Neverending Winter

As the weather heats up on the Central Coast, many have headed outdoors to pursue their activity of choice. While I have managed a few quick outings into roadside wilderness, the bulk of my day is still spent in dark dusty places logging numerous hours of training. I feel oddly British training inside for hours on end, keeping motivation up with coffee and tea, and eating whatever I can get my hands on to recover. Then again, I also feel a bit like a caged tiger, pacing, or I should say limping, laps around a small confined territory. Like the caged cat, I’m on a hair trigger - ready to pounce on any opportunity to escape, but like a Brit, I’m trying to channel this anxiety. Ideally I’ll end up with enough of the condensed product to not only support morale during the daily tedium and pain of training, but also to store as I plan for future years. Hopefully this stuff will serve as a secret weapon of sorts to catalyze that ever so difficult first step out the door on subsequent adventures and challenges.

It really is a case of “be careful what you ask for...”. Shed and Castle affiliates have often joked about how awesome a jail sentence could be - just you and your body stuck in a room with just enough food to survive and absolutely no responsibilities to fracture attention. “We’d get so fit.” While I’ve undoubtedly eaten better than a prisoner, and enjoyed all sorts of other luxuries reserved for the innocent, this has been an interesting look into what’s possible when all of one’s training is confined to a single room with only basic equipment. The situation is even more interesting, because not more than a year ago I got in a knock down drag out argument with, yes you guessed it, Elijah over my complete lack of interest in training indoors. This was of course at a time when I was contributing to a major lull in activity at The Shed by continually getting paid to cook for people on the road and then funding short trips in between with my earnings (sorry, my bad). I kept telling him how I had too many injuries to train at the Shed and how I was convinced it couldn’t help my climbing anymore. His response was to simply doubt my masculinity. Well, take it all in dude. It’s not often that Micah’s gonna tell you how right you were. Yes, training power IS necessary AND far more fun than I remember.

I reminded myself of all this on Saturday. Most of the weekend was spent cooking for a client, so I was unable to join the gang in Santa Maria. Thus my only option was a quick trip to The Shed during an afternoon break. After traversing the base of the wall a few times I was sort of at a loss for how to climb any up problems without begging the gods for another hospital visit. My solution was not only “mom approved”, but highly inspiring as well. The UK is undoubtably home to many of the smallest yet brutally set woodies in the world. A closet is more than enough space for these maniacs to build a wall that will make 8a’s feel like warm ups and The Shed wall is frickin massive compared to those things.

Enter the British Standard.

It’s simple, and as mentioned above, well tested. Routes can only be one panel long (which means they end just above head high). Only wood chips and tracking feet are allowed. Obviously foot holds are the preferred handholds in this scenario, because your buddies will be giving you shit for pulling on jugs when the routes are only 3-4 moves long. Stack this with your caffeinated beverage of choice, mind the jessery, and you’re on your way to hiking Hubble.

Video Note: This wall is on the big side by British Standard, but the use of space is very respectable.

Chairmen of the board from beastmaker.co.uk on Vimeo.