I’m giving a slideshow in the Great Outdoors this Wednesday, about my recent adventure climbing and new routing trip to Oman. It starts at 7pm, and is free, though you have to call Great Outdoors to let them know numbers.
Tags: Dublin, Great Outdoors, Ireland, slideshow
IBL promo picture
As posted on climbing.ie:
“We’re delighted to announce that after a gap of several years that the IBL is heading north again!
Tollymore Mountain Centre (www.tollymore.com), on the edge of the Mournes, is Northern Ireland ’s National Centre for Mountaineering and Canoeing Activities. The centre is ideally located for mountain biking, hillwalking, climbing and bouldering so there’s plenty to do in the area after the competition.
The routesetters are:
Michael Duffy, Ricky Bell & Jose Argudo
The competition will be split into two sessions (like we ran in Galway) with a limit of 50 entrants per session.
The schedule for the day is:
Registration: 9am
Session 1: 9.30am – 1pm
Session 2: 1pm – 4.30pm
Prize Giving: 5pm
There will be approximately 10-12 problems to be completed.
There is a system in place which will allow OPTIONAL pre-registration via the Internet so entrants can guarantee their spot in advance. Please go to the IBL page at:
http://www.climbing.ie/index.php/ibl
* You will notice “IBL Tollymore Round 5 Fee” and an Add To Cart button. This will allow payment of the IBL entry fee by PayPal. You don’t need a PayPal account but you do need a credit card.
* In the Confirm Payment page you can add special instructions to the Merchant. Put in here whether you would like morning or afternoon.
* Please email ibl@climbing.ie to let us know that you’ve paid and whether you would prefer a morning/afternoon slot.
* Keep a printout of your receipt and bring it to the comp.
Entry fees on the day are:
Full fee: £12 (€15)
MI members/students/unwaged: £8 (€10)
Juniors: £4 (€5)
Please note that due to renovations there will be no accommodation available at Tollymore itself unfortunately.
There will be plenty of parking space available at the centre.
Tags: Bouldering, Competition, Ireland
Cross-posted from my own personal blog
“Planning is an unnatural process – it’s much more fun to do something.
The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and desperation”
- Sir John Harvey-Jones 1924 – 2008, Industrialist
I’ve been meaning to write this one for a while but life and work have gotten in the way so it’s been a bit of a long road to getting to it! As mentioned on another interesting blog for those motivated by the sport of climbing, Doylo’s Blog had a good personal reflection on his own past year, and the lessons he learned and the forthcoming strategy for 2010. As it happens, Dave seems to have remembered he has a blog 
and decided to update it also with his own current plans and process he’s going through right now – sounds pretty organised!
I mentioned it a bit here when I took a longer-term view of my own progression from when I started climbing all of 11/12? years ago – sheesh! – and even on reflecting about my experiences so far in Sheffield and the potential for increases.
so, looking back on 2009, I can only say it’s been insightful also in so many ways. I’ve learnt what my natural baseline is now (after going for months of just intermittent climbing) and what many of my strengths were for this reason. I’ve also learnt of the weaknesses – imbalance of pocket to crimp strength, lack of power for burly moves, a lack of belief for harder routes sometimes. All good experiences and brilliant to reflect on now so that I can improve in the future. I was at a seminar today in relation to my course and one of the quotes was “when you share your learning, it grows instead of getting less” (an old 5th century Tamil poem). Well, to the two top-level climbers who answered my calls for advice, I owe you one and to keep the karma going, I’ll continue to share my learning on this blog and a bit on irishclimbingcoaching.ie so hopefully some of it will be of use to someone! LOL Having said that, I’ve always got a lot to learn myself, most notably in getting strong not just in your fingers so I’ll be picking some people’s advice
So, in taking another quote from the seminar – “the future belongs to those who prepare for it today” (some bloke called Malcolm X made that one 
– like Dave’s post, I have a rough plan to follow for the forthcoming months to prepare for my summer plans (so would probably benefit most people in my hemisphere). And in the interest of sharing, my next couple of posts are going to be my own plans. As part of those posts though, I’m expecting comments and thoughts – this discussion is a two-way thing. Hopefully you’ll get ideas of my own plans, and hopefully some can advise on what they think I should really be focusing on……
The topics (and I’ll update as I finish more)
- overall training plan for 2010
- strength work-outs (fingers, shoulders, etc.)
- fitness
- things that haven’t worked and failures
Are the Amazon links at the bottom of my posts annoying/useful/distracting?
Good training books from Amazon:
9 Out of 10 Climbers Make the Same Mistakes: Navigation Through the Maze of Advice for the Self-coached Climber
Self-Coached Climber: The Guide to Movement, Training, Performance
Tags: goals, planning, preparation, Training
UPDATE 8th January 2010: That was quick! An announcement today that due to the poor weather conditions, it’s being postponed for a week…….
“Due to the road conditions and the long range forecast we’re going to postpone the event by a week and run it on Sat 23rd Jan instead.
We’re not going to chance tempting folk to drive long distances and also want to do justice to the effort the local climbers put into organising the event and have as many of ye there as possible.
So see you at IBL Round 4 – Sat 23rd Jan
Enjoy the snow & ice while its there!
Regards,
IBL Committee”
IBL promo picture
Neal McQuaid – don’t forget Round 4 is coming up on Saturday the 16th January (8 days away). What better way to burn off some of the Christmas calories?!?!?
As a request from Damien O’Sullivan, organiser of the event:
“Now that Christmas is over it’s time to get back to business. As you all know the IBL is on in less than two weeks, all the pieces are falling into place from an organisational point of view.
I do however need to know approximate numbers of people intending to compete. If numbers are large then I will set up some extra climbs in the hall down stairs. This will involve a lot of extra work, but it will make the competition much more enjoyable and safer.
I also need to let the Water Rock House know how many people will be eating there and attending for the slide show. I really hope that if you go to the comp that you will go to Water Rock House also, the food there is really good, the owner is going us an excellent deal too. There will be a slide show, and music to dance to if that’s your thing.
I will need to know approximate numbers by next Monday, so please send me an e-mail to ……….. [go to this link for his email address - don't want to post publicly], putting IBL as the subject.
Thanks, Damo.”
As for info on the comp, “We have our plans in place and we promise you an excellent days climbing. We intend setting 18 problems, each with a hard and easy variation. There will be problems easy enough for the newest of beginners right up to the most seasoned of strong (wo)men to enjoy.”
Tags: Bouldering, Competition, Ireland, midleton, national
Recent Comments