Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Sends and Near Misses at Black

UPDATED  to include a second Ex-Pat fail.

Sunday was another day of fun at Black Mountain. The temps keep getting better, and it was pretty chilly by the end of the day. Kris, Anthony and I were joined by our new friends Luke Cudney and Cerre Francis, freshly transplanted from SLC, and we were looking forward to giving them a good tour of Black Mt.

We started by heading over to the top of an amazing chute of boulders that starts essentially right under the summit lookout tower and goes all the way down past Ex-Patriot and down further to the Lion's Mane (approached from the OK Corral, the lower parking spot.) 

After a quick warm up, we headed over to a hard compression problem at the top of the boulder-strewn slope. Anthony had done the stand start two weekends ago, and was able to put down the sit start to Little T's Big Bulge first try of the day, at a suggested grade of v9. 

Anthony on the first move of "Little T's Big Bulge"

The move to the heinous sloper

and from the sloper to the upside down pinch

Crossing to the crack



Anthony is psyched for the FA

Petri found a piece of wood shaped like a piton

From the bulge we went up the hill to a couple of little dyno problems. Not sure of the name or grade of the first one here. I've done it before and there are some pics of it on this blog from maybe a year ago too.





The second dyno, Face Meat, v6. Dan Mills told me he did a sit start to it, which, given the size of the "holds" on the lower part of the face, looks really freaking hard.

Luke Cudney sticking "Face Meat"



Kris Linstrom sending the same


I wanted to go give Ex-Patriot a few goes, since we were in the area, but first we stopped to show Cerre and Luke The Visor.

Luke Flashing "Center Visor," v6

Cerre on "Center  Visor"

From here we went down to Ex-Patriot (v11). I took 4 burns, doing all the moves with overlapping linkage, after being boosted through the first couple of moves after falling on my 3rd go. My last attempt was my best yet, falling literally one move from the finishing jug! I must have just been tired from the previous three attempts, as my foot unexpectedly popped off a pretty good foot hold. Alas, another one I have to go back to, but at least it looks like I'll finally do it soon.

Here is a video of my best attempt so far. My apologies in advance for the profanity.



EDIT: Here is how the second part of Ex-Patriot (the way I think of it, after matching on that block in the roof) should be climbed. Got tired and dropped in an attempt to save some juice for the send ... the results of which you can see above.



At sunset we found ourselves down at Dark Horse (v10) for Anthony to give it a few goes. Unfortunately, none were quite successful, but I'm sure he'll send this one soon too!
Video of what most of Anthony's attempts looked like.


Stay psyched everyone, and maybe we'll see you at Black Mountain next weekend!


3 comments:

  1. Ex-patriot is mega! Awesome vid. You'll do it soon, for sure, Isaac. I have got to get down there! Tell Luke and Cerre that Noah says hey! we are old friends...

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  2. Yeah it's rad. Thanks dude, I hope so. I updated the post with a short video of my attempt just before the last one. Come on down any time! I'll send your regards!

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  3. Another great day in Black Mountain. You are so close on Ex-Patriot!

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