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Hooked up with the indomitable Cassidy Hill yesterday to take a run up the uber-classic climb The Naked Edge (5.11b) in Eldorado Canyon. Cass has been up it a number of times and was looking to get it “wired,” whereas I simply wanted to experience it for the first time. Wednesday was our first attempt, but despite our early start were thwarted by a couple of parties who beat us to the route (in our ensuing despondency we resorted to Rosy Crucifixion and Vertigo).

We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day. The entire Front Range was covered in a fog that combined with the exposure of The Edge made for a truly magical ascent. Plus, the fog kept the sun off us and kept us cool (we were even a bit chilly at the belays). Thankfully, we were the only party on that area of the wall taking advantage of the prime conditions, which is great because other people are annoying.

Since we got back to the car by 11:30 AM, we had plenty of time for some more climbing. We didn’t feel like walking very far, so we opted to climb the first few pitches of Bastille Crack into Outer Space. A good sized day with some substantial vertical gain, and all before lunch.

This weekend found me back in Oklahoma for a number of “celebrations” so to speak. Foremost among them was the passing of my great uncle Jim Smithson. For the last twenty-odd years Jim has worked as a magician, his routines always had a comedic twist to them that was inescapably hilarious. The world lost a great man who left an indelible mark on all who had met him. This impact was none more apparent than when speaking to those who had known him and came to mourn his death. He had countless friends and colleagues who told of his willingness to listen and ability to dispense sound advice.

Perhaps my favorite example, and beautiful picture of a legacy, was a young man named Robert Calonkey (or Rob Lake, as he is known on stage). Rob told us the story of how he had seen a magic show in Branson, MO, at the age of 9 and decided then and there he wanted to be a magician. Upon returning to Oklahoma he took a magic class with Jim, and for the next 16 years was a consistent, pleasant nuisance around the Smithson household. Rob has followed that passion and how has built up a huge, international show; and was recently named International Magician of the Year. For me, it was stories like this, along with happy memories of my own, that helped me to celebrate Jim’s life and mourn with joy.

The night before, we celebrated the recent pregnancy of Alex and Brooke Benton. It’s pretty wild to have friends my age that are already building a family, but I couldn’t be more excited for them. They are to me the perfect picture of people designed to love and raise some little ones.

As if that weren’t enough for an eventful weekend, after Jim’s funeral I headed straight across town to congratulate my buddy Michael Cromwell for slipping a ring on his lady’s finger that very afternoon. Christine Klatt-Lasso is her name, and see reeled herself in a good one. Everybody’s gettin married and havin kids, I feel old…

The Columbian is gone, but we finished of his last day in the land of dreams in good style. Our boy had never done a true alpine-esque rock climb, so we settled on Good Evans for his final send off. Good Evans is a beautiful route up the Black Wall in the Mount Evans Wilderness - at 13,000 feet of elevation. Not only is the rock quality on the route unparalleled, the approach is a relatively short 45 minute hike and two rappels in.

Everything went smoothly except for one little hiccup. As C-money stepped off the belay ledge to begin leading the second pitch, he reached down for a piece of protection to place before embarking up 20 feet of unprotected climbing on a massive flake. Noticeably a little spooked, his hands were a little shaky; so when his paws settled upon my red alien as the appropriate size, the simple task of unclipping it from his harness and plugging it in the crack didn’t go so smoothly. The cam unclipped, he fumbled placing his fingers on the trigger.

Time slowed, or froze, I’m not entirely sure.

My beautiful red alien slipped from his grasp, skittered off the rock, and tumbled in space. It came to rest on the grassy ledges at the base of the route.

“Sorry junior, I owe you a cam.”

Now, for those who are unfamiliar with CCH, the company who produces aliens, they are notoriously unfamiliar with the concept of supply and demand and thus their products are classically difficult to get a hold of. I considered his offer for half a second, “Yeah you do, so go get it.” I lowered Camilo back to ground so he could retrieve it and have the privilege of reclimbing the first pitch.

All in all not a huge deal or major setback, but take this in hand with the last time Camilo and I climbed a multipitch route in Potrero Chico. Our (and by “our” I mean “his”) droppage tally for Afro Juan was as follows: 1 climbing helmet, 1 nalgene water bottle, and 1 camelback bite valve. Impressive, huh? Our Latin friend claims innocence on the nalgene (I disagree, as he faultily affixed it to the backpack). Nonetheless, its seems that I am Camilo’s lucky rabbit’s foot for not hanging onto things. But I like the guy and he has a sexy accent, so I’ll keep climbing with him until he drops the most important thing: me.

We ran into some French dude named Maurice in Potrero Chico this Spring Break. Our buddy Andre put together a nice little video of him cursing his way up Celestial Omnibus - a really nice tufa line that starts about 150 feet off the deck. Great exposure and super aesthetic.

Here it is, enjoy.

(Photo courtesy of Theresa Keefe)

I must confess, my entire summer in Boulder has merely been an effort to prepare it for the arrival of a few special characters from back East. Camilo Lopez, the delicious latin lover and my main man when it comes to crankin’ in DC, is coming out for a week so we can jointly submit our bodies to the punishment of the Rockies. Also joining us for a long weekend is another Okie original who has recently transplanted to DC: Rebeka Hamilton.

As we all know, “work” is a four letter word, so I’ve taken the next week off to maximize our time in the hills. Looking forward to the next week of pulling and partying - hopefully we’ll find some time to sleep, too.

Yesterday was a good day. No. Yesterday was a GREAT day. I finally sent my project, The Wasp 5.13a (traditional), up in the Park. Now, I know that in the grand scheme of things this accomplishment merely cements my status as an outstandingly average rock climber, but I’m pretty psyched about it. This was far and away the hardest thing I’ve ever climbed. I’m no Mark Twight, so I won’t nit-pick other’s choices of style that don’t affect my own (at least not loud enough for them to hear), but I was pleased with myself for staying true a traditional, ground-up ethic. For those of you who are scratching your heads at that last sentence, all it means is that I never toproped the climb or inspected it on rappel - the only way I gained any knowledge was by tying in and leading it, and taking falls until I got it right.

Us climbers are always trying to do the little things to give ourselves one more iota of advantage, and thus engage in an infinite regressive analysis to determine what helps/hurts our vertical endeavors. For a perfect example of this, check Arnold Braker’s recent foray into such analytics (and his insightful conclusion). In this spirit, I’ve done some thinking, and the most likely source of my send power - and action that deviated most from my normal activities - was my dinner the night before: the Tequila’s Especial. Served at the restaurant Tequila’s (go figure), this glorious dish features grilled prawns swimming a green chile tomatillo sauce, littered with baby shrimp, and a massive side of refried beans (I subbed out the standard rice). The dish is at least a foot in diameter, and finishing it is a send in itself. Needless to say, I was surprised I could move the next day; not only could I move, I felt fantastic. I don’t know if it was the magic of the sea, or the flatulent rocket propulsion resulting from the beans, but that Mexican mess did the trick.

So thanks to Tequila’s for the rocket fuel, the good Lord for beautiful rocks to climb, and attentive belayers willing to bear the misery of a 20 minute hike up a talus field.

Waking up at 5:30 is never particularly pleasant. But Cass and I were bound and determined to beat the weather to Rock of Ages so we could get a solid day of attempts on the Wasp. To this end we left Boulder at 6 AM, drove to RMNP, and busted out the approach in 45 minutes. We knew this route was going to be a heart breaker as it sports a final crux just below the anchors, with a pseudo-stable clipping stance for the final piece of protection (a fixed pin), followed by some strenuous crimpy moves the the finishing jug. Cass proved our theory right on his first go: it looked like he was going to get the send, but fell just two moves below the jug! Many a comparison could be made between the route and beautiful women at this juncture (pleasing to the eye, suck you in, rip your soul apart, etc.) but I’ll forgo them because its been done before in words far more eloquent than mine.

After sitting around to regain some strength and timing our runs so they would coincide with cloud cover (the sun was baking the face), Cass tied back in for his second go of the day. He looked incredibly solid, until he started moving from the only decent rest on the route (about halfway up). Somehow he completely botched his beta and ended up horrifically off-balance. Nonetheless, experienced tradmaster that he is, Cass downclimbed back to the jug rather than try to force it through. Another rest and he was on the go, this time nailing the moves and soon he was at those final crimps guarding the send. I must confess that after watching him get mixed up, I thought he had blown this attempt. Not so. He glided through those last few feet with poise, latched the jug, and clipped the anchors like a pro!

So mad props to Cassidy Hill for making short work of The Wasp (5.13a trad), completing it in just six attempts!

I, however, have eight runs under the belt already - but I think I’m getting close…

Cass and I went back up to The Wasp this morning. After a burn from each of us and while Cass was halfway through his second attempt the heavens opened up. Cass did an impressive job of finishing in the rain (so we didn’t have to leave any gear). As wet as it was we had no choice but to bail; there was little chance of things drying up today. We’re going back tomorrow…

Today was a beautiful day up in Rocky Mountain National Park and we took full advantage of it. Cass, Angela, and I went up to Rock of Ages to try our hand at The Wasp, after getting on it last week and taking a massive whipper I was psyched to get back on the sharp end, and it turns out Cass had been eyeing it for a while, too.

We left early this morning to get a jump on the weather and have a full days’ worth of value. After a burn from each of us on lead (and a clean run on top-rope from Cass!) it started to rain. Undeterred, we persevered and took shelter, our persistence paid off and soon enough it was sunny and dry again. I roped up first, and gave ‘er a solid run up to the crux before taking a fall, then finished it out with three falls total (which I felt good about). Cass gave a similarly strong performance, but with just two falls.

We’re both super-psyched on the route and itching to get back up there soon. Not only is it one of the most fantastic single pitches of trad I’ve ever been on, the setting - high on a hillside above the valley in Rocky Mountain National Park - is tough to beat.

Angela snapped some stellar photos, including the one to the right, and I’ll get some more of those up soon.

Three easy payments of $19.95, eight minutes a day, a pill before each meal, and a minimal amount of personal effort that never puts you out of breath. Such is the vastly pervasive conception of fitness in America these days. Nearly a third of American adults are obese, and twice that number are overweight.

To say there’s a correlation between the attitude and the outcome is the understatement of the century. This is when many people like to object and cite other sources for the problem such as genetic predisposition and endocrine disorders. Such arguments are akin to the pro-choice advocate who points to rape as the justification for abortion - in both instances such outliers may be real, but they are just that: outliers not representative of the greater whole.

Even those that do decide to get off the couch and do something often do so with little knowledge and thus to little effect. Not that those efforts aren’t commendable, but if you buy oils and canvass without going to art school, don’t expect to start turning out Picassos. Bench presses, calf raises, and the elliptical aren’t gonna get you to the olympics.

Enter the boys and girls at CrossFit. Started and still run by Coach Greg Glassman, CrossFit is a genuine approach to functional, athletic fitness. It relies on hard work and proven science, rather than gimmicks and shortcuts. Most workouts take less than twenty minutes (but you’re earning it for those twenty minutes), and combine functional bodyweight movements, gymnastics, and weight lifting. It’s the chief fitness program for special operations personnel and law enforcement. I could spend a lot of time and words doing a great disservice by trying to describe it in greater detail, but best to check the site out for yourself and get it from the horse’s mouth. The first thing you’ll notice is the Workout of the Day (WOD): each day Coach posts a workout for the day, so if you want a personally prescribed training program you’ve got one for free. For those who are less individually motivated and prefer a collective competitive atmosphere, there are licensed affiliate CrossFit gyms throughout the country.

An interesting roundabout connection to CrossFit. Remember the movie 300? The cast and crew of 300 were trained by Mark Twight, a once professional alpine climber, former disciple of CrossFit, and current owner/operator of GymJones. There is a bit of saga which involves Twight essentially ripping off the CrossFit model and rebranding it as his own, you can read about that here. Suffice it to say that those guys trained within a CrossFit framework.

Not that it matters, but I can personally attest to its effectiveness. I’ve always had to hit the gym for non-climbing workouts in order to avoid injury, and this stuff does the trick. It works for everyone, young and old, fit and overweight. If you’re tired of fooling about in the gym, and ready for a dose of real fitness, check it out.