Sharkwalk.

Just so the 4 people who read this blog (one of which is me) is clear... Sharkwalk 5.13a (7c+) really is quite overhanging. My previous post made it look like a slab. It's slopey and powerful with a crux at the top. A beautiful route. Below is Mr. Awesome setting for the dyno at the top.
Interestingly enough, Mr. Awesome attacked it the way he trains on the 45 degree wall at the gym- square and powerful with toes pointed at the wall in an almost accusatory fashion. Unlike Mr. Awesome's Ben Moon-informed training style, I resorted to the sneaky sideways approach...
This inspiring route will require some power endurance training on slopey holds, especially since the hardest thing either of us has sent clean is a 5.12. But since Americans are lazy and prefer to get by on talent or any other avenue that avoids discipline, we may instead resort to the tried and true method of ales and onanism or "IRHM" prior to the climb. See the Cody Roth video at momentum climbing (issue#24) for a demonstration of IRHM technique. With any luck a future post will feature Mr. Awesome defeating Sharkwalk with a piledriver, as our climbing escapades evolve into professional wrestling, at least in writing.

Trophy III

This is a shot that Pilar got of a very cute collie mutt at the Trophy. But moving onwards to climb-based narcissism...
At last! I sent my second 5.12a, which hopefully proves to my buddy Masa that the first one wasn't a total fluke. Keep Your Powder Dry goes at 5.12a (7b) if you stop at the ledge, which I did. My second 5.12a ever. First was Maneater, and for both routes I required 4 shots of espresso in the car ride to the crag. Another thing they both have in common is that they are short, which favors my bouldery side because I have no power endurance. However, since I was pretending to be sport climber, I tried to pace myself by resting whenever possible to avoid a flash pump. At the crux, I dynoed with my right hand instead of the left. Most people go left. To me, the right hand is more like a body twist versus the left hand dyno being practically a campus move off of a poor crimp. There's a pic of me sticking the dyno in a previous post . After the crux, you can gain a kneebar rest that if done properly allows you to fully depump before completing a three moves on flat crimps, which aren't that easy after you're tired.
Above, Shawn lowers off The Trophy 5.12b after working out the moves. He had already sent Keep your Powder Dry so he focused on the Trophy. Shawn cleared all the hurdles today, styling the traverse, modifying the rest, sticking the dyno, and deciphering the topout on the ledge. All that remains is the linkage. He probably just needs a good night's sleep, some good ol' beer and masturbation and it'll be done. His all out dyno attempts cost him some skin though. And now for the overdone pic of wounded climber hands:
For an idea of what Shawn was trying to do and eventually did, see this link. Love the fact that the title of pic in the link is "Brilliant Footwork". I found a different way while shamefully hangdogging on second, which was to match on a bad crimp and go right with different foot positioning. I guess "different" is not the right word here as Shawn's feet were not on the rock whereas mine were... it maybe should read "go right WITH foot positioning." Not as dramatic and glorious as a three points off dyno, but my skin is intact. Part of my shameful hangdogging allowed me to put on a silly show of trying to get back on an overhanging route.
Afterwards, Captain Shawn of the Climbship Burlyprise decided to try Sharkwalk, 5.13a. Despite the horrific pun nauseating the Captain... he nonetheless put forth a valiant effort. Pilar's photo below is of Shawn after the crux dyno (what is it with these dynos?) off of an abominably tiny crimp on an overhang. Somehow the photo makes the route appear like a slab, but it was in actuality quite overhung. I dunno. Maybe 30 or 40 degrees?
But that's when things took a turn for the deadly, almost. Above us, some hooligans started mocking Shawn's screams. This was followed by a shotgun blast. OK, it wasn't a gunshot, but somebody above threw down a stone the size of a large brick and it almost hit my wife, shattering on the ledge next to her and sounding like a gunshot. We yelled up to whoever it was that they should NOT throw rocks but I was furious that somebody nearly hit my wife. After Shawn lowered, I fashioned a weapon made of a gri-gri attached to 2 quick draws and ran around the cliff intending to bludgeon whoever threw the rock. When I got around to the top of the Trophy, whoever it was had left... dismayed by the disappearance of the perpetrators, I was left with a sinking feeling surrounding the thought that people tend to hurt others not out of malicious intent but rather out of commonplace thoughtless ignorance.
Below, Shawn grows impatient while waiting for me to mete out vengeance on the absent stone-thrower on the other side of the cliff.
"... Where is that muther ucker?"

Glen
Keep Your Powder Dry 5.12a - redpoint
The Trophy - 5.12b - incomplete/hangdog
Sharkwalk - 5.13a - hangdog/left behind a bail biner (more shame!)

Shawn
The Trophy - 3 tries incomplete (next time Gadget!)
Sharkwalk - incomplete

A##hole rock thrower
My wife - missed

The Trophy.

I like this pic Pilar snagged of John on Coyote Moon with the pine tree encasing said climber. It reminds me of those chinese nature paintings where the human figure is but a small background element of a much vaster and majestic Nature in the foreground. I also like the fact that John is employing a "toes in" approach to the slab, which is not only better technique than the novice "frog-legging", but more photogenic as well. When mentioning this to John, he scoffed at my half-baked climbing technique theories but was happy to look good for the lens.
Pilar on Coyote Moon 5.9. A fun route, but a little too easy for P-Money.

Clark Gable of the belay. He lounges about wearing the desert like his leisure suit, offering a safe yet silky belay to those willing to deposit their trust into his golden carabiner. Clark Gable's belay is a hard habit to break, just ask Shawn. Below is me on the crux of Keep your Powder Dry 12a.
Below, Shawn gets psyched for the Trophy with his trademark eccentricities: A little dancing and prancing, a pink windbreaker by Pierre Cardin (which he kept calling "Pierre Claire" for some unfathomable reason), all the while singing Madonna's "Express Yourself". The white man's ritual must have worked because he crushed the beginning overhanging traverse into the crux.