For those who boulder outdoor often having a selection of crash pads depending on difficulty and terrain can make life a lot easier. Particularly when it comes to more challenging areas, a one-size-fits-all approach usually doesn’t work.
Enter the niche category of sit start pads which have been gradually added to most major manufacturers’ portfolios. Designed to be small and light, yet provide good enough protection for those tricky starts, these neat pads make an ideal supplement to their bigger brothers.
Bouldering in Tsavas, Fribourg / Freiburg Switzerland
Written by YDE
Friday, 27 May 2016 21:30
Tucked away in the heart of the Gruyère Regional Nature Park is an astonishing bouldering area called Tsavas. At almost 1’600m, these boulders lie just underneath the foot of the Vanil Noir mountain range in the Swiss Canton of Fribourg.
You’ll have to make the effort and go out of your way to get here though, as there is no public transport link, with your only option being a one lane road winding up the picturesque mountainside. But that’s not all, a further 45min hike up 400m will finally see you to the boulders. The reward though, is a stunningly beautiful mountain valley, rolling green hills and some fantastic blocks just waiting to be climbed.
As the smallest of the Black Diamond crash pad range, the Impact is designed to be a compact alternative to the bigger Drop Zone and Mondo. Can the Impact hold its own in when it comes to the rigours of the outdoors? Read on for my impressions.
Bouldering in Pierre de Beurre, Martigny, Valais Switzerland
Written by YDE
Friday, 29 April 2016 16:00
Looking for an easy to access bouldering area, with enough problems for an afternoon? Pierre de Beurre just outside the city of Martigny in Valais, Switzerland has you covered. This small sector is nestled just behind vineyard fields on the outskirts of the city is a lovely open space with some quality problems.
Having just recently moved to Switzerland I’ve been looking to explore what the country has to offer from a bouldering perspective. One of the struggles here is the lack of official bouldering guides, many of which are out of print. Partly this seems to be related to the fact that bouldering areas can be fairly small and are geographically dispersed across the country, but also for a small country like Switzerland the demand is presumably low for dedicated guide books. Further, with three official languages it can be a challenge to find information on the web as well.
Enter bimano, an app developed in Switzerland that tries to capture the country's bouldering heritage in one easy to use format, as well as that of some other sites sprinkled across Europe. All this right on your phone and in your pocket. Read on for more details!
Recent news that the Cobra Crack was climbed by two British Climbers had me pull up the old video of Sonnie Trotter's first ascent of the infamous Cobra Crack. Classic video, with some very inspired climbing, check it out.
Cobra Crack is a 5.14 traditional crack climb in Squamish, British Columbia, Canada. Read here and here for further information about the region.
I notice time and again that most people either don’t spend enough time learning the basics around bouldering safety or are not taught this when they learn to climb.
On a recent trip I observed one person from another group fail on a rather patchy highball attempt and land hard on their crashpad. Bad spotting did not help, and the person managed to land on their back and took a knock. Suffice it to say he called it a day and probably suffered a splitting headache as a result.
A bit of physics helps explain why bouldering falls can be so dangerous. The key to understanding how much force is acting upon a fall is the braking distance.
