Verhoeven and Saurwein

2011 was a great climbing year! After the competition bouldering season I was rockclimbing more often than any year before. I've been to Rocklands for 5 weeks where i did my first proper 8a+ (Black shadow) and then I flew to the USA on the 5th of October and I'm still here. After leadclimbing in the Red River Gorge and multipitching in Yosemite, which was amazing, Jorg and I went to Bishop and now Hueco, where I could climb a lot of problems within the 8a/8a+ region. Soon we will be going to Joe's Valley and Indian Creek, then everything is about competitions again for the naxt half year. The highlight will be at the worldchampionships in Paris, where I'm really excited to compete.

Also I want to say something about a topic I came upon in Hueco while climbinging together with Alex Puccio and Shauna Coxey. People tend to downgrade problems, which are frequently done by women or are 'easier' for women, but one can ask as well: Why downgrade problems, which are easier for women (or better said: if you are shorter), when problems which are harder for women or if you are short are not upgraded???
To me it seems reasonable to grade problems for a regular size climber - i.e. most guys. Otherwise there would be a lot of V20's based on little girl ranges - but V11 for 'norma'l range...

I've done the worldcups since about 7 years I think, gradually becoming stronger until I finally won the lead cup in 2008, also the year my injury started.
Three years after (i.e. very recently) everything is healed again, and i can finally train and climb as much as I wish, without restrictions. Now I noticed it's really hard to get back to the 'top' again, since everyone just continued to get stronger, and I kind of got stuck at the same level. The top level might not have changed so much the last years, but the subtop has gotten so much bigger and stronger!
My motivation of course is at its best, so I will be glad to compete in 2012, probably in both disciplines. We will have to regain a lot of training as soon as we come back from our half year USA trip though. Rockclimbing unfortunately makes you weak on the long run, so again we have a big deficit on comp strength. It was so worth it though!

On the topic og FA's: I'm always drawn towards new terrain, whether in alpine, sports or bouldering. I've also grown an unhealthy love for loose rock, which is to be found everywhere, and most people like to avoid it.
This started of with the rock quality not being so high around Innsbruck, evolved strongly with David and my FA on Mt Brento - the worst rock imaginable - and recently showed off in some little FA's in Hueco :)