To go or not to go? I wish the view from the top didn’t look so good. It was by know means a gimme but it did not look like a horror movie.
“You need to look at the crux from the bottom,” I tell myself.
“The risks are too high”
“Let it go.”
I cut a piece of cornice off the top. The sluff is OK, no more rocks get exposed.
Getting more excited. I send Forest down the line to the right to check his sluff. He gets caught in it, hits a rock in the choke but rides out clean. Not what I was looking for.
My brain starts up again, “You could clip a rock in the crux and get pitched over the exposure.”
I hike around to another view, still can’t see over the role.
“I got this”
“There is too low a snow pack”
“Just say now…I got this…walk away..its one toe turn…maybe tomorrow…its ready…the time is now…who knows if you will see it like this again…etc”
This goes on about a hundred times in my head.
This is common thought process for a line with exposure. The problem is I have to beat my sluff to the crux or I am going to get taken over a sloping two hundred foot cliff. Not an option. Respecting exposure keeps you alive. I respect it and avoid it 90% of the time but deep down I live for it. It is exposure that keeps me up at night. It is exposure that makes me scream like a little kid when I get past it and leaves me buzzing for days.
Andrew Maclean’s book the Chuting Gallery had this rated at 60 degree’s. The hard part with this is the steepest part is the middle half above and through the choke.”
I radio the filmer Pete across the way, “I am going to hit this but probably pull up at the island of safety before the crux and let my sluff go by.”
I drop in, push as lightly as possible on my turns to minimize sluff. I point it over the 60 degree role toward my island of safety. The sluff is minimal. I look to my left at the two foot wide crux, it goes. With out hesitation I change directions and charge for the crux. I feel the sluff on my tail, I up weight threw the crux, do a slight speed check, hit a small air and point it out the bottom.
‘YEESSS!” The Lightning Bolt goes down. I flashed a line that had me shaking in my boots.
My track from below. I pointed the 60 degree roll to minimize sluff and make sure I got to my island of safety on the lookers left before the choke.
Dropping in I would have bet the house I was going to pull up but my plan worked the puzzle was solved.
It may or may not be a “shot” but on lines like this that is irrelevant. The film and photos will never touch watch it feels like to overcome your fear and pull it off. Putting it all on the line because you know you have it. You go all in and come out on top. It is very hard to achieve a high that big. They only come from dealing with exposure.
It is a fine line I walk sometimes and today was the finest of the year so far. My blow up on the needle it totally different. I took a pretty mellow line and made it gnarly by pointing it. Today’s line was full risk the second I dropped in. The needle did not have exposure. No matter how hard I ripped it I would not have the achieved the high I achieved today.
This may or may not be a “shot” in the movie but for the special lines like this, getting the “shot” is irrellivant.
Ward surprised us all and dropped in after me. He had been looking at this one for a long time.
Ward puts the finishing touches on a sick one.
If you are going to the Wasatch you need to own the Chuting Gallery.