UKH

As an older climber I find it hard to not get nostalgic on these forums. I keep wanting to say " I did that back in 1976" and stuff like that. For most older climbers our glory days are a memory. Though its amazing to see what some people are still doing. Just read about one of the Lakeland climbers still leading E5 in his 70's! The weird thing is he was doing that in his prime when we met at Deer Bield back in the 1970's And I am still shuffling up HVS as I was then. So maybe the glory days are not over after all.

You will quite likely arrive at an age when shuffling up the stairs will be a problem so enjoy those HVS while you still can.

Go to a bouldering wall. Get involved. Leave all that shit behind.

Strangely enough there is a new bouldering wall opening where I live. And on this very day! 

In reply to Removed Usercapoap:

No 28 what, Clive?

Great, give it a go and tell us what you think. It reinvigorated my climbing.

As I've got older I've realised that nostalgia just isn't what it used to be.

The key to continuous improvement is to have been sufficiently mediocre early on.

I was your average HVS-to-E2 traddie in the 80s & early 90s. Had a long break for various reasons: family, emigration ... Started again together with my son a few years ago. Mostly sport climbing these days, working my way slowly into the low to mid 7's redpointing and having a great time.

Huge fan of IFSC world cup comps which I watch avidly. First time in my life I've ever had any interest at all in spectator sport. Really enjoy modern climbing walls (except when they're stupidly overcrowded) - although I'm grateful for the hours of dank brick edge cranking in my youth, which have given me a lifelong basis of reasonable finger strength & tendon resilience, and the ability to still occasionally burn off kids a third of my age on vertical crimpy indoor problems (increasingly rare sadly).

With my 60th birthday looming though, I can definitely see that my remaining time of ambition & pushing at rock climbing is finite. So this winter I'm learning to ski with a view to ski touring being my next area of noob gain gratification.

I'm climbing a grade harder than I did 40 years ago  but only because all the routes have been upgraded.

Keep pushing. I climbed hard in the late 70's early 80's. Work and family got in the way and the grade plummeted, fortunately I didn't. Started climbing with more seriousness a few years ago. Current aim, before the end of my 70th year is to onsight 7a, 5 months left to achieve it. I will manage it because I have become motivated again. Doubt I will ever get close to my trad peak of E5, but I am working at that. Each year I get a little better mostly by using technique, where years ago I would have used muscle power. 

People tell me decline is mostly in the head, but as my head has a substantial echo there must be another cause!

Just climb. It's all good.

Mick