Here are a few ski pics to whet your appetite for the skiing and touring season..
On 23 Dec I headed over to Wales for a quick day hit with Parnell, Jon Winter and Eric Hildrew. Conditions were top notch, and the weather couldn’t have been more perfect – it was going to be one of those days! Things didn’t start out too well as our intended new route blanked out after half a pitch, so after some time faffing and wobbling I bailed back to the belay. Ian’s turn next, and he fancied a crack at Nick Bullocks route Traversty, an unrepeated VIII from 2006. After a couple of falls he made it across the extremely steep and committing crux pitch, and reached the belay with the help of some power screams as his fingers uncurled from his tools – top effort. I despatched the easier finishing offwidths just as the light faded – a brilliant route, quite short but packs a big punch! Whilst we were having our fun and games Andy Turner and Stu Macaleese made a smooth second ascent of the other Bullock nasty Cracking Up – a savagely overhanging grade 9 on the same crag – Andy’s obviously on good form. (see the DMM website for more details). Eric and Jon also had a top day on El Mancho, and elsewhere it was all going on with ascents of Flanders in the Black Ladders and other hard classics by the local Welsh boys.
Happy Christmas everyone!
Fresh tracks in the Dales
Like many parts of the country, we’ve plenty of great snow around locally at the moment – I’ve done over 1000m of skinning yesterday and today around Kettlewell in the Dales and above home in Otley.
Also built a new sledge this morning, powered by Trab (oh lordy…) - ie a pair of old race skis bolted to bakers delivery crate. Initial testing indicates the need for a damn good runout, coz it goes like a rocket – ie twice as fast as any normal sledge!
Another great Sunday morning charging around in a blizzard – at the annual Stoop Fell Race near Howarth. Everyone took part – me, Sima, the kids and cousin Annie – so a full family day out.
Pic above shows the strength of the field - first Briton in the London Marathon last year - Andy Jones leading, followed by current British Fell Running Champion Robe Hope, then several times previous British Champion Ian Holmes – Rob went on to win, I finished 16th as the 3rd Pudsey counter so we took the team prize.
Plenty of snow already in the Picos De Europa
Just a quick note on current ski availability and early season snow conditions – the Alps has had a good start with plenty of early season dumps, so it’s looking set for another snowy season.
We’ve also been keeping an eye on things over in the Picos De Europa for our touring week in February and there’s excellent cover over there too. We’ve still got places on various trips and tours this winter - check out the Availability page for latest info.
Finally – if you are in the market for new ski kit, then check out our 2010 Ski and Kit Advice Article from earlier in the Autumn. There you’ll find ski reviews and plenty of info on the latest gear developments for the season.
Last week I had a great trip up north with Ian Parnell. We headed into Corrie an Lochain in the Gorms for a bit more early season mixed climbing, and found some pretty tricky conditions with heavily iced cracks and well bonded rime. The weather was on our side though, and we managed to climb a couple of classics: Migrant Direct (starting via the Vicar) and Ventricle. Fine climbing, some night time top-outs (minus one headtorch), lots of fish and chips, and some tired wobbly drives. Standard ingredients of a memorable trip!
Al's 'series leader' race number
We maintained our series lead yesterday, as Team Alpine Guides notched up a second win in the Open5 Adventure Races at round 2 in the Peak District. A bit of a surprise this one - as my chain snapped after an hour on the bike, which resulted in lots of time lost doing repairs as the bike dropped from 36 to 3 gears, then 1 gear and finally none – followed by miles of running, freewheeling and towing to get home!
The run stage went better, but we were both pretty done in from the bike running/towing shenanigans and had to push really hard in the closing stages, to win the male pairs category by just 10 seconds. I cut the chain off with a bolt cutter this morning, so now working out what the repair bill’s gonna be… Hopefully a few action shots from the race to follow.
I had my first Scotish winter trip of the season this week with Andy Benson – on Monday 30 Nov we went for a ramble around on the Ben and ended up below Number 5 Gully Buttress. It was a bitter blue sky day with quite a stiff wind, there was plenty of snow and rime on the crags, and a not surprisingly a lot of ice plastered rock from Novembers wet weather. We had a top day on the FWA of Lysystrata (HVS) - a steep groove system on the left side of the crag giving 2 pitches of steep and technical climbing with excellent protection (approx VI, 7/8). Other teams were getting stuck into Sioux Wall, Babylon, Sidewinder, Tower ridge etc – so things have well and truly kicked off!
Tuesday started well enough, and we found ourselves on the classic Un Poco Loco on Church Door Buttress in Glencoe. Unfortunately, about half way up the second pitch Andy broke his axe and took a nasty fall, resulting in a badly broken jaw. We managed to get off the hill OK, but left quite a lot of rack (plus half an axe..) on the route, so if anyone is up that way we would appreciate its return – cash reward available!
Rich
