last night. Another set of cracking blocs. Simon said that everyone left with a smile on their face.

The results are out already. I won :-)

The Foundry has a blog where they are posting info, results etc. This includes the SWBL for which the last round is on the 13th Feb at the works.