the birm*

Because of the overwhelming number of comments, emails, phone calls and mail I’ve been receiving entitled “what do you mean” (in regards to my post about “the house of technique”), I thought I’d explain myself a little.

Adam (adski) has recently put up a “woodie” in his shed (sort of steep short climbing wall made of ply, usually overhanging and usually less than 3 metres high).  A few keen climbers and myself have been going there of a Wednesday night for some “bouldering” (originally this term came from climbing on boulders, for which no rope or protection, except a mat, are needed). Once we’ve warmed up on the vertical section, we move onto the overhanging section. There “problems” are worked on. Problems are a series of holds marked out by a certain colour or piece of tape. One usually starts on one’s bum and 4-6 moves later reaches the top. The “problem” is that some holds are small, others sloppy, others just out of reach and others face weird ways. I’ve been working on a “problem” for the past 3-5 weeks, which I did for the first time last night. I can now move onto a harder one…which is a lot harder (as it has been set by much better climbers than me!). I was only able to do the first 1 or 2 moves yesterday, as I was tired (and it’s pretty hard!). I hope this post will explain the previous one and will ease the panic of my numerous readers! J