Wednesday, October 29, 2008

It's About Time For A Road Trip...

I've basically spent the last 5 or 6 days setting boulder problems at The Spot. Psychedelia was off the hook and now we're focused on getting up as many boulder problems as possible to keep the members psyched. Needless to say, LOTS of setting. So, I've been climbing very little and have fallen into a bit of a slump. I figured some outdoor time was needed so we headed up to Boulder Canyon today to get on Hard Boiled V11. It's kind of a pissed off little boulder problem consisting of a small roof and a slightly technical slab. I've tried it a few times over the last few years to no avail (possibly due to lack of motivation) and I was happy to finish it off quickly today.

On Thursday, Alex and I will leave Boulder and we won't be returning until December. We will also be taking along my little brother Giovanni for the ride. First up on our list of areas is Horse Pens 40 for the second leg of the Triple Crown. I'm extremely excited to visit this amazing area again. Unfortunately we will only be able to climb there on the day of the comp as we will be heading to YOSEMITE for the rest of November.

I grew up in Northern California and have made many trips to Yosemite both before I was a climber and after. Due to my High School schedule I was only really able to make it to the Valley during the summer and this severely limited the difficulty of the problems I was able to accomplish. Last summer I showed up in the Valley to scope out all of the new hard classics and was turned away by 105 degree heat and an army of mosquitos. I've been meaning to climb in this amazing area during the winter for quite some time now, and this November is our big chance to lay seige. I have a very large list of problems that I want to do and I have a good-sized list of extremely inspiring projects that I have my eye on.

More updates and some photos to come.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Alex Climbs Trice V12

Alex seems to be on a bit of a mission these days. We went up to Flagstaff tonight and she dispensed with Trice V12 in the dark. Conditions were certainly not optimal as I couldn't even manage a repeat. Very impressive to watch. She absolutely walked the thing. She is very psyched and is now putting together a list of hard Front Range boulders that she wants to take down. I have complete confidence in her ability to send anything she puts her mind too.

As for me, I made considerable progress on Midnight Express V14 in Boulder Canyon yesterday and once my arm heals from that heinous undercling I'll be ready to take it down. More updates and hopefully some media to come.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Alex Puccio Climbs Clear Blue Skies V12

A couple of days ago we returned to Boulder after a 12-day trip out east to Boone, NC and the Red River Gorge. I should have a posting up about our trip soon, but in the meantime here is another little bit of news.

Yesterday, we made a trip out to Mt. Evans so Alex could finish up one of her projects. The parking lot was basically covered in snow, but we decided to trudge in anyways to check on the status of the Dali wall. The hike ended up being not so bad. The snow was well packed and despite some small patches of mud it was quite uneventful. Everything at Area A was dry. Some of the topouts had snow on them. Silverback and All Dogs Go To Evans are most definitely OUT THE GAME. The Dali wall was very dry. Topouts as well. The temps were unbelievably good. Extremely dry and pretty damn cold. Clear Blue Skies took Alex about 4 tries to complete and she absolutely hiked it. One of those sends where every move is executed perfectly. She definitely took it down in style. I will say that this is definitely not the hardest she can climb at this point, and I look forward to watching her progress on the real rocks in Horse Pens 40, Yosemite, Bishop, Little Rock City, and Horseshoe Canyon Ranch.

I'll post some pics of the day, but first here is a little something from Alex in regards to the send:

"The day started off with Carlo saying " we can turn back and go to Clear Creek and I won't be mad" as we started hiking in. It was very cold and windy, and as most of you know I am from Texas, where we Texans like it to be about 80 degrees when we are climbing. =)

But despite the REALLY cold, windy weather, I decided I wanted to go finish Clear Blue Skies. Since I hiked in with the given conditions I made sure I was going to do the problem. So we warmed up on the Ladder a few times and then decided to head right to the Dali boulder and just get it over with so we could leave sooner. As we walked to the Dali I noticed that most of the boulders were iced and snowed over on the tops, I started to get nervous that the Dali boulder was going to be the same. But as we approuched it I was so releaved to see that it was clear!! So we got right on it, and my first two tries I dry fired of the second hold, I got nervous for a minute that it might not go. I went to a rock and sat for a few minutes calmed myself down. Then a huge gust of wind came and I decided to get back on it and just climb the damb thing, and two goes later it just flowed.... I was DONE!!!

The boulder problem took me two days of work. The first day I worked it for about thirty min. and I felt like it was for sure going to go down, but what I thought was my send go I tore my whole pad off of my index finger.

Over all I thought it was soft, and can't believe it used to be v13. And all I have to compair the grade too is the Marble Sit and I definitely thought that Clear Blue Skies was eaiser for me. Which I thought was weird cause I don't ever really climb on crimpy problems, I have never been that great on crimps, but I guess things can change. But I really enjoyed the short victory of Clear Blue Skies......great fun!!! =)