bluebrad

Email User

What is written below does have a tenuous link to reality but quite what is up to you to decide. Gonzo at its best...

Born the son of a lowly electric eel farmer he has, against all odds, turned into a devilishly handsome individual with a shock of hair that causes widespread depression amongst the more folically challenged of Sheffield.

He is considered by many experts to be totally insane with his deviant nature manifesting itself most obviously in his love of gritstone climbing and the selection of routes where the noble art of hand and fist jamming is obligatory to achieve any form of upward motion. Regardless of this he is actually likeable in a perverse sort of fashion.

Despite having all of the climbing ability of an encephalitic aardvark his undiminished enthusiasm does not let this get in the way of a prolonged (and ultimately doomed) epic on a two move boulder problem.

Quite happy to do routes but if you are of a weak and feeble disposition then best avoid as prolonged exposure to the prevailing elements will be mandatory while an ongoing and seemingly never ending epic ensues above you.

The degree of difficultly of any given route that he is climbing can be correlated by the amount of swearing going on - think of it as Tourettes on a rope!

Location
Sheffield

Best Climbing Experience
In reverse order:

5) A nice day out just bimbling up VDiffs at Stanage with Just Wanna Climb - we had been planning on climbing that little bit harder but it was a rather breezy day at the end of March. Not only was this good for such entertainment as watching walkers being blown into the heather (literally) and keeping the midges off it also made climbing a VDiff a far more interesting proposition than it usually is.

4) Deep Water Soloing on the Costa Blanca - had a great time climbing with a great gang of people and got in the third ascent of Jellystone just for good measure.

3) Montesa - fabulous crag and just climbed till I was fit only for the knackers yard - got F6b on redpoint too which just made it a truly awesome day.

2) Greeny Crack at Burbage - had a good old fashioned epic on this one - it ate the No 4 cam, it ate the No 3 cam and then proceeded to eat the biggest hex I had ever seen and I had only got half way up it. Twenty minutes of debate then ensued inside my head about whether I was going to ask for a top rope before I decided that is is better to fail while trying rather than have to admit to the fine people of RT that I had to resort to such lowly tactics. I remember looking at the top out and thinking "if it's a slopey one I am going to cry" - thankfully it wasn't!

1) Tody's Wall - the best climb on grit that I have done to date and it had the usual element of epic about it that is somehow considered de rigueur where I am concerned so all well and good. Especially memorable for the Godzilla-esque roar that I let out while getting through the crux which was so loud that it caused somebody to fall off their onsight of Right Eliminate at Stanage.

Favourite Climbing-Related Discussion Topic
The fact that any climb with layback in either the title or the description is not actually a climb at all but is the work of the devil.

Why climbing on grit is so much better than anything you get in East Anglia.

The necessity of having an epic whilst climbing and how this is the only justification required when asked why do you climb.

Colour co-ordination with regard to your beanie and your bouldering mat - how are you going to crank harder than V3 if they don't match?

Asking climbingpixie how the training is coming on for her completing London Wall by 07/01/2009 (more commonly known as the day she will be bluebrad's bitch).

Recent Postings

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Interests Outside Climbing
Real Ale, football (well quality football like that played by Ipswich Town anyway), cricket, reading, electronica, scaring ramblers, music played by obscure canadian bands, the ceaseless search to find the best hair product, dancing badly, Constellation records, comics and adding to my RT profile with whatever random things come into my handsome head...

About My Photography
It is more a case of luck than judgement.

Photo Gallery

Click to view bluebrad's gallery. (25 photos)
Chosen as the Featured Gallery on 27-Aug-07.
Click to search for photos of climbers called bluebrad.

Click to list photo comments written by me. (17 comments)
I've voted for 11 photos, average vote 4.1.
(27% superb - 54% good - 18% average - 0% poor - 0% rubbish)

Anything Else We Should Know
It doesn't matter if you do trad, sport, bouldering or whatever the glitterati have deemed flavour of the month as long as you enjoy it!

The peak of my climbing career will be reached when I accept that getting fully involved with off-widths is not only interesting but should be encouraged.

Conversely the nadir of my climbing career will be when I accept that laybacking is not just a heinous method of falling off a route with a great lack of style.

An epic can be best defined as "absolute misery looked back upon with great fondness...."

I own 3 beanies.

I really like the word "epic". In fact I like the word so much that I regularly subject myself (and whichever unsuspecting person that has been selected to belay/spot me) to them just so I can use the word more often.

If you haven't figured it out yet I like to have the odd epic - please pay attention!!

Best add in the obligatory I am single...

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