I have a project on my garage boulder wall I've been working it on and
off for months. I think Matt Stasiak and I first put it up last spring before
he left. The route traverses across the wall on wide spaced slopers,
with a large matching jug in the middle. The final moves are on large
gently curving slopes that get you spread out in all directions. At
this point, there are three options for movement, a left bump, right
hand dynamic barn door, or a "fuck-it" dyno to the finish hold,
skipping the intermediate sloper. Every combo of this has been tried
by many people, least of all me, with every attempt getting so close,
but ultimately failing. After ignoring the problem for most of fall, I
gave it another go. Lo and behold, working the finish moves, I found
another way, and after a few goes, was able to finish the problem's
last move! This got me all stoked for sending and I promptly spent the
next two boulder sessions trying to link the whole thing. The
strenuous moves early in the problem worked me over and I didn't send
in those two days of solid effort. I gave it another go a few days
later, and got a little hasty in my attempts. I hadnt warmed up
enough, knew it, ignored it, and in my haste for the big send promptly
blew out the pulley in my middle finger. It is a little disturbing to
hear an audible "pop" from your hand, and then involuntarily lose all
grip strength. The best diagnosis I can figure out, without going to a doctor, is that the pulley tendon at the base of my finger is partially torn (a full tear would show bulging finger tendons). So now I am bummin that I pretty much can't rock climb for spring.
On the plus side, I have made great use of my 10 time pass at Mt Hood Meadows, and have gotten out to climb mountains the last few weekends. The most recent adventure was an attempt on Shasta, which fell short due to a storm moving in a little earlier than planned. We camped at treeline (I got to use my new Mountain Hardwear EV3 tent!!!!) and got some really nice turns from about 10,000 ft down. We made the right decision on not climbing; a fatality occurred that morning due to AMS (?) after two climbers bivied near the summit. RIP.
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1 comment:
Bummer about your finger Ian, but good for you for getting out and hitting up lots of other stuff. Too bad we didn't get all this snow earlier in the year, but I guess it's better late than never. Hope you hand heals up quick!
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