Monthly Archives: December 2011

An early tick of my yearly Winter Route

I usually by tradition get one winter climbing route in per season (as I mainly go skiing).  The chance came early this year to get out and go climbing, thought I might as well get it out of the way early this year!

I got up early and drove to Aviemore and met Andy and Monica and set off with everyone else into the Northern Corries.  We decided on Jacobs Ladder, and easy climb but in lean conditions it was in was more interesting than a boring snow gully.  A nice easy break into winter climbing.

Above – Andy and monica at the start of the Climb.  We just wondered up it till it got steaper then got a rope up and roped up to move together.

  There was no fear or abundant swearing at ones choices of a stupid pastime.  It was pleasant social climbing, I could do more than one route like this a year! 

The obligatory up nostril shot!  I am thinking  I might grow a beard this winter, there is a lot of snow around and looks like I will be out a lot hopefully so to keep my delicate chin warm! 

Nearer the top it was not banked out so the normal easy snow exit was not present, instead a bit more of an interesting hoared up rock exit was taken

Getting onto the plateau on top was lovely, the sun was shining, the wind had dropped and it was jsut great.  Neither monica or I for that matter had cried, sworn or thrown hissy fits!  RESULT!!!

This is the last day of their honeymoon, I love it, I can forever say I was on their honeymoon!!!!!

the now classic and obligatory gun show picture!  What men we are!!!!!!!

Cyclocross = pain!!!

So this is a bit late but i wanted to share with you our experience this year with cyclocross racing.  I have did it once before last year, but this was to be Lara’s first attempt.  It was at a local Loch near Banchory.  A small course which took about 8 minutes to complete.  The females course was 45 minutes long, and mine was an hour (so sexist!!!! why punish us for longer!!!)

This was Lara’s first bike race for well over 18 months, she was nervous and full of doubt of her fitness, but as we all said to her, it is fun!  Yeah who was I kidding, cyclocross is pain!!  the start gun goes off and basically you have to red line it until the end.  It is a sprint fest.  but what makes it interesting is that it is such a short lap you get to get faster each lap as you learn the lines and you get to have good battles with other riders.

Lara charging up one of the many obstacles (a sand trap) they like to throw in a bit to keep you on your toes.  Lara finish mid pack which I think is extremely admirable for her first go at racing since she fell pregnant.  She said she thoroughly enjoyed it once she got going and is keen for more.

Next up was my race, I was nervous, but this was mainly due to me being the only one on the start line without shaved legs and warming balm on – I was about to get spanked by a whole load of off season training road racers.  The start gun went and everyone hit overdrive!!!!!!!!  Where the hell they all go!?!?!?!?!?!

I gave chase, with most of them being road racers, they don’t possess much off road skills, this is where i managed to make a bit of time and few places back.  With my heart trying it’s hardest to pop out my mouth in protest of the requests I was making of it,  i had to keep on repeating to myself “it is only an hour, dig in”.  I was having a great little tussle with two other riders who would get me on the uphills but i kept on taking them on the downhills.  For three laps we swapped leading positions, i decided to take it easy on one lap to be able to try and get them both and then try and drop them for the final lap.  Well that was a great idea in practise until my front wheel found a slippy bit of mud and i went down and hit the deck.  We were going at a fair ratchet so i must have slid for 5-8 m on the floor till I stopped.  I slip slided my way back to the bike and had to straighten the handlebars.  they had gone……  bugger. 

from there I just had another lap by myself making sure no one caught me to finish – which I did.  A great fun race, a bit painful on the red lining front,  but i will definitely be coming back for some more!  Was great to be able and go out and race on the same day.

First tour of 11/12 season

Sunday was Lara’s turn to go out and play while Dave played with Ellis for the day.

Richard was keen to put his new equipment to the test so he and I headed up to Glen Shee to meet up with Scott and Helen. Unfortunately Scott was tom dick but Richard and I headed up to the ski station in the hope of finding something to ski on.

Given the lack of snow and it being Richard’s first tour we decided to stick near to the resort in order to benefit from the easy bail out if necessary.

We climbed up the Cairnwell side towards Aosda where there were some good patches of snow. Unfortunately the shallow layer of powder was covered with a couple of centimeters of crust. It was quite amazing considering it didn’t drop below zero! Based upon this information we decided it was not worth skiing down on and opted for a pisted descent.

Upon reaching Aosda we took the obligatory ‘skiier atop a munroe’ pics before traversing towards the summit of Cairnwell. While we were ascending from the ski station the cloud had been rolling in resulting in a white out and accompanying flat light. We couldn’t see any contours which led to some amusing skiing.

By this point Richard’s feet were in agony from his new boots. We also couldn’t see more than 20 feet in front of us. We chose to head back down from the top of the Cairnwell teebar, starting down the Bunny run and finishing down a red towards the cairnwell café.

The piste was in great condition and we had a fun ski down! Next stop Braemar mountain sports for some boot enlargement for Rich!!

A glorious morning

A glorious morning and with Lara away I thought it best that I fled the safety of home and took Ellis for a walk on the beach.  Was an utterly lovely morning with the Ferret who was happy making noises at the waves being carried around on my back.

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