Minor surgery

On Monday, while descending the lines after a session on the Sron, a breeze block sized flake at the belay 10 feet above me was levered off by an unusual direction of pull. It dropped straight onto my bare ankle, splitting it open in a 3cm gash down to the bone. 

After making the most of the rare opportunity to inspect my own skeleton, I abseiled down and started to hurt. 5 stitches later, I’m in less than perfect shape for climbing, or indeed anything right now.

Iain Peter wraps me up for the long walk out to the medical centre.

Less than ideal. Nevertheless, it’s just a flesh wound as they say. A few stitches in one’s ankle shouldn’t bother one’s ability to climb a five pitch E8 on live telly, should it? So I’m doing nothing new but storing up energy (and ibuprofens) for the big day on Saturday.