With three weeks till Nationals I let the cold winter blow through me. We walked religiously to the closest gym while battling the snow and wind which was so cold it awakened every cell. I resumed the strength aspect of my training where I had left off. Time passed quickly and already there was only 1.5 weeks left to the big comp. Tonde was flown to Montréaĺ's Allez Up which held a practice comp circuit as did the gym Vértical. It was at Vértical where I was introduced to the idea of "tapering" by trainer and bad ass climber herself, Melissa Lacasse. After asking her if what i was doing was …
canadian bouldering nationals
Four weeks with Jack Frost. Part 1.
Jet lag settled upon me. At times I felt drunk and unstable; ready to burst with some sort of emotional explosion of gratitude tinged with nervousness. I had just flown from Munich to Montreal on a gamble. The World Cup circuit was coming up and qualifying required a visit to the homeland. I had waited in Munich for permission to get a wild card to do the comps and so avoid the hefty trip overseas but it never came for my deadline. My rational said to go for the regionals and nationals. That way, if I blew one comp, at least I had a back up...! :) Having received no answer days before …
My first Nationals
It was never my intention to go to the Nationals. They were supposed to be in Alberta and I was supposed to be in Europe. But as life would have it, they were switched to Montreal and I was stuck in Montreal waiting for essential things like passports which arrived only a few days before the comp. It would seem like chicken behavior to escape the comp at this point but regretting not going seemed even worse. And so I went. I paid to go and compete with the intention to give my best effort and keep my focus on the climb in front of me. The after affect: self inflicted torture and suffering I …