Blog
/Expression//
Letter from America: Closer
— 06/07/10 Comments - 0
I'm sat in my usual spot in the Yosemite Lodge cafeteria typing out words with sausage fingers, my hips and feet aching with a dull throbbing pain, my head full of fog. I feel as if I've been run over or been cage fighting.
On Friday at 7.30pm I started up Zodiac for my 5th time (2nd time…
/Expression//
Letter from America: A short fix
— 02/07/10 Comments - 0
Well a week has past since I arrived in the valley - a week which has seen little traffic on 'the captain' - and a very hot week (up in the 90's), but thankfully - and after many false starts - I climbed zodiac in 19 hours (with one pitch fixed). Unfortunately this wasn't a solo speed ascent, but with…
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/Expression//
Letter from America: The Hand
— 28/06/10 Comments - 0
Well it's been a busy 5 days in the Valley, with lots of ups and downs… well mainly downs really.
After my last post I went back up to Lurking Fear and by 7.30am I was six pitches up. That may sound fast, but I felt I was climbing too slowly to make it in a day, as I'd set off around midnight.…
/Expression//
letter from America: Superman and the fuckwit
— 25/06/10 Comments - 0
Back in the cafe after another unproductive night shift on El Cap.
Every time I try and fail - I'll explain why later - I come down not feeling glum, but exited about going back. Every time I fail I see things I need to do better; little tweaks, better ways of doing things, new ways of thinking.…
/Expression//
Letter from America: Ringtail
— 23/06/10 Comments - 0
Drove into the valley yesterday afternoon and the first two things that hit me were the crowds and the heat. People often say they hate the crowds, but when you spend most of the time on a wall you don't tend to see them, but yesterday the place was rammed - perfect for a 'get me off the ground' psyche.…
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/Expression//
Letter from America: Thinking like a fool
— 23/06/10 Comments - 0
I'm sat outside the Coffee block Cafe in Merced working off my jetlag with a cup of tea before heading up to Yosemite valley.
I don't mind flying, but hate traveling - which is pain when that's what I seem to do most of the time. I guess it's down to the fact that I just don't trust myself…
/Movie//
180 South Trailer
— 16/06/10 Comments - 0
Saw these guys filming on North America wall about two years ago - and wondered what became of their film. Anything with Timmy Oneal and Yvon chuinard in it has to be a classic, and so far it looks really good.
check out their website (has some great little film clips on i): http://www.180south.com
/Expression//
The balloon
— 15/06/10 Comments - 0
The last few days have been a revelation to me - the kind of days that seem to come straight from the pages of a book.
I'll keep the story short, as it's not my story, but I guess the person involved would never see it as anything special; which is a shame, because for the rest of us, it's…
/Expression//
Windows and bricks
— 13/06/10 Comments - 0
Over the past few months, while writing Cold Wars - as well as writing pieces for Patagonia and Alpinist - I feel I've learnt a great deal about lazy writing. What I mean by this is that very often you take the path of least resistance with your words, generally using clichés as they are a good short…
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/Technique //
ROPE SOLOING 101 PART 3
— 10/06/10 Comments - 0
WARNING: This blog is not meant as instructional text, and is simply a description of how I rope solo. Rope soloing is highly dangerous and demands a great deal of experience and good judgment and in many ways is more dangerous than free soloing, due to an increased reliance on ‘systems’.…
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/News//
Driven to madness
— 08/06/10 Comments - 0
After about a year of chipping away bit by bit and about a zillion changes, this morning I got my first hard copy of my tech book Driven through the post. Opening it made me feel a bit ill, probably as seeing what I'd…
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/Technique //
ROPE SOLOING 101 PART 2
— 04/06/10 Comments - 0
WARNING: This blog is not meant as instructional text, and is simply a description of how I rope solo. Rope soloing is highly dangerous and demands a great deal of experience and good judgment and in many ways is more dangerous than free soloing, due to an increased reliance on ‘systems’.…
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/Movie//
Alex and Uli speed climbing The Nose on 5.20.10
— 26/05/10 Comments - 0
Two of the the best soloists around; Ueli Steck and Alex Honnold have joined forces to attempt to break the speed record on The Nose on El Cap (curreny holdersYuji Hirayama and Hans Florine). The current record stands at 2:37, so good luck with that!
www.ukclimbing.com
/Technique //
ROPE SOLOING 101 Part 1
— 19/05/10 Comments - 0
WARNING: This blog is not meant as instructional text, and is simply a description of how I rope solo. Rope soloing is highly dangerous and demands a great deal of experience and good judgment and in many ways is more dangerous than free soloing, due to an increased reliance on…
>Read full story
/Technique //
The old switcheroo
— 05/05/10 Comments - 0
One of the comments from my blog about climbing as a three asked the following question: I seem to climb multipitch trad as three quite a bit. The one lead/two follow at the same time method works pretty well. My question…
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