Thursday, January 26, 2006

New Route in Italy, Canadians in Mex, Oil in Iran

Canadians in Mexico

Are kicking ass en masse at the paragliding comp down in Valley, very cool. Nicole Mclearn is providing updates here.

Big New Mixed New Route in Italy

Albert Leichtfriend just emailed me a description of a wicked new 5-pitch mixed route he did in Italy's Dolomites, crazy ice and mixed from M8-M11+ ("real" grades, not trickery grades, he did it bareback as usual). He's having a great year, I'll see if he's OK with posting
details/photos.

Hard New Route in Austria
Marcus Bindler is really, really strong... I bet this is hard.

Iran and Oil

Here's an interesting perspective (thanks to Stoltz for sending it) on Iran, or rather why the US is really all wound up about Iran (it's not nukes..). Yep, it's all about oil. I've read this theory a lot over the last five years, the summary is that oil is traded in dollars, and this provides a huge free line of credit to the US. If oil were traded in something other thna $, like the Euro, that line of credit would come due in a nasty way.

Cars:

Decided to go with the Toyota Matrix, it's time to get a good little Japanese econo box and stop spending so much money driving around in circles... Thanks to everyone who sent notes and such, fun readin.g

Workouts:

FINALLY back in the game after a full week of death-by-cold suffering. Went for a good walk up the hill behind the house, then got it on at the climbing gym late in the evening. Bouldered for a while with actual shoes and chalk, it's clear that mixed climbing does nothing for finger power... Then did laps in the drytool cave (well, only three, but that's a start) followed by a brief power session. I don't want to get sick again so I didn't push hard, but for the first time in a week I did not get weaker yesterday. From what I can figure training is kind of like alcoholism--one day at a time, get back on the horse if you can't stay there for some reason. OK, shite analogy, grin.

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