Sunday, September 21, 2008 by Daniel

Great day o' climbing

Decided to forego CF today in favor of getting on the wall, something we've been missing a bit lately. So off we went to GWPC, where I climbed:

10a, 10d(f), 10d(o!), 10c(o), 10a/b(o)

FIVE climbs, TWO d's, and only one fall! And even then the fall was not from muscle exhaustion, it was because I made a dynamic semi-jump out of what should have been a smooth, controlled move, and slid off the greasy hold. Second-to the last move, too. I was pissed.

Both the d's were set by Jim. The first was a pretty straightforward start and finish sandwiching a nice series of awkward, technical moves inside a body-width diagonal dihedral - good rests when you could find them. The second was a mean piece of work on the edge of an exposed bit of wall with a slight negative, involving the same pattern of movements repeated three times (lie way back on a big hold and then step WAY out and pull/push up onto the foothold), each time with smaller holds on a steeper bit of wall. I was actually really surprised I made it up this one without falling. It MAY be my first onsight 10d, I'm not sure.

The 10c was an arete climb that seemed way over-rated - the 10a I warmed up on felt harder - and the 10a/b was just because it looked like it had some fun stemming, and I like stemming. It did, too, and I was tired enough that it was still quite challenging.

I really like climbing at the Power Company - it's good for the ego. The walls are not so massively overhung like they are at Ironworks, so you don't get pumped so quickly or have to muscle your way over so many roofs. There are also lots of nice features that allow the setters to mix things up within climbs, so it's not ALL stemming or ALL face, but you get good variety.

Tomorrow is Ironworks with Tor. We'll see how that goes.

1 comment:

Ev said...

!I love Jim's routes. Good work. You'll be back on that wall in no time

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