Tuesday, December 10, 2013

So Long, Good Season

Its over. Haven't climbed in like a week! Snow falls almost everyday now, and it's hard to get sendable conditions. I don't think climbers have an accurate conception of time during the fall season, because it's always gone too soon. Today I finally hung up a hang board and did the first non-climbing work out in 2 months.. Yuk.

So I did manage to do some work around the SWPA region since i've been here. Basically the first day after I moved in I sent my project for the fall, Giant Slalom a v10 at a secretz area put up by Matt Bosley like 10 years ago. As far as we know it's the second ascent. I got it on video, and a shit ton of other stuff. Some other notable sends for me this fall were Shadows in the Eye v9, Big Long Dickens v9, Pray like a Mantis v9, and Enterprise v8. Oh yea, the crazy apes went on a quick trip to Chatt town and I was psyched to put a couple things down without having any real goals - Pray like a Mantis at Zahnd went down second go, I barely missed the flash with a heel slip at the very last move. Felt very good. Got on alot of stuff that was probably too hard for me, but that is just project prepping for the next trip which will be over new years.

Other than that just been chillin. Showing people around SWPA is always fun, and lately there has been alot of strong and motivated climbers swinging through. The conception of what's here is going up, along with the standard of difficulty. I'm predicting now that Pittsburgh will be considered the next Chattanooga, and Chattanooga is basically already considered the next Boulder. There is a new climbing gym going up in Pittsburgh soon, and shit is going to get crAzy.

Big Long Dickens starts all the way down right, then traverses right at the lip to a harder topout just right of the tree. This pic is from when i was working on it this summer, it was not good conditions to say the least.

This is the amazing Enterprise at Sandy Flats. It's a slopey, technical, powerful masterpiece. 

Giant Slalom. Burley. From there you slap around and top out at the center of this shot, however if you would topout at it's logical purity on the right it's still a project, and it's awesome.