June 13, 2011

The "Origins" & "Headers" - Smith Rock

The Origins of Sport Climbing - or better described as bolted featureless concrete vertical walls.
  • 1983 : Alan Watts introduced sport climbing to the US, with Watts Tots, 5.12b at Smith Rock, Oregon 
  • 2011: Kristin, Brian, Casey and Me make our first and defiantly not our last trip to Smith 
  • 2011: Kristin battles Rock
This place is rad, its the whole enchilada...awesome bivy site with heated water and showers, dirt-bags from all over the globe setting up camp for weeks at a time, thousands of routes sport n trad, the winding crooked creek snaking its way around the countless formations of volcanic tuft, oh ya and snakes...tons of them.  We saw 5 snakes including one of those rattler kinds.

Mt Hood over Asterisk Pass & The Christian Brothers Wall


The Morning Glory Wall - in all its glory




My Casey on The Outsiders 5.9

Brian setting up with the static beta on Toxic 5.11b


Me setting up for the dyno beta


Nailing the Dyno


Kristin On-sighting Carla the Stripper 5.8


Brian's Casey on Hop on Pop 5.8



The "Battle" - K takes a header.  
The darn rope behind the foot during an awkward crux maneuver :( 

Kristin was on fire leading and red-pointing several routes over the weekend, then the Phoenix wall got the Phoenix wall did the above.  She was two bolts from the on sight when an awkward sequence forced the rope behind her right foot, I yelled watch your right foot, then she popped off. It wasn't til the end of the fall that the rope flipped her upside down, her left elbow and forearm hit first followed by her dome.  The above pic was taken as instructed by the patient / ER nurse extraordinaire.  She then instructed the cleaning and temporary closure of the wound.  I must say for a caveman pharmacist, I did such a great job with the temporary fix, that the ER doc looked at the wound and said Derma-bond (basically glue for you non medical peeps) no stitches.  I said  "Doc lets try spreading the wound a bit its pretty deep"  Oh ya it needs stitches answers the doc...DUH!  10 stitches later K and I are heading back to camp for some pita pizzas made by the amazingly tough girl herself.  If it was me we would of been shacking up in the nearest 5 star hotel :)
  • Lesson learned: helmets when sport climbing will be worn when pushing one's limits on lead.
  • Kristin is one tough cookie, oh ya and she's got a hard head:)       
  • The best pain killers or not narcotics.....but BEER



1 header --> 10 stitches = 10 beers @ Bend Brewery