Timing is Everything

(Sandstone Heaven)

Everything in climbing is a question of timing... You need to be climbing at the right speed (not too fast or you'll mess your sequence up and not too slow or you'll get pumped). You have to hit the holds just perfectly or you'll slip off. You need to jam with just the right pressure. If you jam too hard you'll get pumped again and if you don't jam hard enough you'll probably slip out of it and in both cases you'll end up with gobies anyway... believe me I'm now officially a gobies expert.

(my hands are looking good... if only every gobies was a send)

You have to bring the perfect rack (if you bring too much gear, the weight is gonna pull you down and if you don't bring enough you'll get scared or you'll put yourself in bad situations). You also have to place the gear at the right place and at the right moment (you need to place the gear at the waist or it'll be hard to clip and the rope will be in your way as go past it. And we all know that placing the protections in the middle of the crux isn't the smartest idea). Since we can't really rock climb when it's raining, we also have to time the climbing days and the rest days at the right time. Resting when the temps are perfect and being ready to climb when it's raining or snowing is so frustrating... If you don't take enough rest and you'll be out of juice pretty fast and too much rest and your psyche will fade out and you'll turn into an "wanna-be-climber-internet-surfing-blogger-coffee-drinker-couch-potato" like me.

(really good beta for freeWIFI: Moab laudromat...)

I've been trying to "time" my climbing for the last couple weeks... and so far it's not been perfectly right... Well to be honest my "timing" has been really bad. I've been working on and off on Conception in Moab for the past 2 weeks and so far, most of tries (3 or 4) can be describe as follow: I've brought too much gear, tried to place it while in the crux, took too much time in the rests (so my leg got pumped), climbed too slow so I got pumped, then tried to go fast and screwed the sequence up, then over gripped, then got more pumped, then tried to run it out to saved energy and got scared, then more pumped and then finally FELL... Again... With my fingers all gobied I had to take some time off of the route, so I when to climb other stuff, but the psyche isn't there because I'm always thinking about Conception... I don't want my gobies to get worse, I don't want to be too tired and I'm just not that psyche on other routes right now.

(taping up for another try)

(in the middle of Conception, fully pumped)

So instead of messing around on other routes, I decided to take a few rest days and concentrate on growing some skin... I did really well... My skin was almost perfect after 4 days... So after 4 days off I thought I'd be ready to go send, but it started to rain... Bummer. Another day of rest and coffee drinking/facebook surfing... This morning I warm-up on a nearby climb and felt pretty good. I was a bit windy so thought it would be good conditions. I like it when it's windy. What I didn't think of is that the rain would have left a little bit of sand in the crack... I got on it anyway, slipped in the thin-pin-scarred section section and MEGA-GOBIED my finger. This one is gonna take at least a week to heal... maybe more...

(probably my proudest flapper)

(Conception... probably the best line in Moab Area)