Mike Doyle’s Rants&Raves

I spent this past New Years and first two weeks of January in Costa Rica surfing. This was my fourth year down there and it was probably the best one. Each year the trips keep getting better but my surfing doesn’t… someday I will learn how to surf.

This year I once again met up with my friend Jose who grew up in Costa Rica and whose mom and dad still live down there. They are great people and I really appreciate everything they do for me; letting my stay with them a few nights, storing my surfboards and always helping with any little issues that come up. I spent the first two nights in Nicoya before moving to the beach house in Playa Guiones, Nosara.

In addition to Jose we had a full house this year with Stephanie, Angela, my brother Liam, Simon, Chris, Gary and Pat all coming down to do some surfing. We spread out a little when everyone was there but mostly we stayed in once house. It was great. Up at 5am, go surfing for a few hours, come back and have some breakfast, nap and then get ready for an evening surf session. I was working almost every weekday so I didn’t get my naps which meant I was pretty tired the last few days. I also didn’t take a single full rest day so I was absolutely exhausted.

Obviously we surfed a bunch and generally the waves were really good and consistent. A few non-surfing highlights included saving some baby sea turtles at Playa Ostional and seeing an adult female turtle struggling to get back to the ocean after laying eggs at Playa Guiones one night. The sounds of the birds and howler monkeys in the morning are amazing and everyday the sunrise and sunset surf sessions were spectacular.

If you get to Playa Guiones I recommend checking in at ‘Tica Massage’ for the midday ‘Stretching for Surfers’ session. It really felt good. It’s not yoga but a series of stretches to get you ready for your next surf session.

For food we mostly cooked in but the sandwiches and smoothies at Harmony Juice Bar were amazing. The dinners at Beach Dog Cafe and Playa Sol were amazing (Beach Dog was so delicious and Playa Sol was decent but cheaper). The desserts at the Organico Bakery and Cafe de Paris kept us fueled but we probably spent the most time at Casa Toucan ordering ‘Las Cervecas Oscura’ (dark draft beer from the Costa Rica Brewery).

Here’s a short video of the trip and check out the photos below.

Posted on January 20th, 2012 by Mike Doyle
Filed under: Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

This past Christmas was the third Christmas I have spent in the Vegas area. A few years ago Audrey and I met up with some friends in Vegas where if I remember correctly I was playing poker from 11pm Christmas Eve until about 10am Christmas Day. Last year the weather was so bad it rained for 4-5 days straight right before Christmas and the rock was so wet it was advised the people do not climb on the sandstone and Mt Potosi was a complete waterfall. However this year the weather was perfect, bluebird skies and a very pleasant 12-14 degrees Celsius. You can have your white Christmas, I’ll take this weather anytime.

Both Audrey and I were out of commission for climbing; her post surgery and me trying to recover from injuries incurred in Hueco. So we weren’t climbing but were still wanting to get outside and be active.

For Christmas Eve Audrey and I decided to do a ‘quick’ run up Turtlehead Mtn from Calico Basin (not the normal approach). I wasn’t even sure it was possible. While, it was possible but involved a lot of scrambling and bushwhacking near the summit. To avoid that we thought it would be best to descend the regular way, walk past ‘Secret 13′ and then I thought the best way would be to hike to Calico tanks (which Audrey has never seen) and descend the gully on the backside. Boy was I wrong. Descending the gully meant I was running around trying to find a way down that didn’t involve ANY scrambling. Audrey’s shoulder was already pretty flared up from the activity and she really couldn’t use it at all. We barely made it down before dark, hiking down past ‘Alternative Crag’ and over this really cool arch formation that I didn’t even know existed in Red Rocks. Sorry, no pictures.

On Christmas Day Audrey’s cousin Galen and his girlfriend Mary were visiting from the Bay Area. The wanted to get out bouldering so Audrey and I went out to hang out. There were a few moments where I was taking photos and I really didn’t like seeing Audrey doing the one-arm spotting technique. The rest of the time I just enjoyed the sun and not having to climb.

The following day I still wanted to do something (two nights of incredible and large meals, thanks Sebastian!). After looking for a few hikes we decided on ‘Bridge Mountain’. This hike is in the Red Rock National Conservation Area and fortunately with my truck we could drive up through Willow Springs right to the main trailhead. This was particularly nice since we didn’t even leave the house until around noon. Audrey’s shoulder was bothering her so she didn’t come and probably even the 4×4 driving would have aggravated her shoulder.

The Bridge Mountain hike was one of the most fun hikes I have ever done and I normally HATE hiking for the sake of hiking. I enjoy trail running and I’ll hike to get to a climbing area but that’s about it. The first 1.5 miles was pretty gently hiking along a well defined trail before you go up over a ridge and start descending the other side. A few hundred meters down the ridge the trail disappears and you are on bare sandstone rock. There are some trail markers (cairns, painted lines and arrows) but you can move pretty freely over this terrain. The lowest part of the whole hike is right below this sandstone ridge that leads up and to the left, towards a large sandstone arch (the bridge) and then eventually a big dome summit. There are definitely a few places on this climb where slipping or falling would have serious consequences but it’s basically like a staircase and the ‘chance’ of falling is really low. I had a lot of fun on this hike and we got back to the truck right around dark. Galen decided to run down the road and he actually ran faster than I was willing to drive in my truck.

Here are some photos and if you are looking for a hike in the Las Vegas area I strong recommend this one.

Posted on December 28th, 2011 by Mike Doyle
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

At some point in the spring some friends were talking about spending a month in Hueco Tanks. Every year climbers get together and talk about ‘big plans’ but they rarely become reality. This year my main focus was on the World Cup in Boulder, CO in October. The talk of a trip to Hueco was not really my main focus and honestly if it hadn’t been for Rob Jenson being some organized and motivated I probably wouldn’t have made the trip. Honestly by December I needed a break from climbing. My elbows were blowing up and my motivation was pretty low.

The plan was to work from El Paso, trying to climb Tues&Thurs afternoons and Saturday and Sunday. Fortunately my schedule is pretty flexible and Rob’s schedule was even more so, as long as he could get on the phone . After a summer of training I was feeling strong but didn’t have that internal desire to try hard. Fortunately, there’s nothing like a few weeks in Hueco to fix that. Most of our time was spent on North Mountain where you can be more flexible with your time. Towards the end of the trip we went on a few more tours and for the first time I actually go onto East Mountain.

I really only had two goals for this trip; I wanted to redpoint El Techo De Los Tres ‘B’ and Diaphanous Sea. I had spent some time on ‘El Techo’ last spring and thought it would go down quickly but unfortunately I had to spent some time figuring out new beta. Here’s a video showing some working attempts and slowly refining the beta I ended up using. The beta is not the best but it worked for me. El Techo De Los Tres ‘B’

While I did spend some time on ‘Diaphanous Sea’ I wasn’t able to link through the crux dyno. I just couldn’t muster the dynamics and timing. Maybe some other time. However, I was happy with getting a successful redpoint of Loaded Direct, the direct start into Loaded With Power. While I think the grade will get lowered in future guidebooks (the kneebar up top makes the route significantly easier), I was still happy to link through the bottom moves. Here’s another video, Loaded Direct.

All in all it was a great trip and except for my elbows needing a rest I left with a very high desire to return. Hopefully I’ll get back there this winter.

Posted on December 18th, 2011 by Mike Doyle
Filed under: Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Once again this year I was fortunate enough to make a fall pilgrimage to The Red River Gorge. I knew before heading out there that it was mostly just going to be a social trip, a chance to say hi to many friends who are also making their annual trip there. The unfortunate reality about ‘The Red’ is that I have done most of the harder routes there that I can do. Now when I go it is trying to find new routes or get punished on routes that are too hard for me. Of course, having done routes doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy them again, and again, and again. While I would love to be out there developing new routes I am just too selfish and only have a few days to climb there a year. I’m sure I will go back and develop new routes at some point but not on a quick trip.

I was actually in Kentucky for 14 days but only got out climbing five days due to some really, really long work days. Fortunately the first week was spent in a cabin with some other climbers who were having to work in the evenings. Three or four nights in a row were spent with people huddled over laptops until 3am. Grueling…

The days I did get out to climb were amazing. Thanks to Kevin Wilkinson I had a few new climbs to get on and managed to tick some laps on some area classics like Dracula ’04 and The Madness. On my second day I ran out for a quick morning session to get on True Love but couldn’t figure out the crux sequence. I don’t know if it was the conditions or just my skin but I couldn’t hold the crux hold. On my last day, right before flying out, I ran back out for another try. This time I figure out the crux, lowered down and fell in the crux then waited about 20 mins and fired it off. For me this route felt harder than God’s Own Stone but that’s just me.

The big story while I was in ‘The Red’ was the overcrowding of cliffs and parking lots and the removal of perma-draws from the Undertow wall. When I first got there the story was that the perma-draws were taken down by a small group of ‘locals’  for safety and crowding purposes. This doesn’t make any sense to me and after a few days I heard that one of the main reasons for taking the draws down was the attitude of complacency that was taking over the Red. People were starting to believe the perma-draws were a given and should be on every route.

Personally I couldn’t care less if there are perma-draws on the Undertow wall. However, at the end of the day it is nice to just run a few laps on routes knowing that you don’t have to make it to the top to get your draws down. The bigger issue here is that it all comes down to educating climbers about the risks/rewareds of permanent draws and I believe the actions taken by a small group of climbers was silly and out of laziness. Any action that is taken to adversely affect another climbers experience just makes someone an asshole. Each one of us at some point in the history of our climbing experience has had a more experienced climber explain something to them rather than just telling them to fuck off or go away. If you see someone belaying improperly, tell them. If you see someone stick clip a draw tell them to make sure it’s not sharp as they go past (I think first bolts shouldn’t be permanently fixed, too many people stick clip without feeling them and they usually wear our more than other draws). If someone complains about a sharp biner, get them to replace it with one of their own or at the very least take it down and put it at the base of the climb (that way people will know a draw is missing). The ‘complacency’ in the sport is from people not wanting to educate each other, not in the newbies coming out of the climbing gyms and getting on routes that are too hard for them.

As far as crowding goes, removing permanent quickdraws is not going to fix the problem. Bolting new routes, opening up new areas and restricting the number of cars in parking lots will go a long way to address these issues but not pulling ‘localism’ and trying to make the experience a bad one for people coming to the red. The Red River Gorge is one of the best climbing areas in North America, people are going to keep going back and bringing their friends.

The one good thing that is coming from this is that people are talking about it. People who would not normally get involved in access issues or the local community are trying to find ways to get the issues resolved. I hope they do because next year I am going to be going back feeling a bit stronger and being there a bit longer. I can’t wait!

Posted on November 7th, 2011 by Mike Doyle
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

This past weekend I had the opportunity to compete in the IFSC Lead World Cup in Boulder, Colorado. This was my first lead world cup in over eight years and only my third route climbing competition in that same time frame. Despite almost 20 years of competition experience I made some really rookie mistakes. While I was not happy with my results at this competition I was happy in the preparation and training leading up to it.

After taking a short break from climbing starting in early May (coinciding with the Stanley Cup Playoffs) I set a goal for myself to train through July, August and September with my focus being the World Cup in early October. I wasn’t actually sure I would even be competing because in Canada we do not have an established selection process for a Lead Climbing national team. We didn’t even find out who was going until mid-September. The actual competition didn’t matter that much to me, I just needed a goal to train for. I personally find it easier to train for a competition than some random outdoor climbing project where I might not be able to actually get enough time on to climb it, or the weather might be shit on my one day a week outside or….

So I created a training plan and one of the things I did was to try and accurately track bio-metrics. I had never done that before. I tracked my weight, skin-fold measurements, muscle diameters and a few other things. Through July and early August I focused on strength building. Fitness is my forte but I am a weak, weak climber and at the US National Championships I identified that as something I needed to improve on. I spent a few nights a week in a weight gym and did a pretty intense hangboard workout a few times a week. While I did try to get out climbing once a week I didn’t focus on performance but just movement and flow.  Through August and early September I focused on power-endurance but also on trying to improve my cardio and lean out the muscle (and fat) I had put on earlier in the year. The last two weeks of September was base fitness and continued power-endurance. No one will ever call me a lean person but I was trying to get as lean as I could while maintaining a high strength ratio. I was trying to eat healthy and increased my cardio and was using high-rep weights to lean out my muscles.

Overall I was very happy with my training. I felt really strong and fit heading into the competition although there were a few annoying things in the last two weeks that affected my training a bit. Work unfortunately got busy at a bad time and I tweaked a finger slightly when trying to push a tired body too hard. I started out in early July around 150lbs, with the weight training I peaked around 155 (but lower body fat %) and then leaned down to around 143. My muscle mass increased during the strength portion and dropped very slightly during my cardio/high-rep weights. According to skin folds I went from around 9-10% bf to to 6-7%bf, according to an electronic scale I went from 14.7 to 12.9 while not losing much size in muscle diameter.

As for the comp itself it sure didn’t feel like a World Cup, at least not to me. There were several reasons for this:

1. The comp was held at a gym I have climbed at quite a few times so even the isolation area was familiar.
2. The competitors weren’t intimidating. It’s hard to be intimidated by climbers who I remember being skinny kids five or six years ago. I remember Jakob Shubert from China in 2005 when he was the smallest kid in his category (He’s actually pretty tall now) and I remember Johanna Ernst as a girl who befriended a few of the members of the Canadian team and whose father had her climbing blindfolded to practice her route reading and memory skills. My first few world cups were against names that I had read about for years. Alexandre Chabot, Tomas Mrazek and even Francois Legrand with Sandrine Levet and Muriel Sarkany representing for the women. This just didn’t have the same feel that I remember.
3. The field was really small. There really wasn’t much need to fight for warm-up wall space, it just wasn’t that busy. The comp went fast and there wasn’t much time just sitting around. This might be that after coaching at quite a few World Junior Championships where there are 300+ competitors in the difficulty events every other competition feels small.

So how did I climb? Well the qualifiers was flash format which means you can watch other climbers trying the routes. When coaching I have always warned climbers about watching climbers who are obviously much stronger because they will do things that are difficult but make them look easy. If you think a move is easy and it ends up being hard then you get flustered and make mistakes. On my first route I was climbing right after Ramon Julian Puigblanque, one of the top competitors and one of the strongest climbers in the world. What I liked about it is that Ramon is actually shorter than I am although he has more reach and is way, way stronger. Low on the route he made a clip from what looked like a good stance and then just casually reached up to the next hold. I decided that if I could I would clip from there as well. I got to that point, clipped but then the next move was much bigger than I expected. As I generated momentum for the move my hand slipped off and I fell. I HATE falling when I’m not tired so needless to say I was not happy with the first route and not happy with myself for falling victim to watching strong climbers. On the second route I identified a crux down low and a crux in the mid way point. I knew I would be disappointed if I fell at the lower crux but not too upset if I fell at the mid-crux. I made it through the lower crux and managed to then climb smoothly up to the mid-crux where it was a large ‘go again’ move off a good left hold and right heel-hook. I tried the move, fell but was happy I got to there and that managed to get me into semi-finals (although in the final spot).

The semi-finals were held on the following day and were now the more familiar onsight format. I read a good sequence, had a few options and had a great warm-up. Low down on the climb there was one sequence I wasn’t sure about. You could either move off a left hand sloping crimp/gaston or bump again to an pure undercling hold. I was on the crimp feeling relaxed and thought I could match it, see what the undercling was like and match it back if I didn’t like it. As I was matching my hand slipped and I fell. Shitty. Actually my skin felt really dry and leathery this whole week. Probably too much training and not moisture in the air. Who knows. No other semi-finalists would fall lower than that so I was stuck in 26th. The results are pretty irrelevant since I didn’t really expect to make finals but I would have liked to fall because I was tired or at least fall at a hard move.

On to the finals, as a spectator. The vibe from the local climbing community was amazing and there were people lined up several hours in advance to get into finals. Tim Harrington was even hosting a tailgate party out front with snacks and beer. Awesome. When we walked in the first thing I did was preview the two finals routes and they were amazing looking. I am a very, very critical person when it comes to routesetting and these routes were the best I have ever seen. From my position I couldn’t get a full preview but I had an idea of where the cruxes were and where I expected climbers to fall. Normally in a difficulty event the climbing can be boring as you wait for climber after climber to get up to the location where they might fall. Sometimes this can be five or six minutes of boring climbing before they start getting into the difficult sections. Not this time. Even leaving the ground was hard for both the males and the females. There were tricky sequences and hard moves throughout and the climbers never looked comfortable which means as a knowledgeable spectator I was never comfortable and was expecting them to fall all the time. The sequences were not obvious and you could tell that while there were options they were not necessarily natural movement. The men’s route featured a full 360 campus spin move while the women had to deal with tricky heelhooks and bad feet to get over the bulge. The climbers delivered and most of them made it pretty high up the wall providing lots of entertainment. Unfortunately neither finals route got finished but that would have been just icing on the cake.

My takeaway from this weekend was just how far the sport of climbing has progressed in the last five years. The focus on bouldering has transferred over to these route competitions and the routesetters are really taking into account the spectator’s perception of the event. The moves on these routes are HARD and the sequences pretty spectacular. I would have to get much, much stronger to truly compete at this level. For me V10/14a is difficult, v11/14b is a project and v12/14c is a goal. For most of the top competitors V13/14d is difficult, V14/15a is a project and V15 or 16/15b is a goal. Yes, there is that much of a difference.

All in all I was happy I attended although I would rather have been in Rifle on the Sunday . Now I just need to translate all my training into some success on the rock this fall. Hopefully I don’t get too bogged down with work because temps are just getting good in Vegas!

Posted on October 13th, 2011 by Mike Doyle
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »