tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36567730083408380342024-03-14T17:10:58.889+00:00Alex Barrows ClimbingKranko the Klown goes ClimbingAlex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.comBlogger39125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-57036826410043768992016-12-21T13:53:00.000+00:002016-12-21T13:53:44.088+00:00Rifle - The Best Trip of My Life
OK, so we actually left Rifle about two months ago and have been back home for a month, but I've been preoccupied with getting myself a job, catching up with family, doing boring things like DIY and all that 'real life' stuff so I've been slack about writing this. Plus, having had two weeks of rest I now find that every time I climb it takes about a week to be able to use my arms again, evenAlex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-51207550991784412432016-09-11T21:56:00.000+01:002016-09-11T21:56:57.894+01:00South Africa Part 2 – Rocklands and Oudtshoorn<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-21721204728287827562016-07-31T14:48:00.002+01:002016-07-31T14:50:14.098+01:00Rocklands Smash Fest<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-65798508644210282742016-06-04T02:24:00.000+01:002016-06-04T02:29:55.811+01:00The Wheel Of Life
"Are you going to try The Wheel?"
"Na, it's probably too hard and I don't want to spend my whole trip projecting in a cave."
I had similar conversations to that with a number of people before
coming to Australia. In many ways The Wheel Of Life was an obvious
target, being both the world classic of its genre and one of Australia's
hard 'must-dos' for any aspiring wannabe (the other obvious Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-85689937659539350732016-05-19T08:20:00.001+01:002016-05-19T08:22:27.121+01:00Sandstone Season Part 1: The Grampians <!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-8424919751125551672016-01-14T13:59:00.002+00:002016-01-14T14:00:21.416+00:00Optimise Climbing 2016Despite being a training nerd, I don't normally do any coaching. With my PhD thesis submitted, a nice 3-day per week schedule working for my research group's spin-out company and having recently started writing training plans for both The Queen of the Wave and Mina this seemed like a good time to change that. In a couple of weeks time I'll thus be running one of the four sessions at the Optimise Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-37396760918754637262015-11-08T11:55:00.003+00:002015-11-08T11:55:41.662+00:00In Praise of ClimbersIn mid-September I was pulling hard on the Keen Roof undercut when I felt something go in one of my fingers. I stepped off and my DIP joint on that finger stayed
hyperextended. Over the next 2 weeks I did my normal rehab -
gradually do more, try not to do too much. It felt ok after that to the point where I could
crimp again, and I returned to manage my hardest ever boulder problem, and gain Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-80564173000032537262015-08-23T21:44:00.002+01:002015-08-23T23:11:04.911+01:00Kilnsey Main OverhangEarlier this year I noticed a new line of draws heading through the main overhang at Klinsey. From the top of Hardy Annual they blasted into the steepness, swung right along an obvious break line and then once again blasted out to the finish of the classic Mandela. It quickly transpired that this was a project of Neil Gresham's that he'd bolted the year before. I got on with getting Progress doneAlex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-72179760940703865462015-06-22T13:54:00.000+01:002015-06-22T19:18:19.690+01:00Enjoying the RideAfter coming back from Spain I was involved in making a few training related bits of media. Firstly I had a fun interview with Neely from TrainingBeta, which can be found here:
If you've not listened to the others in the series and you're interested in how people train then they're worth a listen whilst you're pootling around doing aero cap or similar.
Next up was a video on endurance Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-66407080600724987132015-04-24T20:37:00.000+01:002015-04-24T23:14:13.335+01:00Margalef Take 2 - a tale of a trickyish route of an unspecified difficulty which may not may not be hard for other people depending on who you talk to
Era Vella - big and steep
For those who didn't already know, a few weeks ago I went to Spain and did my project, Era Vella. I tried it for 3 weeks in October, got my ass kicked, came home and trained for it all winter, went back for a 5 day mini-trip in Feb, then headed out for 3 weeks in March/April to do the deed. Fair to say I was pretty chuffed to get up the thing this time around! Being Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-15226264289348882552015-04-24T20:28:00.000+01:002015-04-24T20:30:07.844+01:00The New Most Pressing Questions in British Climbing 18 months ago, dear readers, a select group of climbing's finest minds brought to you the 20 most pressing questions in British climbing. Many of these have now been answered - Yes! The school boards were resurrected. Yes! You should get anorexia. And, resoundingly, you responded that yes! A girl has stuck her finger up your bum whilst having sex. And yet, a whole bunch of new questions have Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-88336655723609685642015-01-05T18:23:00.003+00:002015-01-08T08:54:53.494+00:00It's been a while...... since I went highballing on the grit...
Narcissus, Froggatt Photo: Guy Van Greuning
The Mint 400, Froggatt Photo: Guy Van Greuning
...or made a little video...
36 Chambers Sit from Alex Barrows on Vimeo.
... or blogged.
I was supposed to blog at the end of October, upon return from Spain as a newly crowned 9a climber. The post was to be adorned with photos of my bulging Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-3091546997165180912014-05-19T16:35:00.002+01:002014-05-19T21:55:36.794+01:00Rodellar 2014 - Why you should always smash on
As I got to the second set of chains I just wanted to give in and say take. I was boxed. I felt broken. I'd climbed the lower section abysmally, nearly falling off an easy move by misreading it. Then nearly falling off a tricky move by being shit. I'd been lucky to scrape through to the first anchor, let alone the second, and I knew the top was supposed to be the hardest part. Still, might as Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-63104821984323963002014-04-20T10:42:00.002+01:002014-04-20T10:56:08.663+01:00Stamina BoysYesterday I climbed what's probably the hardest bit of route length climbing I've done. This classic testpiece takes an audacious and improbable line though intimidating terrain, with unrelentingly bold climbing, continually challenging technicalities and the very real prospect of severe injury should you accidentally sit on the tree part way through.
The Boy Band/Staminaband link tags another Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-33101899220050126382014-02-05T23:03:00.000+00:002014-02-06T21:45:26.316+00:00Training for Sport ClimbingBack in the summer of 2012 I went to Gorges du Loup for a 5 week trip, and in between pinching tufas until my thumbs were raw and desperately trying to trick my way up things using kneebars, I decided to write up an article/document with some training knowledge. Having served its purpose of stopping rest days getting boring it promptly languished on my computer doing nothing, until recently when Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-82876106055861044542013-11-10T22:35:00.001+00:002013-11-10T22:49:40.350+00:00'The Red' I cruise past Miguel's. I can almost hear the tires crunching through the carpet of leaves that covers the landscape from head to toe and the last signs of the cliffs disappear in the rear view mirror. Another angsty Country song comes on the radio, one I've learnt from my time here, and I can't help but smile. There's something different inside me when I'm on a trip. A contentment and happyness Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-74817277608336058932013-10-20T00:44:00.000+01:002013-11-30T22:17:31.500+00:00The 20 most pressing questions in British climbing
Whilst on a rainy rest day we began discussing the topics on
the lips of every climber in Britain – How much speed does it take to do
Hubble? Have Jonny G and Jesus ever been seen in the same room together? Why
are British male climbers so ugly and nerdy? Will Mark ever get a girlfriend?
In no particular order here are the top 20 most pressing questions on the
British climbing scene today…
<!Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-33254675173935731712013-10-20T00:41:00.001+01:002013-10-20T00:41:18.715+01:00Today's Menue: Doughnuts, Fried Chicken and PumpRight now I'm in the Red River Gorge. This is somewhere I've been dreaming of going since seeing the video of the Petzl RocTrip there a few years ago, and the footage from the endless rampage of Ondra, Megos, Lachat et al last year didn't exactly diminish the psyche. With France having a wet year and worries of my intended trip to Loup being a wash out, plans were quickly changed and America was Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-38671141419331390942013-06-01T18:25:00.002+01:002013-06-01T18:36:04.687+01:00Kaabah: Tor, Tor, Glorious TorI Got a Feeling
That moment when you realise that a route really is doable for you. I think this might be my favourite part of projecting. Everyone into this aspect of climbing will know it. A shot of pure psyche straight into your bloodstream; uncontainable excitement bubbling up inside you. This is a rare event - the route has to be hard enough that not being able to do it is a real possibilityAlex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-7545982104825529772013-05-15T22:26:00.003+01:002013-05-15T22:40:36.772+01:00Non-slip Kneepad BetaA couple of people have asked me for the full on, no holds barred kneepad beta for reducing slippage, so I figured I'd put it up here for anyone interested. None of this is my own invention, it's all shamelessly stolen from the Yanks. Just so you know not to blame me for bringing leg shaving into climbing.
You will need:
1. A razor. I'm assured that ladies ones are rather more luxurious for Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-89690913800541244152013-05-02T17:26:00.000+01:002013-05-02T17:30:38.219+01:00Spanish Trippin'<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-904827055781860132013-03-08T21:58:00.000+00:002013-03-08T21:58:41.455+00:00Pilgrimage FootageHere's some mobile phone footage of the send. Unfortunately it cuts out the first few moves. The rests are cut down due to technological issues and the guy filming getting a phone call whilst I was in the second one! You'd get bored if all the resting was in anyway.
Thanks to Iwan Willams and Jason Reeve for the footage.
Pilgrimage 2nd Ascent from Alex Barrows on Vimeo.Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-87460880832003089222013-03-07T07:53:00.001+00:002013-03-07T07:58:44.901+00:00Pilgrimage 2nd Ascent<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-18207585978744820282013-02-26T19:07:00.002+00:002013-02-26T19:07:32.182+00:00Frozen February"You can't always get what you want"
That's what the song claims, and it's right, especially if you're a climber and you live in Britain. Sometimes that's not such a big deal though, and you get to do something else fun instead...
Frozen February from Alex Barrows on Vimeo.
Once again I went to Wales, once again I didn't get to try Pilgrimage. This time because it was soaked with seepage. Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3656773008340838034.post-30822276368184462822013-02-19T18:46:00.000+00:002013-02-20T13:45:41.565+00:00Golfers' Elbow - My ExperienceI've had issues with golfers' elbow since last August. Having talked to a fair few others in person and on facebook about my experiences getting on top of it I thought it was worth jotting a few thoughts down for others in the same position.You only have to take a glance at the online forums to see how common this issue is amongst climbers! One thing which I think is worth noting is that despite Alex Barrowshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17299279252944510894noreply@blogger.com9