Varazze, Italy from Courtney Sanders on Vimeo.

More info on courtneysanders.com

Invisible Man Project, 8c++? from Courtney Sanders on Vimeo.

Courtney put together a little video from Joes and Hueco

Hueco and Joes Valley2010 from Courtney Sanders on Vimeo.

Footage from Joes Valley this fall, and Hueco Tanks the past 2 weeks. Big Boy, A River Runs Through It, 3 Years Dead and the Bitch still Burned Me, Yellow Diamonds V13FA, A Good Day for Swiss Crisp Mix, and Escape Velocity FA.

Climbers: Flannery Shay-Nemirow, Daniel Woods, Courtney Sanders

I just received SANUK as a new sponsor! They make amazing sandals. I have never worn a more comfortable sandal in my life and am now addicted. All of their products are made from recycled materials and transformed into this flexible sandal. They are designed to strengthen your feet and overall balance.

My Sanuk of choice at the moment is the Grifter. It has an urban appearance, but can handle the alpine terrain. The sandel is very light and comfortable.

I am psyched to represent Sanuk and be a part of a motivated company. Everyone is very positive and always psyched. To view more Sanuk items visit http://sanuk.com/

 IT has been a while since my last post. Too much has happened so I will not back track, but carry forward. This summer has been filled with many adventures up to this area called Wolverine Land at Mt. Evans. IT was discovered many years ago, but not till this year has it seen an explosion of boulder problems at all levels. The boulder field is situated in a gully leading from the top of the road into the cucumber shaped lake. You descend a steep 900 foot hillside at 12,000 feet into a paradise of boulders. The air is very thin, so breathing can be stressful at first until your body gets adjusted. Dave Graham was shown this area by Jamie Emerson, and has been on a rampage scrubbing, chalking, and building landings for everyone to enjoy these new tespieces. He has put up many classic FAs as well including Mote in God’s Eye, Clan of the Cave Bears, and Bebe Wolverine. He has taught me alot about exploring virgin rock and preparing it. Dave has always been an inspiration to me with his dedication to developing not only boulders but sectors and areas. He is a true pioneer of this sport and climbing/learning from him has been an honor. My whole perspective on climbing has changed since last year. The satisfaction of climbing unknown stone is paralyzing compared to repeating lines. The amount of days that goes into climbing an undone boulder makes you realize how long it takes to develope an area. I still enjoy repeating other climbers testpieces, but now I appreciate all the effort that was put into creating these works of art. Wolverine Land allowed me to go out and create new boulder problems. IT has been a total joint effort by Dave, Courtney, Chad, Luke, Jon, and I to put Wolverine Land on the map. There are already 10 boulders graded 8B or harder with projects popping up everyday.

8c in Wolverine Land from Courtney Sanders on Vimeo.

A while ago, Joe Kinder put together a nice promo vid of the Solution. I have worn this shoe for the last couple years and can say that it is THE best shoe I have EVER worn. Everything about it is perfect. The Solution is comfortable, agressive, and has a nice appearence. Enough said check out the shoe in action!

On June 4-5, the 3rd annual World Cup was held in Vail, Co. A total of 52 male and 37 female competitors came to bring their A game, in hopes of finding a spot on the podium. Favorites for the male category included last years gold medalist Jonus Baumann, Kilian Fischuber, Gabriele Moroni, and Paul Robinson. For the female category, it was Anna Stohr, Alex Puccio, Alex Johnson, and Akiyo Noguchi. Competitors had to go through a qualification round on Friday, a semi-final round on Saturday morning, to make it to the Finals on Saturday evening. Twenty climbers advanced to the Semi- Final and 6 went from there to the final. The venue was located outside underneath a giant awning, weather was crisp and perfect; the only kryptonite was altitude.

To start things off, qualifiers ended up being a huge success. We had 5 boulder problems that determined who would advance to the next round. Overall, our problems were very physical, yet not straight forward. Problem one started with an iron cross push up into a mantel, following with a dyno around the corner to a poor left hand sloper and right hand sloper. From here, you crossed over to a small but incut edge, place your right foot next to your right hand, and lock off to the finish jug. Problem 3 was more complex with a 360 campus move in the mid section, leading to a technical move on the arete, and finishing up on pinches to the top. The nature of the problem was long and resistant, which allowed you to give it only a couple efforts. Only 4 competitors finished this boulder, with myself having the only flash. Problem 5 was completely opposite of everything else. It was our slab problem and spit off every male competitor. Paul Robinson, Jernej Kruder, and Tusukuru Hori were the only climbers to send this problem. It was very powerful/ technical on sloping balls with a difficult mantel finish. I ended up sending 4 out of the 5 problems, qualifying in 3rd place and advancing to the next round.

Paul took 1st and Jernej 2nd. The next day was going to be the true test.
Semi- finals ended up being a dramatic show. Our first problem was a slab that consisted of an awkward mantel to the finish jug. Problem 2 and 3 were pure power problems and 4 had a tricky start to technical climbing on horrible slopers. I ended up sending the first on my 2nd try and flashing all of the rest. The rest of the finalists completed 3 out of 4 problems. The line-up ended up being like this: Daniel Woods, Jernej Kruder, Francois Kaiser, Kilian Fischuber, Wouter Jongeneelen, and Tusukuru Hori. Every finalist was from a different country. Everyone had their eye on Jernej Kruder from Slovenja. He was tall and very talented on compression problems. The style fit him well and he was going to be a true test. This whole time, Kilian was competiting with a bruised toe and had to keep freezing it in between problems. He is a true competitor and has so much experience with climbing well in World Cups. The final round was going to be difficult.
Finals was kicked off with an introduction of the athletes, followed by our route preview. We had 4 final problems with 4 minutes to complete each one. The tries were unlimited and even with a few seconds left on the clock, you could jump on and give the boulder one final effort (this is different from the other rounds because in qualis and semis once your time is up you have to drop off. You also get 5 minutes to complete each boulder). Problem 1 was a compression boulder up a right arete. Problem 2 started with a dyno to two crimps with a technical dyno finish from two poor sloping pinches. Problem 3 had a technical start on slopers with a huge dyno finish. Problem 4 had a tricky dihedral start with a massive dyno to a ring following with crimps to the finish. On problem one Kilian, Jernej, Tusukuru, and myself all completed it. Problem two every competitor was able to reach the final hold or come close to it, but no one could do the final move. I ended up sending it on my second try and this was the deciding factor of the whole competition. Problem 3 had an impossible last move dyno which every competitor got too, but could not complete. Problem 4 had a dyno in the beginning that shut down most of the field. Jernej Kruder was the first to stick the move but came short of the bonus hold. At this point I knew that I had won since I had 2 tops and everyone else 1. I also wanted to do well on the final boulder and try to send it. I fell repetively on the dyno and chances looked slim for doing the boulder. I had 10 sconds before my time was up and had to make a deciding factor. Either not try and win or give one more effort to do the problem and take the win. I got really psyched and jumped on with 3 seconds remaining. The crowds intensity was high and to most people, I had not wont yet since Jernej had the high point. I finally stuck the dyno and climbed through to the bonus hold. Arriving at the two final crimps, I was staring down the finish jug and about to move then my foot picked off the hold and I was unable to keep enough tension to complete the last move. The crowd was roaring and to them I had solidified the victory. I really wanted to do this problem, but more than anything I was happy to be done with this competition. Two months of stress and training can be hard on the system, to have the relief of being finished and winning was bliss. The podium looked like this: 1st Daniel Woods, 2nd Tusukuru Hori, 3rd Kilian Fischuber. Second and third place were decided by falls to bonus on problems 2 and 3. Jernej had the previous rounds on lock down, but had too many falls getting to the bonus holds. If he would have stuck the bonus on problem 4, he would have placed 2nd.

Overall, the WC was a huge success. Everything was ran perfectly, the walls and setting were incredible,and the hometown energy was the best I have ever seen at a competition for climbing. Competitions are beginning to grow and I am excited to see what they will look like in the future. Congratulations to Tusukuru and Kilian for taking 2nd and 3rd and to all the rest of the competitors who entered the event. See you next year.

I haven’t blogged in a while due to the fact that I have been on a constant move. Recently, Dave Graham has come back into town and discovered a new area above Mt. Evans.  It is a majestic talus field sitting on top of Lake Lincoln. The valley is vast, and there is so  much potential for new projects everywhere. First day going up there, Dave showed me two amazing projects. The first line consisted of compression climbing with slopers for the right hand and crimps for the left. The finishing move was a sweeping dyno with the right hand to a sidepull. From here you go to the lip and topout. We shared beta and tried to figure out the best solution for getting up the bloc. After about a couple of hours working it, I managed to get the first ascent, naming it The Great War for Civilisation.

The next bloc was a roof that Dave had found with the potential of having 3 hard lines. One was located on the left side of the cave, and the other two on the right. I had my sights set on the one that was on the left side of the cave. This boulder has a very crimpy nature out of a horizontal roof. There is a really far lockoff out left to another crimp side-pull, followed by a couple of crompression moves to the top. Dave, Jimmy, Cardeck, and myself all went at the project trying to discover what was going to work. We figured out a sequence, and soon all the moves were complete. I made a good link from 2 moves in to the top, so I started giving it goes from the bottom. After a few failure attempts, I gathered myself together and fired off the FA of Evil Backwards 8B+. I am not positive on the grade, but I think it is harder than The Great War for Civilisation. Jimmy also confirmed that it could be harder. It is so inspiring to have these new lines to do at this area. There will definitely be more to come!

This past week, C and I have been motivated on waking up at 7 in the morning, percolating some coffee, and rallying the 2.5 hour drive out to Poudre in the Corolla. A thing about the Poudre is that it is considered a “winter” area, which means end of May puts it out the game. We had a freakish week with 60 degree temps, so we took advantage of the situation. Courtney had her eyes set on finishing up the classico Bisher Trav. and I wanted to do Chris Shulte’s What’s Left of the Bottom of My Heart. Both are opposites in climbing style. Bisher Trav. consists of 18 moves out a perfect horizontal seam, with 3 crux sections. WLFTBOMH is a 4 move short compression problem. The difficulty of Bisher Trav. is executing each move perfectly and having enough energy to do the last Coup de Grace move. The style is very physical on the shoulders and fingers. It can be summed up as an 18 move campus problem due to the lack of foot holds. I was really inspired watching C session on this climb and go from not being able to do the intro moves, to doing all the moves. She has only been climbing for little over a year, so developing the finger strength and shoulder power needed to do these moves with such short climbing time is very impressive. On her 3rd day of effort, she hiked the boulder making it look like a warm up. 

 Absorbing the psyche from her send, I was ready to go and put down my project. This bloc climbs the left side arete next to Sharma Lunge. It begins with  right and left hand sloping edges that parallel each other. You paste your left foot on and do two bumps to death slopers, then one more final bump to a hold just below the lip. Next, you place your right heal next to your hand and lunge for the lip, hoping that your heal stays. For me, this boulder was at my maximum reach. I could feel the muscles in both shoulders stretch to capacity each time I stuck the final bump move. It took me three days of effort to succeed. Chris called this problem 13 originally, then Jimmy and Brion both came and conquered quickly, giving it 12. Personally, I thought it felt 13, but height was a major factor in this. I had to place my hand and foot in the perfect position in order to make the span of the move. If something was off, then I was off. I could see it being easier if I was even an inch taller, but I am not and that is the challenge, so I accept. For being small it is an amazing bloc with really hard, precise moves for both feet and hands. Psyched to do another Poudre addition.

Now that we both sent our Poudre projects, we are throwing in the towel for the area and awaiting the melt off in RMNP. WOW RMNP is about to be in season. So ecstatic to have a summer in the park, it has been a couple years. I want to explore Upper Chaos and try to establish as many problems possible. Upper has so much potential! Psyched. Stay tuned I’m Goin Innnnnn.

DW