UKC

I've just spent an interesting couple of hours reading a wonderful article on Cycling Tips, recounting the tale of one Nick Clark, "a pro cyclist, a soldier, a CEO, a lawyer, an author, an academic, a hostage responder, and a weapons instructor."

https://cyclingtips.com/2022/04/exposed-by-a-strava-kom-the-many-lives-of-a...

Has the author found Goucho?

For newer readers of UKC - see this thread for information about the legendary Goucho, also named Nick:

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/off_belay/whatever_happened_to_goucho-713...

Greatly enjoyed re reading that post, totally intriguing once the two obvious people who always rush in to have their say on everything and anything were eliminated. We're still looking for him (or her?)

Ah, Goucho... I have my suspicions. Would Mike 1, 2, 1, 2, 2, 1, 2, 3, 4 possibly be a clue? 

I'm still looking for Linda.

You might have to explain… (for me, anyway)

I could, and I could ask my suspect, but I prefer not knowing for sure. Sometimes enigmas are best left unsolved. Best not to drop the mike or the bass. Apologies if I'm wrong.  

That's a great example of a "typical" UKC thread.  Totally highjacked by two UKC top twenty poster nitwits who spend the entire thread bickering over who's right with regards some trivial semantic interpretation of one post in an increasingly desperate attempt to stroke their respective egos.  

For me, Clive, the most intriguing thing about it was the suggestion of a "Fourth Man".

Anyone remember Louise watmough and her brittles knees?

I agree, a mystery is more fascinating if it remains a mystery... but I'm afraid I still can't get your clue!

Reminds me of an advert for an Italian cycling parts manufacturer

'Merckx The Cannibal - Myths Are Not Debatable'.

The mythical and intangible has a place in life too, even if it is sometimes used to sell things.

Totally hijacked? 6 posts a piece between me and Timmd in a thread running towards 300 posts.

Not been in the top forty for months let alone top twenty. I did point this out to you a few days ago when you made exactly the same dig.

Fair

Yeah, no. As above, just bollocks.

 Talking of egos, yours appears to be so fragile that you can't forgive being called out on your bullshit bloody ages ago and now have to make weekly passive/aggressive digs in an attempt to regain a modicum of equilibrium. Fascinating

What...who has a big ego? I can be a little bit literal or Asperger's-like, and get stuck on detail, but I don't know how consistently one can define ego size from somebody's posts

One person finding details important, could be seen in another way by somebody else. In hindsight these things are never important.

I wouldn’t read too much into mate, it’s not about the facts, it’s about me and him bumping heads very briefly and him seemingly taking it to heart, 

It did seem a bit harsh. You two obviously went off on a bit of a tangent, that got a bit heated ... not so much 'typical UKC' as 'typical conversation.'

Fair enough, but getting back to Mr Gamisou's contribution, calling out a couple of other posters for being prolific and derailing a thread in pursuit of petty point scoring may also seem fair enough, until you consider that Mr Gamisou is a prolific poster who's clearly just derailed a thread in pursuit of petty point scoring.... total hypocrite. Laughably so

I love the way it became a discussion of the boundaries between fact and fiction in climbing and especially where online anonymous personas are involved.

The top hits from putting Mike 1,2,1.... into Google all link you to "Beavis and Butthead".

Makes you wonder...

CB

'Mr Big' is elementary dear felt...

Riiiiiiiiight

A MikeB1234 was the OP of the 'Goucho RIP' thread.
If Goucho was a fictional character, then the only way that MikeB1234 could write it is if he was either Goucho himself or had knowledge of what was happening.
 

if Goucho = Nick (not PMP)  = Mike 

then 4th man= Ni... G

I think when these forums had picnics/meet-ups, people would bash heads then find one another to be nice after all in real life.

With you the worry would be the other way round. Quite the risk, as you seem so perfectly pleasant on here.

In reply to Magma:

Well, that's a bit blunt, but I tend to agree. Unless, of course, we're really being played and there's a Cairncross in the wings.

Ha, I'm not perfect, but I'm hopefully pleasant. You should hear my internal dialogue if I'm late on my bike, or in a queue.

To my shame, I've glowered at people to hurry them up, pondered that they're glum and slow moving because they're moving so slowly, and needed to hurry more for their own good.  

It might sometimes be true, but it's none of my business. 

procreative writers sound legit:

If any of the information you’re trying to claim is unsourced, no problem. If a subject doesn’t meet Wikipedia guidelines for notability, Procreative Writers can help overcome this by creating the necessary references – resources that, without proper fact-checking, could be exploited by the client to create a veneer of legitimacy.

Much as I enjoy people bashing heads, willy waving and generally talking a load of blox...

Back on topic.

What a great story. Top cycling bloke, CEO, ex SAS and general all round great guy.

I do sometimes wonder what happens to the individual. Clearly in this case he went on undaunted. A new life, using his considerable talents. I cant help thinking that in some cases, an unravelling of lies upon lies, might end very badly.

Does anyone know what eventually happened to McCallum - famously disgraced '1st ascenter' from the late 60s, exposed in the Sunday Times of all places?

Yes, it's either the Donald Crowhurst scenario or the Boris Johnson one.

It's the delightful thing about climbing literature (and I include online anecdotage of recent decades) - it's a rich tapestry of exaggeration, understatement, and sometimes fiction, sometimes outright lies - and that's before gossip and word of mouth adding to the store. One just has to read with a young eye, and also an old eye. It's a fascinating genre. Literalism can be overrated in some contexts. 

That 2019 thread is a great read, ignoring the sidetrack.

Grimer sounds a good bet.  Or Rubbishy.  

How about Andy Kirkpatrick?

They're all far too young for the Goucho zeitgeist. He claimed to be 60 then, so circa 63 now. I've always reckoned he was within five years of my age (69). So, roughly 64 to 74. Younger or older, possibly but imho unlikely. 

Mick 

Couldn't a fictional character be whatever age they wanted to be?

Sure, but can a younger man successfully create an older persona? Less plausible than the other way round!

CB

Of course. My money's still on Grimer.

Yes, of course. But the further away in age, the harder to create the fiction? And, as said above, surely harder for a younger person to get the cultural references right? 

For instance, I could easily have been Goucho (I wasn't) as I knew most of the cultural references/zeitgeist. It would have been harder for me to be a Goucho of the 1990s, say, as, although I was around, it was two climbing generations after and not of 'my' time. I'd have really struggled being a Goucho of the 1950s, two climbing generations before. 

Anyway Goucho may have left some blatant clues. Of course they could be misdirection. 

Mick 

When Goucho's demise was first announced I posted the following;

I can’t be the only one here with some nagging doubts about Mr Gaucho, or as we now know, Nick.  There has been some gentle probing already, “any photos of the 38 route in winter?”, “I live in Chamonix why don’t we get together sometime”.  

No one actually seems to know him in real life apart from the recently-arrived Mike 1234.  The climbing scene of the 70’s and 80’s was quite small and someone operating at his level would have a high profile.  Who were all the “stronger” partners?  There is a hugely impressive list of routes in his UKC profile but not a single photo?

I acknowledge that the writing is good, sometimes brilliant, but I fear it is fiction rather than fact and in the final chapter the hero is killed off with a heart attack.

I do hope I’m wrong and apologise if any of the above has caused offence or distress but I’m just about old enough to remember the Keith McCallum affair……..

It was quickly pulled by the moderators but perhaps now it might survive a little longer.
 

What was that? (Googling gives me no hits.)

Thanks.

A lot of new routes on Gogarth by McCallum in the goldrush of the 60's, grades well above his known ability, no one knew his 'partner', the routes hadn't been cleaned. The story was broken in the Sunday Times.

Stuff here: https://www.alpinejournal.org.uk/Contents/Contents_2007_files/AJ%202007%201...

Thanks both.

Quite, pulled. I've always said UKC management could throw a great deal more light than it wants to on this affair.

I remember your post and thought it was barely on the correct side of inappropriate, but by then I'd had my own doubts about Goucho too. I have to applaud your courage for posting it but it would be a different matter if G had turned out to be real person. I think the mods were correct in removing your post at the time, assuming they weren't any better informed than the rest of us. Given that G had managed to get an article into a book, I suspect they weren't.

I'd been entirely taken in by him and, leaving aside his rather fantastical stories, I thought he was one of the most entertainingly thoughtful posters on here. I only started to have doubts when a friend who'd have almost certainly known someone with G's profile emailed me to say he suspected him to be a troll. This wasn't long before G stopped posting.

I dithered about my original post but by then I'd convinced myself that Goucho was a fake, the evidence was just too strong.  I was quite active myself in the 70's and 80's and I would have been aware of him and the no names no photos is very telling.  I was never taken in by him, I guess I'm just too suspicious by nature, I never believe anything I read in the papers.... 

I agree the mods were probably right to pull the post although I did argue the point with them at the time. 

But the mystery remains.

I had some exchanges with UKC management at the time and the impression I had was that they saw it as something of a storm in a teacup and perhaps they're right.  A guy tells some wild stories that convince a few people that he was a bit of a rock star together with some useful and entertaining stuff a least some which turns out to be fantasy - so what?

But the mystery remains.

It's not the first time it's happened here.

There was some chap who claimed he was some long term MTR member and had all this knowledge from that, and had climbed really hard Scottish routes back in the 80s and 90s but no one who knew the Scottish winter scene seemed to know who he was. His profile photo was him wearing crampons but plodding up some easy snow with ski poles which seemed weird.

And then of course what's his name who wrote Scottish area reports for OTE back in the day and started doing the hardest boulder problems in the world on Skye and publishing very stylised B and W photos of him doing them on here. Dave Macleod tried to go and have a go at repeating some and could never even find the boulders, or would find something that might have been it but was many many grades lower than claimed.

Quite.... it's not that difficult to troll because most people are actually pretty nice. Even most with suspicions will generally not say anything on the basis of giving people the benefit of the doubt. 

I'm always bemused by trolls who pat themselves or their mates on the back......... impersonating someone or an opinion in text isn't much harder than falling off a log.

And it reminds me of someone who claimed to be a famous British climber when he was in South Africa, and a famous South African climber when he was in the UK. 

Never heard about that one!

What a bunch of liars these climbers are!

Si O'Connor I think his name was? I guess he wasn't a UKC-only character someone created in cyberspace only, like Goucho. But it was a hugely imaginative self creation. I always hoped that it was an elaborate art project of some type, but that it was someone going through a mental health crisis was another distinct possibility.

It was Tom Ripley here on the UKC forums, and then others with boxing and athletics backgrounds looking deeper, who pulled at a loose thread that unravelled the Rich Simpson story - who I guess at the time was considered one of the best sport climbers in the country, but probably wasn't.

Correct. I think he was a fantasist, a mate told me he cropped up on kayaking social media a few years after being exposed to the climbing world with tales of outlandish sea kayaking exploits.

I remember that - it was on his blog that he was now doing these amazing sea kayak trips, all written up with the same stream of consciousness style he had used for reporting his climbs.

Some of his writing was pretty good, there are bits of it in the original Stone Country guide and lots of photos of him. I know John of Stone Country was fairly instrumental in exposing him but he stayed pretty tight lipped on the details. Edit: that's not a criticism of John, if anything it reflects well on him.

Yes, but it had been going on a long, long time. And as most climbers would agree you take what others say at face value, allowing for the occasional bit of exaggeration. So when someone of the standing of Goucho turns out to be a liar, I believe it is the responsibility of the host forum to investigate and not just  cover up and hope it all goes away. It hasn't. Incidentally I see that those replies lambasting the thoroughly unpleasant remarks by a well known poster of a poor girl enjoying herself on a climb have been deleted, presumably so as to keep everything  nice and comfy on UKC 

I'm still pretending that Goucho exists as he is the poster boy for us aging climbers with alpine ambitions. Talking of which did I mention my recent ascent of the Walker Spur....

Goucho was a well crafted hoax, not a liar, and I see a huge difference between the mystery authors actions and those of the likes of Si O'connor.

As for a UKC cover up, really?

Yes, Gaucho was a wonderful fictional creation. Totally different from Si O'Connor or Rich Simpson.

They clearly were credibly informed soon after Gaucho's "death" that he was fictional and decided to let the mystery run; a good decision.

I understand the comments on the photos being pulled, but pulling the thread seems (to me) to be a bit over the top - unless it got worse since the last time I looked.

I used the term quite deliberately. The fact that he turned out a hoax was by deceiving people.  I think in the end he deliberately decided to commit suicide. But his earlier claims were lies and designed to deceive. If you are brought up in a climbing ethic of believing your contemporaries , doubting them is a very serious breach of trust and to me unpardonable. Amusing for some who were not of his time, but a bitter deception for those who trusted his good faith.That may sound pompous, and dismiss it as a bit of a giggle, but ,so be it. 

John, I completely agree with you. Sure, in the past there were many tales which grew in the telling but premeditated deceptions seem to have been remarkably few. And I think the principal reason for this is the code of trust which traditionally existed between climbers. Everybody accepted that climbing was a potentially lethal activity. You could get killed; people did. So honesty came with the territory. Given human frailties, the truth might  occasionally be embarrassing but one simply had to be honest at all times.

Obviously Goucho knew/knows this. I found him immensely likeable in the same way that people seemed to relate to Nick, the bike guy, in the OP's link. When people voiced suspicions, I found it hard to accept them. The code of honesty was too deeply ingrained. Also, because I liked Goucho so much, I didn't want to think otherwise of him in the same way as Nick the bike guy's buddies didn't want to think badly of him (cognitive dissonance?) 

But the breach of trust...  For me, there's a line drawn in the sand. You just can't cross it. Unfortunately Goucho did. However worldly we were before, we now view people with slightly more cynical eyes - which is rather sad. 

'Mike', who wrote Goucho's obituary so wonderfully in the style of Goucho ('he was a right hard bastard') seems to have been an alter ego. And there was a later post by a different persona which was a pastiche of Goucho verging on parody. So is the man himself out there, probably reading this thread with interest? Yes, I would suggest he is. 

I've long held a theory about who Goucho is. There are clues and resonances and, at one juncture, there's a rather telling convergence of timelines. Obviously I may be incorrect and I've no intention of publicly accusing anyone. However, if I am correct, Goucho's initial motive may have come from a somewhat distressing affliction. And a thread where he lost the plot may have related to a tragic episode in his climbing career. It's possible that things got wildly out of hand. That's the most charitable explanation that I can think of. 

 Enough. We've all sinned. If you're reading this, Goucho, go in peace. 

Mick  

I broadly agree with you Mick, although I do think there is room for the non-serious hoax of the Eric Shipton /Yeti print kind (if such it was). But you realise that this penultimate paragraph may be fanning the flames? I’m even more intrigued, despite myself! 

I think I must have missed something here. What photo and what comments are you referring to? Thanks.

I enjoyed Goucho's posts and is/was intrigued as to who the writer was, I did'nt think his 'fiction' endangered anyone physically or mentally .. so I see it as harmless and adding to life's rich tapestry rather than detracting from it. 

So are you convinced that Goucho was a real person posting under a pseudonym and lying about his own life and climbing for some reason rather than a fictional character created by someone for fun?

I had assumed the latter and, since his "demise", have never for a moment have felt lied to or deceived any more than if I had been reading a novel. No breach of trust. No dishonesty.

Well I don't know about 'convinced'. I'm much given to self-doubt so, to paraphrase Groucho Marx, don't place too much credence in any theory I've devised!

But if it is the person whom I suspect, and it was the initial motive I suspect, then yes, in the beginning it may have been to prove something to himself. And that something was not a bad thing but rather one deserving of our sympathy. (I'm choosing my words carefully here.)  Then perhaps it got out of hand. Also his initial reason would have become redundant. As Nick in the link could inhabit other worlds (e.g. bikes to guns), so too, I think, can Goucho do likewise. 

Mind you, I could well be wrong about some if not all of this. Caveat emptor. 

But what if you read a novel which was presented as truth and then found out it wasn't (e.g. The Long March? The Painted Bird??) would you not feel betrayed?

Clearly there's a spectrum of opinion here from those who feel it was all a bit of a lark (which it undoubtedly was at times) and those like John (jcw) and I who ultimately feel differently.

However I felt Dave MacLeod's treatment of Si O'Connor was a masterclass in how to behave humanely about such matters. And that was Scotland! (Felt things were going to get physical once with a leading Scots mountaineer when I made some ill-advised quip about 'the fabled Jacksonville'. "Jacksonville was hallowed ground!" Gulp! Yeah. Whatever.) 

Anyway that's my last public word on the subject. Off to clean and shunt a new route. Wish me well. Old and weak ain't perhaps the best hand to play. But if it's the only one going...

Mick 

There is a photo of someone aid seconding a route in Dalt Quarry which is (I believe) a little slate hole in the middle of Borrowdale. The photo is labelled "Anne on first ascent".

A seasoned UKC poster made a rather long disparaging comment on the photo and was then in turn slated by further comments for being unnecessarily rude/aggressive/whatever.

There was then a thread which started with a "I don't understand what's going on here" type post, (aid climbing? + first ascent but seconding) which led to further comments criticising the climbers and also the original "nasty" post.

Usual UKC escalation and jumping to unsubstantiated conclusions, but basically it was just a piccy of some climbers having fun - and I hope if they saw the thread that they had a good laugh about the storm in a teacup that the innocent photo produced.

... You might have taken Mark's remarks at face value, rather than putting an extra twist on them.

It was an odd photo, and I'm not sure what it was about either.

Now I'm confused 😁, do you mean:

• I should have taken Mark's remarks (which I can't remember) at face value and not have put an extra twist on them - did I?
• Or, that I did take his remarks at face value and missed the twist being implied by them.

> It was an odd photo, and I'm not sure what it was about either.

If the photo had just been captioned "Anne seconding an aid route" then nothing would have happened, but as it was, there were some contradictions (which could no doubt have been easily explained by the climbers in question - but why should they?) which caused confusion and doubt without any real evidence to support that doubt (as invariably happens on UKC).

If you're used to UKC then that "style" of thread is neither here nor there, but I can understand that a newbie poster might take it more to heart than any of the posters intended.

Thanks.

Ummm... I don't like to be anal about this, but for the 50+ years I've been climbing the caption I would expect to have seen would be 'xxx seconding the FA of yyy.'

It's not a big deal, but I can see Mark's point and my interpretation was that he was simply expressing a genuine puzzlement.

I am now going to try desperately hard not to contribute further to this!

That is a fair point because I did feel disappointed and let down when I found out that The Long March was fiction, whereas I just felt admiration for Goucho's creator.

I think the difference is that The Long March is such an astonishing story, almost beyond belief if it had been real, that it loses everything by being fiction; it just becomes a rather naff adventure story. Goucho, on the other hand was nothing special in his achievements, an accomplished climber and colourful figure but nothing really out of the ordinary; his strength was almost entirely in his created character.

And I'll sign off with that little aphorism "what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive"

And I think that "Goucho" has contributed to this thread...

Without a doubt. Anybody who is that committed to telling porkies on the Internet is not going to suddenly give up!

It's in the quality of the writing, TLM is a great tale but pretty average writing so take the story away and there's nothing much left. From what I remember of Goucho's work it was good writing. 

I'm not claiming to be particularly prescient but I started to doubt TLM when reading it on account of the distances he claimed to be covering every day. And then they met the yeti...

His contributions were certainly consistent. In a previous life I had a business restoring classic cars. Sometimes I contribute to threads if that kind of stuff comes up. Goucho would often wade in as having had something better or more valuable. In one thread It came up that my current car was a Discovery HSE, so up pops G stating he had been through a raft of better top models. Never really thought about it at the time, but it appeared to be quite invested, rather than someone just creating a myth. There was some underlying ‘problem’ being played out.

Good job you didn't mention you'd been to Tenerife, or we'd have found out Goucho had been to Elevenerife.

Maybe it's like 'Fight Club' - Goucho's real persona doesn't know s/he has an alter ego.

Maybe it's me? or you?

He wasn't in Spinal Tap as well was he?