Flow

A comment was made on the last post that I should be working my weaknesses. Amusing timing as I got sucked into an Interval session at the Foundry tonight with Dave, on undercuts. I hate them, they make my wrists hurt, and I can't use the damn things when it gets steep. But, as part of this new found love for attacking weaknesses and (as Chalkbag emphasised) "maintaining strengths", it was a case of getting stuck in. And of course, after a period of time, I was suddenly linking much of the sequence I'd been given (it's a training lap on the woodie that the locals use for training for Malham). Sometimes it's not that you're not strong enough, but that you don't know how to use that strength.
Many years ago, I attended one of Neil Gresham's coaching courses. I didn't find it overly beneficial (mainly due to the huge ability difference in the group I was with which meant that it was hard for anyone to get time with him - but I can't recommend coaching enough) but one thing stuck with me at the time. He'd asked me to demonstrate a steep drop-knee on the UCD 30-degree board. Then he asked to me do it without just pulling on my arms! It was a good point - all your core and feet can do a huge amount to keep you attached, but all I was doing was pulling in and gripping with both hands.
It seems somewhere in the past (unknown time) while I've gotten out of this habit a bit again - and especially with undercuts, if you don't push with your core and feet, the only direction you're going is towards the matting (or pad or airtime :). So, some practice and some regular repetition will hopefully fix this. It's like dynamic pulls, the campusing should start paying of soon.

Why the dolphin photo? Wouldn't be awesome to be able to move like one of those, like they move in water? And as another analogy, I took this photo as the dolphin rode the wave off the boat I was on in New Zealand - a creature that is ridiculously powerful, and yet still has the smarts to use anything at it's disposal to move forward. Nice analogy eh? I must still be ill to come up with that one ;)

One of those weeks. Some sort of flu, throat infection, and I seem to have tweaked a finger at the comp (nothing new there - haven't left a comp in years without an injury. sigh) so crimping is out. Ironic considering I was focusing on crimps right now! At least I had the amusing experience tonight of realizing that I can comfortably out-hang quite a few strong people at the wall on an open-handed edge - but it does mean I can't work on the weakness now!
What can you do but keep the head down and remind yourself of fun times you've had (and will continue to have) - Naomi and I stuck in the hut in the Fjiorlands in torrential rain in NZ on this day last year :)



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