Some old school footage from Al Hughes and Al Leary of Neil Carson on the Big Bang LPT for the Welsh channel S4C. Apart from talking through the style of the route Neil talks about how he thought climbing could be in the Olympics. When I was starting out climbing Neil was an inspiring character, climbing well in the UK competitions, sometimes winning them as well as putting up a climb which at the time would have been amongst the hardest in the world.
The Ormes are really coming into there own the past few years with loads of great new climbs being put up on them with 3 friends polishing off really good projects and a new guide coming out it seems an appropriate time for this footage.
The Ormes are really coming into there own the past few years with loads of great new climbs being put up on them with 3 friends polishing off really good projects and a new guide coming out it seems an appropriate time for this footage.
In 2011 I told myself I'd do whatever it took to try and climb the Big Bang. The long repoint style epitomises everything I hated about climbing when I was younger and on moving to Wales George Smith asked if I was going to try it, I said absolutely no way thinking I'd never ever have the physical capabilities and would never be boring enough to spend days and days trying 1 climb. The repeat came after a not inconsiderable effort over 2 months involving no alcohol or cake, waking up before work with my blood boiling for training and worst of all resting on some nice days. At the start of the siege I was onsighting some 8as in the UK and the odd 8a+ abroad and couldn't touch it. Chris Doyle shouted at me that his Grandad could do better, I retorted I'd send him a postcard from the 9th grade.
It's about 8b+/8c to 3/4 height where a fingery crux of V9/10 at the top is reached and you need to be hitting the end boulder problem relatively fresh to succeed. After finishing the siege on the 31st July I 'peaked' smashing through a bit of a performance platuea and for a month or so afterwards no climb felt off the radar in Britain before I went back to normal - bummer. Although I went back to normal it was Carsens brainchild which taught me that a section of climbing which feels like it takes everything can end up feeling easy with enough effort and attitude and led on to the ascent of the Meltdown the year after. The climb had taken me 13 session that year but it ended up saving me time as soon after I climbed routes which would normally have taken me a few days each I could do in a few hours.
Although I followed a vague/flexible structure to my training, rest and attempts it wasn't until afterwards whilst reading some sports science style books where things started to make sense about the siege. The best one I'd recommend is 'Bounce' by Matthew Syed, other than Dave Macleods book obviously. Some good snippets I found useful were:
When the body is put under exceptional strain extraordinary physiological processes are activated.
Top performers take active steps to stretch their limitations every session.
World Class performance comes by striving for a target just out of reach but with a vivid awareness of how the gap might be breached, over time through constant repetition and deep concentration the gap will disappear.
Purposeful practice is transformative
A few key points to performing well for sporting types were:
Setting specific goals
Working Hard
Showing tremendous discipline
Taking responsibility for their actions
Receiving immediate feedback
Putting as much emphasis on technique as on the outcome
It's about 8b+/8c to 3/4 height where a fingery crux of V9/10 at the top is reached and you need to be hitting the end boulder problem relatively fresh to succeed. After finishing the siege on the 31st July I 'peaked' smashing through a bit of a performance platuea and for a month or so afterwards no climb felt off the radar in Britain before I went back to normal - bummer. Although I went back to normal it was Carsens brainchild which taught me that a section of climbing which feels like it takes everything can end up feeling easy with enough effort and attitude and led on to the ascent of the Meltdown the year after. The climb had taken me 13 session that year but it ended up saving me time as soon after I climbed routes which would normally have taken me a few days each I could do in a few hours.
Although I followed a vague/flexible structure to my training, rest and attempts it wasn't until afterwards whilst reading some sports science style books where things started to make sense about the siege. The best one I'd recommend is 'Bounce' by Matthew Syed, other than Dave Macleods book obviously. Some good snippets I found useful were:
When the body is put under exceptional strain extraordinary physiological processes are activated.
Top performers take active steps to stretch their limitations every session.
World Class performance comes by striving for a target just out of reach but with a vivid awareness of how the gap might be breached, over time through constant repetition and deep concentration the gap will disappear.
Purposeful practice is transformative
A few key points to performing well for sporting types were:
Setting specific goals
Working Hard
Showing tremendous discipline
Taking responsibility for their actions
Receiving immediate feedback
Putting as much emphasis on technique as on the outcome
I thought I'd finish by showing some footage from the opposite end of the rock climbing spectrum, at least in terms of scale. Pictures of the big walls were definitely one of the reasons I first got hooked on climbing.
The video below was probably the hardest pitch on Premuir wall which myself, Hazel and Dyer climbed last year. This is pitch 25, overlooking the base of the Nose more than 2000 ft beneath us. The gear for the corner has to be preplaced as its fiddly RPS which would be near impossible to place on the lead. The morning after climbing it Dyer got some footage of Hazel showing how the blank corner can be climbed. The corner is harder than Hazel makes it look being probably 8a+ on its own before finishing with an evil bouldery crack above. Your shoulders and calves are gauranteed a thorough drumming on this corner.
It was a desperate pitch. Climbing the 2nd to last pitch (another desperately slippery 8a+, gear pitch) by headtorch with Hazel and Neil on night 6 stands out as one of the wildest moments in climbing the last few years and the ascent had an element of everything I got into climbing for.
The video below was probably the hardest pitch on Premuir wall which myself, Hazel and Dyer climbed last year. This is pitch 25, overlooking the base of the Nose more than 2000 ft beneath us. The gear for the corner has to be preplaced as its fiddly RPS which would be near impossible to place on the lead. The morning after climbing it Dyer got some footage of Hazel showing how the blank corner can be climbed. The corner is harder than Hazel makes it look being probably 8a+ on its own before finishing with an evil bouldery crack above. Your shoulders and calves are gauranteed a thorough drumming on this corner.
It was a desperate pitch. Climbing the 2nd to last pitch (another desperately slippery 8a+, gear pitch) by headtorch with Hazel and Neil on night 6 stands out as one of the wildest moments in climbing the last few years and the ascent had an element of everything I got into climbing for.
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