DACKs are BACK

On Saturday, JP, Kyle and I rolled back out to 9 Corners for the first time since the snow fell and spit me off. Well, this time, I had three months of training under my belt and was ready for this plum of an Adirondack line. On the most beautiful face in the entire area, lies the most natural line, Thorazine - V8.
When we arrived, a few of the holds were damp from some seeping. We chalked and dried them and then went to warm up. Kyle had had his eyes on this hanging death flake called Sudden Death - V3, for quite some time. With a little inspiration from the guys already trying it, he jumped on and showed them how its done. He inspired me to do the same. HOLLOW!

Then onto slay the dragon.

It took a few goes to prime the holds for sending, but after about 3-4 tries, I polished it off. JP gave his goes as well, putting together a few more moves, but still unable to stick the bump move mid route. Next time, I'm sure.

We then moved up the hill to Kyle's project from last fall, Ice Cold - V7. He proved that he's got the moves locked down, all the way to the strong shouldery move to get to a resting jug. I gave it some goes as well, moving through the jug once when starting two moves in and then also getting to the shouldery move from the sit start. It should go for the both of us next time.
We also worked on Absolute Zero - V8, which starts three moves left of Ice Cold and traverses in and finishes the same. The opening moves were worked out pretty quickly, but it will be an endurance finish, even more-so than Ice Cold. We also did some fun variations on Nippin' Out - V3 to train on a slopy finish, and then we called it a day.

We are SUPER PSYCHED for returning to the ADKS after a long winter spell.

Spring Day at Lincoln Woods

Before I had ever even been to 'the Woods' I had heard of its gym-like qualities. "It gets mobbed there" and "There are so many variations, you should probably use tape" are the kinds of comments I'd received. And on this beautiful spring Saturday, I began to see the reality of these descriptions.
On our two previous visits, we had nearly the whole place to ourselves. One was a frigid winter day and the next was just a bit warmer.
This past Saturday began calmly enough. We started at the Tombstone Boulder and had it to ourselves for about 90 minutes, before Paul Robinson rolled in with two others to warm up. We had completed our routes, so we moved over to the hilltop boulders with Iron Cross V4 (which everyone sent quickly) and the Cave. That is when the mob scene began. The Cave Boulder is one with about 15 routes in a 30 foot section of wall. We took our turns on things like Rump to Jump, The Clutch, Neil's Lunge and New Dimension. We all got Neil's Lunge but despite good work, didn't finish any of the others.
We then scouted out a few other boulders but ended up down at the Try Again wall, which is another 15 problem wall in 30 feet of space. The crew there was working a cool V8 called Diesel. I took one go at Try Again but the ledge was just too painful for that late in the day. Kyle tried again, and again and again. The most fun route on the wall looked to be Loadies Zen V6, so after cruising to the jump move and flying right past the hold, I decided to try it statically. Although the prescribed method is a cool jump, I much prefer slow and in control, so I pinched, perched and moved slowly to the top, completing the classic route in three tries.

Lincoln Woods is a very nice and compact boulder field, which I believe is best kept for the dead of winter. I'm pretty sure that we won't return there until the crowds have dispersed and Thanksgiving has passed us by. Have a great summer RI.