Enjoying the climbing. Caroline bouldering at Burbage South in the Peak District. Photo: David Simmonite 52 Sep–Oct <strong>2017</strong> www.climber.co.uk
James Pearson & Caroline Ciavaldini So why this one? I did a big project last year, The Voie Petit on Grand Capucin on Mont Blanc. That was last summer, nearly a year ago now. It took a lot of focus and I knew afterwards that I would need a couple of months on and off to regain my full motivation. So I gave myself some time. We travelled a lot and I gave some time to James who had been my sparring partner for nearly a full season, to focus on his trad projects. Eventually I did start training again and I could feel that my motivation was going into a new direction. I wanted to learn to trad climb on-sight, something that I had not really done before. That is a very delicate subject that would be worth another column entirely… you English often say you are not fit for sport climbing, but with a little work you could be great in endurance – on-sight trad is really pumpy. I trained on our climbing wall in our house, progressing through all of our old circuits and feeling a little fitter every day. We visited Annot, a great trad climbing area in the south of France, full of cracks of all shapes and sizes. Every day I could feel the progression of learning new skills, then one day in a tiny crack where I had to crimp like an animal to place some gear I started feeling some pain. After 20 years of climbing I am still learning Ironically, with all the intensity of hard sport climbing and competitions, I think it is trad climbing where you are often at the most risk of injury. There are lots of times where you don’t really warm up properly because there are just not the right routes to warm up on and you often find yourself pulling harder than necessary out of fear, or a simple desire to feel locked onto the holds. I stopped fairly fast as the pain was not going away and came down from the route, but sadly by that point the damage had been done. At first I did think that, as usual, I had stopped early enough to recover fast. It was only a small pain. But it is taking time and three weeks down the line I am still waiting. I didn’t worry at first, trying to actually enjoy the time off climbing and focusing on other things… but now it is getting too long. I have started climbing a little bit again; only easy and without my little finger but I know I have to be very careful. Three years ago James had a similar injury and after some time he realised he could actually climb if he kept his little finger in the air – like you British drinking tea. Unfortunately for him, in doing so he modified the way he held his arm in the air, causing several other muscular tension problems that lasted much longer than the original injury. I know I can’t climb too much that way but just easy climbing should be okay and I am enjoying climbing just for the pleasure rather than constantly pushing myself more and more. I keep coming back to finding your balance, which is easy to say and obviously harder to do, but if it wasn’t we’d all be perfect and I wouldn’t be writing this column about injury. I am also starting to look forward to training again and that makes me realise the good side of my injury, being forced to take a break finally helps me to regain full motivation, something that I did struggle with the last year. Not being able to climb gives me lots of time to dream of the routes that I want to try and now I am simply looking into the future where I will be allowed by my body to climb, train, improve, test myself once again. After 20 years of climbing I am still learning. If we look hard enough we can normally turn each situation to a positive and at the same time learn how we can minimise the risks in the future. I’m still learning and I’m sure I’ll be injured again at some point in the future, but for right now I’m enjoying missing the effort and enjoying getting back to wanting it. You come back more motivated than ever. n Caroline drinking tea and keeping her injured little finger in the air – very British. Photo: James Pearson Caroline and James are supported by Edelweiss, La Sportiva, The North Face, Wild Country, Altimssimo and Biomechanica. They also founded the S.P.O.T. project, a charity aimed at helping less fortunate climbers. You can find out more about this and maybe make a donation, buy a T-shirt or pass on some climbing gear at www.spotclimbers.com Read more from Caroline and James at www.onceuponaclimb.co.uk www.climber.co.uk Sep–Oct <strong>2017</strong> 53
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