Scottish Tooling Series, Round 4

On Saturday morning Ashley and I (Anna), headed to Glemore Lodge to take part in round 4 of the scottish tooling series. We were to be competing in the third and final time slot, meaning we had a leisurely start to the day.

The glenmore lodge round is unique as it takes place on their outdoor rock pillars, and the competitors must wear crampons. As we kitted up and got ready to go, we felt the first few drops of rain fall upon us...
We strategically chose our first route; it had a board of wood that was almost destroyed, and an ice block that was 3/4 gone! Better now than later we thought!

By the time we both completed this route, the heavens had opened and there was a pretty torential downpour going on!

We both managed to flash the first six routes, and then we arrived at the harder stuff. By this point, we were drenched to the bone and very cold from the wind! we fought hard, and succeeded and failed on different routes to one another.

Finally, we were at the last route. Ash made light work of this. As I reached the second last hold, Ash said "watch that hold, its sketchy!". What is he talking about, I wondered, this is bomber! suddenly, wham! my axe popped of and went straight into my lip! I lowered down, and quickly started to try again within the time limit. However as I kept going, I could taste more and more blood so i thought i should bail! We went back inside to clean up and dry off. Unfortunately my parents had come to visit, and seeing me with blood all over my mouth has not given my mum a good first impression of drytooling!
Results were in, and I made it into the finals in joint 2nd. Unfortunately Ash did not make it through this time, I think we can put this largely down to "the conditions"!!

The final route had a horrible balancy start, that spat off more than half of the finalists! When it was my turn, I came out of isolation and had a quick look at the route. I took the start carefuly, and made it onto the overhanging bit, before falling off from a sketchy hold. Fiona was last out in the womans, and she was spat of in exactly the same place. It came down to speed, and as the slowest climber in the world, i finished in 2nd :-)

despite the weather, we both had an awesome day (i think) , and we really felt like we deserved our fish and chips on the way home!

Don't die, I have no signal!

Mark and I had been keen to try some night climbing for a while. We'd ventured out on Wedensday night, only to be beaten back by the weather, Friday night was a different story though. It was dry and pretty mild for November so after a short shift at tranny I picked Mark up and we made the journey north to Longhaven near Peterhead. I was confident Phaff would be dry as it's a face climb on the massive red wall at Longhaven quarries. A huge lump of granite that juts out to the North sea, Phaff is a rising traverse of the cliff on ramps and cracks. An easy but exposed severe that should be a good adventure in the dark.



We geared up at the Dais, before the climbing gets interesting. The swell was running and big waves were breaking on the wall below sending spy up to our height 20m up the cliff much to Marks excitement! I led off since we had no guide book and was sure of the way. Easy climbing on ramps and narrow ledges led to a small step and thus a good belay to take Mark over.




I was pretty sure we were on he right track now as the 'crux' lay ahead. An airy hand traverse during the day, we only had the waves to remind us of the void below. It was marks turn to lead, easy climbing again on jugs to a tricky step around some short corners proved a little thought provoking. After these were passed only a short wall was between us and the top. We topped out in a fit of giggles, a good adventure. Maybe well try something a bit harder next time.

Ryan Slater

Transition Climbing Staff

Hey the staff at the wall now have a new blog!!!

We will try and keep this really active to keep you guys up to date with what the staff do when they are not instructing, setting routes or looking like they are just wandering about cos when they are not here they are usually up to something.

So keep an eye out to find out about climbs, trips, comps and other stuff we do