Monday, October 27th
AM—4 Miles—1:42—2,700’—2nd
Flatiron and Green Mountain
An easy morning lap since David couldn’t get out for a run
until this afternoon. Descended via NE Ridge.
PM—10.5 Miles—2:00—3,000’—Green
Mountain
Up the middle route and down Bear Canyon with David Ponak.
We kept a pretty easy pace for the ascent. On the descent my footwork was spot
on, which led me to open up the pace a bit on the more technical parts of the
trail. It’s always a great feeling when you can cruise down rocky trails and
not even snag your toe once.
Tuesday, October 28th
AM—2.5 Miles—0:49—1,500’—2nd
Flatiron
Just an easy trip up today. I was planning to take David up
the Freeway after he got done climbing the Lost Porch, but his climb took
longer than anticipated. So, I just used this as a nice, easy day before an
afternoon acupuncture session.
Wednesday, October 29th
AM—4 Miles—3:36—4,000—2nd
Flatiron (x4), 1st Flatironette, 1st Flatiron
I started the day off with two timid trips up the Freeway
before my legs finally felt decent. Then, I knocked out a sub-10 minute lap
followed by a 9:03 fourth lap. With my legs feeling good I decided to head over
to the 1st Flatironette to keep the day going. The wind was gusting
enough that I decided to pass on The Spy’s narrow ridge and just went straight
up to the North Arete of the 1st. Any time I was exposed to the west
I was greeted with a howling wind. I spent about 30-45 minutes on the summit
waiting for the wind to die down a little before beginning the downclimb. It
never did.
Thursday, October 30th
AM—6.5 Miles—3:49—4,500’—Flatiron
Trifecta (3rd, 2nd, 1st) and Green Mountain
Fun day out with Cordis Hall. I was considerably hungover
and sleep deprived, but somehow managed to pull myself together to meet him for
a 9am start. The hardest part of the day for me was definitely the Southwest
Chimney downclimb on the 3rd. I spent a good 3-5 minutes it seemed
standing at the chockstone and figuring out how the hell to get down. On the
descent trail I slightly rolled my left ankle. From then on, it was pretty
smooth sailing. We took our time on the East Face Direct of the 1st
and after getting back to solid ground made our way up to Green Mountain. I took
the descent really mellow since I felt half-dead and didn’t want to roll an
ankle again.
Friday, October 31st
AM—14 Miles—3:50—5,900’—2nd
Flatiron, Green Mountain, Bear Peak, Green Mountain
Up Green via 2nd Flatiron and NE Ridge, down Bear
Canyon, up Bear via Fern Canyon, another trip up Green via Bear Peak West Ridge
and Green Bear, and a final descent between the 2nd and 3rd
Flatirons. Should have been closer to 3:30, but for some reason I decided to descend
between the 2nd/3rd Flatirons rather than the usual 1st/2nd
descent. Then I rolled my ankle slightly on some off-trail terrain and took it
easy back to Chautauqua.
Saturday, November 1st
AM—11 Miles—3:33—5,200’—2nd
Flatiron and Green Mountain Loop (x2)
Two laps of ascending Green via the 2nd and NE
Ridge and descending the back side. Another hungover and sleep deprived
morning. First lap was nice and easy since I was taking Shad up the Freeway and
he hasn’t really climbed in a while. There were a few spots that got his
attention, but he managed to shimmy up the slab pretty quick and with little
cause for concern. We then headed on up to Green and caught the Basic runners
and they reached the summit. After a mellow descent we reached Chautauqua in
2:16. Chris Gerber called me and said his group was near the summit of the 4th
Flatiron. He challenged me to a race to the summit of Green. So, I put my shoes
back on and charged back up the hill to the face of the 2nd—reaching
the base in a hair over 10 minutes. I zig-zagged between a few roped parties
and walked off the top in about 10 minutes. After 47 minutes I was sitting atop
Green Mountain wondering where Gerber and Mark were. Some random hiker said he
saw a couple of big guys running down the back side about ten minutes prior. I
took off and tried hunting them down, but never saw them. Oh well, I made it
back to the Taco for a 1:17 loop. An hour or so later I got a text from Gerber
saying they just reached the summit. Guess I won?
Sunday, November 2nd
AM—3.5 Miles—2:51—3,200’—Flatiron
Trifecta (1st, 2nd, 3rd)
The day started out with me treating Eric Lee to his first
ever soloing experience in the Flatirons. I took him up the 1st Spyronêtte
route, which provides an easy way to reach the summit of the 1st. On
the summit we ran into Peter Bakwin who was on his first summit of a Trifecta.
He invited us to join along for the 2nd and 3rd
Flatirons, which I certainly couldn’t pass up. Peter and I parted ways with Eric
at the shortcut to the 2nd from the access trail and a few minutes
later we were on our way up Free For All. This was my first time reaching the
true summit of the 2nd in one continuous east-facing line versus
scrambling up the Freeway and walking around to the West Face. This route
provides a couple of fun, vertical sections with easy, yet exposed moves to get
onto the face of the Pullman Car (I think the cruxy sections might be 5.6?). Once
on the East Face of the Pullman Car it’s back to more 4th Class
scrambling up to the summit before the exposed downclimb off the West Face. When
we reached the 3rd Flatiron’s East Bench we were both breathing a
sigh of relief that we were soloing rather than roped up because there was a
line of roped climbers from the summit all the way to the bottom with a few
more groups waiting to even get on the rock. So, we stayed well to the right of
the standard East Face route that the climbers were using and avoided the
traffic jam completely. From the summit of the 3rd we could count at
least eight people soloing the 1st and those were just the ones
visible on the upper portion of the North Arete. It honestly looked like a
Minions race was going on...The Southwest Chimney downclimb went considerably
easier for me today versus the other day with Cordis. I spent less than a
minute remembering the sequence of moves at the chockstone today. With a few
more downclimbs under my belt I should have this sequence down pretty good.
Weekly Totals
Miles—56
Time—22 hours 14
minutes
Elevation Gain—30,000
feet
This was my first 30k feet week since the first week of
September. It felt great to finally get steep again. Right now I’m torn between
chasing a few numbers. With some decent pushes through the end of the year I could
possibly reach a million vertical feet of ascent for the year. I could also
reach 3,500 miles for the year. The mileage goal would be more attainable for
sure, but the vert goal is more appealing. We’ll see if I decide to chase after
either one…
First Green Mountain summit in a while |
Western view of 1st Flatiron and Sunset Flatironette |
Where all the fun begins... |
Some climbers on the 3rd as seen from the 1st |
Eric Lee heading up The Spy |
Eric heading up the 1st Flatiron's North Arete |
Downclimbing the 1st Flatiron |
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