March 06, 2016 - Dealing with fear.

It had rained during the night and even though the weather was really nice when I woke up, the ground was still quite wet, so this time I obliged myself to be patient.

I was happily surprised that my oldest son, Anthony, decided himself that he wanted to join me to the forest for climbing.
Being almost 13 and in his puberty, I forced him to get out of bed at noon and told him that I wanted him to go outside with this nice weather.
His decision to join me almost sounded like music in my ears.
I was set on trying "À Gil" today, and having him there to spot, even if it's just in the head, felt comfortable.

"À Gil" is an impressive boulder at the start (depending from where you're coming) of Apremont Butte aux Dames. Impressive, but oh so nice and asking to be climbed.
I had seen a couple of videos of it, each with different beta, but all showed that the crux was the mantle on the nose. Right at the top and at considerable height.

My first tries were miserable.
My fingers were hurting from the climbing of the days before and a cold sharp breeze was making my skin sort of crack.
I wasn't sure anymore if I wanted to do this and assisted Anthony in climbing some orange and blue problems.
It was exactly what I needed. It made my body and skin wake up in a calm fashion instead of immediately with agressive holds and moves.
I felt ready and we moved the crashpads to "À Gil" again.

Stepping into the problem is nothing, taking the first hold right hand is easy, but as soon as you start hanging into the hold to reach far left, it starts to hurt the fingers.
The hold far left is nothing more than a small hole. I can imagine that some people can put two fingers in, but I was forced to use it as a mono.
Once you got the far left hold good enough, you have two possibilities.
Either you use the right hold for your foot to push up onto, or you jump to reach on top of the 'nose'.
For me the second option seemed like the most natural way to move.

The first time I looked up to look where to jump to, I was scared as hell. The fear took over and I didn't dare to go for it completely.
I had no idea what I was jumping to, I knew it were slopers, but was there maybe a small edge, were they going to stick?
I didn't know. I had to jump into the unknown.

After a couple of tries, I got used to the fear, even though my heart was pounding in my throat.
I was able to stick the slopers after the jump, but then came the crux. The mantle up with no holds at all.
You get in this position where you have to decide to jump off, or continue on with the fear of making a bad fall.
Such kind of mantles put you in a situation where a sudden slip can result in an uncontrolled fall.
It took a while and some tries before I overcame the fear and dared to push through. I rode my way up.
Knowing that Anthony was standing below me, helped, even though he wouldn't have been able to do a lot.
We were both glad I made it.

Fontainebleau - Apremont Butte aux Dames - À Gil 7A+