Doyle's Blog
www.doylosblog.blogspot.com
I've got a big presentation soon, followed by an X-ray before probably sitting in traffic around Luton well into the night in order to spend this Easter with Nat's family. Hopefully next weekend I can potter around the peak a bit, work allowing.
Thursday, 20 March 2008
Sunday, 16 March 2008
Uncomfortable
Congrats to Ned who won the Busa yesterday with Dan hot on his heels, the hardest problem looked truly hard in a basic burly way. Nice!
Today Nat and I braved the crowds in the works (obviously lots of people made a weekend of it), the session was going well after a shaky start (confidence wise on Nat's part)... I won't bore people with details of problems but the new yellows were fun and soon enough I was trying the comp wall problems. Did the grey again 1st time in much better style (it's soft for 7a)...Then did a few more and was happy to finish by flashing the yellow comp wall up Percy's cluster of volumes (however it seems to circumnavigate the majority of them), spotted by Andy.
Walked past Travs and Mike Lea attempting the problem detailed in the last post, I muttered some words to Travs about my incident and right on cue Mike took the same nasty fall, Trav's did the same and they both moved on. I mentioned it to Sam and he looked horrified and vowed to fiddle with the foothold.
Recently Dave Macleod soloed a sport route that was reported as an 8c solo, firstly this doesn't sit comfortably with me, why does some one self engineer danger? especially in such a contrived manner, he needs a rope and harness to get down so why the f*ck doesn't he use one to get up? Secondly the clips are still in (ok so they're semi-permanent) but again he's wearing a harness so every meter or so there some kind of back up safety point so if you are going to make a point of soloing it, do it properly. His reasons for doing so didn't seem very sensible to me either: you can confident as you like soloing whatever at 50' overhanging that doesn't mean that you can solo something of similar difficulty on a slab, especially if said slab will not have semi permanent draws hanging every 1m. Lastly: Is it truly 8c? I hate to say it but I was cynical from the start.
Its very interesting when people are at their top level (not specifically this ascent I must add it just got me thinking) to see what they do re: grades, its very easy to take the big grade and this happens a lot (I've most definitely been guilty of this in the past), a lot of people also go down the other path of just pretending like everything is a path which leads to needless downgrading (...and this). Hopefully at the end the day a consensus leads to a good understanding of a given problem/route's difficulty, if this doesn't happen cutting edge ascents mean nothing as they could well already be history, the 'Next Level' may just be a crock of sh*t (like this post no doubt)...
Right now for something a bit more light hearted, this was published this week after Nat won a Road Safety quiz at her works. Oh the irony.
Today Nat and I braved the crowds in the works (obviously lots of people made a weekend of it), the session was going well after a shaky start (confidence wise on Nat's part)... I won't bore people with details of problems but the new yellows were fun and soon enough I was trying the comp wall problems. Did the grey again 1st time in much better style (it's soft for 7a)...Then did a few more and was happy to finish by flashing the yellow comp wall up Percy's cluster of volumes (however it seems to circumnavigate the majority of them), spotted by Andy.
Walked past Travs and Mike Lea attempting the problem detailed in the last post, I muttered some words to Travs about my incident and right on cue Mike took the same nasty fall, Trav's did the same and they both moved on. I mentioned it to Sam and he looked horrified and vowed to fiddle with the foothold.
Recently Dave Macleod soloed a sport route that was reported as an 8c solo, firstly this doesn't sit comfortably with me, why does some one self engineer danger? especially in such a contrived manner, he needs a rope and harness to get down so why the f*ck doesn't he use one to get up? Secondly the clips are still in (ok so they're semi-permanent) but again he's wearing a harness so every meter or so there some kind of back up safety point so if you are going to make a point of soloing it, do it properly. His reasons for doing so didn't seem very sensible to me either: you can confident as you like soloing whatever at 50' overhanging that doesn't mean that you can solo something of similar difficulty on a slab, especially if said slab will not have semi permanent draws hanging every 1m. Lastly: Is it truly 8c? I hate to say it but I was cynical from the start.
Its very interesting when people are at their top level (not specifically this ascent I must add it just got me thinking) to see what they do re: grades, its very easy to take the big grade and this happens a lot (I've most definitely been guilty of this in the past), a lot of people also go down the other path of just pretending like everything is a path which leads to needless downgrading (...and this). Hopefully at the end the day a consensus leads to a good understanding of a given problem/route's difficulty, if this doesn't happen cutting edge ascents mean nothing as they could well already be history, the 'Next Level' may just be a crock of sh*t (like this post no doubt)...
Right now for something a bit more light hearted, this was published this week after Nat won a Road Safety quiz at her works. Oh the irony.
Thursday, 13 March 2008
Well last night I went down to the works. I was having a reasonably good session, doing the grey thing on the curved section of the comp wall, don't know what grade it gets but it was a minor triumph.
After doing that I started looking for easy reds, swiftly found one. 34 i think, opposite the small kids boulder. Long reach to the top of the long volume, match, left foot up onto edge just below the lip of the volume, rock up a long way, turn your right hand, rock some more, right foot to hand....well and then my (left) foot slipped, i pivoted round the hold with two limbs attatched before springing back and landing badly on the leg, my break hurt like hell, Nat was in tears and the group I was climbing with was silent. No damage so I sat down and tried to laugh it off to make Nat feel better. Nat unsurprisingly wanted to leave, so I made myself warm down and tried to chuckle it off some more.
Not good.
I know i've been fairly negative and critical of the works since it opened but the thing i'm least a fan of is the new matting cover they have, I forecast more injury.
After doing that I started looking for easy reds, swiftly found one. 34 i think, opposite the small kids boulder. Long reach to the top of the long volume, match, left foot up onto edge just below the lip of the volume, rock up a long way, turn your right hand, rock some more, right foot to hand....well and then my (left) foot slipped, i pivoted round the hold with two limbs attatched before springing back and landing badly on the leg, my break hurt like hell, Nat was in tears and the group I was climbing with was silent. No damage so I sat down and tried to laugh it off to make Nat feel better. Nat unsurprisingly wanted to leave, so I made myself warm down and tried to chuckle it off some more.
Not good.
I know i've been fairly negative and critical of the works since it opened but the thing i'm least a fan of is the new matting cover they have, I forecast more injury.
Tuesday, 11 March 2008
Catch Up
There's been very litte bloggage from me recently, this is mainly due to the fact that a while ago we bought and Xbox 360 which came with a months free Xbox live membership. I've been wasting vast amounts of time online.
Quite a lots gone on but most of it isn't really all that interesting so i'll try and sumarise things
Cars:
Well the yellow one turned out to be a bit dodgy, it had door drop and other issues. The dealership sent off the V5 before we paid so we now have that hassle to sort out. Idiots.
We found a blue one, its great, 6 months older same ish mileage. It had an adisory notice on the rear brakes so I went to get that sorted up at quickfit, nice and cheap and a lifetimes worth of pads for the price of one set (basically as they try to get you to replace all of your brake components every time you go in). Got back in the car after the above work, airbag warning light came on. Sh*t. Got the bloke out but he was having none of it.
Lots of stressing and pricing up diagnostics and replacement parts then followed until I saw sense and visited the Fiat Forum, a little time spent reading and i found something interesting
, there is a connector beneath the sear, when I picked it up the seat was in the rear foot well or near enough. A quick look and the monkey working on it had managed to wrench the seat back hard enough to dislodge the protective clips and pull out the connector. Snapped it all back together. Job Done.
The more time we spend with the new car the more certain i'm getting that the other was remapped:
* It had more go, espeically in the lower gears
* When driven steadily it did better mpg (by 10)
* It smoked more under hard acceleration
The insurance company are still faffing about.
Climbing ish Stuff:
I tried climbing the day my cast came off, it was a bad idea and hurt a lot. I tried a week later it hurt less but still enough to worry me. I can't crimp or pinch and I couldn't ever openhand so i'm screwed. I think this injury is going to be a right pain, yes its early but still my leg didn't bother me this much after it came out of the frame.
The works now have rings, I've tried to get Percy to build a box but he refuses which is annoying as you can't do a full rings workout without something to kneel on. He suggested a chair, this was very unstable when extended and with my luck I decided that wasn't a good plan.
His massive cast iron hook ring removal system is utterly crazy as well, hopefully it doesn't fall off at any point while hoisting as it will knock whoever is stood near the desk clean out.
I get more and more uncertain about the works each time something like this comes up, its becoming gimmicky, huge almost 70% useless campus board, Graffiti'd training board which isn't steep enough (its better but lets face it the people who like it usually have access to a contrasting steep as f*ck board) and now the rings...Maybe its just me?
My mate James Blay has started working for Wild Country so Nat and I took him to dQ on Friday night for the party (thanks to Vic's for the heads up as I was unaware as per usual). Saturday night came and James' new girlfriend was up so I was required to go out. It was expensive and I felt terrible on Sunday.
Well I did a rubbish job of making that short...
Quite a lots gone on but most of it isn't really all that interesting so i'll try and sumarise things
Cars:
Well the yellow one turned out to be a bit dodgy, it had door drop and other issues. The dealership sent off the V5 before we paid so we now have that hassle to sort out. Idiots.
We found a blue one, its great, 6 months older same ish mileage. It had an adisory notice on the rear brakes so I went to get that sorted up at quickfit, nice and cheap and a lifetimes worth of pads for the price of one set (basically as they try to get you to replace all of your brake components every time you go in). Got back in the car after the above work, airbag warning light came on. Sh*t. Got the bloke out but he was having none of it.
Lots of stressing and pricing up diagnostics and replacement parts then followed until I saw sense and visited the Fiat Forum, a little time spent reading and i found something interesting
, there is a connector beneath the sear, when I picked it up the seat was in the rear foot well or near enough. A quick look and the monkey working on it had managed to wrench the seat back hard enough to dislodge the protective clips and pull out the connector. Snapped it all back together. Job Done.
The more time we spend with the new car the more certain i'm getting that the other was remapped:
* It had more go, espeically in the lower gears
* When driven steadily it did better mpg (by 10)
* It smoked more under hard acceleration
The insurance company are still faffing about.
Climbing ish Stuff:
I tried climbing the day my cast came off, it was a bad idea and hurt a lot. I tried a week later it hurt less but still enough to worry me. I can't crimp or pinch and I couldn't ever openhand so i'm screwed. I think this injury is going to be a right pain, yes its early but still my leg didn't bother me this much after it came out of the frame.
The works now have rings, I've tried to get Percy to build a box but he refuses which is annoying as you can't do a full rings workout without something to kneel on. He suggested a chair, this was very unstable when extended and with my luck I decided that wasn't a good plan.
His massive cast iron hook ring removal system is utterly crazy as well, hopefully it doesn't fall off at any point while hoisting as it will knock whoever is stood near the desk clean out.
I get more and more uncertain about the works each time something like this comes up, its becoming gimmicky, huge almost 70% useless campus board, Graffiti'd training board which isn't steep enough (its better but lets face it the people who like it usually have access to a contrasting steep as f*ck board) and now the rings...Maybe its just me?
My mate James Blay has started working for Wild Country so Nat and I took him to dQ on Friday night for the party (thanks to Vic's for the heads up as I was unaware as per usual). Saturday night came and James' new girlfriend was up so I was required to go out. It was expensive and I felt terrible on Sunday.
Well I did a rubbish job of making that short...
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