days in the woods alone

As much as I enjoy bouldering with good friends, many of my most memorable climbing moments have been spent bouldering alone.

November 11, 2006: Me on It Ain't No Layup, Dinosaur Mountain, Flatirons, CO. After being shown this problem 3 weeks earlier by the first ascentionist, Will LeMaire, I had to come back for more. I had only a half day to get out, so I skipped out on joining everyone else. After warming up down-trail, tweaking the landing a bit, thoroughly recleaning the candidate holds and scoping the topout, the best sequence of moves (for me) became obvious. I tossed aside Will's beta and began my efforts to dyno for the top from lower holds. It took me awhile to fully commit to the big dyno, jumping harder and harder with each successive try. I took a couple bad/awkward falls along the way, which were mental setbacks. Nobody else would have had the patience to put up with how slow my progress was, but I enjoyed the 2+ hours I spent warming my mind up for the dyno and "palming the basketball." Obviously, these pictures were taken on a return visit, but the real treat was solving this problem all by myself on a very quiet and centering day up in the Flatirons. Thanks for taking the pics Scott!