The Wicked

Leading pitch 3 of The Wicked, E6 5b, 6b, 6b, 6b, 6b, Ben Nevis. Photo: Dave Cuthbertson/Cubby Images.

In 2000 and 2001, Gary Latter and Rick Campbell worked on a major new line on Carn Dearg Buttress of Ben Nevis. It took the obvious challenge of stepped grossly overhanging wall pitches, followed by the attractive wall left of the Bat corner pitch high on the buttress.  At the time it was by far the hardest rock climb on Ben Nevis, before much harder routes such as Anubis and then Echo Wall were put up in the years following.

They approached the climb ground up, cleaning the route on aid and then redpointing the pitches. However, they did not climb it in a single push, but rather climbed various pitches on different days (and years) by accessing them from the easier routes, eventually grading the route E6 and calling it The Wicked.

This left the obvious challenge of a first continuous ascent. It was a great challenge too, as the climb has four consecutive hard pitches. I had stood at the foot of it once before with Niall McNair several years ago, but it was wet. In fact, frequent wetness on the first two pitches seems to have helped maintain its unrepeated status for all this time. As far as I know noone else has climbed it.

I went up to the buttress with Donald King the other day with no particular plan. Since a period of fine weather had not long started, I expected to find The Wicked wet and we might go for the other mega E6 on the buttress, Trajan’s Column. But on arrival, the wet streaks didn’t look too bad, so we decided to go up for a look. Donald studiously avoided a few wet holds on the first pitch which was ok. But on closer acquaintance, the slab leading up to the first hard pitch looked pretty wet, and the start of the crux itself even worse.

I went up, expecting to quickly come back. At the overhangs, the holds above looked quite big so I wondered if I could just climb on through the wetness. I knew it would end up in a scrap, but who cares? It’s training. And, who likes starting up a route and not finishing it, ready excuses or not?

 I picked my way through the wet and sharp jugs in the roof and eventually managed to grab a flat jug over the lip. Looking down, there were no dry options for feet whatsoever. Hanging with my feet off, I felt under pressure to make a decision so opted for an overhead toe-hook behind a loose looking flake. This worked nicely to get a runner in and dry wet hands. But with one hand in my chalk bag, the block suddenly flew out, sending me swinging wildly with one point of contact. Instinct kept me on and there was no option but to go up, quickly. Below, Donald tried hard not to laugh. The holds beyond were manky, covered in thick lichen and the odd bit of wet moss. I pressed on trying to clean as I went, but totally pumped, I slid off onto the rope at the last move.

Eyeing up the final pitch of the lovely wall left of the Bat corner.

Why on earth didn’t I put the brush in my bag? A quick clean by rubbing the slopers with my hands sort of worked, and on the next attempt the pitch went down no problem. The next pitch was almost as bad, cleaning thick lichen off most of the holds while pumped, but at least I got up it onsight. The next was even worse and I slid out of licheny jams twice before giving it a good rub with my T-shirt and getting it done next go. The final 6b pitch up the lovely Bat corner wall looked immense. It looked a little less dirty too and I was determined to clean it on lead without resting on the rope. However, as I reached for the crucial crux crimp, my finger tips sank into a fluffy pile of moss which was saturated with water. Damn! Even that one needed a quick garden before releading it from the start.

All in all we got quite a workout. But we got to the top!

Come climbing for a day in the Dolomites

On October 19th I am at the International Mountain Summit in Bressasone/Brixen in the Dolomites. Gore-Tex are running a competition as part of their long running experience tour for myself and David Lama to take some of you guys climbing for the day on Oct 19th. Gore-Tex are paying the expenses to get to the Dolomites too!

If you like the sound of that, all you have to do is enter the competition here with a few clicks and a note about why you would like to come climbing with us, and then get yourself some votes on Facebook. See you in the Dolomites then...

The message and the story

I mentioned before I’d been doing some filming in front of camera. I was on the sea cliffs of Lewis and some footage of me throwing myself off Screaming Geo is now in a Land Rover ad which reached the TV screens of the UK last night. You can see it above.

I was aware I needed a bit of falling practice after the last proper trad fall I had ended in surgery. There is a short film about one of the other guys in the ad called Mike Goody (the blade runner) below, which is a really nice and honest film. Worth watching. It’s amazing how feeling a bit powerless can really creep in and affect you after an accident or injury. I must admit I’ve let that happen quite a lot at times over the past year and been in need of a bit of support (understatement) from friends to help me get through.

It’s not as black and white as just finding the will to be positive, as some sources of advice would suggest. You have to have something to be positive about. I.e. there has to be a plan, and knowing what that should be can be next to impossible when you are very injured. I reckon most folk can deal with adversity pretty well, and many can even take it in their stride. It’s the uncertainty that really hauls you over the coals. You aren’t sure if you are still going to be able to be the person you are and want to be any more.

Even the old Churchill saying about 'when you're going through hell, keep going' is a bit simplistic. Sometimes you just don't know where to go to leave your present predicament. I've definitely learned over the past year or two that good help and advice are critical. Without it you are vulnerable. Good friends and very very good doctors who share, or at the very least, truly understand your goals, are precious.

In the ad, everyone was saying 'I can'. It's true that 'I can' is the message it boils down to. But the wider story is 'with your help, I can'.

One project done.

The MacLeod wall. Done. Let's get climbing!

The past few weeks have been varied; film work in front of camera, behind camera, voiceovers in studios, training for summer in the alps, researching for my injuries book and finishing getting all the holds on my wall.

It sounds a bit stupid, but I underestimated how long it would take to actually get all my holds on the wall. And I was grateful to be gifted lots more from friends. Being the slightly maladjusted character I am, I was anxious to finish the project completely before starting to climb on it. I just didn’t want to be climbing on it when it still felt like a building project. So it was really nice to get it all perfect and then start to climb. The only pieces of the puzzle left are the mats which are being made right now. It feels just great to be training. It’s just over a year since I dismantled my wall in my old house, and it’s only after starting to climb on the new one that I’ve truly realised how much I’ve missed it.

Ahhhh. I do like to see projects, of all kinds, complete. Now, what shall I do now? Oh yeah, I was writing a book on injuries wasn’t I...

Between days of setting, training, and book work, we have been making a film for a Glasgow based Geology company called Midland Valley. They make software for structural analysis of geology and have produced a smartphone app for digital mapping in the field. We had a nice couple of days running around the north face of the Ben shooting with them and me abbing down cliffs and getting my phone out instead of doing what I normally do!

Readying the crane above the CIC hut. Photo: Jenny Ellis

Daddy jump!

Freida like to tire me out at the swings.

The Supercrag

View from the walk in to Creag Rodha Mor

The past couple of weeks have been filled with a couple of exciting film jobs, one involving taking some air time. More on that later. I had a weekend booked in with Steve to head to a good sounding Gneiss crag near Lochinver in the north west called Creag Rodha Mor, or more commonly known as the supercrag.

It’s the sort of terrain you’d normally have to travel to the islands for; big steep pitches on positive holds and generally good gear. On our first day we sped up from Roy Bridge, abbed in by 2pm and got cracking on ‘My own personal Mingulay’ (E4 5c, 5c). The morning dampness was still hanging about the crag a little, but with such huge holds and sinker gear, it didn’t matter. Steve was going well despite little opportunity to get out climbing for some time. I wouldn’t say I was going well, but at least I was going up.

Steve on pitch 2 of My Own Personal Mingulay (E4 5c).

Once the blazing sun hit the wall, it went from damp to roasting and greasy, so I bumbled up Ruddy Glow Corner (E4 6b) feeling a little hot. We rounded the evening off with The Shiner (E5 6a) and Rhubarb Champagne (E2) and wandered off to meet Stuart and Erick who were joining us.

Me eyeing up the crux of Ruddy Glow Corner (E4 6b)

Next day, I kicked off with Read My Lips (E4 6a), again feeling a little unacclimatised to the blazing summer sun. Steve had a whale of a time on the big pitch of Ramp it Up (E3 5c) - a mega line on huge bucket jugs all the way. Afterwards, I got a chance to get on The Cuilinan (E6 6b), which again proved to be a mega trip up the wall. At first the holds were fantastic and the gear bomber. Then after a good tricky section I arrived at a wee footledge where I could cool down a bit. I slipped my boots off for a moment as my feet were cooking, arranged a spiders web of gear and proceeded waste a lot of energy trying to climb the wrong way up the headwall above. After repositioning a metre or so to the right, things went rather better and I even persuaded the in situ fulmar on the belay ledge to fly off  straight away using a well crafted grunt. I think I have the knack now.

Sadly, Sunday dawned wet so we opted for active rest cruising about on some 6s and 7s at the lovely Moy sport crag. Summer is definitely here.

 Steve in a sea of jugs on Ramp it up (E3 5c)

Locals around Creag Rodha Mor.

Foot training

Climbing Romancing The Stone E5 6a today at Wave Buttress, Glen Nevis. Photo: Steve Holmes

May is often a month of sore feet for me. After a winter of climbing short and very steep things, when I start trad climbing my weak and unfit feet get kind of sore. I remember having this problem particularly badly a few years ago on my first visit to Cloggy one june after a month of climbing upside down in the Anvil.

Kev Shields making good progress on his project.

So today I joined Kev, Steve, Joe, Dot and Ewan at Wave Buttress for some slabby wall climbing and toe endurance training. Kev has been working away on a project up there which will be a nice E7 6c. He toproped it with apparent ease today and was looking strong on it. I had some laps on it too and enjoyed myself in the May sunshine. It has a very thin thumb press move with just enough gear to entice you on, followed by a sustained E6 6a to the top.

 

Joe and his shadow leading Edgehog E3 6a. 

Afterwards I went round and did Romancing The Stone E5 6a with Joe. It was a little dirty in places and I took my wire brush with me to clean the odd hold as I went. As predicted, my feet felt worked. I enjoyed the route finding, although another decent runner on the lower part would’ve been nice. The other guys were giving On The Beach (E5) some traffic.

Natalie on a thin groove problem on Harris on our pre-ferry boulder session the other day.

It was a little hot for crimping this hard. That's my excuse anyway.

Hebrides with Natalie

Natalie Berry enjoying The Prozac Link, E4, Screaming Geo, Lewis.

Natalie Berry has been a very successful youth competition and sport climber for several years. Now in her early twenties, with podium places and 8b red points under her belt, she is motivated to move into adventure climbing and has just started trad climbing. We had a few days booked in to head north and get some routes in, taking the Hot Aches Productions crew with us. Although I’ve known Natalie for many years from our days living in Glasgow, we’ve never climbed outdoors together until last year. These days we are colleagues on the Scarpa and Mountain Equipment teams too!

The poor forecast told us to get the ferry to the Western Isles for the best possible chance of dry rock. With a wealth of mountain and sea cliffs of all different shapes and sizes, and plenty of new routes still to explore, Lewis and Harris are always still high on my list of places to hit when the warm weather arrives, despite the fact I’ve climbed there a lot over the years. To be honest, I like to go there for the general vibe of the place even more than the climbing. Stress tends to disappear here. After 5 days here I feel like I have more energy than I have for many months.

Sunshine at the Aird Uig sea cliffs, Lewis. Photo: Hot Aches Productions

On our first day, the mountain crags were looking a bit windy, wet and cold so we ended up at the Uig sea cliffs, where Nat dispatched her first E1 with ease. She was still looking a little uncertain how to approach trad pitches; arranging the protection, breaking the pitch down into chunks, and dealing with ‘trad’ type features of wet jamming cracks loose rock and the odd bird.

I got a nice E6 done, initially thinking it was new but later finding out it had been done by Jacob Cook recently. Good to see some other folk visiting the islands and putting routes up.

Repeating a nice E6 at the Flannan area. Photo: Hot Aches Productions.

The next day we went to Aird Feinis with Cubby’s excellent Top Tackle Tips (E6) in mind. But big waves battering the base of it prevented us. So we had a top rope play on two new routes, one hard E7 and the other hard E8. Nat also had a play on the E7, and obviously had no trouble doing the moves. 

On day 3 we visited the Boardwalk where Nat onsighted an E2, again without any bother at all. I climbed one E4, then backed off another soggy one. At the end of the day, Nat went for an E4 with a bouldery crux right off the ground. After some deliberation about where to start, she pulled off the ground, only for the very first hold to break off a nanosecond later. Nat plonked down on her bum on the wave platform, and we laughed that she survived her first trad groundfall. I tied in and tried another hold that stayed on the wall.

An obvious good objective for the trip was the super classic Prozac Link (4 pitch E4) in Screaming Geo. It’s widely regarded as among the finest E4s in Britain, and it’s a mega trip across the great arch; guaranteed to provide an adventure. We started up it in glorious hot sun, but cracks still damp from the sea spray, so I led. The next two pitches had a couple of wet holds or unobvious gear so I led those too, and both of us were enjoying the increasing exposure.

Hanging on the belay before the final and crux pitch, I thought it would be interesting to see what Nat decided about this pitch. Would she lead? On such a classic route, on a great day, it seemed like a good moment to take a step up. Would she feel ready? When she arrived at the belay, it was obvious she was determined to go for it. Once she set off, her movements across the wall made it even more obvious. She was going up this pitch no matter what. It was great to watch.

Natalie setting off on pitch 4 of The Prozac Link, E4, Screaming Geo.

View from the Hot Aches Productions camera of Natalie leading the Prozac Link, E4. 

The next day we returned to Ard Feinis with the E7 wall in our sights. It was damp and already raining. But I was totally psyched to do it if at all possible. Natalie linked it on the top rope with ease but still opted to pass me the lead until she had more experience placing the few crucial small cams that only just protect it.

The rain got heavier and heavier, so there wasn’t time to lose. I kept my chalkbag dry by tucking under my top until I was under the crux roof before flinging it off, drying my hands and feet and launching up the wall. Apart from a few seconds off faff drying my hands after fiddling with rainsoaked cams, I enjoyed every second of the wall, especially grabbing the monster bucket wet jug at the top and throwing on my pre-stashed Gore-Tex jacket. A first E7 since coming back from surgery and a good milestone in regaining my confidence. Nat seconded into a faceful of drips from the top of the wall, and we scurried back to the car to thaw out, happy.

I don’t know whether it’s because I’ve had a nice rest this week with lots of sleep after all those 16 hour building days at home, because I’ve been back to climbing, or because I’ve been climbing in inspiring surroundings all week, but I feel a burst of energy right now. I’ll have to use it for something good.

Looking across to the Flannan isles from Screaming Geo, Lewis. Photo: Hot Aches Productions

Holds going on my wall, and new routing on Harris

Some holds going on the climbing wall at last!

After a month straight of 16 hour days on average, my climbing wall is finished. Well, apart from getting all the holds on. I must admit that after completing the build and various other jobs that needed doing at my place, I was a bit too broken to even climb on it. I just wanted to sleep! But now there are some holds going on it I’m getting more and more excited as it turns from a building project into what I had originally envisioned - a brilliant place to train.

However, rather than jump straight on it, I opted to take advantage of the dry weather and head to the Outer Hebrides for a couple of days new routing and prospecting with Calum Muskett. We did a handful of new lines from E3 to E5 and I worked on this immaculate 40m wall of perfect Gneiss that has been on my projects to look at list for a few years. It was just as good as I hoped, if maybe a little hard.

There were a couple of different ways you could go. The best, and hardest looks upwards of 8b+ climbing with adequate gear. But the crux is super hard. On the first day I was climbing all day in a Citadel jacket and still had numb hands in the wind. In those conditions I could get some purchase on the crux crimps, but couldn’t see how to use them. The next day it was much warmer and I needed a bit of help from the rope to stay on, but did get a sequence that may work. So now I have something great to direct my training, and an excuse to get the ferry back to Harris pretty soon.

A very very hard project to go back to.

4 new titles in the shop.

We’ve just added four great new books and DVDs to the shop. The first three books are all major contributions to the literature on improving at climbing and I’d recommend getting hold of all three. Well done to the authors of all of them who have made a great contribution here and no doubt these books will be the first step to many hard ascents and goals realised in the future.

Gimme Kraft: The Cafe Kraft gym (Kraft = strength btw) in Nurnberg, Germany has gained a great reputation for coaching a string of fantastic climbing talents over the past few years, most notably, Alex Megos who became the first climber to onsight 9a. Their coaches have put together a new book and DVD detailing the principles and exercises they have used to help their talented young climbers become super strong and fit beasts.

So the book is very focused on physical strength and endurance training, both on and off the climbing wall. It provides a great and easy to follow manual for sharpening up weak areas in your strength. This is particularly useful since it can be hard to choose or adapt core strength routines from other sports for climbing.

Both the book and DVD show clearly how to do the basic strength and endurance exercises and the DVD contains many interesting interviews with climbing legends about training and climbing performance. 

Training for the new Alpinism: Steve House and Scott Johnston’s new book on training for alpinism is a much awaited and weighty addition to the available literature on training for climbing. It is the first book to focus solely on alpinism and brings the field right up to date. It is very much training focused (as opposed to skills focused), which is both it’s greatest strength and weakness.

It contains clear and extensive sections on the basic principles of sports physiology, but with the discussion relating directly to climbing in an alpine setting. So you no longer have to learn and then adapt the principles used in other endurance sports to effectively plan your training regime. It also has great and focused sections on strength, mental skills, nutrition, altitude, schedule planning and choosing your training goals. It also contains some fantastic contributions from other world class alpinists, sharing what they have learned about the most effective ways yo improve your alpine climbing.

Its focus on physical rather than technical skills training means there should probably be more than just this book in your training library. However, it joins a collection of titles that are essential reading for climbers who are serious about improving.

The Trad Climber’s Bible: The skills for trad climbing are about as broad as in any sport. This is especially true if you wish to climb in many different settings - hard, technical single pitch climbs, big walls and and alpine faces. The Trad Climber’s Bible comes at the challenge of passing on these skills from a different angle from most instructional manuals.

I jumped at the chance to order it in for the davemacleod.com shop simply because it was authored by the American trad legends John Long and Peter Croft. I was fascinated by how they had approached the challenge of writing about trad skills. They have written the book in a narrative style, with many stories and anecdotes from their combined 70 year experience of pushing their limits on trad all over the world.

Some of the sections, such as those on ‘fiddling’ and ‘embracing the weird’ made me smile as they highlighted the sheer range of unusual skills that are nonetheless essential to be a successful trad climber. It’s a big, thorough, entertaining and inspiring book which will provide much food for thought and arm you with many more skills to throw at your next big lead. Excellent photography throughout and great value for what has clearly been a huge project for the authors.

Wideboyz II: The Wideboyz, Tom Randall and Pete Whittaker, have decided to turn their hand to finger cracks, with the goal of repeating the hardest and most famous of all finger cracks - Cobra Crack (8c) in Squamish. In their own Wideboyz style, they convert their offwidth training den into a finger sqaushing setup and proceed to train, hard. Still, Cobra Crack put up a good fight! Entertaining as ever, and a reminder that focusing and trying damn hard goes a long, long way.