Steve Hope

The only real barrier I have with my climbing at the moment is my lack of focus. Not that I have any less than I used to, but I’ve realised I actually had only very little to begin with. I spent too much of my time shitting myself over ‘simulated fear’ that I never managed to develop my climbing. Spending half the season indoors and the other half doing trad has really shown it’s benefits recently, and I now know that the only thing stopping me is where I set my goals. My fast take-up indoors has made me begin training at home again, something I’d dropped out of once I left the gym last Spring and headed outdoors again.

I have a real enthusiasm to push myself indoors now, and not just treat it as a way to kill the time between now and when the crags dry up in Spring. The wonderful side effect of this, is that when I do go back to trad, I should be all that more stronger and confident that I can really push my trad grades to where I want them to be.

For the time being though, I need to stay focused when I’m at gym and try to get into the meditative like state that all the pros talk about and that normal climbers rarely experience. I’m wondering if Dave MacLeod’s new book 9 out of 10 Climbers Make the Same Mistake might be of some use.