Burying the previous year

 So another silent 6 months has passed, I've popped the odd thing on Instagram, but not really felt up to splurging on here. .

Rewind to October:

By this point I'm trusting my ankle, having good sessions at the wall, I even started to try this new crack project..

Then got carried away.

Basically, while I was dealing physically and mentally with my bust Achilles, I had stepped away from climbing.

This meant no maintenance, no conditioning, I needed to compartmentalize that away.

When I returned to climbing I was surprised by how little form I'd lost, possibly something to do with how long I'd been maintaining at a certain level of form. However what hadn't stayed the same was my connective tissue. 6 months of stress free living had made my pulleys soft.

Lesson learnt, a little maintenance goes a long way.

One finger max density hangs have been a real eye opener. I use bungies and a home made edge so I can just make myself uncomfortable. I consider these exercises key to my recovery. 10 seconds of pulling in half crimp, then rest a minute. Repeat 5 times.

I did this twice a week for two and a half months. Now I just do it once a week as conditioning and will do indefinitely.

In the meantime I was going for the odd adventure with the kids, like exploring the woods 

I even got an opportunity to walk up a mountain looking for cracks 

They're a bit tall, not sure if they will be highballs or trad. I've not really tradded for 5 year's or more, so that might be interesting.

Finally this weekend Ethan and I returned to the crack

Unfortunately, it was a bit wet and the tools I'd brought to remove the stuck log were insufficient. Even our make shift swing didn't pull it out.

Still, I had a good play, and was reassured that my fingers were back up to this sort of shenanigans.

Something for another visit.

I'm really enjoying these adventures with the kids though. They have very little filter so are quite forthright and refreshing.

Adventure awaits