Witness the (un)fitness

The days of cold bouldering conditions must surely be numbered. It's been a great season. My best ever without a doubt, with a pleasing list of completed projects and fairly quick ticks. The last time out in Torridon I finished off one of the last problems that I'd had on my season's optimistic ticklist by slapping my way up Wee Baws. Regular use of the board in the shed has definitely paid off. And with that I'm pretty content to put the boulders to bed and start thinking about ropes and harnesses and all that faffery.

Within half an hour of topping out Wee Baws my transition was in full swing and I was slumped on the rope, straining to fiddle out wires while trying to follow Ian up a punchy new route he'd just done on one of the short walls above the boulders. There's work to be done.

I followed up with a pilgrimage to the ever-dry Am Fasgadh the next weekend with Murdo. Despite it being the first time on the sharp-end for the best part of 6 months I just about hauled myself up the Warm Up and tickled the chains on Curving Crack so felt fairly happy with my endeavors.

In a bid to start injecting some endurance into my one-move wonder arms I took Frankie the dog down to Tom Riach for the year's first after-work sessions. After getting reacquainted with There, Back and the Butcher Finish on the SW face and with the trickery of the NW face I started working the Knil, the traverse of the NW face into SW going left to right and the obvious next thing to do after doing the original Link. I was surprised to fluke my way through it on my second visit, so now I need another local project to keep me busy.

Pete turning the arete on Tom Riach's Link.

I kicked off the 2016 trad year with a three day trip to the Peak District.  Here I am getting horrifically pumped on the The Tippler at Stanage. (Photo: Phil Applegate)

The last route of the short trip, the legendary Right Unconquerable. (Photo: Rob Greenwood)