Sickness & Recovery, Brooklyn Boulders, Future Plans at 9:21 AM

YO!

So lets see...

I got really sick last week, from sunday to sunday i was barely able to walk.

my liver became inflamed, i didnt eat more than two bowls of soup for 5 days, vomitted blood, had a steady fever, lost a total of 10 lb.s, and my urine was dark brown.

saturday i forced myself to eat so i wouldnt have to go to the hospital.

they thought i had hepatitis a, but thankfully the blood tests came out negative.

i go back to the doctors next week to get a couple more tests done.

on sunday i started feeling a little better, and since i had to cancel a trip to the gunks, instead i decided to go to gsr for an hour.

i felt pretty weak.
next day i went back and still felt pretty bad but almost sent a new v7.. (now that i look back i think it may be kinda soft for a 7.) next session i felt a little better and got it right away

im not allowed to eat things with fat, caffeine, obviously alcohol, and im supposed to regulate my protein intake to about 40-60 grams a day.

to a person thats targets around 140 grams of protein a day...thats a major setback. (although i hardly hit that goal daily...lol.)

so it felt like i was told i wasnt allowed to get stronger for 2 weeks. kinda beat.

i feel the effects, i feel like its taking longer to recover and im not able to unlock the potential i should have by now...

anyway. i checked out brooklyn boulders with jj last saturday. the place was insane! so many problems, some really really fun setting, and a cool environment.

i sent a bunch of 5's and a 7. i was projecting a couple more 7s and 9s. on two v9s i got about halfway, and i feel i could get much farther if i was fresh. theyve been haunting me and i really want to go back to send them.

we mostly stuck to ivan's problems, they seemed to be the most fun.

there was a really cool stemming v4 with two giant features that was really sweet, and the most fun dyno problem ever that was a v5. (video footage below of a really funny burn. lol.)

i really want to go back there. i feel like going there could really give me the potential to be strong. theres a lot of things out of my grasp, and problems that can teach me new moves and techniques and stuff. thats really what ive been looking for.

i went to gsr on monday, and still felt sore from saturday. we bouldered saturday night from 8pm till 12am.

i was kinda upset i was still feeling weak. ive started to gain back some weight, but i doubt much of it is muscle because of my diet..

im debating right now whether to go climb between now and sunday...

sunday i plan on going to the gunks. i hope to have lots of fun and to be able to try some hard stuff beyond my ability.

soo i want to be able to be at full throttle sunday...idk. maybe ill wait.

at the same time i want to get stronger for sunday...but if i climb today i might still be sore..ahh! too much thinking.

anyway. ive been watching videos from niagara glen. i really really want to climb there. it looks insane. the rock looks so good and the problems are hard and really cool.

maybe ill go there during winter break if its not snowing.

idk!

i need to get outside, even though its getting cold.

so for now, check out a vid from brooklyn boulders featuring the most fun dyno ever, and a really embarrasing fall. lol

Blood and Bouldering @ the Gunks at 8:22 AM

So sunday i was mad stoked to get on the rocks again. my plans were to send a bunch of problems i left unfinished from last time i went, try a couple new hard out-of-reach problems, and flash black boulder problem v5.

i went with manuel, jj, and emiliano.

maybe 10 minutes into arriving at the trapps, we were warming up on the boulder of the gods and the warmup boulder

i went over to check out new pair of glasses with a d00d i just met who was also psyched to work on it.

i walked back to check on the guys and unfortunately emiliano fell and broke his ankle by landing one foot on the pad and one foot on a jagged rock.

the bone was stickin out of his ankle and his foot was sideways.

we called the ranger over and 911 and got him to the hospital.

5 hours later, jj and i decided to leave the hospital and go back to the gunks

(emiliano is recovering as of the time of this writing, keep him in your prayers as he will be undergoing surgery and such.)

with about 2 hours of sunlight left, i decided to try to focus on having fun and working on a project that wouldnt consume a lot of time.

so ive wanted to flash black boulder problem, because it looked like a pretty fun problem, and it seems like its hard for me to flash things outside, because the holds are often harder to read for me.

i saw some other guy working on it from the v3 stand start, so, thinking that it was the start i made an attempt and fell off the crux move because the left hand sloper with the thumbcatch was very different than what i thought.

so then i looked at it one more time and started from the v5 sit start and got it right away. felt solid.

so even though i didnt flash it, i got it 2nd go. still much to learn for me

so we walked a little further to andrews boulder problem.

i was lifting weights with my forearms the previous wednesday, i worked them out pretty good, and i havent lifted in a while...

for some reason, on andrews boulder i got so pumped...maybe left over soreness from wednesday..? i felt sore in the morning, but idk i never felt that pumped before.

i was sending andrews boulder problem and on the v0 top-out i felt so pumped that i touched the last jug but decided to let myself down because my hands were opening up.

very weird.

but if im feeling this sore, then that means ill probably get stronger for next time :)

the following morning i felt sooooo crappy hahah.

i picked up manuel from the hospital and after traffic on 87, we got home at 930. i had a 3 page paper to write and a history test to start studying for.

so i was mad beat.

and i feel like new pair was a tease yesterday, i really wanted to send it, but didnt have time to get on it! very disappointing. i am much more disappointed for emiliano, so it was a disappointing day.

but i didnt let it get me down, i still had lots of fun, and i think we made the best of it.

november 22nd is the next day i will be at the gunks, weather and God permitting...

ill make sure im ready this time!!

Bouldering In Lincoln Woods at 8:41 AM

So i went up with my friends jason and john to stay at our friend daves house in Massachusetts. we drove up early saturday morning and chilled in a very cool new england town, watched "yes man" and rode bikes.

yesterday, (sunday) we drove east to lincoln woods state park in rhode island to boulder.

the park was beautiful. the trees were tall and extremely colorful. i couldnt have asked for a more perfect day. the temperature was in the low 60's, and the sun dried out the rock that was soaked the previous night.

most of our time, unfortunately was spent wandering around trying to find the boulders..in particular, the try again boulder.

one guy who was helping with crag clean-up led us to a boulder he said was ships prow, which actually turned out to be try-again, so we used that as a basis and walked around for 20 minutes lol.

there werent any locals on the boulder to help us with the problems, so we tried very few problems for the amount of time we had unfortunately,

but i got to send a pretty fun powerful problem called try again v5.

from there we headed to our cars and then drove to the other side to work on the iron-cross and cave-wall boulders.

i sent a really fun v4 traverse called iron cross. crimpy, big, powerful cross moves. i am usually not a fan of traversing, but the moves were pretty sweet.

we walked over to the cave wall boulder and i worked on a v7 called rump to jump. the opening moves were really cool, really shouldery moves on pinches. i got so close to linking the extension to the v4 problem neil's lunge. but i ran out of steam.

i got sick over the weekend, so i think that affected me a little bit, because i was sick- all i ate that day was a quarter bowl of cereal...lol. as well as the problems taking their toll on me little by little.

if i had another day, id definitely be able to send rump to jump. kinda bummed we had such limited time, but it was a good learning experience!

for some reason it feels like when im on real rock i forget to use technique, and once i remind myself, the problems go from being really hard to being alright/easy/fun. lol.

i really wish i could have checked out the pond cave. there lies the boulder problems "who needs hueco v8" and "leap frog v7". both looked really cool, they were the only video problems i could find on youtube when i looked up lincoln woods.

but...maybe next time, whenever i go back...gunks definitely felt more fun to me, and the access is so easy and so much closer lol.

i got to train more!

its been officially 9 months since i started climbing, since trips outdoors are limited, i dont have time to spend days in a row at a crag. i need to send harder stuff in a day.

i need to build strength, endurance, better problem reading skills, and more fluid/precise foot movement.

back to the gym for now!

Strength by numbers at 4:17 PM

the stronger i get, the more i realize its not about strength. in everything.

the stronger of a climber i become, the more i see there are ways around using strength. an interview with dave graham helped me see that.

he can climb v9 in sneakers and claims hes mad weak and has weak fingers...but its all about seeing the geometry and the "various boxes".

last night i went with manuel to gravity vault. i was able to flash a bunch of v4's and v5's, as well as almost flash a couple v6/7's. i wound up not getting anything higher than v5 haha. i kept on moving from wall to wall, and then eventually i just got worn out from everything else. and really hungry.

im trying to complain a lot less, and try to eliminate powerful moves from my inventory. instead, im trying to look at the problems and really analyze them. thinking no matter what, that there HAS to be an efficient, and capable way to do every problem in the gym.

so although im trying to get stronger, im going to focus as much as i can on just climbing. and stop thinking, "oh i should work out this muscle so i can do that move in that one problem."

my etch motherboard hangboard finally came in the other day, and i got to put it up in my garage. so happy with it! and my free holds also came in the mail, not sure what im doing with them yet...

Here's a vid of the hangboard


i also realize its not about my abilities or what im capable of doing in anything in life. its about my weakness and relying on God for strength to get through hard times and relying on God to do the things i need to.

i dont have to worry about the future. i dont have to look at the future nor do i have to look at my goals as one giant monster anymore.

chuck smith last week at church really taught me the basic truth ive needed to realize. i like how his teaching always seem to be so simple... and so profound.

he said that 12 spies were sent into the promise land to scout it out, and 10 said, (super paraphrase)"oh theres giants and the walls are so high, theyll crush us like bugs" etc.

and joshua and caleb said "the land is plentiful...those giants? theyre like bread to God...the walls? come on now"

now i thought he was going to be like, "ONE WAS POSITIVE AND ONE WAS THINKING NEGATIVELY"

but thats not it.

10 were looking at it from their point of view.

2 were looking at it through God's eyes.

and before...
i kept thinking like it was all a joke
that i wasnt making progress
and i had so much work i have to do
and such little chance of anything actually working
and its all my fault for not making it happen
and like there was this big monster of work i have to complete

but joshua and caleb saw the promised land through God's eyes
the problems are minor to Him, let Him deal with the troubles

just do it

ya kno?

now i can be diligent and do it
and know i wont get stuck..
i wont rely on my strength.


one more important thing i want to say

sometimes im upset that God actually listens to me, and gives me what i want.

because i realize how stupid my wishes are. and usually it just doesnt turn out anywhere near what i thought it would.

but whats amazing is, it was all in God's plan that i would foolishly ask for these things and that He would use it to show me how stupid i am. and then make it work in His plan.

yesterday i had the weirdest experience. the weirdest feeling.

i was sitting in class surfing the web on my computer.
i saw something.

like i felt freed, like i was in bondage, like i couldnt escape, claustrophobic, happy, sad, bitter, spiteful, relieved, focused, empowered, hopeful and very very alone all at the same time.

honestly it was like a wave of these feelings all at the same time. i felt like i was going crazy

so i took a deep breath, thought about where i was. and continued paying attention to my science teacher and taking notes.

i may not be able to relate to anyone, ever. and im ok with that.

i dont need anyone that understands how i think, or how analytical/competitive/weird/motivated i am.

i really dont want to slow down. i honestly, and truely like being single. sometimes i feel like im the only one in the world that actually loves being single. theres so much i can do. so many things i can do without thinking twice.

of course there are downsides. but you learn to replace the loneliness with good things. with Godly things.

so its time to move forward. not by my strength, not by my ability, but through relying on God for strength. no person and no thing else.

ecstatic for the future = me :)

Clips from TRC gym in New Rochelle NY at 7:03 PM

I'm mad beat so I'll make this short

1. Today marks 7 months that I've been climbing
2. It is wayyy too hot and humid outside
3. I'm going to attempt to hit up the normal gym tomorrow morning, hope its not hot.
4. toothpaste kills acne really awesome
5. new as tall as lions cd is amazing, go BUY it. they need support
6. I was going to escape this week, but plans failed for now...try again in a couple months
7. I had an epiphany on wednesday...maybe i'll share that later.
8. I'm going back to school this fall. exciting!
9. I'm very excited to see what events will unfold in the last half of this year.
10. I don't know what I want.

V5 With Crappy Hands. I just wanted to show everyone my failure...lol

Big Dyno, about 7 1/2 Feet

God bless all of you :)

-Alan