Helmcken Falls Wrap Up: WI3+ routes etc.

On Saturday EJ and I returned from Helmcken Falls. Tim Emmett had to head out a day early due to slideshow obligations in the UK, but we all had at the climbing there for another few days. The stoke level is high!

Tim wrapped in from the lip of the falls to see if the "ice" on the headwall was climbable. This year it isn't, mostly snow, but I've seen photos from years where it is. EJ and I bolted sideways for another 30 feet on the headwall before the spray pattern changed, and we had to bail before turning into a long-term feature on the wall. Tim redpointed pitch 4 and said, "I spent $1000 and four days of my life to change my tickets for this trip. That pitch was totally worth it!," And, "This is how BASE jumping used to make me feel." EJ worked the first pitch and said, "This is the best climbing ever. Dude."

I can talk about how good the climbing is forever, but their comments sum it up for me. The ice climbing in the Helmcken Falls cave is just over the top brilliantly good. On the last day EJ and I opened two short "practice" routes on the spray, "Dora the Explorer" and "Sabre." One is a rampy 3+ sorta thing, the other a Haffner-sized WI4 fun ride that goes directly up to the same anchor. I only give grades to encourage those who don't climb M10 or harder to visit the cave; there is opportunity for everyone who can handle the high-risk environment. Both the "easy" routes would make any ice climber smile for the day.

I'm now firmly convinced that grades on ice in general and at the Helmcken cave specifically are irrelevant. If you want to climb WIxx it's there; but a few pillars might grow that would allow no-hands rests, and it would be WIx... Horizontal ice climbing is about like horizontal drytooling, but with more technical feet, movement, and of course it's ice so you either have to swing or use hooks in the ice like any other route. Placements rip, it takes all the skills of normal ice climbing and the power of hard drytooling. The biggest thing I learned on the last trip is that at the "difficulty" end of the ice climbing spectrum is a return to the novice days of ice climbing: it's about the experience, the place, the movement. I know our route is way, way harder than anything I've ever climbed on ice, but harder routes are of course possible, and next year Spray On could be littered with pillars that would make it easier, but no less fun. And a harder route that didn't follow cool features just wouldn't really be any cooler... Grades are useful for rock, but for ice climbing beyond about grade 4 they are somewhere between annoying and irrelevant. Take a look at the photo, climb it or don't. Like surfing, kayaking, skiing, or skateboarding, it's all about the moves, the scene, your friends, life, fun, stuff that grades just don't measure. So, I'm done rating any ice climb after grade 4 with numbers. Words, sure--thin, hard, steep, bad gear, good gear, you can do it, you should maybe do something less serious, but not numbers. Helmcken just blew the building up that contained all the ice grading ego BS; it's harder than all of us, ha ha!

On our route (Spray On) you climb the first pitch, pull the rope through, your belayer walks out across the floor of the cave, climb the second pitch's horizontal roof, your belayer walks out across the floor of the cave again, drop the rope, repeat. Each pitch ends in a place where you can get a solid no-hands rest; the 3d climbing and ice features require relatively short pitches for rope drag and safety. After four pitches the rope is 30+ horizontal meters out from where you started, but you're only 35 meters off the deck! It's madness. Some pitches could be linked. With three or four ropes, a whack of slings and some jiggery you could maybe do the whole thing in one massive pitch, but would it be more or less fun? Harder? Better just climb!

There are hundreds of routes to do down there. It was raining and plus 5 when we left so there's likely not ice much left for this year, but come next year we'll be there. Other people are going to visit the place too I hope, so I'd like to offer a short set of observations we've found useful:

-Don't leave quickdraws or any gear on the wall, or permanent fixed lines on the route or raps on the way in (leave 'em in there for your trip, just not when you leave). This stuff is invisible from the viewpoint or anywhere else, but a few people do walk in there in the summer. With added traffic low-visibility should be a focus. Downclimb pitches so there's nothing on the anchors, etc... This adds work, but is important I think. I would regard leaving gear in there for the summer as a serious failing on the part of any climber. What we're doing is the same as climbing anywhere in a park so no legal issues, just using the best visual style and lowest impact on other users. Although the main complaint so far has been that we're near-impossible to see from the rim where we're climbing, ha ha!

-The whole place is hazardous. You can get complacent about standing under many-ton icicles, but someone is going to get hurt or killed down there, and evacuation will be an adventure. I'm in full "alpine" mode down there; what's happening with the temperature, where is the spray forming new ice, can the cone break off (generally it breaks off to the OUTSIDE), and if so will the car-sized blocks get to us, etc. It takes a few days to start to understand the place at all. Even the five-minute walk to the back of cave (no lie--that's how long it takes to get there from the trees!) could be lethal if you slid down the ice and into a crevasse. This isn't Haffner, it's more like climbing big alpine faces in terms of environmental hazard.

-If the temperature in there goes much above freezing for even a few hours you need to walk out the long way or risk getting smushed. The ice doesn't have the same insulation characteristics as fat water ice and will fall off the roof sooner. Beware.

-Spray ice is weaker than full-water ice, and breaks in odd ways. It only takes a whack from a tool to rip a 40-foot dagger, and that dagger can start other daggers ripping. Rope management is critical; never have your rope running under a big ice feature, even one that seems solid. I've broken out desk-sized blocks I was sure were solid... Putting up new routes is a battle of epic, epic proportions due to not only the angle but also the ice cleaning etc. Some days in the horizontal roof we would only gain about 20 feet for a day's effort. It's worth it, just work.

-The Helmcken Falls Lodge runs a winter special for $120 that includes a room with two beds, two breakfasts, two good dinners, and lots of great hospitality. That's only $60/person for a warm, nice room only 15 minutes from the falls. The owners are good people too, and have really helped us out over the last two seasons, say hello and treat them well 'cause if you go there once you're going to be going back a fair amount I bet...

We're done for the season, but game on for next year. A metal detector will be required to find our old bolts (even some on the upper pitch were getting covered with a light frosting when we left). We'll put up some topos and tricks for finding the base of Spray On (Dora and Sabre should be easy to find every year, far side of the cave)

Back at it today

Helmcken Rematch: Tim walked the 1.5 hours into the top, wrapped in to see if the white stuff was ice, it wasn't, back out with a monster pack, good effort Tim! EJ and I re-rigged the first five pitches, which have not gotten any easier but still have good ice to climb. Tomorrow we add to the route, likely another amazing pitch or two before the turns to frost. Do not want to drytool higher, plus there's the small matter of actually climbing all the pitches! Might start another line or two if we have time, this place is just awesome!

It's a hell of a lot of effort to just get back to our high point. Normally I'd take a rest day tomorrow, but game on! When the ice is good you gotta go at it.

Helmcken Falls Workout

If you have a Plice that you can tilt the following workout is pretty darn fun. All laps start with the heads of your tools 48 inches off the ground or less, butt, one pullup with a lock at the top. This is roughly the same amount of effort required to climb the five pitches we've done so far at Helmcken. And we're heading back today to try and get higher...

Helmcken Falls Workout

Approach: 50 squats with a 1/4 bodyweight PACK, 50 push press w/ 1/4 bodyweight, deadlift 1/2 bodyweight 50 times. Now yer warm, loose and have a slight pump in your forearms.

Chop wood for five minutes, wheelbarrow and stack. (substitute row 500M if you don't have wood to chop. No rower, ground to rack clean the deadlift bar 20 times).

Pitch One:

-6x 30 degree Plice, full solid lockoffs every reach for first three laps.

-20 Knees to Elbows.

Chop Wood for five minutes.

Pitch Two:

-2x 45 Plice, two figure 4s per side per up lap.

-10 KE

Chop wood for five minutes

Pitch Three (continuous)

-1 x45 Plice all campus

-1x45 Plice all Figure Fours

-1x45 Plice.

-20 Front levers to best of ability, done straight through.

Chop wood Ten minutes

Pitch 4

6x30 plice, campus first lap.

20 KE

Chop wood ten minutes.

Pitch 5

4X30 Plice with a 20 Lb Pack.

20 negative Front Levers.

Hike Out:

Finish chopping wood for 15 minutes.

That'll be all.

Mental Tricks

Ice climbing is far more mental than rock climbing, and I mean that both in the sense of, "It's mental mate!" and that ice climbing puts more of a load on the brain. This does not mean ice climbers are smarter than rock climbers obviously... Here are a few brief tricks I've found useful for leading ice.

Be a better climber on toprope than you'll ever have to be on lead.

If you can hike any piece of vertical water ice on the planet on a toprope then you're not going to be losing it too much leading a 70-degree pillar. Put another way, be better in training than you'll have to be in combat, 'cause I can guarantee you that you will NOT perform better under pressure than you will in training, at least in any sport that requires fine coordination like climbing. Running or other aerobic sports maybe, but if you haven't trained to an appropriate level then you won't perform well in competition. And your training had better look like a performance day; lifting in in the gym will not make you a better athlete unless you can use that strength...

Stop.

In rock climbing the solution to most pumpy, difficult situations is to simply try harder and keep moving. I watch rock climbers on ice do this all the time; most ice climbs just aren't all that steep, even the "grade 6!" hype. Stop. Put both tools in. Get some good feet. Shake out. Stem a bit. As the pump drains your mind will open up. Put in a screw. If you're really messed up clip a quickdraw into your belay loop and put the biner on the BOTTOM of the handle, either through the hole or over the pommel. Rest. Once you're mentally back in control start climbing again. It's actually the swinging that is the pumpiest thing about fresh steep ice climbing, if you just slow down and focus on finding either a natural rest or one on your tools then life will be far better.

Climb down two feet.

I've watched leaders turn into mental gerbils while wrestling with a tough bit of climbing when all they had to do was climb down two feet to a rest and look at the situation from a slightly different viewpoint.

Don't start until you can see it.

Look at the climb. Figure out where you'll start swinging, where you'll get a screw, how you'll pull the bulge, where you'll belay, what the tough bit is likely to be and how you'll deal with it, how many screws/slings you'll need, how you'll climb, etc. Then close your eyes and run the climb in your head. If you can see yourself doing it all then you will. If you can't figure it out. Have a couple of plans about how you're going to deal with the ice; "If that's bad I'm going right, but if it's good I'm going right over the top."

Climb Lots.

No matter what sport you do the person doing more of that sport will likely be better at it than the person who does less of it... Ice climbing is hard to do a lot of unless you live near the ice, but there's no other way to get comfortable than to climb a lot of it. A two-week trip will likely make you a far better ice climber than 10 days spread out over two seasons...

And some other stuff, but I gotta go now. Give 'er!

Spray Ice Quick Report

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Helmcken Falls Spray Ice Continues

The last two weeks have been higher speed than usual. Travel, prep, closed roads, full chaos, but Tim Emmett and I have now been at the Helmcken Falls Lodge for five days, and climbing every day. So far the climbing has consisted of super technical radically overhanging ice action to just get a line of gear out the cave. Yeah, CAVE!

We're bolting ground-up 'cause it's too steep to rap, and there would just be no way to find the line from above. It's just nuts, insert expletives here. And we haven't even climbed anything new, just worked and worked. Each time one of us comes down after a bolting session we're just done mentally and physically, battered and bruised and stomped upon by falling icicles

The icicles in Christian Pondella's photo above are anywhere from ten to 50 feet in length. The snow cone is at least 100 feet high. We had to rope up to cross the crevasses, that's how big it all is in there, the scale is just mind-bending. If it gets too warm we're done without climbing anything, but the temperatures are holding, we found last year's bolts under the ice, and it's all ON! We start really climbing tomorrow, but realistically have another two days of prep to get to the top of the ice. Yesterday we sent down tons and tons of icicles, and yet you can't even see where we've climbed unless you're looking at just the right angle.

Seldom have I ever been involved with a route that feels so far out there. Icicles, rock, angles, crevasses? But one thing is for sure: We're exactly where we want to be, have received far more than we dreamed of, and are totally stoked to be doing our best. You don't get too many times like that in life really, yeah! Upward.

New Year's Tips for Ice, ability gains.

Ice Tips:

-Carry more "short" ice screws. The standard rack here in the Rockies used to be a batch of 21cm or longer screws. Now the vast majority of my screws are 13cm, with a few stubbies if needed and one 21cm screw for V or A threads (I don't think it matters much which one you use really). Clear the surface ice to get to good ice and a 13cm BD is as strong as a longer screw or close enough it doesn't matter. Longer screws tend to hit rock and are then ever the same again; it's far better to use a "too short" screw than one that's too long. If I could only have one screw size it would be the 13cm.

-Dig hard to get to good ice for screws. A few days ago I set up a belay in a spot where a lot of other people had done the same; in my opinion almost every screw at that belay station was junk, I broke an "onion" skin off that was 15 cm thick and riddled with holes. In my view many if not most ice climbers don't do enough clearing to get good screws, especially at belays. This is likely what led to a recent situation where three of the four ice screws in the system blew. Clear yer ice, get something undeniably solid or don't bother with the screw.

-Push on the ice with both your hand on your lower tool and by taking your hand off the tool and pushing on the ice to balance, just like rock. I do this a lot, it's intuitive now, but as I teach and coach I remember it's not obvious until it's learned. The long head of my triceps always gets sore from pushing when climbing ice, along with the lats... If you think about rock climbing you'll probably remember all the pushing you do to move up, not just the pulling. Ice is the same, if one hand is pulling the other is pushing on the lower tool or ice...

-Good rock climbers can learn to climb ice a lot faster than good ice climbers can learn to climb rock. I attribute this to the fact that rock climbers already have the fitness, and just require motion training, while most ice climbers are relatively weak. But, while a rock climber can learn to get up about any ice climb in a season or two, just getting up a climb does not mean doing it well. I have seen reasonably competent rock climbers move with glacial speed on what for a good ice climber is 5.5 terrain. I think the real artistry and style of ice climbing is not in just getting up a pitch, but doing so quickly and securely. It's like running--anyone can run a mile, but it's another thing to do it in under five minutes... I would rather see someone climbing well below their max but in total control than someone pushing it on ice, not worth it.

-I'm seeing more and more people top-roping and working on their skills in Haffner and other places. This is great!

-If you don't have a good placement don't pull up on it. The situation will not improve. Make good placements, which are pretty much always possible. I see so many climbers get shallow placement and then pull up on it anyhow, which leads them to place the second tool at the same level as the poor placement.

-Don't yell "ICE!" unless things are getting really western and someone is clearly in danger. This isn't sport climbing, ice is going to fall off all the time, and the shout of "ice" loses its effectiveness rapidly if everyone is yelling ice for every little bit of falling water.

-Finally, watch out for free hangers. I wrote a little about this here.

Performance Gains:

I've been out whacking icicles, dirt and rocks a lot the last few weeks, finally seeing some decent performance gains. My real fitness level likely hasn't changed more than a few percent in the last couple of weeks after the training base I laid down (I managed to train on the broken finger, but that delayed its healing some) over the last few months, but I'm climbing a ton better. Why?

Because most of the initial rapid gains that occur in the gym or in the real world aren't due to strength development but to better movement patterns, better muscle recruitment and more confidence. If you're an athlete who has taken a break for whatever reason and come back to the sport, even years later, you can get back to your top ability relatively quickly if you haven't gained 50 pounds and/or turned into a complete slob. This is more true for technique sports (climbing, kayaking, mountain biking, skiing, anything fun) than more pure endurance sports (road biking and road running, anything involving Lycra and toxic levels of repetitive suffering), but for all these sports the road back to performing well is a lot faster than pure physiological improvement would indicate.

Even on a "pure strength" movement like the bench press the athlete who has bench pressed at least his or her own bodyweight will get back to that level a lot quicker from the same relative fitness level than the novice who has never benched. Old-time coaches used to call this "muscle memory," and while muscles don't remember anything it's still a decent term compared to the fancy sounding "neurological recruitment." So my gains are less due to an improving fitness level than to having done a lot of work in the past, and now reactivating that mothballed programming.

This relates to New Year's in the following manner: If you were once any good at something and make a resolution to get better at it again then you can, and faster than you thought possible. Those years of training and conditioning are still in there; gains will be speedy! Of course you'll plateau eventually, but the barrier to getting truly good again at something you once loved is lower than many think. The pain level, on the other hand, is just as high as ever.

And Happy New Year!

New Year

Ice, Range of Motion, Intervals

Photo to left is of a cool "Plice" (is it a plice if it has ice?) from my bud Tom Comet. And someone needs to tell me how to put photos where I want 'em...

The Christmas tree is already showing signs of pine needle exfoliation, the sun doesn't come up until 8:30, there are beer bottles in the streets every morning and my liquor cabinet is stripped almost bare. It must be the week between Christmas and New Year, which is often a great week for ice here in the Canadian Rockies if it isn't -30. Temps are actually great, lots of friends rattling around, Happy Ice Season to everyone!

Some things to think about relating to training:

Range of Motion: You get what you train.

A few weeks ago I was in Bozeman, Montana and hit a local gym because I had no ice tools, no clothes beyond what I was wearing (thanks United!), and it was too late to scrounge. I note why I was in a gym because going to the gym in Bozeman is silly in the middle of ice season, go climbing already! But in the gym was a guy doing "pullups" by jumping up onto the bar and flexing his shoulders back and forth for ten "reps" at a go. I counted. I couldn't help myself, I asked him if he wanted to do some pullups, next thing he knew I had his feet and he was busting out legit pullups with a bit of a push from his feet. I'm a complete freak for grabbing his feet, but damn, a pullup starts with the arms straight and finishes with your clavicle nearly hitting the bar, elbows behind your front ribs. And full range of motion is not just getting your chin above the bar or bouncing your chest off the bar like a spastic, it's getting your Adam's apple (or equivalent) above the horizontal plane of the bar and at least breaking the vertical plane of the bar with your entire chin, not the dimple on the front of it. If you're a climber I think it's important to lock that top position for a brief moment, especially if you're an ice climber.

One of the best things I've learned through Crossfit is how to scale pretty much any exercise to get full or as close to full range of motion as possible. Doing one full "ROM" rep of any exercise is far, far superior to ten "fakie" reps. A good strong set of full ROM reps done with assistance are 1,000 times more useful than one "fakie" rep done without help. Use bands, use a friend, use the fancy anti-gravity machine, but for God's sake do a real full ROM pullup! Being mentally lazy in the gym will lead to mental laziness in life. STFU and do the full ROM or you'll get no respect from me or yourself, and you know it.

A quick note on "kipping" pullups: Crossfit popularized these, and they kick ass in general. I've seen many people who couldn't do one pullup learn how to do tons of 'em using this technique. But many kipping pullupers fall far short of full ROM, and the full kipping motion may be less useful to climbers if there isn't a brief pause or at least control over the bar. I did a lot of kipping pullups last year and found my lockoff strength collapsed compared to doing "normal" pullups. I now use momentum as I fully buy that theory, but try to get and maintain control over the bar, and keep active, engaged shoulders at the bottom of the pullup. Edit--the main site WODs have had a fair amount of weighted and "chest to bar" pullups in the last while, I think that would address the weak lock off issue that can come with kipping pullups. I just noted that today's workout has L-sit pullups, you can't kip those, that's a nasty workout!

Workouts:

We tilted the plice back to between 30 and 45 degrees overhanging. This is stellar training for both mixed climbing, and radically overhanging ice climbing, which is the current obsession that I'm training for. I can handle day on, day off on the plice, it's more than enough! Here are a few "fun" workouts we've been playing with, useful for working in groups or just keeping the motivation high:

Do a plice lap every minute for as many minutes as you can keep it up. Mentally as well as physically painful. If your plice is vertical either tilt it back a bit or add a pack with 1/4 your bodyweight in it, that'll make it hard enough that a lap every minute will be an adventure.

If you're working out with more people add more exercises. We've been doing a plice lap, then ring dips, then air squats, then back into the plice. Or thrusters, or deadlifts, whatever. Resting is useful for pure power training, but I'm becoming more and more convinced that resting is a waste of time in general when training for sport... Lots in that idea, but rest for power, go the rest of the time. Except when doing the long slow distance sessions. One of the reasons I think specificity counts in training is that "training" is a massively broad idea. Like writing, or engineering, you need to know what you're trying to do, but somehow people think one form of "training" is going to do it for them. "I do TRX." "I do Crossfit." "I do XXXX" Cool, but the definition of what you do is not in the training but in the action, not in the gym but in the real world.

Tabata Training on ice tools:

Get one of those Tabata apps for your phone (one with sound so you don't have to look at it), hang your ice tool over a tree branch, whatever, hang one-handed for 20 seconds, rest ten, repeat on the same hand eight times. This is so much fun... If you can't hang on one hand use two. I ripped this idea off Crossfit too, tons of fun protocols on there for your own training. I don't follow the mainsite WODs at all this time of year, but my training is heavily influenced by the ideas there, plus info from many other sources. Use what works, leave the dogma in the sweat pool.

Right, time to go climbing!

Bits and pieces

Bits and pieces

An interview I did with Gregor over at Some Good Adventure, ranting and raving. Which I seem to be specializing in lately after doing a half-dozen shows from Tofino to London, England in the last four weeks--I'm finally back home and de-spinning from the travel, no place like home! Unlimited good coffee, good food, as much as I love traveling, meeting new people and generally going for it on tour it's always a pleasure to get back home to the Canadian Rockies and my family.

And this is funny, not exactly correct but never absolute correctness get in the way of good writing! Overall I'd agree with the ideas.

Ice Tips for the week:

I taught a few clinics while down at the Bozeman Ice Festival. The Bozeman Festival is one of the longer running, well-attended and all-around fun ice festivals going. Joe Joesephson ran it, did a great job, I'll definitely head back there! But, as always, I learned a few things about teaching ice climbing by teaching it.

Swing your tools, swing your feet. I've always taught a kick done with your toes high so the frontpoints contact the ice, not the toe of your boot. We all learn to kick a ball with our toes low, and as that's the only point of reference that's how people tend to kick on ice. But you swing a tool, and in reality a kick should be done with momentum and is more of a "swing." Bring your foot back, bending at the knee and not at the hip, and swing it toward the ice with your toes high. Swing HARD, most people peck with both their tools and their feet. Ideally there is a ledge to put your foot on, but if there isn't then you need to basically make one for your points. That's not possible without some meaningful violence. Do not be shy.

Unweight the foot you want to move first. I see a lot of people "hopping" their feet on ice. In rock climbing this can sometimes work OK even if it's awkward, but it just won't work on ice as have to kick your crampon points or at least place them extremely precisely in order to get good security. So, move your hips over to unweight the foot, then move it, repeat. Same motion of feet over to the side and then up with the upper arm straight, not a big step up.

Pretty much all steepish climbing is basically versions of the same move: Have a hold in your hand or hands, position your feet to push/pull, and push/pull up with your feet using as little arm strength as required. If you watch someone good drytooling, rock climbing or ice climbing that's what they do... Check this out, and watch from 2:22 to 2:32. He might as well have been ice climbing: hold, feet up, push, grab, straight arm, repeat... Rock climbing has more limited holds and is a lot steep than ice climbing so the movements are different, but I think anyone can see the common ground in the movement pattern. Sharma is one strong mofo, but check out how much time he spends on a straight arm as he sets his feet. The holds in rock climbing don't always allow this obviously, but the trend is clear, cool to watch! The more I climb the more I realize it's all the same stuff under the hood.

Oh, and I almost forgot: Homage to the masters of the pose. In my show I talked about climbing being what I love, and the posing being the work. Blue Steel!

Short clip on squat, stand, swing

I recently wrote an article for Climbing about what I feel is the basic sequence for steep ice climbing: Squat, stand, swing. I'm on a roll today with the video, I just pulled a clip from the Ice Mines video that illustrates this pretty well. When this clip was shot I wasn't even thinking about how I was climbing, it's just how I climb. Kinda cool to see it. Anyhow, here it is:

Grip, swing

A few people emailed to say that my text explanation for how to grip and swing an ice tool wasn't super clear. Here's a fast video shot in my back yard about 30 minutes ago that might help explain the two different grips used to swing and then hang onto an ice tool.

A few additional notes on hanging on and swinging:

-My hand rotates from the "Swing" to the "Grip" position every single time I get a placement and then hang off the tool. Easier than it sounds.

-The tool rotates around my pinky finger pretty much, the middle and index fingers are relaxed.

-The same rules as ever still apply for an overall good swing--elbow at or above the shoulder,fingers, wrist, lower arm, humerus all aligned, look before you swing.

-I underestimated the amount of rotation around the ice tool that my fingers go through. It's not 20 degrees, it's closer to 45 degrees from the "grip" to the "swing" position and then back. I got that wrong in the video.

I shot this right after a training session involving the "splice," or steep plice plus ring dips and deadlifts, and I'm a bit hammered. Thanks to Keith for the help.

Edit a little later--and the reason for the leash on my left hand is that my left middle finger is broken, a leash makes it easier for me to hang on during the training sessions.

How to hold an ice tool, "small stuff."

I've done a whack of ice climbing and coaching the same in the last two weeks, and it's made me think of a few "small things" that make a huge difference for climbing ice. Most of this stuff is in my book or other writing somewhere, but I have to relearn it myself every season.

The basic technique of steep ice climbing is pretty well diagrammed now (Put in a high tool, straight arm, walk feet over and then up keeping arm straight, stand, not pull, up, place high tool, repeat to top) but there are endless refinements. So here's a list of "small stuff" for ice climbing that makes a big difference.

-Look where you're going to swing next and swing there. Probably 90 percent of the people I see ice climbing don't do this. Same with your feet, LOOK before kicking.

-Most people don't swing leashless tools very well, mainly because they wrap their hands too far around the shafts of the tools and the human wrist just won't swing well in that position. This "wrapped" position feels solid and is how you hang onto leashless tools, but it sucks for swinging. If you're climbing leashless, and most people are, rotate your hand around the grip about 15 degrees to the outside or the side or away from your chest while swinging, and rotate it back again to "grip" while hanging on the tool. If you hold your hand in karate-chop or thumbs up thin hand crack position and keep all the fingers straight then move your thumb so it's making a sort of half-oval at the same horizontal level as your index finger your ice tool will fit exactly into that groove. The knuckle on your thumb will naturally be in the middle of your ice tool's shaft. Now close your pinkie and ring finger around the ice tool. The groove between your thumb and index finger guides the swing, the index and ring finger hang on... That's the "swing" position. After planting the tool (and I plant mine, not peck), close all your fingers and rotate your hand slightly so it's easy to hold the tool. That's the grip position. This system works whether you're on Cobras or any other tool I've seen out there. I'm sick of seeing bumbling swings with leashless tools even by otherwise decent ice climbers, no reason for it, we can do better.

-Fluffy pants. Like belaying in a sleeping bag, absolutely dreamy when it's cold out. Love 'em. I have these.

-I just figured out how to describe the last tip in this list, and I'm really stoked about my geeky discovery. Here it is: If your right rear deltoid is feels tight or feels "strung" while climbing I'll bet a dollar that your crampons (edit, ADD strikes) off to the left side of your tool. That "barn door" feeling usually happens when both feet are too far to the inside of the tool, and one foot is lower than the other. So, if you feel "tight" and slightly out of balance while your rear delt (and probably also most of your rotator cuff...) is freaking out move your feet under the tool. Cool, I've been trying to describe this for years but just figured it out. For some the "rear delt" visualization works well.

I could write pages on this stuff (and have!), I just love thinking about ice and working with people on how to climb better--it's an endless challenge to find the right way to explain something to somebody, whether they will be leading grade six this year or have just started ice climbing. And ice climbing changes as our gear and understanding evolves, cool.

In about a week I'm going to do a couple of "Review" and "Gear" issues of this blog. For some reason people I don't even know have been sending me stuff, ranging from foot warmers to little crampons for your street shoes. I have sponsors obviously, and any "review" of their gear would be compromised by that relationship in the justifiably scornful eye of the public, but I'm going to go through what I'm using for this season and why, hopefully that isn't too materialistic. I put links to my sponsors on this page, but there are no ads from them or anyone on here, I try to keep it as honest as I can on these pages.

Looking forward to a show tomorrow night in Seattle at the Mountaineers, and then off to Bozeman for the Arcteryx ice festival there, I imagine I'll see a bunch of you out there!

WG

PS--If you are a telemarker reading this blog, welcome! I sure stirred some people up with the last couple of posts on skiing, it's all good fun, let's SKI!!! The funny thing to me is that I still likely ski better with my heels loose; I only got back into AT skiing a few years ago, and do most of it on my ice boots. 25 years of telewhacking doesn't just disappear overnight.

Still skiing.

This photo is from a ski tour I did with my dad in about 1977 in the Canadian Rockies (maybe Dolomite Pass?). I'm ten years old. The gear I'm on is far less supportive than modern BC NNN gear, the skis have minimal sidecut, and yet the fun level is for sure at least as high as it ever has been, was, or will be. Yesterday I was out with my daughter; I was on high-end XC classic gear, she was on plastic waxless rigs. We both had fun. Skiing rocks, it's not fundamentally about the gear but getting outside and skiing. I want to be clear on that, it seems some people are missing the point that gear is a means to an end, not an end.

That said, function and style are related. Personally, I like using functional gear, meaning gear that fits the use, no matter what the sport. If my goal is to do tricks in a kayak I'll paddle my play boat. Creeks, you want a fat creek boat. Paddling a play run in a creek boat is relatively boring. Skiing flats on AT gear with skins on sucks compared to the same terrain on well-waxed race XC gear. I can not find one place where telemark gear is, for me, more fun, more functional or better fits the "spirit" of what I want to do, at least today. That could change; I did a lot of tele skiing in resorts for a while because it was more fun than alpine skiing there for me and a real challenge, but I burned out on that eventually. That was still a good period in my ski life, no regrets, but not where I'm at now. Function and style are not all exterior, a lot of what forms the definition of "fun and functional" is in the skier's head. Some people want to run sick creeks in low-volume play boats. Cool, I'll watch. I'll skate up skis resorts in the early morning and fly on the velvet on the way down, that's fun too...

Just to clear up where I'm coming from, if I could only have one set of skis/boots I'd run a set of NNN backcountry gear with metal edges. I can ski just about any resort run in North America on that setup (not rip it, but get down OK), ski set tracks, ski the back country, do just about anything. That's the most versatile gear for a solid all-around skier who wants to ski anywhere. Not the best for skiing into ice climbs obviously (have to change boots), but it would work. The learning curve for this gear is brutal compared to AT gear, the best prep is XC race skiing. A lot of people are more into the yo-yo style skiing, or hucking their meat, great! I've got skis for that too, let's play!

Some of the comments on the Teletalk site (ten pages and going strong) seem really defensive to me, like how the insecure and religious act when their God is questioned. Those secure in their faith are fun to talk with; those who scream, "Blasphemy" get old fast. Telemark skiing doesn't need "defending" if it's working for you and you're secure in your belief that dropping a knee gets you closer to god. I just think telemark skiing has gone off in a weird direction, and so far it's not coming back.

I did some telemark racing back in the day, but gave it up when an alpine-racing friend of mine (Jim Grossman, surely one of the more talented skiers I've ever seen) tried on some tele skis and proceeded to shred the course on his first run. He did a "pretend" tele turn, but really just rode the outside ski hard and relied on his years of alpine racing experience. His comment was, "Why not just parallel?" If you have to pose to compete then it's getting closer to figure skating, and that's weak sauce. On hard, consistent snow with big gear tele turns make little sense other than to pose. Trim yer goatee.

But the telemark turn is just as functional, useful and all-around fun to do as ever even if the gear named after it now has little real relation to the turn itself. I use the tele turn more on my lightweight "nordic" gear than I ever did in the last years of my "tele" career; on heavy tele gear I generally just do some version of the parallel turn . The telemark turn is great for dealing with softer conditions on lighter gear. In consistent conditions the parallel turn rules no matter what gear you're on. Telemark skiing to me now means doing tele turns on light BC NNN gear during a big tour; works great.

I was cleaning out my garage yesterday evening (I've got a serious Cultfitter infestation going on, had to make some more room!) and found an old pair of Voile Mountain Surf skis, with cable bindings on 'em. They are my wife's, and she won't get rid of them because, "Old skis are like horses, you can't just shoot 'em!" My old "tele" skis are gone, but I can see her point, even as the dust gathers on the old boards.

And, never forget, I'm a damned ice climber, not a skier, ha ha! The super-steep plice is destroying us!

The Evolution of Skiing: Tele is a zombie.

I just realized that I've been skiing now for 40 years, a hell of a long time. I sorta even remember my first few sliding steps as a kid, it was fun, and even after 40 years I still just love going skiing. I've had some side trips into snowboarding (best sliding tool ever for crusty or weird conditions!), but overall it's always been about skiing of some kind for me. I started out in little leather boots with cable bindings, then mountain touring on three-pin bindings, then a few years of resort skiing on alpine gear, then some XC racing, bunch of telemark skiing (a couple of pretty serious decades in there), then AT gear with ice climbing boots to get to ice routes in Canada. Skiing is a tool, recreation and just fun. But I'm done with modern "tele" skiing.

About six or seven years ago I did a long ski into an ice route in the Adirondacks with my friend Will Mayo. He was on AT gear, I was using some decent tele gear that I'd borrowed. Mayo is a good athlete who truly knows how to ski (he raced XC at one point also), but I got incredibly pissed off that I was having a hard time keeping up with him on my tele gear. We were on wax as it was cold, not skins, and I just couldn't get a good kick because the damn "bill" on the tele gear prevented the boot from flexing properly. Will, on his AT gear with ice boots, could get a great kick and use far better technique as he could also ride the ski with his leg vertical over it instead of having his lower leg canted forward in the stance most tele boots induce . I about hucked a lung chasing him, and cursed the tele gear for what it had become: a great thing for riding chairlifts and skiing down, but useless for actually traveling in the mountains. This struck me as somewhat ridiculous; how did equipment that had, in my childhood, been a great way to travel in winter become so useless for anything but going down?

Then I had a day where I skied out from an ice climb in my ice boots. There was a nasty breakable crust, some heavy whipped snow, and other junk. With my heels locked down I could get through it reasonably well; it would have been a pain in the ass with any but the heaviest tele gear. The light went on, and I sold all my tele gear that year.

Modern light AT gear is now more efficient, lighter, and allows more confident and functional skiing in any situation I can think of when compared to tele gear. If a day involves more up and down than flat terrain I'll use my Scarpa F1 boots, light Dynafit bindings and Black Diamond Guru skis. Somebody is going to argue that modern tele gear is better, but the bindings and boots are still heavier for an equivalent amount of function. The BD O3 and other bindings at least have hinges to allow for a more efficient stride on the flat, but locking your heel down just results in more skiing control and function for less weight than any tele combination going. End of story, tele is dead unless you have a goatee and ride a "Fixed" gear bike (which, by the way, always reminds me of neutering a dog--what's up with that name?). Tele is now about style, not function. Snowboarding is a pain in the ass in the backcountry but at least has some useful function in junk snow, tele skis don't even have that benefit.

So what to use?

I've done a few of these "ski mountaineering" races, and they are a lot of fun. These races are mainly up and down, so light AT gear makes sense. Some AT courses could probably be won by a good Nordic racer on nordic gear, but there are gear limitations in the rules, and most of the courses have serious enough terrain that AT gear is for sure faster. If your object is to "yo yo" up and down then I'd say light AT gear is the way to go. If you want to huck your meat in the back country then heavier AT gear rules. Some people are into the "it's all about the down" idea, but I'm still enough of a geek to enjoy trying to ski on light AT gear.

At some point skiing becomes more about skill than supportive equipment. Little kids can't stand on their skates well until they learn to balance, and I see many skiers who can't ride a flat ski without a lot of support. Many of the best heli-ski guides I know don't even buckle their AT boots; they just ride the board well, and ski smoothly. That seems logical to me. I am not a great technical skier by any stretch, but years of XC skiing and skiing around in the mountains on ice boots have given me some decent survival skiing skills. I still remember a Swiss guy named Michele absolutely shredding steep gullies on ancient, narrow Fischer XC skis and some 3-pin bindings 30 years ago. I don't know many people who could ski terrain like that half as well today. At some point skill at actually skiing trumps the gear. My friend Pat Morrow is a die-hard tele monster, and although not a young pup anymore he can hang with pretty much anyone in any steepish terrain. The point is that anything will work, but what's the most functional for the weight?

The logical setup for big glacier tours without really difficult terrain is, in my opinion as always, the NNN gear. Every couple of years a few friends and I go down the full Wapta traverse in a day. We've tried several different setups, but the NNN gear is by far the best for this type of skiing. People often ask me, "But don't you need big boots and AT gear in the mountains?" I first skied the Wapta when I was 12 on light leather boots with little cable bindings that allowed for a decent kick; the whole setup probably provided far less support than modern NNN gear. Heavy AT gear is overkill in almost any situation I can think of except lift-served or heli skiing terrain.

What made me think of all of this is that I just got home from London, where the trees still had leaves, and found a foot of snow on the ground here in Canmore. It's time to SKI, and I'm still as stoked about that ideas as ever. Skiing is fun. Even if you're a bark-eating, meadow skipping face-planting tele skier. See you out there, let's get the turns ON! And it's ice season too, options again!

PS--Roger Strong is an exception to all of this.

More Plice

I'm really psyched to keep receiving photos of the Plywood Ice "Plice" that people are building around the world, really cool! I recently wrote an article for Climbing (out soon I think) about training for steep ice climbing; the gist of it the article is that climbing a lot of ice would be the best training, followed by some sort of wall (plice), followed by replicating the movements (which we can all do on the playground or with any brick wall out there) followed by weight room training. Periodization (focusing on when to peak, rest, refresh, build and so on), like any sport, is important to prevent burnout and injury, but most performance gains for ice climbing come from skill and muscle recruitment, not pure strength.

Anyhow, here are two more pictures, psyched for everyone getting it on! The season has started here in Alberta; I haven't been out 'cause I broke my finger, but I have been training on my own plice with a wrist loop, all good!

Photo Credits: Hagen and Taylor

Plice, Core, Travel

First off, specific training rules for performance results as measured by time expended and real-world results. I received the photos of a Pennsylvania "plice" (plywood ice, like the one in my back yard) today, so cool! Nice one JW! Total cost: $82. No excuse not to have one.

Next, I don't think I did a very good job of differentiating between "core" strength, body tension and "abs" in my last post. So I'll try again to clear it up in my own head.

People wouldn't have to work their "core" if they just did exercises that build a strong core instead of isolating muscles with exercises that exclude the "core." Basically, almost every exercise done sitting down (even on a ball, maybe especially while balancing on a ball) is getting rid of the body's natural "core" function, and will therefore result in a weak "core."

Do squats, deadlifts, front levers, your core will be plenty strong. Do hamstring curls, exercise ball ab curls, exercise ball flys, etc and get a weak core and strong extremities, which leads to problems that may require "core sessions" to fix.

Put another way, if someone does leg presses, hamstring curls and leg extensions they are doing exercises without using the "core" and will have to work on that on a ball. Isolation breeds imbalanced weirdness in a body. Do squats, deadlifts, knees to elbows and your "core" will get strong at the same rate as the extremities. If your "core" is weak while doing any basic movement it will be the limiting factor in the exercise, and will get stronger. Cool.

Body tension is the ability to put your feet on the wall from a hanging position in a roof or steep terrain, and then to keep 'em there. Front levers and deadlifts are good for this. Even better is to climb steep terrain.

"Ab strength" is only part of the puzzle in body tension or "core" strength. Body tension must be trained as a whole; training abs to do crunches is worthless without also training the shoulders to hold the load. Doing L-sits is better than doing crunches because it also engages the leg flexors, but again misses the shoulder/lat component, and then again the hamstring lower back engagement (although it has more of that than twitching around on a ball with one side of the body supported).

I used to think isolating muscle groups was good. It is, for a body builder. For an athlete it's all about training muscles t0 work together to produce useful power.

I'm happier with those definitions and ideas.

Otter, Westjet

I flew to and back from an athlete meeting in Tofino on Westjet, with a leg on Harbor Air. It was pretty pleasant overall, especially the Harbor Air leg on a old Otter on floats. I was in the seat right behind the cockpit, and got to watch all the dials. Because I'm close to my private pilot license I was able to understand a lot of what was going on; flaps, fuel, prop, etc., all pretty much the same. I kept searching for the RPM dial, which is really important on a piston plane, and finally figured out the Otter was a turbine... No huge RPM dial, ha ha!

The Westjet legs were good. I've got no status on Westjet, but as usual there were flight issues etc., what would have cost me $lots on Air Canada only cost me $50 on Westjet. Thanks for that.

Exercise balls are stupid, "Core Strength"

My ideal training environment has the following in it:

Some sort of ice climbing simulator thing (Plice).

A place to run around outside.

Rings, both Rock Rings and gymnastic rings, place to hang 'em.

Some weight and a bar. A stylie set of Olympic bumper plate weights would be nice, but I've got a bunch of weights we got at garage sales for pennies. They work fine.

Anything after this is gravy. Really. Exercise balls, machines, etc. etc. are somewhere between comfortable accessories and shiny garbage. It's nice to have a squat rack and stands and so on, but it's not necessary. I go work out with my friends down at Athletic Evolution when I want the comfortable gear or a controlled environment (or for fun, good people), but you don't really need anything more than a jungle gym at a kid's playground and a rock. Or a tire.... There are a ton of wicked workouts here that don't require any gear at all.

I figure that about 90 percent of the machinery in the average health club is wasted space. Movements should be done as you do them in real life. A squat is not composed of a quad extension and a hamstring machine, it's a movement that involves just about every single muscle in your body working together. I generally reject Crossfit T-shirt slogans (you shouldn't wear T shirts with bad-ass statements on them unless you're a bad ass) in general, but "machines are the enemy" is a good one.

Anyhow, I had a long discussion with a guy on a flight the other day about all the junk in gyms (he was convinced a lat machine was better than a pullup), and it bothered me so you get to read about it. The most ubiqitous POS in the gyms I visit while traveling (and I do visit 'em even if I can barely see the micro free weight area over the sea of machines) is the exercise ball. Exercise balls should only be used for rolling target practice at 200 yards. Want to involve some more muscles in a situp? Do a front lever or a knees to elbows or a windshield wiper or whatever. If you can't do that then sit on the floor and try to balance on your own butt while picking your feet up. Anything can be scaled. Rolling around on a ball is only extremely useful for sports that require rolling around on a ball. Are you working out to get stronger in a useful way or working out to get better at rolling around on a ball?

But rolling around on a ball is better than rolling around on a couch for sure, so right on if you find it fun to get your ball on...

Now on to "core strength" as it relates to climbing and balls. I often get into discussions with people who think their "core" is weak for climbing. They usually can't get or keep their feet on an overhanging wall. Most "trainers" will prescribe rolling around on a ball like a spastic to increase "core strength." The ability to get your feet on a wall while climbing is NOT determined by your abs or anything having to do with that ball anymore than your ability to do a squat is determined by hamstring curls. To put your feet on the wall you need to be able to do just that motion--hang on two holds, swing up and place your feet and hold them there. You need more shoulder strength and front-lever style training than anything else. You could have the abs of a ball exerciser and not be able to do shit about getting your feet on the wall because, like the hamstring curler, the whole system has to work together. The shoulders, not the abs, are almost always the weak link. If I see one more "core" exercise for climbing that does nothing for actually climbing I'm going to burn the magazine I see it in on the spot. At least I'll be able to work out in my jail cell.

I had coffee with a good bud of mine, Greg from Crossfit Canmore, yesterday, and he made an interesting point that deadlifts improve his "body tension." I had to think about this for a minute, but he's right. If you've ever done a lot of steep-wall training for climbing or deadlifting you'll notice that your hamstrings and lower back muscles (not joints or ligaments, muscle) will be sore the next day. Front lever training gets your feet on the wall, but holding them there takes a combination of dead-lift hamstring/back contraction (and every other muscle involved in that motion) and shoulder tension. If you had bomber footholds you wouldn't even need any shoulder strength once your feet were on the wall, it's all back and legs. Many good rock climbers I've trained with are disproportionately strong on their deadlifts; I think this is because they have strong body tension and REAL "core" strength.

My measures of "strong" core strength would be this:

-Can do 15 knees to elbows in row (and not swinging spastic knees to elbows, controlled leg lifts), or hold a half-front lever for 10 seconds.

-Can deadlift 1.5 times bodyweight.

Anyone who can do that is not in general going to have any problem with "core strength" or body tension in life or while climbing. Very steep routes or tougher forms of life may require more than that.

So, if you're a climber that has a hard time holding your feet on the wall practice by hanging onto two good holds in a roof and swinging your feet up and "catching" holds with them, repeat with holds to the side, etc. The good news is that this strength does come relatively quickly compared to pullups or something. Some deadlifts may also help, as will knees to elbows etc.

Send your used exercise balls to me, I'll take good care of them.

Travel, Social Media, Learning to Fly

I haven't been

writing lately because I've been traveling a ton, trying to finish my private pilot's license (maybe by December at this rate!), training a bit despite a really gimpy foot, etc. Plus writing about four articles for various publications, prepping for shows, climbing (went drytooling yesterday!), planning for 2011 and some other stuff like being a dad and finishing house projects. Life is great really, but sometimes there's a lot of it to wrestle all at once. I feel incredibly lucky every damn day to be alive.

Social Media:

I've been on Facebook for a year, and it's a fun combination of voyeurism, communication, posing and public heckling. I've also got this Twitter feed thing, Linkedin, and some other stuff I can't figure out what the hell to do with. But at some point I have to ask this: Is all of this communication making my or your life better? More fulfilling? I'm still working through that one, and while I do there's this cool vid on Facebook I've got to watch... Attention Deficit Disorder and the internet just had to be made for each other, it's brilliant. What were we talking about?

Paragliding:

Over the years I've had a lot of people ask, "How do I learn to fly paragliders?" I wrote the following over the years to answer that question, here's what I generally send back.

What I tell everyone who wants to fly is this:

-Flying is "time expensive," especially when you're learning. It's going to eat about a minimum of 100 hours of your time to get going, plus dicking about driving to and from the hill etc. Once you've got basic skills it's about the same entry cost as skiing without the lift ticket prices.

-Flying is the only sport I've ever done where you absolutely must complete a good instruction course or you will die. You may die even with good instruction. The risk is comparable to riding a motorcycle, but as the air is invisible the dangers just aren't apparent without some good schooling. You'll likely survive learning how to climb, kayak, cave, even maybe ride a motorcycle, but good instruction is critical to staying on the right side of the odds bet in the air.

-It's very addictive. You may quit your other sports, spend money on tickets to warm places with thermals, and generally squander all kinds of time and money. In fact, you'll need to do this for a couple of years to get a solid base level of skill.

-Don't buy equipment until you have your basic ratings. Even then use the school's stuff for as long as possible, and then either buy used from the school if you've got Moroccan bargaining skills, or have an experienced friend help you buy stuff off the web. You can get a solid used setup that will get you through your first two years of flying for about $2-3,000, and which will actually be worth something when you sell it 'cause you will want to upgrade, maybe $1500. If you have a fat wallet then by all means drop the $6K on new gear, your school will love you as they often make more money on gear than on instruction, good to understand this.

-If it's sumer and the weather is reliable in your local area learn there. If the weather is not super reliable in your local area then go someplace where it is more reliable for two weeks and fly your brains out, get the basic ratings done, then continue your training locally. I like Point of the Mountain, Utah, and Santa Barbara, California in general. Lots of other good schools out there too and this is not meant to slight anyone, just that these two places have a selection of schools so you can find one that fits your personality, and the weather is generally reliable in both places. A good relationship with your local operator is important; even if you get your ratings somewhere else you'll still want to get onside with your local school/shop/guru. Paragliding likely has the most retarded politics of any sport I've ever been involved with at the school level, it's insane, but there it is, better to just recognize it and do your best to work with it.

-Your learning is really just starting when you get your basic ratings; if you can find a good local crew of pilots to fly with you will progress faster, have more fun, and be safer. I owe a huge debt to the all the "crows on the fence" at the two places I really learned to fly, everyone does. Do NOT be the guy who knows it all, you suck and will for some time. On the other hand some very good pilots are also idiots, you'll likely figure out who is helpful and who isn't pretty quick. Buy the guys who are helpful beer, they will become more helpful. If someone yells at you in the air figure out why, and remember that in the US a significant percentage of the pilots are armed. In Canada they're just fierce and don't need guns.

-I do not regret one hour of time I've ever spent in the air. It's great, have fun, stay open, learn, yeah!

Right, I'm back on the blogging train, yeah! I hope your fall is going well, it's finally Indian Summer here in Canmore, which is gorgeous after a truly horrendous August and September. If we hadn't had the last two weeks of good weather I'd be booking tickets to Vegas or something, it was truly a dire late summer here in the Canadian Rockies. But now it's perfect, stoke!

Some words on shoes...