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lena_chita
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Mar 30, 2007, 5:13 PM
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Clausti calls it "the R word"...
Yes, I know there is always a way to figure out a sequence of moves around a reachy move...
Yes, I know that technique is the answer...
Yess, I know that Lynn Hill is very short and that doesn't stop her from being so great.
Yes, I know that there are some situations when being short is an advantage...
But DAMMIT!!!!!
Boulder league at our gym... a guy who's been climbing for barely two months and can't climb anything above 5.8 just freaking reaches across with his 6ft2 frame and grabs the hold. And I get on the same route, throw my 5 ft midget body with all I have... and FALL!!!!!
Yes, I was able to figure out a way to do the move differently, used a couple of crappy holds that he skipped and got the problem clean after couple tries, while the tall guy got hung up on the technical move 2 moves after the reachy move and never got past it...
But he got a higher score on his onsight! As ridiculous as this sounds, 2 days later I am still smarting about it. WAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!! I want to be taller!
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rushgirl
Mar 30, 2007, 5:45 PM
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I hear ya sister. What is worse is when reaching for said move, body as close to the rock as possible to give as much leverage as possible and the girls go smacking up against the holds in front of you. That smarts.
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lena_chita
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Mar 30, 2007, 6:19 PM
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LOL, rushgirl, thanks for reminding me that it could be worse... my 'girls', as you put it, are nonexistent, so at least they don't smack into anything...
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jakedatc
Mar 30, 2007, 6:22 PM
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get that lanky guy on a low sit start and have a good laugh..
Everyone has limitations.. guys.. girls. you can either get down about it or take advantage of what you do have and use it to your advantage.
You don't HAVE to technique everything.. work on your weaknesses.. go work on campusing and get strong dynamically.. it can be done if you want it. So i got no pity for you.. just belief that you can change.
lynn hill is the old example(still awesome.. she kicks ass).. how bout a new one..
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granite_grrl
Mar 30, 2007, 6:34 PM
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I have a buddy who's 5'3" who has crazy mad dynoing skills....develloped for obvious reasons. You should see some of the stuff he goes for!
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lena_chita
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Mar 30, 2007, 7:35 PM
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wow, jakedatc, who is that girl in the picture?
I know I need to work on the dynos. They are my very sore weak point.
And yes, my whining is very inconsequential... I don't seriously think that my height has anything to do with anything. But a girl has to whine sometimes...
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taino
Mar 30, 2007, 7:47 PM
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lena_chita wrote: wow, jakedatc, who is that girl in the picture? I know I need to work on the dynos. They are my very sore weak point. And yes, my whining is very inconsequential... I don't seriously think that my height has anything to do with anything. But a girl has to whine sometimes...
I believe that's Cicada Jenerik... climbed V10 when she was ten years old.
T
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jakedatc
Mar 30, 2007, 8:21 PM
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Lena i understand your frustration.. see my weekly posts about the problem ive been working for the past few weeks. Think.. maybe that guy is talking to his friends going "yea.. i had to jump past these crap holds and this short girl cruised through it so smooth" haha.
the girl is Cicada Jenerik.. best known for sending v10 at age 10. And i just read "On August 8, 2005, Cicada Jenerik once again climbed her age, this time V11 at age 11"
she's in the Return2Sender dvd. And unlike Tori Allen she seems to be motivated by herself and supported by her parents.. instead of the other way around.
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crazygirl
Mar 30, 2007, 9:07 PM
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lena_chita wrote: Yes, I was able to figure out a way to do the move differently, used a couple of crappy holds that he skipped and got the problem clean after couple tries, while the tall guy got hung up on the technical move 2 moves after the reachy move and never got past it...
i think that guy posted the "i'm so good, i need a sponsorship" thread. just wait till he starts climbing outside, and the universe, as they say, will unfold itself as it should.
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kimmyt
Apr 1, 2007, 12:27 AM
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I think it's a lot harder to ignore the height thing at the gym. There, you only have certain holds to use. When you're outside you don't have 'only use these features' routes. That'd be dumb. You have a lot more options outside. Although i'm sure this pretty much goes out the window with harder routes (none of which I do, outside, anyway).
Inside you have a route set by someone who is 6'4" tall and has set the first move on a 5.9 so that he can easily reach it... which means I have to dyno for the start of it, being 5'3".
However, they do get mad when us little ones use their 'foot jibs' as crimpers.... "That wasn't supposed to be on!"
Well guess what buddy, now it is, sorry your fat paws can't get an edge on it!!
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tavs
Apr 2, 2007, 4:31 PM
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Re: Kimmy's post: at one point, some (undetermined) people at the gym I go to got so annoyed with (mostly) females using jibs for hands on a particular problem that they actually put up a sign saying "JIBS ON FOR FEET ONLY." What crap--as if we need to go out of our way to make the gym even more contrived than it already is???
First, to join the pity party.....there was a problem I was working in the gym, could do a bunch of moves on it and really enjoyed them, but the second move--never able to do it. It involved a long move around an arete that I was just not able to reach. Dynoing/cutting feet wasn't the solution here--I couldn't touch the hold because at my full arm extension, my chest was crushed into the arete and I was still coming up a couple inches short. Shrug. Le crap.
Now, an anecdote that echoes what jake said. I was working a problem with another female that had a couple of long moves. While I think you could finagle some way of doing the moves statically, I found the best, most reliable, and most efficient way was simply to dyno. After trying the problem herself and failing at trying to static the first long move, then watching me throw the dyno and stick it, this woman made the comment, "Ugh, another problem with a dyno? There must be a way to do that with technique." To which I replied, "There is--it's called dyno technique."
Some people seem to view campusing or dynos as always evidence of lack of technique--simply a way to muscle through a problem using only strength. But having worked deliberately on big moves in order to improve a my weakness (being short!), I am a firm believer that there is (or at least can be) just as much technique involved in cutting feet as anything else in climbing. So I embrace the dyno as a useful tool in my repetoire of climbing techniques.
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lena_chita
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Apr 2, 2007, 5:30 PM
Post #12 of 39
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I think the person who set this problem just didn't realize how reachy it was for someone who is 5 ft tall. It wasn't meant to be a hard problem, and it wasn't. it just stymied me...
O.K., I am not whining anymore. Case closed. (it helped that I went back to the gym and finally got that move dynamicly... woo hoo!)
LOL, re: "Jibs for feet only"-- what a co-incidence, I just did a problem that was all jibs on Saturday... with a nice sit start, pulling up on two jibs, followed by a bit of scrunched up twisting... It was so much fun to be better at something for once than the harder-cranking guys.
Of course then they went on to "throw from this to that and campus up this" type of problem that I looked at and said "no, thank you".
Need to work on that... and go bouldering outside! Somehow that never happens, b/c when we go on a trip, it is all sport climbing... But I am determined to try bouldering outside this season.
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jumpingrock
Apr 2, 2007, 7:15 PM
Post #13 of 39
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Ihategrigris wrote: Short people climb, tall people reach
In reply to: Short people complain
(This post was edited by jumpingrock on Apr 2, 2007, 9:45 PM)
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iamthewallress
Apr 2, 2007, 9:12 PM
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My gym has a couple of really short course setters who often set problems where I can't make the reaches. The combination of lock of strength, getting in close to the wall when it's steep-strength, balance, positioning, etc. makes the very short dude who boulders double digits have a much longer effective reach than I do...and I'm probably 4 inches taller than him.
I had the pleasure of watching him staticly and smoothly send some of my projects where I had to huck for the reaches for all that I was worth!
If I bitch about the reaches when I'm climbing w/ my boyfriend, he'll eliminate them. He may concede that it's harder that way, but the rate at which it's doable keeps me quieter these days.
Non-Lynn Hill famous climbers off the top o fmy head who are shorter than me:
Beth Rodden
Alex Huber
Timmy O'Neill (maybe)
Scott Burk
And a million others who are shorter, climb harder, and aren't that famous.
But I know what ya mean when I a see a guy reach past like 4 hard moves... But then I figure that our gym's 12 foot bouldering area must be kind of boring for someone who's 6.5 feet tall.
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rushgirl
Apr 2, 2007, 9:38 PM
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I went climbing over the weekend with a guy friend who has more than a foot on me in height. There were a few climbs that I complain about being reachy that he is able to just reach with out a problem. Here's the thing though. His hands and feet are huge, so I am able to get my fingers into places and toes onto things I wouldn't be able to do other wise, so I guess being small does have some advantage.
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charley
Apr 2, 2007, 10:36 PM
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lena_chita wrote: I think the person who set this problem just didn't realize how reachy it was for someone who is 5 ft tall. It wasn't meant to be a hard problem, and it wasn't. it just stymied me... O.K., I am not whining anymore. Case closed. (it helped that I went back to the gym and finally got that move dynamicly... woo hoo!) LOL, re: "Jibs for feet only"-- what a co-incidence, I just did a problem that was all jibs on Saturday... with a nice sit start, pulling up on two jibs, followed by a bit of scrunched up twisting... It was so much fun to be better at something for once than the harder-cranking guys. Of course then they went on to "throw from this to that and campus up this" type of problem that I looked at and said "no, thank you". Need to work on that... and go bouldering outside! Somehow that never happens, b/c when we go on a trip, it is all sport climbing... But I am determined to try bouldering outside this season.
it was great at lisbon sat.
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lhwang
Apr 3, 2007, 5:26 PM
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Lena_chita, I used to shy away from that kind of problem (campus this/throw that) because i have a different problem... I'm not particularly short, but I'm weak! I used to say "No thanks" too, but then I actually started just trying them. So what if I just make one move and then fall off. At first that's exactly what would happen, but as time has gone on I've actually gotten a lot stronger and I enjoy that style of problem more.
Good on you for sticking that move in the end!
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zenelky
Apr 3, 2007, 8:07 PM
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I'm really f-ing tired of hearing this stupid complaint!! If only I were taller, I could have gotten the move, if only I were stronger, I could have hung on...well if you would have been better than you could have done either of the above. I'm only 5'2" and this was my crutch for a long time too. People got tired of me saying "I could reach it if I were an inch taller" until someone finally hollered back, if "If you were stronger or had better technique then you wouldn't have to be an inch taller!!" and it's true.
This is just a crutch that people have to get over or else you will hit a plateau that you will NEVER overcome because you have the "I'm too short" problem. I've stood next to Beth Rodden, she's smaller than me. It made me relize that I'm better because I have to pull harder, and the harder I climb the more clear it is that it has NOTHING to do with height, it has to do with mindset (I'm talking 11d's, 12's and up).
So until then, stop complaining, stop focusing on what others can do, and work on what YOU can do. What were you doing climbing inside anyway? I see the height problem FAR FAR more often then when I'm outside. IMO, if you are at a gym whose route-setters don't understand the differance between 5' and 6' reach, than they shouldn't be working there anyway.
My motto from Lynn Hill (I think): There is no such thing as a long move, they are just power moves.
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lena_chita
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Apr 3, 2007, 8:29 PM
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zenelky wrote: I'm really f-ing tired of hearing this stupid complaint!! ... I'm only 5'2" and this was my crutch for a long time too.
OOOOHHH, if only I were 5'2"!!! That's two extra inches! I could have reached that hold for sure!  Just had to say that to irritate you further, zenelky!
Don't take my whine too seriously. it wasn't meant seriously. And it was last week, anyway... I can't sustain a whine for that long. I tell my kids that whining has a time limit :)
Yes, I am perfectly aware that if I had more strength I may have been able to do that move on the first time. And if I had a better dyno technique I would have been able to do it, too. And if I had a better route-reading skills I would have seen right away the technical way to step around the reachy move. All of the above are skills I can work on and do work on.
lhwang, you are right, of course, if I don't try something I would never improve in that area... I'm just getting over my fear of bouldering after seriously hurting my back last year, so I do still shy away from some things that look like the move I fell on last year. But I AM getting over it.
Aww, charlie, I know we missed out chance last weekend... And now there is snow in the forecast...
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blonde_loves_bolts
Apr 4, 2007, 12:11 AM
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lena_chita wrote: LOL, rushgirl, thanks for reminding me that it could be worse... my 'girls', as you put it, are nonexistent, so at least they don't smack into anything...
OOOOOOOH!!!!!
Are we calling a small boobies whaaaaambulance as well?? Or should we start a separate thread for that?? *adjusts heavily padded 32A Victoria's Secret bra over 28A- chest*
In any case, it is a little frustrating when my girlfriend's boobs get BIGGER as she loses weight and my body taps that extinct resource first... I swear I'm going concave, people!!
Whatever... I'm 5'7 and I'm allegedly only allowed to bitch about being short in regards to rowing... I'll shut up now.
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snoangel
Apr 4, 2007, 12:30 AM
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blonde_loves_bolts wrote: ...and my body taps that extinct resource first... I swear I'm going concave, people!!
I hear you, big time. My boobs are the last to get bigger when I gain weight and the first to go away when I lose it. Doh!
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clee03m
Apr 4, 2007, 1:46 PM
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I admit I wear super duper ginormously padded bras when I want my boobs to go from B to a major C. And they are wonderful. I like how I can change my boob size according to the outfit and how I feel for the day. I did wear the padded one once to the gym, and they kept getting in the way, but because they are so heavily padded, it didn't hurt!
I hear your frustration about loosing boobage (I gage my diet sucesses with change in how my boob fits into my bras), but I am telling you, there are bras to fix that.
And please ladies, don't slaughter me for buying into the patriarchal bull about hypersexualizing boobs and idealizing a thin body. I just really like boobs...and a FIT body.
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lena_chita
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Apr 4, 2007, 2:33 PM
Post #24 of 39
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clee03m wrote: And please ladies, don't slaughter me for buying into the patriarchal bull about hypersexualizing boobs and idealizing a thin body. I just really like boobs...and a FIT body.
Nah, I won't.
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littlefingers
Apr 4, 2007, 8:04 PM
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I'm 5-0 too.
Have to say there's not much more satisfying than hearing a bunch of guys/gals/people spraying at the base of a climb/route/boulder problem, and then being a 5-0 girl who hikes it. There is a definite advantage to being short here-- makes the loud people hold in their spray. that's kind of fun. Why people assume if your short and send something that your like a salmon swimming up stream, I'm not sure. but it works on keeping people quiet!
in all honesty-- being short makes heel hooking a ton easier(or at least getting your feet over your head to do the heel hooking), and most often you come with fingers that can make use of the tiniest crimps. I've found if you're creative and determined enough, most things can go. I get frustrated on reachy slopey stuff, but recently was able to haul my whole ass on top of one sloper and have a seat of sorts--- !
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