Hot grit

Initial plans to go to a certain Yorkshire grit crag to try a project ended up getting shelved due to lack of team. It’s hard to drag people a bit further a field at the best of times and most of the usual suspects were away, injured or likely to be too hung-over to get up in time. Next weekend hopefully.
Decided I needed some morale boosting successes so opted for a quick trip to complete things on Mossatrocity and then over to try Dick Williams which I’d heard was steady at 7b+. Met up with Dave Parry at Grindlewald and set to work on Moss’. Warming up was hard work but got there in the end and managed to improve my sequence a fair bit. Did the top bit once, then went for the link and got it on the second go. Pretty much did it all off the left heel as per Adam’s beta. Funny how the heelhooking wasn’t hurting my hamstring this time, but had been too painful to use last weekend. Great problem.


On Thursday at the Works I’d had to leave after less than an hour due to a pain/pulled muscle in my left peck. Had hoped the hasty retreat and a couple of days rest would have sorted it out but this wasn’t so. Trying hard on the last bit of Mossatrocity caused it to flare up worse than before. But weather was too nice for home and rest so I decided to push on with the pain and then take a week off training down the wall and hope it’s fixed by next weekend.
Dave wasn’t feeling it on Moss so we moved on to Secret Garden. Lots of folk there (Joe L’S, Vicky, Jo W, Jim, Tetler, Joe B and about four more) and just missed Dobbin. Managed Dick William quite quick without too much pain. Brilliant problem, can’t believe I’ve never tried it before. Had a brief go at Zaf’s but it was hurting too much so wandered over to Mother Cap, where it was boiling. Greased my way up Conan before deciding to sack it off for somewhere cooler.
Spent the last of the day at the Plantation. Deliverance Traverse seemed like a good one to try that wouldn’t hurt the peck. I’d tried it a few times before but always given up before really getting to grips with it. Watched Si piss across it with a Dawes/R-man-esque side leap, which I totally failed to duplicate. Managed to do it in the end by squatting down very low on the smears, kicking a limb out, pushing a pebble and shuffling about a bit until I could grab the sidepull. Another class boulder problem and pleased to do three new things in a day. Good to bump into ozzy Si/Rubber Chicken who’s over for a couple of weeks.

The pulled muscle felt well sore on Sunday and thought it best to take it easy. Fi wanted to try Gorilla Warfare so I went along as spotter and beta monkey. She’d got close earlier in the week and was well psyched. After a slight tweak to the sequence she bagged it on the third try. Good effort!!


Had abortive attempts on Ben’s Wall and The Art Of White Hat Wearing, but boiling temps and the injury prevented any serious effort. Think it’s time I had a few days off now.