Gretna comp 2014

Charlie Garcia on The Box, Mt. Gretna

Went to my first Gretna comp yesterday, and they threw a heck of a party.  It's something I've been wanting to go to for a while, mainly as an opportunity to find my way around a notoriously confusing boulder field, but I'd have gone way sooner if I'd known exactly how much fun I'd have.  Charlie obviously crushed everything he touched, and I have to say I was pretty happy with how things turned out for me too.  Some of my successes...

-Making a casual entrance- Yeah, things started at 8, but showing up at 9:30 works just as well.

-Falling off the top of my warmup- Porcelain was the one problem I was really psyched to do, so we went there first, and I promptly fell from the top on my first go.  I also forgot to clean the resulting dirt out of my shoes, and fell again on my second attempt, which my ankle wasn't all that happy about.

-Breaking my second climb- Deciding Porcelain wasn't a good idea, I turned 90 degrees and tried Needle to the Vein.  Almost an easy flash, until a crimp snapped off and dumped me on the pads again.  At least it still went easily afterward.

-Balance- I think the first couple falls jarred something, because I spent the next hour feeling a bit wobbly and constantly tripping over myself, or randomly almost falling over on flat ground.  At least Charlie was having issues too.

-Finding my own footholds and then forgetting to use them-  After warming up, we went back down the hill to get on The Adjuster.  Like many problems, there are a ton of ways to climb it based on body type and climbing style, and what I did ended up being nothing like what I've seen in videos.  Unfortunately the effort I put into efficient climbing at the bottom didn't translate into my topout footwork, and I pumped out trying to mantle of the the lip.

-Skin conservation-  On a following attempt at The Adjuster, I got a nice split in the tip of the index finger, though honestly I still had a bit of a hole in it from working Curtain Call two days earlier.  Hooray for tape!

-Remembering to stretch-  Later in the day we stopped to climb the beautiful Scarlet Lady slab, and I was just marveling at how easy it felt when my calf decided to lock up.  Mental note: electrolytes are my friend.

-Not even writing anything on my scorecard- But let's be honest, I never planned to anyway.  Way more fun that way.

-Dinner plans-  All day long we had been planning to stop at the Troeg's brewery for dinner and some recovery fluids.  Not sure why we thought 6:00 on a Saturday with a Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert down the street was going to happen.  Impressed that they had at least five guys waving glowing red sticks to more efficiently move us through the maze of cones and back out of the lot.

-Backup plans-  When we couldn't find a Sheetz for food, McDonald's seemed like a good option too, especially when I had my first ever Big Mac.  I'm a grown up boy now!

So yeah... Slightly sore ankle, sliced up finger tip, assorted other scrapes and bruises... Guess I'd better go hit the bakery and fuel up for a day of Frederick bouldering!