The Upper Y

Part 1:

Last Friday a third of the V0 Army went climbing (the third of the ‘Army’ being me, seeing as the rest of the ‘Army’ currently consists of JM and B Hips) with the man, the legend – who for the sake of anonymity we will call Curtis, up at the Upper Y on flagstaff. Side note 1: It is important that I keep the legend’s identity a secret because if you knew who ‘Curtis’ was then I would have thousands of friend requests per day on Facebook from all of you stalker-ish readers just so you could get one step closer to ‘Curtis’, and let’s be honest, the time that it would take for me to sort the stabbers from the back patters and ‘hey bro’ers’ is not worth my time.

The session started out smoothly. I warmed up on the traverse and ‘Curtis’ hiked a couple of highballs. I asked if he used a tree coming out of the crag, but he said, ‘no’ and just kind of looked confused. I felt that my statement needed more explaining so I said, ‘Well you know, like 90% of the time naturals are on…” The legend just looked more confused and a little angry, but I continued, “So… I mean, if you used the tree to get up there so fast it’s cool.” Curtis claimed that he hadn’t used the tree sticking out of the crag, but I still think it is okay if he did. Side note 2: I climb at the Spot a lot and have noticed that roughly 90% (with a standard deviation of 2%) of the problems there are natural tracking, because the standard deviation is so tight and the data is taken from well over a 100 problems I assumed decided that spot tracking rules may be applicable to outdoor problems.

After the warm ups ‘Curtis’ pointed out a problem that he thought I should send – a highball up the center of the crag topping out along the ‘Y’. I asked ‘Curtis’ for some beta and he sent the problem slowly so that I could take notes. Now if any of you have ever climbed with ‘Curtis’ you undoubtedly know that when ‘Curtis’ sends a problem it never looks difficult, it always looks completely easy and natural… as natural as a kitten sipping milk, a desperate dog ‘hugging’ an unsuspecting child’s leg, or watching a tortoise live to 115. Side note 3: I have a memory of being about 5 in Louisiana when some person’s dog whom we were visiting (there person not the dog) tried to accost my shin. All of the adults just laughed and said, “The dog wants to play,” or “The puppy likes you.” To all who were present that day I now inquire,” What the F%CK?!!”

After watching ‘Curtis’ send the problem I gave it a couple of goes to figure out the bottom of the moves. I was pretty hesitant about sending the highball part of the problem due to a ‘sketchy’ looking mantle after the crux. I told ‘Curtis’ that I was just planning on finishing the lower problem, but he insisted that once I got there I would want to finish the problem. The bottom moves were pretty straight forward, some small pockets, a match and then some jugs. The biggest problem I had before the crux was using my feet… big surprise because when I climb I tend to use my feet as much as Helen Keller used her reading lamp. After the jugs, the problem finished up with a right hand pinch followed by the crux crimp with a bump to the last jug. … And would you know it? The legend was right! As I grabbed the final jug I felt a strong urge to mantle and top out the highball. Perhaps this feeling was brought on by ‘Curtis’ yelling at me from the ground to mantle and top out. Maybe I am part of the sheople herd?

The first part of my attempt at the send has been documented here

Part 1 of Brad's day at the Upper Y

in the preferred V0flash format – GIF animation. I regret that we didn’t have audio recoding last week because you all missed out on an extremely anxiety driven tirade after the crux including promises to jump. One lucky man hiking past us now has an example of exactly which adjectives should never be used with which nouns. I’m sure that his descendants will benefit for generations from the lessons that will be passed on them about how to behave in public, in private, or at the Upper Y. How will this climb end? Will I send my first highball? Will I fall to my certain death? Will I jump? Will Boulder County Mountain Rescue pluck me off of the crag? Submit your guess below. Check back soon!!

~Bradley D.

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