eldiente

I retract my statement about the dumb tat. A good friend of mine has an even dumber tat. (John you can appreciate this) This guy loves computers so much that he got a Pentium 4 chip tattooed on his foot. (this was back when a P4 CPU was hot shit)

I love my split system, Burton 62 S. The Split system opened up a lot of lines that I never thought I'd ride because the approach was too long/flat. Fast up fast down.

That is the dumbest thing I've ever seen, by a long shot. Side note, how the hell is some guy so much flab going to swing a tool anyway.

Yikes, I sound like such a jerk on the internet. I was trying to add a bit of humor to a conversation that is WAY too serious. Were talking about Beacon Rock right and not El Cap? Kidding aside, it is a bit silly to close that one section of trail when that whole area is crawling with trails, fences, railings etc. Worth losing sleep over and screaming about? Probably not. If that trail has a special meaning for you and the lack of access is truly ruining your life, do what you need to do. I love eating candy, if the "man" outlawed candy I'd still eat it and not feel one bit guilty. Ok bad example, but I've been eating corn candy all day and yumm! I can't recommend breaking park rules as it jeopardizes access for us all, but I'd be lying if I said I've never broken a park rule that I viewed as "silly." ( I slept in my car in the Valley once, oops) As for this trail. It is actually a nice Winter hike down there, but I'm OK if they close the trail during the off-season in an effort to limit our impact. There are plenty of other trails that I would gladly hike if it helped keep Beacon open for climbers during the summer. I still think that for access sensitive areas, the best thing we can do as climbers is to keep a low profile and try to be invisible. Cutting back brush and encouraging people to be down there doesn't count as low profile. (Side note) Do we really want non-climbers around the base of Beacon? I get a bit nervous of having my pack stolen when I see rednecks from Camas wondering around the base of the wall while I'm up climbing. I'd be stoked if the climbers trail was hard to find to discourage hikers from going in there. -Nate

The crag is closed so it makes sense that the climbers trail is closed as well. Why would you want to hike down there if you couldn't climb? Do you want to encourage non-climbers to hike around the base of the wall? Keeping a low profile is important for access restricted areas (like Beacon) Needlessly hiking around the base of walls and calling up the Ranger to pester him about the sign does not count as "low profile" If you really need go down there during the Winter to help visualize the moves for your SE Corner red point attempt, do so in a quiet manner. Calling the ranger to complain does not help matters. -Nate

We were up there as well, made the summit by 3:00PM as a party of four. Good turns going down, a bit crusty in spots but overall a good day.

It must be nice to have all that wisdom gained over the years and apply it to the redpoint of Givler's Crack that you've been working so hard on. Those jams are tricky, no young punk could ever figure it out! (Although I hear Marc is going to send as soon as he gets done playing with his iPhone) If were looking for opinion leader, I'm not sure if age or number years climbing has much to to do with it. Sorry. Anyone climbing at a high level (like Marc) clearly knows something about climbing.

The amount of cardio he's doing makes me feel like going for a run, right now!

I should clarify that I was thinking of what works best for protecting your skin, this has nothing to do with what is best for strength gains, tendon prevention etc. If your coming off the couch with no base, yes doing 6 weeks of jug hauling is a good thing to get a nice, deep pump. Although again I think this is the most painful part of a training cycle. The crisp jugs cut into the hands and if you are indeed coming off the couch, the skin is already soft an easy to damage. One possible work around for this would be to hook up some skin friendly holds (wood, smooth ) to a lat-pull down machine and do a bunch of sets there. Similar to jug hauling on the 45 but perhaps not so hard on the skin and doesn't need a belayer. When doing this I like to do the normal 10x pulls but instead of letting go, I'll dead hang with one hand from the hold for 30 seconds, shake out chalk-up an do x10 more sets for 20 minutes. The folks at 24 hour fitness might give you odd looks but it sort of feels like climbing a long route with good shake-outs. Side gripe. Anyone have any problems with the texture of the wall that is normally used for the campus board? My gym bolts the wooden campus holds onto the normal gym wall that is textured like sandpaper. The problem I have is that when I dry-fire my finger tips go scarping across the textured wall and I lose a lot of skin. I'm thinking it would make sense to use smooth paint, or put thin rubber strips above and below each rung to protect the skin from botched moves. Has anyone tried this? Perhaps I just need to be more accurate with my campusing.

A few possibilities. *The image is part of flash animation. *The image is copy protected. *Other? Some type of animated JPEG or Giff. One low-res way of getting around this is taking a screen capture of the image. On the Mac it is "Shift, command and 4" all at the same time. This allows you to capture whatever is on the screen in front of you with a lasso like function. If you need more help with this, PM me.

What route are you talking about on South Early Winter? Are you thinking of the Direct East Buttress? At last check, the bolt ladders climbed free at 5.11.

Funny as I have the same problem when gym training. Often my skin goes raw and becomes soft long before my arms get pumped. Sometimes this happens outside too, but often outside the pump sets in first. Bouldering is usually the worst for me as I used to try and do 50+ problems in a night. A few things I've tried... *Don't do steep jug hauls. I find the overhanging jug hauls to be hard on the skin, it gives me splits and blisters low on the fingers and has minimal training value. I mean, how often outside are you going to climb a 45 degree wall with huge buckets the whole way? I can see maybe doing a few easy laps to warm-up, but that's it. If you feel the need to do jug hauls, go use a pull-up bar or something more skin friendly. *Dont squirm. This again is more of an issue on routes with big holds, but often my skin get trashed shuffling my hands around on a hold trying to re-grip it. Stick the hold and don't wiggle, that wiggling action saws away at the skin. *Climb hard routes. Do enough "easy" routes to get warmed-up and then do problems/routes that require 100% effort. I'm thinking of roped routes that are hard enough where you're falling half the time and leave you gasping at the chains. For most mortals, 3-6 routes like this and the arms will be pumped but the skin won't be too raw. *Climb thin stuff. Again I find the big, more abrasive on the skin. Thin crimpers might wear out a tiny spot on the tips of your fingers but leave the rest of your skin un-touched. -Nate

Not entirely sure, but I think this is an established aid line done by other parties in past years.

Stevie Haston recently ticked 5.14D sport and flashed a .13+ crack at the age of 52! Clearly this guy is washed-up and should move over to let the young kids climb. [img:center]http://www.dmmclimbing.com/uploads/news/Stevie_Left_Right.jpg[/img]

Timbuktu is a real place in Iowa with real workers and real jobs. Respect.

I do find that jumping from tall problems gives me sore knees and a stiff back when done repeatedly.

Split Beaver is indeed burly. I got spanked on it when I tried it a few years ago... [img:center]http://lh6.ggpht.com/_XNueStDVX8c/RkDCyr-jt5I/AAAAAAAAAGE/bWtk-lyymBs/s512/IMG_0374.JPG[/img]

Ahh I miss Durango. During the summer there is some fun sport routes on this wall.

I was thinking more along the lines of the mental difficulties, not the physical ones. The point I was making was that placing gear does not automatically make a route "bold" and conversely clipping a bolt does not make route "trivial." Give EBGBs a J-tree a try and try to tell me that clipping bolts makes a route safe, or Rock Warrior in Red Rocks for instance. I'd have a better chance of success on a trad climb two numbers grades higher than these routes just knowing I can plug gear whenever I want.

Again I'm going to have to say, why do we keep associating trad with bold and/or run-out climbing? Sure, there are gear protected trad climbs that are run-out, scary whatever, but your typical crack climb is not bold or run-out. Get sketched out on lead? Place another piece of gear and continue you on. I'd say the average trad lead is less committing to on-sight than your average bolted route. I can't stop half-way through a hard section and place another bolt. As for working out routes on the rope.. Yeah maybe on TR this is true but you ever been on upper Heinous? The rope only helps stop your 40 foot fall and doesn't offer any help in "working" the moves.

Funny how everyone associates "trad" climbing with bold because your placing gear. I find the opposite is true, climbing at the Creek I can plug a bomber piece every 6 inches if I want. No commitment or boldness is required, easy to on-sight as I know that I can stop anywhere and plug bomber gear. If the on-sight goes South, I know I can French Free it to get up the pitch. Mellow fun. Same goes with gear. Yeah a big shinny bolt aways makes you feel good, but I feel the same way about a good cam. Climbing above natural gear is no more scary or bold than climbing above a bolt. The longest/most painful falls I've ever taken have always been above bolts. You get into positions where you have to make a hard clip or take a nasty whipper. No way you can plug in more pro to calm the nerves or French Free the moves to get around a crux section. So in this sense I sometime find a bolted pitch to be more "exciting" or as some on this forum would say "bold." *Eds note. I was thinking about this yesterday while on sighing this dirty 5.11C R pitch. Technically this is a rap bolted sport pitch, but the first bolt was half way out and wiggled, the second one was bomber but a ground fall from 40 feet to clip it. Remind me again how this is "safer" than climbing a few feet above a bomber cam?* -Nate

Kevin did you just discover YouTube this week? What's up with all the video postings? Looks like a fun route to me, although you'd think it would make more sense just to wear the harness from the start vs putting it on mid route.

Skipping the last oh 10 posts because I'm too lazy and it sounds like nonsense... Most of Xfit is interval training with a different name. Athletes and fat folks alike have been doing these types of workouts for just about ever. I recall doing many of these same workouts that now have girl names when I wrestled in junior high. Simple and hard. Now for some reason these workouts are revolutionary, controversial and require that you pay $$$ to a coach to show you how to do them. Very odd. Just about any athlete can benefit from interval training, however it is important to do the training targeted to your sport. Unfortunately, many of the Xfit WODs have no benefit for climbers and in fact will make you a worse climber. EX: A 1.5x bodyweight bench press requires massive pushing muscles that you'll have to drag up the mountain but won't be of any value to you.

Are you kidding me? I can guarantee that there are many elite athletes working out this way and pushing themselves to the limit and even puking...maybe not at theie time trial, but in their preparation for sure. So you're saying that an olympic athlete is not going all out in a close race and is holding something back? Maybe, who knows what goes on in someone's head. Although I'd think most folks at that level of competition are going all-out in a way that none of us could even imagine, 100%+. At the end of hard race, these guys aren't puking or rolling around the ground. You'll see cyclist a immediately get on the trainer and spin out, a runner does light jogging etc. It is possible to work really f**ing hard and still be able to cool down properly. Of course nobody at X-fit really cares, it is hard to brag on your WOD blog about a cool down.. Sounds much better to talk about puking or passing out.

This makes me laugh. When's the last time you saw an Olympic marathon runner puke? Or Lance Armstrong finish a time trial and collapse? That's right, these guys aren't elite and not trying hard enough. I've never understood why anyone thinks falling over after a work-out is a good idea. Puking? I could break my finger with a hammer and the pain might cause me to puke, doesn't mean that I got a good workout.