Return from Brno

We return from Brno even more psyched for the training season than we were after our last training session if that is possible. Climbing is awesome.

I have my first international event under my belt and have learnt a lot from the experience. I will know how to prepare properly next time. When you first compete internationally you spend a long time in isolation as you are the last to compete. This is tiring after a long day supporting the rest of the team (well done the lads) and getting all the beta on international comps.

We'll post some photos soon...

Brno (Czech)

Thursday morning and Diane and I are on our way to Stansted airport. We're off to Brno for the final round of the World Cup. This is Diane's first international competition (I think). For me, it's the end of long, hard season that has been disappointing at best.

Loving the blog girls!

Pull hard for the final time this season .. lets see a bit of British Girl power!!!

Team Training Day 4

Today we went to Mile End Climbing Wall for the first round of the twentieth year of the Southern Indoor Bouldering League (SIBL). The organisers had kindly set some very special problems just for us. The lads went to work and dispatched some slab and vert dirt to the admiration of a large crowd (about 190 competitors!). Good effort, boys. Despite our best efforts, none of the ladies came close to the blocs but we still went around the rest of the tour and tried the other problems in the Female Open set.

After four days climbing, sore tips and many miles on the road we went our separate ways for the long drive home. That is, for everyone except for me- for once living in London has an advantage in climbing!

Team Training- Day 3

Up bright and early for Craggy Island's Boulder Bash. 15 blocs set by Mark Croxall, a lead route, a speed route and a dyno comp. All of us had various degrees of aches and pains from the previous days' sessions, but pushed through nevertheless. The blocs were very technical which was good for our sore shoulders, but it was also easy to drop points if you weren't focused.

Audrey Seguy (above) and Zoe Ogden (below)

Rae Cowie (below)

Team Training - Sheffield (Days 1 and 2)

This was our second team training in preparation for the 2008 season. In October we went to Alsager for a round of fitness testing including the dreaded 'bleep test'. This time it was more of a training camp. Thursday and Friday we were at The Climbing Works in Sheffield for circuit training, on-sight bouldering, campus training and learning how to blog. The circuit training was tough- pull-ups, press-ups, footless, lock-offs, body tension exercises, speed climbing, leg raises and dynos all on the agenda. After one round I was shattered and nearly fell asleep on the bouldering mat. Too soon it was time for round 2 and we all warmed into it and performed well. Round 3 properly finished us off. Gaz then chose 20 blocs for us to climb in pairs and even the easy ones felt quite hard at that stage!

The next morning Chris 'Springer' Graham showed us the wonders of the world wide web (hence this blog).

The Geordie invasion continued with Andy Earl running us through a campus session. For the girls I think it was a real revelation about how much work we need to do in the pre-season to get up to scratch for next year.

After two days work it was off to Guildford for the Craggy Island Boulder Bash on Saturday.