So, if it has not been obvious, I’ve turned the page on the “serious cycling” chapter of my life. For nearly two years, I (mostly) committed myself to racing. It was good fun, I got to meet some really fine folks, and I got into better shape. I had some fleeting success (cyclocross, StrongLand), but, by the bye, I was pretty average at best. There was also the issue of time–as far as our family went, cycling was a solitary activity. I found it increasingly difficult to muster the motivation for rides on the weekends, as those meant I was taking time away from the family.

Climbing, of course, solved both of these issues. I reckon I’m a better climber off the couch than I am a racer with two years of racing in his legs. We can also climb together. This really came into focus after the trip to Hueco Tanks–we could spent a month together, doing what we loved. Seemed like a winning situation. And now, weekend trips, for all the exhaustion they introduce, are something we look forward to–climbing, seeing friends, sitting (sometimes) around the campfire.

But what is it about climbing? It came into focus a bit this weekend. In my prior incarnation as a climber, it was all about numbers (what isn’t?)–hardest onsight, hardest redpoint, hardest boulder problem. I was known to pitch wobblers in my younger days when I couldn’t climb something. Thought I put a lot of pressure on myself at Hueco to send (which I did, barely), since we’ve been back, it’s been quite the opposite. Climbing at the New (Summersville Lake, mostly), I worked for a bit at getting back some degree of route fitness (re-sending Apollo Reed–5.13a–see, number dropping!), then set about throwing myself at something that was well above my current fitness level (Still Life, 5.14b, maybe). Why push that particular Promethean boulder up the hill? Well, Jen was working on sent Apollo Reed, so I needed something fun to do. The route is good, with crimpy, hard climbing for 30 or so feet, leading to the really, really hard part. How hard? I could do two of the five moves. Sometimes.

Well, this weekend, that all changed. A tiny bit. The first crux move, a long pull off a really poor sloping pinch with a heel hook at the lip of the main roof, has always confounded me. Confounded, as in, I couldn’t imagine ever doing the move. I had good company, as the whole route has repelled climbers with far better pedigrees than myself. But this weekend? Well, I nearly hit the first move. And herein lies what is truly cool, addicting, about climbing–the subtly. Was I suddenly stronger? Perhaps, but I doubt I gained that much strength in just two weeks. Instead, I think it was the subtly of my movement. The setup for move is complex–your hands are on a pancake-like hold on the lip of a three foot horizontal roof. Your feet are pasted on the wall below the roof, resting on two fairly good footholds. Your right hand moves about two feet to the right, grabbing the pinch (imagine a half-used bar of soap glued to the rock). Your right foot moves in front of you, stepping on a small edge used previously as a handhold. Squeezing hard with the right hand, your left foot comes up nearly to the lip of the roof, and your left heel sits on another, smaller, pancake hold. The toe of your left shoe then slips under the arch of the roof, camming your foot into the hold. All this time, you are still squeezing the pinch, and forcing your hips into the roof, trying to keep your weight off of your hands.

At this point, you pull with your hands, and your left foot. The pinch feels horrible. You need to reach up with your left hand (this leaves only your right hand, on the poor pinch, to hold you on the wall), to the headwall above the roof, to a small crimpy edge. Then, your left hand needs to move again, roughly six inches higher, to a sloping, triangular hold that represents the “rest” before the remainder of the crux.

Usually, I can barely pull into the pinch and heel hook. Sometimes, I can throw wildly for the edge. But this weekend, it was different. Despite what seemed to be poor conditions (read: a bit of humidity), the pinch felt good. I shifted my weight, set up my feet for the heel hook. My hips were a bit higher, and I locked in the heel, solidly getting the toe cam. Then I pulled, and to my shock, I reached up and grabbed the next edge. Being the third attempt of the day, I fizzled trying to get the next hold, but it was progress.

Progress, you say? Yes. Progress. In a matter of a few minutes, I went from being unable to even visualize the move to nearly sticking the move. Was I close to sending the route? Hardly. But beginning to unlock the puzzle, however small the piece, can make the effort worth it. It’s about the subtly of movement–how just a slight shift in the hips, or the hands, or the feet, makes something that was previously unthinkable suddenly attainable.

Posted on 14 October 2010