Busteni 2012

I just woke up with a nice movie: STS on the Ben. With loads of real climbing, snow and horrible Winter conditions: lovely.

Watching the climbers I wished it was me being filled with spindrift snow and getting soaked with water and sweat that after a while would freeze again...

In stead I'm in Busteni, Romania where I woke up in a room stuffed with climbers. Every bed occupies at least two people. I'm not sure how it really happened but I got an autograph of a climber on my chest and remember doing the same to that climber. So I had to explain something to Dennis and he just laughed. Luckily.

The party was funny and quite a bit crazy as the usual iceclimbing parties. Russians drinking quite a bit too much, the Korean can't cope with alcohol (probably because he's Asian), Radka dancing like crazy and Kendra and me enjoyed trowing peanuts everywhere.

I tried to go asleep but our bed is exactly above the party room so the bouncing music still kept me awake for a while.

After almost 2 months of Winter climbing it's now all getting to an end. I had to say goodbye to people that feel like close friends but will be far away for the next 10 months again (where would we be without Facebook). Thanks everyone for the support, chatting, help, climbing and all the other fun. I'm going to miss you all.

Meanwhile the whole day passed by and it's evening. I just took a shower in the Duct tape shower and packed my bag. We're leaving tomorrow morning at 6. We bought the train ticket and we'll fly around 12-ish to Munich and later Geneva. We're sort of lucky by buying the expensive flight from Swiss as the company that was cheaper went bankrupt this week and the French were on strike causing quite some trouble for other climbers who were also flying from Swiss.

Today we skied. My second time ever on a piste. And I did quite well I found, at least if I compare my skills to that of most of the other skiers. Gosh those Romanians we're just going straight down like suicide torpedo's without making any curve or bend... Dennis tried to practise his snowboard skills but failed as his rental board (the best he could get) was far too small and flexible with bindings that even a beginner wouldn't like. Oh, yes and his boots weren't too good either. I felt sorry for him. He loves the snowboarding but just couldn't do 'his thing' on the crappy rental stuff. My ski's were fine tough.

Later we went for dinner together with Gordon and Kendra. They're now also sleeping in the mountain-hut enjoying movies and chat about climbing. Here in the mountainhut is pretty good to stay. The people are friendly and today I learned a lot about the Romanian history, giving me more respect for the country. Unsurprisingly the issues here today are not too different from what plays in the Netherlands. That worries me sometimes. How far away are we from yet another war? It sometimes really seems it's 1935 all over again...

Yesterday evening we couldn't be bothered all of the finals (is that bad?) We missed out the speed and stuff. The climbing wasn't much better then the qualifiers and the semi's. The women had a strange weird but okay route with Maria, the Russian girl topping out. The men's finals was as epic as the rest of the comp. Three Russian finalists climbed and all popped off one of the first holds. Without consulting the head judge the routesetter stopped the competition, sent back the climbers into the isolation and changed the hold for something loads bigger. Then the three had yet a new chance and climbed quite a bit higher. They had 13,5 minutes climbing time and were traversing left to right and back again. It was long and because the climbing was long it wasn't too spectacular and interesting anymore to watch. I'm happy one of my favourites, Markus won finally after all his bad luck in the previous comps.

The final results can be found here on the UIAA webpage.

That evening we had dinner together with Katherine and Malcolm at their rental home. We enjoyed the food veggies and almost forgot the nuggets. We chatted and I figured Malc has been having quite a bit of the same disappointment in all the comps as me. Mentally we're quite a bit alike. The good thing is that we both still know we can progress and get better but it would have been so nice to show what we're actually worth...

Kendra came with the point that some climbers (Steve House) are looking for a climber to mentor and guide to become better. I think, because theres so much I can still learn that would be a good thing. So, hereby: who know a good mentor. Someone who can guide me up in how to climb proper souple WI6/7, boulder 7C, climb 8b, do proper trad like 7c's, get onto hard trad mixed M10 and more and of course get some proper ED/ABO routes on my Alpine list. Anyone? I don't mean with guide 'put me on a rope and just do seconding/toprope climbing', I guess you got that :)

This week will be our last ice/mixed/alpine Winter week. Romania was my last Worldcup of this season. There will still be another one in Kirov, but with just Russians on the comp, a lot of travelling and expensive housing and more it's not worth going. Actually I just don't have the money for it.

Hopefully without any coach or mentor I'll still be able to reach my goal of the week :)

Photo's:

Fireworks at the climbing structure in between the mens en women's finals.

The twins Dennis and Malc getting ready for the party.

How-do-they-dare-to-call-this-a-worldcup pt. 2

Unbelievable. It's not even 12 yet and I'm already homesick (not homesick as in wanting to be in the Netherlands but homesick as wanting to be in our little van somewhere in the mountains away from all this shit).

I woke up at 23:00, 00:00, 01:00, 02:00... and finally again at 07:30. They kept on walking, talking and one girl got the brilliant idea to take a shower at 03:00 midnight. So I had a good nights rest.

I was in time in the isolation and was nervous but could work my mind to focus on other things. I imagined that the thing I was going to do was just another add-on boulder in Dennis bedroom-drytool-boulder-room: long moves, tricky holds and sure I could do it and just have fun.

I forgot my gloves and luckily the mens and women's semi's were at the same time so I could ask the men for a pair of fitting gloves (no way I could ever fit in the women's gloves...) Malcolm (UK/Denmark) had a spare pair for me (Thanks Malc).

The route preview was different from usual. The Russian suspected the Europeans to help each other with how-to-get-the-right-place-of-the-hold-with-your-axe-when-climbing. We suspected (are sure) the Russians shout hits to each other as we sometimes see them move, hear some Russians shouting and then they make the moves totally different but correct. Everyone complains about that so they came with a solve. Sort of.

They made pictures of every hold that would be in the route, stuck them up in the isolation so everyone could see the holds beforehand. One little problem with that was, that all pictures were black/white printed so quite vague and they were not printed as they were put in the route so you still would have advantage if your fellow Russian would shout up how to use the hold.

It was my turn to climb. I waited in the isolation tent, trying to stay warm. My warm up was good though, trying to simulate the climb, visualising it and warming up my shoulder muscles better then average for all the sideway holds in the route.

I climbed the ice, slamming my axes in as I didn't want to fall off there (as happened in the qualification). Then the holds. The first hold was flat and you had to move to an steinpull. I didn't want to fall off in the start so it took me some time before I decided to waist a bit of energy and time to make a figure-of-four. I moved up to the undercling/steinpull quite easily with that move and wanted to go on. Suddenly the judge said "Marianne stop climbing". I was confused, why stop, was it really the judge telling me to stop climbing of was someone in the audience just joking with me. She said it again. I turned around to look at if she meant it and then she said "go". So I thought it was a mistake and then she said again "stop climbing". I got angry as I didn't knew why I had to stop my attempt, what did I do wrong? She told me I used the edge of the structure. Really? Really? Did I really use the (forbidden) edge of the structure? If I did I would have noticed. But I was still not allowed to climb on. I jumped out of the hold and angry, confused, disappointed I stood on the ground again. I hadn't even clipped the first draw! I felt okay when I started, okay, better then really nervous, for the first time I felt okay and then this happens! Gordon, Malc and Dennis watched back the footage and it seems that my foot went under the structure when doing the fig4. I didn't notice that at all and if I would have touched it I would have noticed that for sure. My boots are quite soft and I'm always very conscious of my climbing.

I have the feeling they try to play really strict on the rules with me. I just heard that in the first comp in Korea they wanted to disqualify me (that was avoided by one of the judges), later I heard that they find that I complain too much about the rules and regulations. And, I know, if I'd would have been a Russian climber doing the same thing (if I really did that 'thing') she could just climb on.

I could put in an appeal/protest but why? They already made their decision, paying €100,- would just be a loss of and extra €100,- on to of the rest of all the costs. They're never going to change their mind anyway. (And here I actually wanted to add a lot of curse words)

Honestly, how could this happen, what happened?

I don't feel like I had the chance to show what I'm worth, actually, I now feel more like questioning 'am I worth anything?'.

I feel angry, confused and quite useless right now. What the f*** am I doing in here?!

Oh, yes, yesterday Dennis and I both climbed speed. Dennis was again the best non-Russian, me one of the last in the result list. As usual. But I climbed extra slow and didn't fall off so I got full four climbing attempts. Better then last year (where I had just 1/4 climb)...

Pictures: Dennis' speed attempt and how far/low I got in the semi's...

Little Russia in Romania

Just back in our shared room.

It was busy last night with 6 others grinding their iceaxes when we tried to sleep and the couple sleeping above us moving the bed in a good rythm (don't want to know what that meant).

In the middle of the night I woke because of some alarm/phone. I noticed I felt pretty sick. Really sick and sore stomach and no idea why. Tried to toilet but nothing worked. Finally I got back to sleep feeling a bit better then during the night, luckily. At least I was able to eat my breakfast.

The isolation was packed. Steph explained it as being in the emergency hut on the Mont Blanc with Russians lying everywhere. I think it came pretty close to that.

It was first too cold and later too damp and warm. The warm-up was too small for all the climbers and the single toilet was occupied constantly.

I was 18th to climb (of 24) and warmed up okay-ish. The route looked quite strange with stone holds that we were not allowed to take as steinpulls because they might brake. The fourth hold was a sidepull that didn't look too good. I asked the other girls about the hold and they said it should be fine as it was just qualifications and it was low in the rout. I trusted them thinking of my new climbing plan: faster climbing without hesitations on every move.

It was my turn, Catherine helped reminding me of my new plan in the isolation and wished me luck. Gordon was climbing on the mens route and fell off somewhere in the start, then Markus got a second turn next to me (after he popped off in the top with a twisting hold).

I climbed just a couple moves and found it hard to find the holes in the snow/ice (snice). Suddenly I hung in the air when my left axe ripped out of the snow. As it's a qualification and haven't clipped the first draw yet you're allowed to start again. Losing precious time (we only had 5 mins for the whole route) I got really stressed. It slowed me down, stressing me even more. Two times more my axe almost ripped out forcing me to really hack in the ice, losing even more time and thus stressing me even more. I reached the top of the icewall and now had to get focused on the other style of climbing: drytooling. Focusing on the holds reminding what I told myself: move faster. The idea was to make a move in 3 steps. Preparation, movement and stabilisation. Only the movement to the next hold has to be steady and slow, in the other two parts I could speed up. And so I tried, realising I probably had just a minute left after the fall in the start. I came to the sidepull move, felt the hold, surprising myself that the hold was worse then I thought. I had no time, I had to move. As stable as possible I moved onto my axe, doubting the stability of it. I was getting onto it as my left axe popped off the not-so-good-hold before it. For two seconds I hung on the sidepull but as the hold stands sideways I slid off in seconds dangling in the air again. No second chances here, and just happy the belayer actually held me.

I was too astonished to even think of crying, being angry and having any feelings at all. How could this happen, how?

I instantly lost all faith in my new method. Wondering why I actually got all the way here to climb four moves on some crappy stones in glassfiber/epoxy.

They tricked me again, making me believe this worldcup would be better then last years here. "Yes, they changed". Yes, they changed. And made it worse.

The Russian routesetters made some big (huge) mistakes. In the mens route they had the same problem with half of the men falling off the same hold (including Dennis) and loads of climbers ripping out off the ice, losing precious time just like me. The routesetters are old, heavy, one tiny one big and they don't even test the routes making it a big gamble.

Dennis spoke to one of the routesetters after his disappointing climb. "And what do you think" Dennis asked the routesetter. "Not so happy I thought after 4 competitions people are strong, it's too hard" he replied. At least he realised...

Hopefully better at the speed or maybe a second chance tomorrow...

Thanks for

nothing.

Ow by the way, as I guessed the livestream isn't working.

Pictures:

They sell crap in the stores here. The registration yesterday. Ursus beer, better then water and the menu, piept is chicken we figured after we ordered. The opening dinner, tables full of cold meat. The isolation warm-up wall still being build when we're already trying to when we're warming up (perfect timing...)

Busteni 2012

Again in Romania.

Sorry to say but it really is the last place you want to visit. In some ways even worse then the trip we had to China a couple months ago.

But we're here.

The train ride was not as epic as last years' and we arrived safely in Busteni without having to share Dutch cheese with the conductor a criminal and a nazi and a walk over the rails to get into the Busteni train station.

This evening is the 'opening dinner' and ceremony (eat a lot of different types of meat in small slices, great if you're vegetarian. I'm sure they have vegetarian chicken, beef and pork. You know, chickens don't eat meat so they must be true vegetarians)

We're lucky being here. The French are on strike meaning most of the flights are canceled and next to that theres so much snow on the railway and the roads that even if you arrive to Romania it's still hard to get to Busteni.

And then once there we noticed hardly anything changed: tramp dogs, chaotic infrastructure, and in the mountain hut the organisation seemed totally waisted on some moonshine. Pavel (Russian, UIAA organisation and former expedition climber) trying his utmost to explain that there still loads to do... This midday we discussed the horrible isolation tent where we cooled down before our climb and sat for hours, hopefully that will be improved. Now I hope I can sleep tonight without getting nightmares of the belayers we had last year...

They say on the website you can follow it all live. Haven't figured yet if it's true. Here at least the website of the comp: iwcbusteni.ro

The program is a bit different then we're used to. Women climb the qualifiers and the semi's on the same day and the finals on the next day. You can find the whole program here.

Pictures:

In Romania they sell beer in 2L plastic bottles

The sign to announce the ICW

Secondhand Dutch clothes are being sold in Romania in shops like "First class European"

Caminul Alpin is where we stay, close to the Ghetto Hotel...

Busteni adventures 4

Finally, internet again thanks to Stephanie, who gave us the key to her room. Enough to write some e-mails and get some pictures online.

The qualifications long behind us, even the semi-finals were already yesterday. Just the finals left, but not for me...

(Here the up-to-date info and livestream from the event)

This was our last competition of the season. We don't have the money to go to Kirov, which is the last competition of the series in the beginning of March. And even if we'd find a Millionaire today we still couldn't go as you need to get your invitation and visa in advance.

I'm questioning all I did the past year and wonder what I should do next year, train again, quit and work, study, do nothing, become fat and boring?

Looking back on the competitions this is how I feel:

• disappointed and ashamed for not reaching the finals here in Busteni
• disappointed and ashamed because I fell out of the speed route after 2m. of climbing in shitty ice and now see that really slow climbers are way higher in the ranking
• disappointed because the lead-routes were made as speedclimbing routes, not a hard, technical or difficult move, just the speed counted
• disappointed and ashamed for all the work being put to send me all the way to Romania, spend money, change flights, spend more money and then, don't reach a thing
• disappointed and ashamed for spending a whole year on just climbing and not even reaching a top 5 ranking
• disappointed and ashamed to see that the iceclimbing worldcup is full of women (and men) who'd never even put a single icescrew in the ice!
• disappointed because I didn't finish my studies and don't have the feeling I get any support from my supervisor
• disappointed and ashamed because I don't know how to explain my results back home
• disappointed and ashamed because I don't have the feeling anybody will understand my results
• disappointed because iceclimbing doesn't have enough countries competing to become Olympic
• disappointed and ashamed because my results are not good enough for any proper sponsoring
• disappointed because I don't know what to focus on for the coming year, climbing, studying, working?
• disappointed because I don't have the feeling I can combine work, climbing and studying as money is always the biggest issue
• disappointed because, what shall I do now, focus again on the worldcup theatre or find a normal job and work?
• disappointed....
• ashamed, because what made me think I'm good enough to be the climber I want to be, and ashamed, as I don't know how to explain this back home...

Sorry, I'm just not too positive about it all...

I was hoping to close the season with something better then this all.

At least it was fun around the whole Worldcup Circus. We climbed real routes and saw a bit of the world: rice in Korea, ugly people in Romania, Swiss precision (not), Italian chaos and cancellations, German friendliness, and now up to Icelandic fun?

Wild bear detection counter for today: still no bears spotted!

Here our video from the Rabenstein Icefight, again, as I noticed it didn't upload correctly the previous time. Check out the Rabenstein website with video's, photo's and more about the event!

And the Icelandic duo Robbi&Gummi made a funny little 'introductionary' video about iceclimbing and their sponsor (Marmot). They proved Marmot jackets are almost waterproof, almost...

Busteni adventures 3

Day three in Romania.

And still no climbing.

I gradually start to get trouble with my addiction (climbing) as I haven't climbed for 5 days now...

Hereby I intend to feed my addiction on another way: by being online all day on the slug-slow Romanian internet. I can tell you: it doesn't work...

This evening will be the official opening (originally planned on...yesterday) and then finally I'll climb, on Saturday.

I'm wondering how good/bad it is to take such long rest from climbing.

In case the internet completely breaks down here, the program (no idea if it's the right program) can be found here. And in case I'm climbing during an internet-wave, here you can find the live-stream.

And, because it's always good to look back on fun activities, here some video's from Lukasz for Planet Fear. (Still wondering why I'm not 'starring in the video, but hey, whatever :)

Wild bear detection counter for today: still no bears spotted...

Busteni adventures 2

What a day, again.

We figured that the e-mail from Alex was not correct...So we're having quite some stress again, rebooking flights, booking a hotel, money issues...

We decided to go for a stroll and landed at the climbing structure. Located in a ski-resort. There we spoke to some people who told us the competition would be on February 5 and 6 and not on February 4 and 5 as Alex told us.

See here the e-mail:

"We would like you to know that the competition in Busteni will be held

between 4 - 5 February 2011 (Friday & Saturday). Registration will start Thursday 3 February 2011.  Please consult Competition Program for other clarifications.  There where some differences between the program on UIAA Website (5-6  February) and Competition Website (4-6 February), that's why we want to  clarify this situation.  Best regards, Alexandru Paun IWC Busteni Organization Team" 

So we re-booked our ticket and thought it would be fine. But now we figured, on the day of our departure we'd have to climb the semi-finals and maybe the finals! Ridiculous unprofessional planning here...

We decided to loosen up a bit an visit the Count Dracula castle in a nearby town. We took a good offer for a taxi, with the taxi driver waiting for us in the town to bring us back again. And walked around in the castle belonging to the Dracula myth. (See pictures) But Dracula, turned out to be just a myth. Just a tourist attraction. We tried to check the teeth of the man in the castle, all looked normal, not spiky...

For our myth-Dracula visit we drove 42 km to the town of Bran. On the way you see the harsh, hard differences between our Europe and this Europe. Poverty, street dogs, bad roads, crappy houses, farmers with horses, men stealing branches for house-heating, and a Dacia car crash...

Back again we were tired, ready for some food, sleep and rest. Soon we'll head for 'city centre' and see what food Romania has to offer. 

...With Tim, our coach still working for us to get different tickets and solve the thing... 

Wild bear detection counter for today: n0 bears spotted...

Busteni adventures

There we are, it's early in the morning but all Romanians are already awake, so I couldn't sleep any longer...as the public kitchen is next to our bedroom...

Two days ago we got a rental car and drove to Dortmund, almost in once. Around 22:30 we really had to stop as we were both too tired to drive the car. The thing was eating petrol (Benzine) like it was candy and it 'trembled' off the road if you tried to drive 150 km/h which is an normal speed for a German highway. And thus saw our money disappear on petrol faster then the top-speed of the car.

We slept in a 'formula 1' roadside hotel (the hotels truckers use to meet up with hookers, murderers use as home and we felt like we were in a well I don't know...) It was a pretty funny combination. In the evening we cooked some food on the MacDonalds parking-lot without even thinking of going inside of the Mac and that evening we took a back-door in the Burger King to get to our Hotel bedroom...

When we arrived on the airport, there were supposed to be some lockers for our luggage, but nope, as I was already afraid of: no lockers, not a chance to store your luggage for some days... Shit...

Luckily we could store the stuff in Ferdinands car, problem solved.

And then we flew, all the way...between some drunk Dutch and a lot of ugly people.

We arrived on some ini-mini-tiny airport, welcome in Romania.

We we told to take bus 780 from somewhere close to the airport and then take the train to Busteni. Easier said then done.

Taxi, taxi, taxi louche taxi drivers whispered around us. We ignored them, bought our bus ticket for four people (no idea why she gave us four, as were are with three) and waited. And waited, waited, and waited. Until finally, quite too late, our bus arrived!

Stress! Were we going to make it to the train in time?

Some Romanian told us it would take 30 minutes, so we wouldn't make it in time we thought...

Suddenly it only took 15 minutes. I ran, ran, ran, stopped, got the right platform, ran again, Busteni I asked, yes, Busteni it was, Ferdinand and Dennis also hopped in and there we were, no train ticket, but we had the right train.

We sat down in a coupé which was already occupied by a man which we in 'Europe' would describe as burglar, the one you don't want to meet in a back-alley.

Later we met his friend, was he his friend? I don't speak a word in Romanian but I sort of understood what he said. We figured he's 50 years old and because of the knitted USA Formula one sweater he looked a bit more 'trustful'.

We bought a ticket in the train, by a man who spoke some un-understandable Italian. The normal price for a ticket, when you buy one in the train was 49,50 Lei. (about 12 Euro) so, we decided to buy three.

He wrote a something, made a ticket and meanwhile we fed him some old Dutch cheese.

He decided to make us a deal. We paid 50 Lei for one ticket, paid him 50 Lei and got 50 Lei back of the original 150 Lei. What a deal.

Later we figured from our 'trustful' friend that his daily salary was about 50 Lei. Meaning we just paid the man and extra day salary...

Our 'trustful' friend was talking about politics with the burglar and when the burglar went for a smoke he turned to us. The first things he got out in Romanian was something about Hitler.

We didn't figure straight away if he was against the thing or not.

But, when he showed the tattoo on his leg (a red flag with a skull, four stars and a Nazi cross) we were pretty sure about his Hitler support.

He kept on talking and I was about to take a picture of his beautiful (not) tattoo when we were called out, this was already Busteni! Shit, we ran out of the train, jumped out, onto the rails and ran to the train station. Gosh, lucky?

There we were, on the side of the street in the dark with big trucks driving through the little town with 80 km/h.

We walked a bit around and finally found our Romanian Mountain Hut. They knew of our arrival and had a 4p. bedroom available for us.

We went back in town, bought some cheap beer, crisps and more and after some gritstone climbing movie, we fell asleep...

And this is where we are now, early in the morning, eating our way-too-hard-old-concrete bread ready too meet Count Darcula.

And: here, two (!) new movies, of what we did outdoors next to the Worldcups. Not too much though, as there was hardly any ice :( So no Flying Circus, Twin Towers or more yet...

And one of our Rabenstein adventures. As we finally have internet, I'm happy to show you more then just a single picture. Enjoy!