Last days of the year.

I spend the last days of 2016 working in a project I tried earlier this year. Last May I climbed Toit de Cul de Chien and thought that ‘the other roof’ would also be within my reach. I struggled back then and couldn’t do the long move to the pocket on the top. So, with two days left in 2016 I went back and tried the boulder again. It threw me down many more times but I persevered and finally was able to do the long move to the pocket. I enter the new year with a good feeling.

I wish all of you a great 2017 with many happy sends.

Good days and bad days

In between climbing trips there is only plastic when you are living in the Netherlands. Our country is as flat as a pancake without any rock, but we have a tremendous amount of climbing gyms. So I busy myself training on plastic.
Some days are good, I feel strong and can do amazing boulders at my home gym. Some days are bad. I guess we can all relate to those high gravity days when noting works out. Every boulder you try, no matter what the grade, feels really hard.
The movie below shows me having one of those days.

I am entering a full week of school exams, but after that I can relax over Christmas and New year with two weeks of outdoor bouldering. Really looking forward to that, I hope for dry and cold weather with a breeze coming from the East so I can stick the slopers in Fontainebleau.

Fontainebleau Autumn break - 2016

I had a nice time in Fontainebleau last week. The weather was good but the rock was moist so conditions were not optimal. I sampled a number of projects but kept slipping of the holds which was frustrating. But lowering my ambition and trying 7A’s instead of 7B’s and 7C’s made for a pleasant week. I did some great boulders and enjoyed the company of my NIHIL buddy Trevor. I finished the week with a really cool dyno and returned home a happy man. Now it is back to business: school and learning for exams. My wish list of boulder problems is growing, there are so many nice boulders. We will be back in Bleau over Christmas and New Year, hopefully with better conditions. I am already looking forward to that.

More pictures can be found HERE 

And a movie of my trip can be viewed below.
Thanks for reading and watching.

NIHIL Training camp/photo shoot

I just returned from Fontainebleau were I spend a week with my sponsor NIHIL. They organised a training camp / photo shoot. It was truly wonderful. The sun was shining each day, the food was good and we stayed in a lovely gite. Being the youngest member of the group and surrounded with lots of good climbers was an amazing experience. It is very motivating to see the strong climbers of the team send hard problems. It is in a way a bit frustrating to see them flash the boulders that I consider my projects but also nice to get some good and different beta.

I didn’t climb a lot of hard problems and I have not found my ultimate 7C yet but I sampled many. My wish list with boulders for Bleau is getting bigger and I hope to send some nice problems during the coming autumn and Christmas breaks. I did do l’œuf and canonball, see movie below.

Special thanks to Rene and Irene for organising this beautiful week and to Duncan for keeping me company, driving me around and spotting me in some crazy boulders.