A Plastic Pullin' Contingent Migrates South

Team Strong decided to go to Earth Treks today. We wanted to go to the Gunks, but the weather was all busted. With no further ado . . .

WHAT UP, PEEPS sorry about the red eye

From left: DelForte, Temple of J, Electric Feeley, THE TEEG, OGDV

So yeah. We rolled pretty deep. The bouldering was intense:

SO focused.
 

 YES, I'll clean the chalk off my lens, FINE   jerks

Who's THIS goober?

Hey, you know what would be great? Pictures of roped climbing!

Oh, so THIS is roped climbing! I was wondering.

THE TEEG was, well, THE TEEG:

He can smell your fear.

Today was a long session for me (I had to get my money's worth). Naturally, after the session, it was off to the campus board to perform some of those exercises I spoke of in the last installment of Plastic Pullin'.

My favorite kind of campus board.

I basically worked until I decided that any more would jeopardize my ability to climb in the foreseeable future. Plus, I'm a sissy girl and I don't like it when my skin is on fire. There. I said it.

THE RECKONING

The time has come for the readers of this blarg (I have those, right?) to share their goals for the summer.

This is . . . THE RECKONING.

Leave a comment on this post. Your comment should detail your goal for the summer. Improvement in roped climbing counts! It's all rock climbing anyway, right?

Remember: ideally, your goal is to climb one grade harder than you have climbed so far this year. We're trying to show solid improvement. Don't sandbag yourself!

I will collect the comments and post everyone's goals together. When there is news to report, it shall be reported.

If you go climbing, and I'm not there, and you crush your projects, I'd like you to send me some awesome pictures so I can document your send with authority. I have set up an email address for this very purpose.

Send your radness to: summerofstrong@gmail.com

Let's do this, people!

It's Dark and Haycock is Hot

When you write a professional climbing blarg (like I do), sometimes you have to endure conditions that no (relatively) sane person would consider acceptable. You know, like getting up at 5:30 AM. Also, bees. Lots and lots of bees. I'm just putting this out there, bees: I am not a pretty flower. In fact, I'm not any sort of flower.

But, it was probably worth it!

As mentioned in the previous episode, Miss Lady and I got up ins Haycock (affectionately referred to as "The 'Cock") on Thursday. We expected resistance in the form of X-TREMEly hot rocks, as well as a literal barrier of foliage. We went 1 for 2 in that regard. The foliage was there, but the day was actually not like walking straight into the Devil's kitchen.

However, we did have to cross a river to get up ins!

You have come to a river. Will you attempt to ford the river?

> Y

You attempt to ford the river. Your wagon overturns! You lose two oxen and 400 pounds of food.
You have died of dysentery.

Our adventure also marked the first use of my new crash pad! It is tres delicieux, oui? I think that one of those colors might be cerulean. No off-mauve, though.

Soooo . . . you're gonna sponsor me now, right, guys? . . . Guys?

Much of Haycock's climbing involves very few footholds. Haycock is what you would call a friction area. Usually, with higher temps, climbing at Haycock is very difficult.

Pretend this V2 is actually V8.

Miss Lady, however, said "non-ideal conditions be damned," and decided to crush anyway. I don't think I had ever heard her yell on a boulder problem before, but there's a first time for everything THAT IS AWESOME.

This is what you call "getting big."

Eventually, whether it was from lack of sleep or lack of caffeine, I started losing my mind. Upon the Philadelphia Flyers' valiant victory over the Montreal Canadiens a few days ago, Captain Roommate texted me these two words: Meatreal Clownadiens. I think I started yelling "Meatreal Clownadiens" in the moment depicted in this photo, but it's all a blur.
At least, that's the excuse I'm going with here

It's okay, the doctor told me this would be temporary . . .

And there you have it.

NEW SENDS LIST:

Miss Lady:

• Bubblegum, V3
• Unnamed, V2

Me:

• NOTHING

I'm not jealous or anything, though. I guess.

As I Walk Through the Valley of the Shadow of Good Boulder Problems

Last night, Miss Lady and I decided to patronise (fancy spelling -- this is a high-class blog) PRG's Valley location for a bit of the ol' plastic pullin'. And pull plastic we did. One might say that Valley is a Cranksta's Paradise. Miss Lady had not climbed for eight days, so she was dissatisfied with her performance (she did fine). I, however, felt stronger than I had in two months. In layman's terms, I got big.


One of the highlights of Valley is its simple campus board: nine wooden rungs, evenly spaced, each rung one pad deep. Classic-style campusing, using might-building techniques from the days of yore.

A few weeks ago, I had read a few postings on a website which contains quite a bit of training information. I especially liked this section, all about various exercises you should perform when campusing. I had never really done the triceps pushes that he describes; they are full of ferocity. My shoulders are now officially worked. If you can get past the somewhat stilted anglais (this blog is classy and multicultural), there are some solid tips here to help you out.


Tomorrow, Miss Lady and I take a fantastic voyage to the molten rock of Haycock Mountain. Hopefully we won't get struck by lightning or turned to ash by the sheer heat of the boulders. They might be TOO HOT. Uh . . . wish us luck?


Quick summary:

• Campus training! Click those links!
• Bouldering at Valley is fun!
• DELTOIDS DESTROYED
• Haycock tomorrow

A billion bonus points if you got the Coolio references up there; zero if you're just realizing it now -- BE HONEST

Under Construction

There will probably be a lot of changes to the layout of the blog in the weeks to come. I'll settle on something eventually, but don't be alarmed if stuff is jumping all over the place.


Desires:

• A great header for the site

• The best colors with which to impress even the most demanding of interior decorators ("SoS is SOOOO good at color matching -- I like the way the cerulean drapes highlight this slightly off-mauve couch")

• HTML science power magic
  

• Your climbing pictures -- especially if they are of you crushing your latest and greatest project

• A pony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . with buzzsaws for hooves and a mane of fire

Welcome to the Summer of Strong.

People, this is big. You are getting big. You didn't know it before you read this sentence, but you started getting big the moment you came to this blog.

You will be SO big.

This summer was given to us for the purpose of getting strong. So that's what we're going to do.

"But Derek, summer's sooooo hot . . . !"

CAN IT. Yeah, sometimes on the Right Coast it seems like your body meat is being boiled when you walk to the supermarket or whatever you do in your daily life. Yeah, any day in July it's so humid it's like a swim meet when you're crossing the street. Forget that noise, because we're getting strong.


Here is the plan:

EVERYONE increases their climbing prowess by at least one V-grade, or NO ONE gets candy!

What does that mean? To me, it means that you have to climb at least one problem (outside, of course) that is at least one grade harder than the hardest problem you've climbed so far this year. For example: I've climbed two V8s this year, so I need to climb at least one V9 before summer ends.

"But Derek, I've never bouldered outside before!" If this is the case, then you need to get up ins. All I require from you is that you complete a boulder problem outside.

If I fail in my quest, no one gets candy. If you fail in your quest, no one gets candy. We get big as a team, we eat candy as a team. If everyone increases their might by one V-grade, I will hand-deliver candy to everyone. I pledge this.

Get big. Eat candy. Summer of Strong.