So. I sent Receptionist on Friday the 14th, after what feels like a year, but was probably more like half a year's worth of work due to the weather. Anyways, this is well... unexpected, if I say so myself! From an outside point of view, the things I did during the week would have for sure resulted in a resounding opinion that I ruined my projecting session, but yet- here we are. The day before, I went bouldering at South Mountain with Bobby at the Public Enema Roof. We sessioned for a bit on Fuzzy Little Peach Man, a powerful V6-7 granite roof with crimps instead of pockets. I ended up sending, but at the cost of some torn skin, and a slightly tired body.
The next day, I went to Priest Draw with Noah. Due to the previous day's session, I woke up feeling quite sore and not entirely well rested. Nevertheless, I forced myself out of bed and drove to Noah's so we could journey up together. I didn't have too many expectations for this trip, since I knew I was slightly tired, so I planned on not climbing at all until we got to Mars Roof. On the way, we did the usual shenanigans- we stopped by a gas station to pick up some caffeine and provisions. Noah gave a few burns on his project, the Hermit, and I spotted him. Then we headed over to Mars Roof.
I warmed up quite slowly, taking sips of a caffeinated beverage in between moving my feet around the roof and feeling the body positions. Initially, I planned to just work the last few moves on Receptionist, which include a powerful move to the phone hold, a very slippery sloper, and then a crucial right toe cam to a not-so-good undercling, and then the jump move. In my previous sessions at Mars Roof, doing these 3 moves felt very low percentage, until that day. This is most likely due to the conditions. The conditions were quite good on this day. The humidity was at a whopping 18%, a far cry from the previous version of 40+% humidity, and the temperatures were finally dropping below 70 degrees Fahrenheit.
After I finished warming up, I went to work on the last three moves. I could stick the throw to the final jug in isolation due to visualizing throwing my right arm parallel to the right-most dark streak on the rock, but the move to the undercling was still not correct. The right foot toe-cam was not sticking and the undercling still felt terrible. Through some video footage and general thought about the beta throughout the week while reviewing my notes, I decided to slightly alter my beta. For the right-foot toe cam, I decided instead of dropping my knee early, I would point the toe straight into the slot pocket. Secondly, for the right hand undercling, I would cup the hold with my entire hand instead of crimping the lip. This meant that while the undercling would feel terrible at first, as soon as I moved my feet into the necessary squared-off position, I would be able to leverage it in order to make the jump.
The results were instantaneous. Immediately, the toe-cam stuck, and the move to the right hand undercling felt much easier. When moving the feet over to set up for the jump, I had to actually press quite hard with my left foot in order to release the toe-cam, which was a drastic difference from my previous experiences. It's amazing how much change can happen by shifting your toe and hand by a couple degrees, but yet it's also not surprising. Microbeta is a thing, and Mars Roof has plenty of it.
I then went on repeating the last few moves in a row to test the validity of my newfound beta. It was very consistent, so I then went for the whole boulder problem. The first time, I had not yet practiced the moves from the beginning, so I was unable to stick the phone move due to some decision fatigue on how I should place my right foot in sequence so that I could readjust the grip on the teacup hold to setup for the phone move. Through some more analysis, I realized I could step on the pocket-pinch grip with my right foot in order to get my left foot into the honey-comb shaped foot. A benefit to this was that I could also minimize the time I would use for the readjustment, and conserve energy. With this newfound beta, I was ready.
The second go, I ended up readjusting on the phone hold in order to get a better grip, which ended up killing the burn. The phone hold, even though it was in good conditions, can still get quite greasy, so I resigned myself to realizing that readjusting is a quick one-way trip of ruining the go. Therefore, I told Noah that if I didn't readjust on the phone hold, then I would send.
And well...here you go:
The Receptionist
When I sent, I don't think I personally could have climbed it any better. I definitely don't think I am qualified enough to say if this is good for the grade, but this one required me to climb the best I ever had. From what it's worth, 99% of 8a.nu ascents on this one (at least 100+) say it's V10, so I guess that's what it is. Personally, I can't tell. The boulders here at the draw definitely require you to dial in the moves and by the time the moves are dialed, I think you lose the difficulty. Nevertheless, it's definitely a guiding light into what I'm capable of, and I hope to be able to climb many more boulders with the same confidence and feeling that I did on this one. If anything, I'm just glad to feel slightly qualified in working some of the other lines on this roof, and I hope to get the same feeling from the rest of the lines.
The process was wild from start to finish, as I've mentioned in my last post about Mars Roof. If you told me last year that I would do this line in a year, I would have called you insane. To reiterate, when I first came to this roof, the reputation of the line was already intimidating. I wanted to climb the line in the style that it was known for: resistive, flowy climbing that demanded dialed, well-rehearsed, and elegant movement. While the initial moves of each climb came relatively smoothly, hitting the phone move became a long-term goal. In spring, once I hit the phone once during a random session, the possibility of actually doing the line was enough to have my left hand go numb out of nerves once I started driving to the draw. And then suddenly, it just disappeared and Mars just became another roof. I'm not sure exactly what changed, but I think these were some of the reasons:
- Taking some falls off the moves and missing pads. I was able to get up and feel ok.
- Circuiting and repetition of my hardest projects thus far at the draw gave me the confidence and fitness I needed. For instance, after 2-3 sessions (once per week) at Mars Roof, I was able to climb Anorexic Sacrifice (V6), Meateater (V7), & Carnivore (V8) - all very power-endurance boulder problems- in a day with still energy to spare.
- Falling off the Receptionist at the end in bad conditions. For a while, continuous repetition of my failures despite being so close removed the scary reputation it had in my head- but at the same time, it also got me feeling a bit more dejected that I would never do it. That being said, I didn't give up and decided to keep on working the tiny details, which really ended up being the key.
- Some physical training. Because of my trouble with the phone hold, I was working on pinching a 20lb weight with a handmade wooden block (3-4 inches wide?) gifted from a friend for about two to three weeks. I also realized from my previous sessions that my biceps would cramp up a bit, so the week before, I did some inverted rows on rings with a bicep grip on my right hand and a pinch grip on my left hand in order to get my body to get used to the movement.
- Caffeine. I usually don't drink it, but that just means the effects are stronger when I do.
Climbing at Mars Roof has taught me, among other things which I've listed in my previous post on Mars roof, the value of good beta and the art of really refining your sequences. It was funny thinking that on the Wednesday of that week, I was telling a friend that this would take me another year of work at least, and then two days later, I sent. The process isn't over though, there's always more refinement to be done.
So what's next? Over the last two weeks or so, I've decided on some new goals. For the last two years or so, I've spent almost every possible weekend I could (probably 20-30 weeks) at the draw learning the style, so I am quite aware of my deficiencies in other terrain. So I think I will spend some time on other terrain angles (overhanging, slightly overhanging, vertical, and slab) and different techniques (compression, crimping, etc...). That being said, I don't plan on abandoning the roofs entirely. At the draw, there's still the rest of Mars Roof to do, as well as some linkups on Bad Ass, and Puzzle Box. In all of Arizona, there's still many other lines I haven't visited again that I hope to get to this winter- so there's a lot. Finally, this doesn't even cover out-of-state stuff, so I have my hands full. There's a lot to learn out there!
I've already gotten started. I just got back from a first-time trip to Red Rock Canyon which I'll write about at some point. I tried all manners of different climbs so I think I'm making good progress on that.
And finally, pictures:
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| Going to the pocket pinch |
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| The phone move |
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| The jug |
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