On Saturday 26th
November, me and my mum got up and organised today is the 2nd round of the British tooling Series.
We got in the car and headed down
to Keswick in England. The drive was about 2 and a half hours with stopping at
the services where we met some climbers Joe and Kev, also heading to Keswick. Once
we had got to king Kong climbing wall, we signed up for the comp. After we
sorted all the gear out we had a quick look in the shop before others started
to arrive. We went and said hello to everyone, and then went for a briefing. At
the briefing they told us the rules and how the comp worked. We had to wear
leashes, we were allowed to wear rock shoes except from two routes which you
had to kick into ply wood with.
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| Briefing |
I started on route one with rock shoes on. I
managed to get it first go and quickly changed my boots to ones with points on
the front for route two. On route two I could only use holds with carpet behind
it and the ply wood for my feet, my feet could also use holds I had used for my
axes. I hadn't really tried my boots out, because they were brand new so my
first few hits into the ply wood weren't very good but I got the hang of it. I
was at the 3rd last hold on route two and suddenly my axe popped of the hold
and I fell. I moved on to the second route which needed crampons. it was the
same rules but it was slightly at an angle and a lot longer. I got halfway up
before falling off. I decided to try the route two again while I still had my
crampons on. When I got round I tied in as quickly as possible. I had already
wasted time by waiting for routes with long lines so I had to speed my pace up
a bit. I managed to get it second go. It felt easier because I had tried the
longer one. After that we didn't go round them in order only by how hard they
looked. the next one I tried I slipped off and then tried one on the more
slabby wall. I flashed it but found all the moves really long and stretched. I
tried one with really big moves. I got halfway up to wear the icicle was. The icicle
was a bit of wall which hung by itself. I put my axe on the hold on the icicle
and the whole thing moved. I almost popped off only to slip on the move
afterwards. This was one of my favourite routes because the icicle moved and I
had never done a route with anything like that on it. There was a really overhanging
climb that looked really hard do my plan was to leave I till last and try the 3
boulder problems.
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| One of the qualifing routes |
I really like doing bouldering with the axes because I feel a
lot more confident on them than routes, although I still get a wee bit nervous before
trying a hard boulder. I got to the last hold on the first boulder problem
second go and didn't really try it after that. When I got on boulder two I
slipped of near the start but got back on and got to a big move going for a
chain, I could just reach it but as soon as I stretched to hook the chain my
other axe popped off the hold. The same thing happened on my third go but I was
running out of time so I went and tried the third boulder. It was really hard.
it had a sit start where you had no feet and hung on a chain, you then had to
do either a figure of four/nine or lock of before striking into a big log which
was attached to another bit of wood. I got my figure of four sorted then messed
up and over stretched my shoulder. I didn't want to injure it any more so I
went to lockers, sorted my gear and put some heat pads on my shoulder before
having another quick look in the shops.
I was really annoyed because in the end
I never got to try the hard overhang one and also one that I hadn't seen with a
gherkin shape hold. I looked like some massive moves but I was still pretty disappointed
that I never got to try it. we came back from the shop had some lunch, then
went to see the results and finalist. I qualified for finals in second place. My
mum didn't really want me to climb in the final, but its only one route and it
was lead, and since I had been practicing some leading back home with the shmoolz,
I really wanted to try it with the axes again. In the end we agreed I would
climb the final route. I went got all my stuff put in isolation before heading
out to read our route. our route was a slight overhang with some pretty small
holds. I had climbed on the holds before so I wasn't too nervous about them. I
went out second. once I was out quickly
went over the route tied in then got my axes sorted. They already have two
preclips. I made it past the first two preclips then made a further two clips.
I was almost at the third one, but unfortunately I wasn't confident enough
doing the move. I ended up timing out. although when I came off I was pretty
annoyed at myself for not going for the move I was still really happy I got 2nd place and I
didn't find leading as scary. All I have to do now is get more confident. :))
Photos courtesy of Kong Adventure.
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