Wellington

Teenage Mutant Ninja

Ω JJG has been busy at the Rak:

The Code of the Samurai (V9/10) and Boilerplate Sit Start (V9) from Josiah Jacobsen-Grocott on Vimeo Ω

Ω Matt Tait has recorded a new 7C+ (a sit start to Sharik Walker’s Firestarter problem) on the Pukerua archway. He says: “I thought it was pretty stiff doing it starting from the two pockets so would have thought it to be a hard 7c . I also tried it from inside the cave with a sit start and thought it might be 7c+ but perhaps at the softer end of the scale… With the sit start, making the pockets, setting up feet for the move out to the chicken head and walking you feet up to make the toe hook is all a bit harder… so don’t man if there was a grade 7c/7c+ for the sit down start I would give it that. cheers, Matt”. I’m not sure Firestarter has had any other ascents? Not sure the local bogans care much Ω

Rak Attack

Ω JJG has been on a Rak rampage, repeating Raw Iron V8 (third ascent after James Morris repeated it), Kompressor Arete V7 (second ascent), Supersonic V8 (second ascent) and Boilerplate V8 (second ascent). He’s also added a start and a finish to Raw Iron, to produce this:

Raw Ruthenium (V9) from Geoff Jacobsen on Vimeo Ω

All Credit

Ω All credit to Kristen Foley (BBQ), Kevin (guide printing and logistics), Tomo (courier services), Nina (first aid) and everyone (all 23 of you) who entered the first (and only) Rak Hop yesterday. You were awesome. Most awesome was Amie Jones (female expert champion), JJG (male expert champion) and the other category winners (results will be on the NBS site in the next 48 hours).

Completely not awesome were all the people who didn’t come to the competition. I can think of lots of people who should have been there but were not. Excuses? No doubt. Good ones? Probably. But the bottom line is that if people don’t support these events they wont happen. Maybe people think that’s a good thing. I can’t see how scrapping a social day on the boulders followed by a BBQ and beers is a good thing, but then I’ve always been a little different.

Either way, after stints running comps at Jardines (back in 1998!), Baring Head, the entire NBS and most recently the Rak Hop, I’m done with organising bouldering competitions. I can’t be bothered if others can’t be bothered to turn up. Finito.

Oh, and who ever has my black hoodie fleece, can I have it back please? Ω

WX

Ω There is a prospect of a brisk southerly change at the Rak overnight. Do not let this put you off. Unless it’s chucking down, the comp will proceed as planned. One advantage of having a bouldering area in a windswept wasteland is that it’s a windswept wasteland. Rain drops fear the Rak!

I’ll be out there at sparrows and will update this site and the NBS site if conditions are not conducive to crankage.

See y’all tomorrow! Ω

Who Will It Be?

Ω Two more sleeps. Who will it be? Who will win the inaugural Rak Hop Womens and Mens Expert comps?

In the womens, there are short odds on E.P-H (aka the hyphen), if she doesn’t have to work at Fergs. If she does have to work, the field is wide open. Or will Kate Sinclair have something to say about that? What ever happened to Emma Hawke - will she make a surprise return to competitive bouldering? Will T-bag jet back from Czech to straight-arm her way to glory? Or will a dark horse emerge from the pack?

In the mens, the big show down should be between Tomoya and JJG. Will they both (re)climb Allison Wonderland? Will James FM make a guest appearance (as promised) to spice things up, or will his busy interview schedule prevent that. What about StuartKurth.com? Will he megadownload on Wellington’s hardest lines? Will David Kopp come out of retirement to finally claim the spoils he so richly deserves? Or will the Vostinar join our dimension for just long enough to climb everything that moves?

All will be revealed on Saturday (including the hokey little trophies I’ve made for the winners!!) Ω

Update

Ω This is the moment you’ve all been waiting for! Maybe. Either way, the new Bronx guide is here and available for download on the Guides page. You’ll find fresh new problems (the holds fell off the old ones), topos and photos. Plus I’ve corrected a few errors and updated a few grades here and there.

ALSO the guide will double as the route list for the Rak Hop next Saturday (no I wont be chalk-lining 160 odd problems). I will have copies on competition day, but if you can, please print and bring your own. I recommend printing as a booklet, two A5 pages to one A4 sheet, double-sided colour. Snip, staple and bob’s your uncle Ω

The Last Samurai

Ω The Masterton Pocket Rocket has done it again:

Yet another link in the Bronx Cave - Allison Wonderland into Freak Out Ω

Agent Orange

Ω Last month, special secret service agent, Ewan ‘the Ginger Ninja’ Sinclair spyed a “new” line in the Bronx Cave. Not a pure line, but not a pure eliminate either (although he is an Aucklander). Starting on the Speed Freak flake it is possible to pretend that no holds exist above the obvious crack that runs across the front of the cave, and thus a sequence of steep compression moves is revealed, leading to the razor edge on Ryan VH’s obscurity Calypso And The Barnacle (WTF?). From there (still avoiding the crack) a final lunge to a perfect sloper-edge and then the lip nets a long, power-endurance problem.

Dubbed the Agent Orange project (in deference to its creator), Ewan and I have being trying this line furiously ever since. It took a few sessions to unlock the sequence, then the redpoint attempts began in earnest. You can watch the output from one of those sessions here.

Anyway, yesterday, while Ewan was being gassed (literally, he was being gassed as part of his pre-deployment training for a secret mission abroad!) I trudged out to the Bronx Cave on my own (Richie Rich bailed, Lewis was sick) in a developing spring storm and dispatched the first ascent. It didn’t go down without a fight, I got to the razor edge 4 times before finally sending.

The grade? I was initially thinking V9. None of the moves are desperate, but there are a few hard ones in a row at the end. Definitely a lot easier than Allison Wonderland V11 and Fatal Discharge V11. And harder than Passive Attack ;-) So I’m going with soggy V10 (a la Mr Olympia). That might lure the hot shots out. Time will tell.

The best bit? The potential for link up madness is almost unlimited: Allison Wonderland V11 into Agent Orange; Fatal Discharge V11 into Agent Orange…Black Out V9 into Sideways V6 into Agent Orange Ω