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| Richy Reed showing how it should be done in BIG BOOTS!!!! |
Yet again another great turn out for the dry tooling and Schmooling taster sessions.
On the Schmoolz side of things …….I think it’s time I stopped calling them tasters as the people coming down are becoming quite proficient at the required techniques. People seem to be moving away from the positive jug holds they ‘thought’ they needed to more what I call marginal holds. This allows for a more aesthetically feeling route (if that is possible), and puts more emphasis on the way the tools are tensioned and the direction of pull. Of course this all ends up being great training for the dry tooling.
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| Mike aka The Schmoolz Man, cooling down after his session at the wall |
On the dry tooling side…..We seem to have created a problem ….queues!!!!! first week we had 2 routes, last week we had 3 and this week we set 4….even still there were queues at each one and this went on the whole night till 9 pm (much to Richy’s delight ;-)). This week’s routes seem to go down well with a hanging log you could ‘bash the S***’ out of, the tyre quad (4 hanging tyres for the lay people amongst us), overhanging simulated ice (ok foam :-)) and a flat wall that allowed those that hadn’t tried dry tooling before a gentle introduction.
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| Amy on her first try at dry tooling - good shapes Amy! |
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| John looking strong, a potential winner in the Vets catagory |
The atmosphere has to be praised again this week….It makes it a pleasure to see so much ‘Buzz’ and Hype around the Wall and for everyone to be enjoying themselves. Seeing one of the guys (Colin) slowly making his way up and achieving a really tenuous Schmooling route was the highlight for me, even more so when I saw the huge smile on his face. The newbie’s that came along to last night’s session (Mike and the Teesside Mafia) got quite a shock and went away happy and smiling if not a little weary ;-).
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| Perhaps shorts are not the best idea on a route like this one...eh Jack? |
Once again the staff at Sunderland Wall were on hand to encourage those that had not tried these activities before to ‘have a go’, help where they could and make everyone feel really welcome…They must take most of the praise for creating a great atmosphere generally around the wall.
If you are thinking about (I hope you are) entering the competition and attending the Greg Boswell lecture on the 11th February can you please start to complete on line registration so we can get a better idea of the numbers we are expecting on the day....click on the link below to take you to the Northern Tooling Series website for registrations and general information.
http://www.northerntoolingseries.co.uk/
See you all soon
Cliff
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