Kurse im Herbst

Jeder möchte in die Berge gehen und klettern. Das ist großartig. Hier ist ein Überblick über meine Kurse im Herbst:

In der Kletterhalle habe ich am montags, dienstags und mittwochs Kletterkurse für Kinder, Jugendliche und Erwachsene. Ich kann jederzeit Programme für Schulgruppen, Probeklettern und auch für Personal Training arrangieren. Individuelle Kurse der einzelnen oder kleinen Gruppen können jederzeit organisiert werden. Treten Sie direkt mit mir oder mit der Kletterhalle Salzburg / denkundstein in Verbindung.

Für den Salzburger Alpenverein habe ich einen Mehrseillängen / Plaisir Kurs von 17. Oktober bis 19. und einen Klettern Basics Kurs für Anfänger von 31. Oktober bis 02. November. Ich hoffe auch, dass die Eiskletter-Saison früh beginnt und ich einige Touren ab Mitte November anbieten kann. Ich gebe sämtliche Termine und Veranstaltungen bekannt, sobald sie festgelegt werden. Nagelneu im AV-Salzburg alpine.ausbildung in diesem Jahr ist, was wir „Ausbildungs-touren“ nennen. Dies sind Programme, die weiterführende Kurse zu den schon angebotenen Kursen sind. Programmideen können von den Instruktoren oder von den Teilnehmern kommen. Die Gruppengröße kann von zwei Leuten bis zu 6 oder 7 Leuten betragen. Ich plane einige Sachen zu organisieren, die von Interesse für diejenigen sind, die mehr Eisklettern möchten, oder anspruchvolles Ski-Bergsteigen unternehmen möchten, oder leistungsorientiert Kletter-Training für Gruppen, usw. Nehmen Sie Kontakt mit mir auf beim Salzburg Alpenverein.

Die Amerikanische Internationale Schule Salzburg hat wieder begonnen und des bedeutet, dass ich den Kletterkurs des Herbsttrimesters jedern Mittwoch in der Früh wieder abhalten werde.

Neu dieses Jahr ist ein Bouldering Seminarkurs für das Pädagogische Institut Salzburg. Der Nachmittagskurs ist mit meinem denkundstein Co-Trainer Martin am Montagnachmittag, den 17. November. Dieser Kurs ist für öffentliche SchullehrerInnen des Salzburg-Bereichs konzipiert, die eine Boulderwand in ihrer Schule haben und möchten lernen, wie man sie besser verwendet. Wir konzentrieren uns darauf, wie man Bouldering mit Fitnesstraining verbinden kann und zeigen ihnen alle Arten von Boulderspielen.

Zwischen allen Kursen bin ich wie immer beim Training und Klettern. Ich freue mich darauf, Sie dort zu sehen.

Fall Courses

Everyone wants to climb and get in the mountains. That is great. Here is an overview of my courses for fall:

In the climbing gym I will be holding climbing for kids, teenagers, and adults on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Arrangements can be made at any time for school groups, introduction to climbing and of naturally personal training too. Individual or small group custom courses can be set up at your convenience. Contact me directly or the Kletterhalle Salzburg / denkundstein.

For the Salzburg Alpenverein I have a multi-pitch course October 17^th -19^th and a climbing course for beginners on October 1^st – November 2^nd. I also hope that the ice season starts up early and I can offer some tours from the middle of November. I will post things as they are scheduled. Brand new in the AV-Salzburg alpine.ausbildung this year is what we are calling “Ausbildungs-touren”. These are programs that are follow ups to the established course offerings. Program ideas can come from the instructors or from participants in the courses. Group size can be as little as two people up to 6 or 7. I plan on organizing a number of things that will be of interest for those who want more ice climbing, ski mountaineering, training groups for climbing, etc. Get in touch with me at the Salzburg Alpenverein

The American International School Salzburg has started and that means that I will be running the fall trimester climbing course on Wednesday mornings again.

New this year is a bouldering seminar course for the Salzburg Pedagogic Institute. The afternoon course is with my denkundstein co-trainer Martin on Monday afternoon November 17^th. This course is designed for Salzburg area public school teachers who have a boulder wall in their school and want to learn how to utilize it better. We will focus on incorporating bouldering into fitness training and show them all types of games.

In between all the courses I will be training and climbing as always. I hope to see you out there.

Training Routes

Yesterday I was able to get back on one of my area training routes; the east ridge of the Untersberg (with variations to the standard route). I like to ride my mountain bike to the approach trail, then hike up to the route, climb, hike down and bike out. The bike ride is about 30 minutes. The approach is about 60 to 90 minutes and 1000 meters of elevation gain, climbing goes between UIAA III – IV for about 400 meters (with some exposed hiking linking up climbing sections). The descent and ride home take between 90 minutes and two hours.

A training route such as this gives you a nice warm-up, an aerobic power workout and sport-specific skill work. Of course the volume is also great, with 2 to 3 hours going up and about 90 minutes to 2 hours coming down. The whole thing takes more or less four and one-half hours.

The greatest benefit of such a workout is developing the ability to move fast over moderate terrain, transition from hiking to climbing and developing a feel for pacing and concentration for exposed climbing while being aerobically taxed.

Kelly Cordes talks a bit about this in his piece for Patagonia, “Somthin Bout Nothin”. (http://www.patagonia.com/web/us/tinshed/index.jsp?ln=241#/1/cordes)

I think it’s really important to have a handful of training routes within a very close distance to your front door. Off the top of my head that means for me the Kleine Watzmann south face, south ridge and routes on the west face, routes on the south face of the Untersberg and routes on the east face of the Watzmann. I can get to these routes by mountain bike and hiking various trails. The climbing is between UIAA II - IV and from 350 to 700 meters of elevation. With a total amount of elevation gain from 1400 meters to a bit over 2000 meters.

I try to add variety to the climbs by wearing different footwear, testing clothing systems and equipment, carrying various amounts of weight and also trying for super light, fast times. I know what my level of fitness is by my established times on the various routes.

Giving

I have no patience with people who do not give. Help out other people when they need it because your going to need it some time too. Sooner than you think. Give information, time, advice, listen, understand, try to find away to help. Don't just throw money at some thing to ease your conscious, but really give of yourself.

Climbing with the Girls

We did a really nice alpine bolted route on the German side of our "Haus Berg", the Untersberg, on Thursday. Valerie, Sabine, Jennifer and I climbed the 7 pitch/320m/V- route "Anfängerfreuden" on the Berchtesgadener Hochthron. Everything worked out very nicely; the route was dry, weather cooperated, the climb fit the experience and fitness of the group, and everyone moved efficiently.

The approach is around 1000 meters of elevation gain and then you have the climbing with a short bit of easy scrambling to link up pitches 2 & 3. In total there is about 1350 meters of hiking and climbing involved. We climbed as two 2 person rope teams. We shared the belay anchors so that the lead climber of the second team could directly follow the second climber of the first team. for the two crux pitches we needed about 30 minutes, and for the others a bit less. Efficient, clean, uncomplicated climbing.

Jennifer and Sabine making a short slab traverse just before a steep bit in the fourth rope length.



Coming up to the belay in the fourth rope length. The climbing is a slight bit overhanging with big and plentiful holds.



Valerie exiting at the end of the last pitch. The last rope length is a slab with cracks and water runnels.



We were finished at about 14:30. Te weather held for us and there were no problems while underway.



The route tops out at about 1950 meters, not too far away from the hut "Stöhrhaus". This was the second alpine climbing route for my wife, Jennifer. Valerie and Sabine have done some multi-pitch climbing, but are also still gaining experience. With the long approach, including scrambling on steep grass and rocky slopes (with lots of loose rock), to get to the start of the route - Plus the long hiking descent - the whole endeavour was serious and demanding for everyone. The smile on my face says it all; we had a great, very full, day.

"Unbeständig"

Unsettled - this has been a recurring word in the weather forecasts in the area. What to do? You could go to the climbing gym, mountain bike, trail run, etc. You could also go alpine climbing. Adjust your mind set and your goals. Just because our ego says that you want to climb route "x" or mountain "y" does not mean that the mountain gives a shit. Also, just because you have time, it happens to be the weekend or you've paid a guide, does not mean that it's the right time.

However, unsettled does not mean that you should sit around and bitch about questionable weather or bad conditions. On my old white Petzl helmet I had written after a particular spell of being feed up with excuses, "It's better to try and fail than sit on your ass and do nothing". I try to always keep this in mind. To paraphrase what Will Gadd recently wrote on his blog, "It's always better when you do something".

Back in the Gym

After about a month of doing a lot of courses and climbing and skiing in the mountains, I just got back in the gym to start getting at it in the weight room. It's always a rude reminder that no matter how fit you are in the mountains, the weight room exposes some holes in your overall level of conditioning.

I wanted an overall body workout with a bit of emphasis on my legs. Later in the day I planned on going to the indoor climbing gym to do climbing specific strength endurance work.

The weight room workout looked like this:

• warm-up with cross trainer, about 10 minutes (easy)
• bar bell complex, 6 sets of 6 reps of dead lift/row/power clean/front squat/overhead press/back squat/push up - 20 to 50kg
• squat complex of overhead squat/front squat/back squat on bench (legs below 90 degrees) super set of 10 reps each, 20-80kg, five rounds (first round is ohs @ 20kg, fs @ 40kg, bs @ 60kg) with a focus on form, movement and flexibility
• cool down with an easy 1000m row

The source for all my training in the weight room is from Gym Jones and the Mountain Athlete. Mark Twight and Rob Shaul have both done so much work in the area of applying training principals to people who are working out to improve themselves for mountain activities.

I had a few hours of personal training work in the indoor climbing gym later in the afternoon. Afterwards, I did my climbing workout which involved strength training with pull-ups and boulder intervals, and then technique work with roped climbing easy warm-up routes plus on-sight climbing and then finishing off with three laps on a 5c to cool down.

A training day like this is really efficient in regards to getting the most training effect for your time. It is also something that I have come to realize brings me more benefits than always spending day after day in the mountains.

As I mentioned, this was the first time I have done a training day like this for about a month. In that month interval, I have climbed a lot of multi-pitch routes, ski touring, ski mountaineering and sport climbing. I felt really fit hiking or skinning on the approaches. I lost about a kilo over the month too. However, the workout day described above stressed my body and wore me out more than any of the days spent in the mountains during the previous month.

Intensity and its effects are very interesting.