Sweet "New" Area and Epic Failure at Black Mt (AND 1 SEND! UPDATED)

UPDATE about Saturday: Saturday, Brett, Marina, and Matt drove up to Black Mt to try to close the book on a few of their projects. If you've been following this blog, you've seen countless photos of Brett and Marina on Tour de France sit and stand, respectively. Well apparently it was a good day for the crew, and Brett sent TdF sit first try of the day for his first v10! Congrats dude! I wasn't there to capture the action, but here are a couple of photos shot by Drew Mylrea of one of Brett's better goes:

Brett almost doing Tour de France, a couple of weeks before his actual send. 

What's so funny, Brett?

Sunday, Jeff and I met up early, scarfed some breakfast burritos, and hit the road for another day up at Black Mt.

We warmed up on a couple of nice moderates on perfect rock on the slope just below the lookout tower, at the top of the talus slope that leads down to Ex-Patriot and beyond to the Lion's Mane.
A nice long v4 lip traverse in this sector has become one of my favorite warmups. There is also a v4 stand start on the same boulder that begins with right hand on an okay crimpy pinch and left hand on an undercling hueco. I did the obvious, yet not-so-stellar, matched undercling stand/crouch start, which may or may not have been an FA. If it was, I'm not going to pretend it was noteworthy, but it was a pretty hard 2-move wonder, probably v7-ish.

From here we went over to the vertical dyno above the visor, which Jeff came painfully close to sending multiple times.

Contemplating the dyno

The setup

Aaaalmost there

From this point we headed down to Ex-Patriot, but it had just gone into the shade and was still feeling somewhat warm. We ran up the slope to find Anthony Tarascio and Ian McIntosh working on a rad project with a steep overhang followed by a patina face that looks somewhat like a giant tortoise shell. Unfortunately, I left my camera down at Ex-Pat, so there are no photos of this rad project or all the other boulders I'm about to describe.

From this project we ventured around the corner to where we found another group of friends in a cool corridor of boulders, with a high concentration of great problems including a nice tall v2 slab, a tall v4 face, a nice looking v6ish sloper problem, a steep and crimpy v7 or 8 and a very tall, intimidating/balancy v7. I hadn't brought my shoes over, as I wanted to save my skin and strength for Ex-Patriot. After it cooled off a bit, we headed back down to my nemesis. 

I gave Ex-Patriot several tries, 7 in total, almost twice as many as last time...

... unfortunately, I didn't stick the left gaston crimp that you can see me falling after in the video from last week. My core just felt too tired for some reason, so it will have to wait for another day. There are lots of videos of my attempts, but since there is already one posted of me getting to a higher point from last week, I probably won't post any of them. 

Before we packed up and hiked out for Anthony to go try Man is a Bastard, he decided to give Ex-Pat a "why not" burn. (He has already done the problem.) Below are some pics of his VERY different beta, right up until falling. (That'll teach you to try to re-send my projects in front of me, Tarascio! Muahahaha)

Anthony going out left to the tiny crimp that I skip

Matching on TOP of the block.

Skipping my crux move to the left gaston, and coming up just a little short of the right hand crimp.

The "Once Upon a Time" boulder, as seen from "Ex-Patriot"

After hiking out to the cars, we drove down to the OK Corral, so Anthony could give a few good goes on Man is a Bastard. He came agonizingly close, grabbing the jug at the apex of the big dyno twice, but not quit latching it well enough to stick it either time! 

Cleaning the crimp on Man is a Bastard

First move

Setup for the dyno

SO CLOOOOSE!

Although nobody  neither Anthony or I sent any groundbreaking projects this week, it was another fine day at Black Mt. The conditions were slightly less than ideal, so the good news is it's only going to get better until the first dump of snow closes the gate and blocks entry to the upper areas of the mountain.  

Stay psyched everyone, the season is in full swing, and maybe some day soon this blog will have some media of some sending to share again!