It has been one whole year since my first post to thebradlands, December 15th, 2005. I would like to thank my mom and dad, for bringing me into this world. Also my producer/ providor/ spellchecker/ factchecker Warren Myers. Of course I’d like to thank Jillian who has stuck with me through thick and thin and has helped me with my Spanish. And lastly all my fans who have made it fun for me to write knowing that you care enough to check by and read. Blogging has been a great way to vent my excitement in lots of different areas. Hopefully reading has energized you, and thebradlands has been an instrument to get you excited about life.

Ian and I are both now doing yellows (5.10s) at the gym now and we are knocking out a lot of the oranges. However there are a couple oranges that I am really struggling with. My nemesis right now is an orange that has two ledges. I got the first ledge no problem, and I am underneath the second ledge, but I am stuck there. There is a Saturn hold just above the ledge on the left side that doesn’t have the greatest hold for a left hand but is good for a right. To the right of that is a lousy little post, and above it is a great two hand hold. The problem is getting my feet under me to make the reach up to either of the next two holds. Next time I go out I am going to try to get my foot way up on the left side. Although thinking about it now it seems possible, in practice it might not be quite so much.

It is really great conquering a nemesis. Previously my nemesis was a green that was borderline between green and orange. I tried it over and over for weeks, and couldn’t get it, and then last Thursday I finally knocked it out. I now want to go back to it to perfect it. Before that my nemesis was a green that had a big overhang so you had to climb on the ceiling. Nemesi are what keep me motivated to keep going back and keep getting better. Thankfully there are tons of climbs left at the gym that I am not close to being able to do, so I am well suplied with future nemesi. By the way I am working on getting some short video clips of some of Ian and my climbs on google. I’ll post links as soon as they are available.

One really great thing is seeing Jillian and Steven and Melissa and keep at it with climbing and getting better and better. Jillian keeps conquering more and more greens, and she redoes a lot of greens in order to get better at them. Its really good for me to watch how she does climbs, because she doesn’t have the reach and upper body strength that I have, so she relies a lot more on balance and footwork.

Oh yeah and I’m now getting to know the homies that are hanging around the gym as much as I am. Yesterday we met Christie and Susan and Nick. Christie and Susan and Nick and Ian and I are all at about the same level (I am probably the least of these bretheren) so we were having fun talking beta. It would be cool if after getting to know some of the folks out there we could take advantage of their experience and gear and do some real rock climbing with them outdoors. If I am going to do outdoor climbing it will need to be with some people who have experience at it.

One last thing, as an update, I am still working out 3 or 4 times a week. When I dont go down to the gym at our appartments then I go to the gym at work. I like the gym at work a lot because they have freeweights rather then just machines. I think there is real value in using freeweights because it requires balance as well as strength. Today I benched 140 five times.

I have this Dave Barry calander thingy that has a clip from him every day of the year.  This was todays words of wisdom, and I am totally fealin’ it:

Is my weight training working? Consider this: After just one week of lifting, I can no longer move my arms. I feel as though oxen have been clog-dancing on my upper body. I have to brush my teeth by holding the toothbrush still and moving my head up and down.

The problem is that weights—follow me closely—are heavy. When you lift them, your muscles hurt, which is your body’s way of telling you: “Stop lifting weights, moron!”

What a great way of putting it.  I took my time more working out Saturday and today, and my whole upper body is limp.  The big breakfasts rock though.  Gotta have lots of protein, so this morning I had two sausage and egg biscuits, and a bagel.  Pretty good compaired to my usual fair: de nada.

Ok, I have to admit to something. For the past couple months I have been going to a climbing gym about every week. I also bought a harness and a chalk bag. That means I am committed to doing this on a regular basis. This has caused me to desire a couple things. One is better technique climbing. Another is a much stronger upper body. I searched around the web a little and found some websites and articles on techniques for climbing and getting better at climbing. Here are some of the links:
This is a great article on training excercises you can do at a climbing gym.

ABC of Rockclimbing talks a lot about technique.

Here is another article concerning the importance of using your feet.

Here is a general blog on climbing that might warent regular checks.

Here is an article on slacklining, something that I unknowingly learned how to do as a little kid when my brother and I tied a rope between two trees and spent the next couple months learning how to walk it.

Finally here is a blog that talks a lot about gear for climbing.

Ok so the other thing that i am interested in is getting stronger. This means doing what i am terrible at doing, going to the gym on a regular basis and working out. Here i am making it official, for the next 6 weeks I’ll be aiming to get up early enough every morning to either run or go to the gym every weekday morning. I also want to be going to bed earlier at nights, which will probably make the first half of my task easier. Allright so now that its official we’ll see how it goes.

UPDATE: I didn’t put a link up there before, but here is a link now to the place where we have been climbing, Verticle Edge Climbers Center in Durham. We went again last night and had a really great time. I was able to quickly and efficiently do two climbs that I had really struggled with before. Good stuff! Also here is a link to a listing of all the indoor climbing places in North Carolina (I believe there are links for other states as well.)

Oh yeah and also i got up early this morning and worked out. Unfortunately I felt really sick to my stomach and my arms have been dangling because I can’t lift them, but it is a grand start.