Mountain Leader Training Association
Launches We've finally launched the Mountain Leader Training Association.
You can join MLTA for £15 now. Visit the site on www.mlta.co.uk
Developments in Single Pitch and Mountain Leader Awards Reviews are now complete for the Mountain Leader (ML) and Single Pitch Award (SPA) resulting in very few changes to the basic syllabus but a range of developments in the guidance notes.
3-4/5/08: This is going to be a busy month, so hang on to your hat! The month started in fine style with MLTUK hosting the UIAA Mountaineering Commission annual meeting. This was a great success, and after having concluded business the whole group visited the notorious Lockwood's Chimney resulting in the obligatory epic struggle and late dinner! If you've never climbed Lockwood's you have a gap in your CV! Incidentally it was where I took my wife on our first date...
6-7/5/08: The International Training Standard seminar followed immediately fter the commission meetings. This was also a great success, but you don't have to take my word for it: have a look at these action shots from the practical sessions. I will be publishing a report for the UIAA website very soon and will post links here.
April 2008
19/4/08: BMC AGM. I can't remember what the British Mountaineering Council called this weekend, but it was the most enjoyable mixture of fun in the sun combined with business meetings that you could possibly imagine. Hosted by the friendly Northumberland Mountaineering Club we sampled acres of immaculate sandstone with not a single "sandbag" delivered! The climbs can take care of themselves though; they are fierce little numbers that pack a real punch for their size. I certainly came away with a clearer understanding of why this region breeds such strong climbers.
The month started in great style with a family holiday in Antalya, Turkey. As well as visiting fascinating ancient ruins at Olympos and Perge, Sion and I drove several miles inland to the tufa paradise of
Geyikbayiri for a few days of world-class climbing. The highlights of the trip for me were soaking up the atmosphere of the enormous stadium at Perge (shades of Ozymandias) and on-sighting the superlative tufa climb "Ja-ja City" (7a+). You can stay in wooden chalets at the foot of the crags, but for a change we stayed in a luxury hotel by the sea. Highly recommended!
March 2008
23/3/08: Just back from helping on the first IML winter assessment, based at Sixt in France: all eleven candidates passed with flying colours. Now we will be able to make any final improvements in the course handbook and send it to the printers after the next Board meeting.
14/3/08: Phill Thomas and I joined the BMC and MLTE staff at the Ordnance Survey OutdoorShow at Birmingham NEC. We were able to meet representatives from many different organisations as well as plenty of our award holders. The highlight of the event for me was being allowed to have a go in the qualifying stage of the climbing competition and completing the whole climb. Apparently I was the oldest and slowest climber to reach the far end successfully: so that's 2 records set...!
4/3/08: It just keeps getting better! Today Toby Keep joined us as observation practice for his Guides' training and we watched two teams climbing on the West Face of Aonach Mor. Bathed in sunshine and full winter conditions throughout this was about as good as mountaineering gets. We watched Golden Oldie Simon Hale in action with his team Martyn Frost and Rafael Salazar and discovered a natural cave out on the flanks to the North. In the evening the staff piled into a jacuzzi for a team debrief. Plas y Brenin wasn't this comfy in my day!
Geeks Corner: Here are some of my favourite bits of software. I thought this might make a change from all these climbing accounts. No. 1: Roboform. If you hate remembering passwords for all your web links, this is an absolute must! No.2: ACDSee. Brilliant for keeping track of your photo collection if you back up photos offline. Pretty good for basic photo retouching (Photoshop for the tricky ones). More later.
Other interesting recent events included the MLTUK Board meeting at Glenmore Lodge (1/3/08) I'll post a link here as soon as I've written a summary. The following day Allen Fyffe, Neil Johnson and I ran another workshop for prospective providers of the new Climbing Wall Award. Over 200 people have already successfully registered for the scheme.
3/3/08: I'm up in Scotland this week and have been enjoying perfect conditions on Stob Coire nan Lochan, Glencoe with a Mountaineering Instructor (MIC) training course. Today I watched a small team of candidates (Cath Wilson and Bryn Williams) with Tim Neill, a really inspiring day. We climbed a classic line on excellent snow ice named Langsam. Contrary to the name, we moved pretty fast!
The Coaching National Source Group met again on 29th February to begin working on its report to be submitted to the Mountaineering Councils in April. Excellent progress has been made on a consensus basis. Watch this space for further developments!
February 2008
Half term: We finished the week off with "A Dream of White Horses" but a biting wind made for cold conditions.
16/2/08: We had heard rumours of a new "crag X" in North Wales, so Sion and I went to investigate. Sure enough we found a small but exquisite crag and met the man who has been cleaning and equiping the lines. We were sworn to secrecy so I can't tell you who he is or where the crag is, but as you can see it gets plenty of sunshine and has several lines in the 5-6c grade range. Don't worry, it's whereabouts is bound to become public before long!
14/2/08: I'll fill this in this evening.It's warmed up now and I'm off to Gogarth!
Well, I'm home, and what an adventure. Sion and I climbed Positron, perhaps the best E5 in the world! We topped out as dusk descended. 3 pitches of sheer magic - I cheated slightly by using the Rat Race crux to bypass the awkward traverse on pitch 2: I think it makes for a better combination of pitches. I doubt if it's had many ascents in mid February, certainly not by a 15 year old! As a bonus I was able to get loads of great photos as well. Click here if you would like to see some.
Yesterday Sion led Icarus (HVS) at Rhoscolyn. It would have been a warm day if it was summer! As it is this week has been nothing short of outstanding. We also did some great routes on slate earlier in the week.
January 2008
26/1/08:Fresh back from Grenoble I joined Chris Parkin travelling to Horseshoe quarry for a meeting organised by the BMC for sport climbing activists from across England and Wales to discuss findings and standardise bolt placement and testing methods. A historic meeting that would probably have been impossible 5 years ago (without ending in a punch up!)
Gary Repents! Gary Gibson practices using a hydralulic bolt remover. Bolts placed in batches at Horseshoe Quarry will be tested over various years to see how long they pass accepted pull-gauge tests.
20/1/08:The chairs of the home nation boards met at Plas y Brenin today to discuss ways that we can pool resources to maximise efficiency while retaining autonomy. The results will be distributed for the next Board meeting on March 1st, 2008.
25/1/08:Pierre Humblet (the chair of the UIAA Mountaineering Commission) and I will meet Petzl head office to discuss strengthening the relationship between industry and mountain training.
18/1/08: The Climbing Wall Award is now a reality, and all the home nation boards have successfully inducted a number of providers. Registrations have been flooding in, and the Handbook has now been published. Our database has seen phase 1 of a major overhaul completed in order to manage the new award and also the significant changes to the International Mountain Leader scheme that were introduced last year. As always there were a couple of teething problems (not helped by some extreme weather and power cuts in Snowdonia!) but I think we've got those sorted now.
MLTUK is a member of the NW Regional Management Committee for the National Skills Academy. This is a major initiative that seeks to provide suitable training for industry needs and we are helping advise on the "outdoor sector". I am delighted that MLTUK has been involved in the consultation process, but naturally it is vital that we protect our awards, which have built a great reputation by serving the needs of both volunteer and professional leaders and instructors.
December 2007
Where did December go? Is the whole world getting faster or is it just my imagination? The month was filled by meetings and workshops plus the completion of the final draft of the Climbing Wall Award handbook for publication. (You can read it online at: www.mltuk.org/docs/documents/CWAHandbook-Dec19.pdf)
8-9/12/07: Working alongside Allen Fyffe, Jon Garside from MLTE/BMC and myself co-delivered some workshops at Glenmore Lodge and Extreme Dream for MLTS.
On Boxing Day my son Sion and I found dry conditions at Vivian Quarry and climbed "Last Tango in Paris" (E1 5b). On the walk in we met Joe Brown, an auspicious end of the year for me. Joe is of course one of the finest climbers of all time and was certainly one of my great inspirations when I took up mountaineering. His book "The Hard Years" was one of my favourite teenage reads. The belay station is set too far back to retrieve ropes so I abseiled down "Comes the Dervish". Before we could use the toprope opportunity the rain set in.
We had a great family holiday in Chamonix over New Year. It was great to get back on skis again, and my wife Anita finally got a pair of boots customised to fit her fused ankle so we were all able to ski together.
The month started in great style with a family holiday in Antalya, Turkey. As well as visiting fascinating ancient ruins at Olympos and Perge, Sion and I drove several miles inland to the tufa paradise of
Geyikbayiri for a few days of world-class climbing. The highlights of the trip for me were soaking up the atmosphere of the enormous stadium at Perge (shades of Ozymandias) and on-sighting the superlative tufa climb "Ja-ja City" (7a+). You can stay in wooden chalets at the foot of the crags, but for a change we stayed in a luxury hotel by the sea. Highly recommended!
23/3/08:
Other interesting recent events included the MLTUK Board meeting at Glenmore Lodge (1/3/08) I'll post a link here as soon as I've written a summary. The following day Allen Fyffe, Neil Johnson and I ran another workshop for prospective providers of the new Climbing Wall Award. Over 200 people have already successfully registered for the scheme. 
Well, I'm home, and what an adventure. Sion and I climbed Positron, perhaps the best E5 in the world! We topped out as dusk descended. 3 pitches of sheer magic - I cheated slightly by using the Rat Race crux to bypass the awkward traverse on pitch 2: I think it makes for a better combination of pitches. I doubt if it's had many ascents in mid February, certainly not by a 15 year old! As a bonus I was able to get loads of great photos as well. 
Yesterday Sion led Icarus (HVS) at Rhoscolyn. It would have been a warm day if it was summer! As it is this week has been nothing short of outstanding. We also did some great routes on slate earlier in the week.
On Boxing Day my son Sion and I found dry conditions at Vivian Quarry and climbed "Last Tango in Paris" (E1 5b). On the walk in we met Joe Brown, an auspicious end of the year for me. Joe is of course one of the finest climbers of all time and was certainly one of my great inspirations when I took up mountaineering. His book "The Hard Years" was one of my favourite teenage reads. The belay station is set too far back to retrieve ropes so I abseiled down "Comes the Dervish". Before we could use the toprope opportunity the rain set in.
