BMC International Winter Meet Report

© Jack Geldard - Editor - UKC
Luka Lindic of Slovenia dry tooling in Newtyle Quarry  © Jack Geldard
Luka Lindic of Slovenia dry tooling in Newtyle Quarry
© Jack Geldard, Mar 2009
The Scottish Winter International meet went with a splosh. It was wet. And warm. However, the troops went out everyday, finding some climbable conditions and generally having a great time.

Hosts came from all over the UK to show off our finest routes to a group of the world's keenest winter climbers.

Team Petzl nipped over from France to shoot a film featuring Ueli Steck, American Super-Alpinists teamed up with Ian Parnell and went... (wait for it)... rock climbing at Dunkeld! (They did get some winter routes done too). Slovenian mixed masters tore it up at Newtyle dry tooling quarry, Japanese Giri Giri boys came, saw and described Scotland as “WET”. Everyone got well and truly drunk too. Especially the Czechs.

Typically the conditions came good the day after the meet, but luckily some of the visitors stayed on and sampled Ben Nevis in its full winter garb.

Scottish winter climbing. It's brilliant.


Ian Parnell relaxing at Glenmore Lodge  © Jack Geldard
Ian Parnell relaxing at Glenmore Lodge
© Jack Geldard
The BMC organises an International Climbing Meet every year, alternating between a rock climbing meet at Plas y Brenin and a winter climbing meet at Glenmore Lodge. Around thirty five guests are teamed up with a British partner of similar ability and sent out on minibuses to find adventure wherever they can.

The meets do attract lots of top climbers, making for some exciting headlines, but behind the media curtain of super hard ascents, the vast majority of hosts and guests just get out there and climb loads, all week long, and have a great time.

These meets are a great way to share world climbing information, watch slide-shows, catch up with old friends, make new friends, get inspired and generally put out the good word for British climbing. I think they are a vital part of what the BMC does.

If you're interested in hosting in either summer or winter, there is more information here: BMC Website.


Giri Giri boy Yusuke Sato and Jack Geldard getting wet  © Jack Geldard
Giri Giri boy Yusuke Sato and Jack Geldard getting wet
© Jack Geldard, Mar 2009
This last meet was particularly taxing on the hosts, as seeking out routes that were in climbable condition was somewhat tricky, and a rugby-scrum style race ensued most mornings as teams headed up the Ben for the very highest ice routes.

UK host and top mountain guide Stu McAleese was just about to head off climbing when he glanced back at the minibus:

All the doors were left wide open, everyone had jumped out and set off running without looking back – that's how psyched these guys are! I'm sure they almost left the engine running!”


An international team in the Ciste, Ben Nevis  © Jack Geldard
An international team in the Ciste, Ben Nevis
© Jack Geldard, Mar 2009
Routes climbed over the week include: The Secret, Sioux Wall, Darth Vader, Babylon, Thompson's Route, Glovers Chimney, Comb Gully, Green Gully, Tower Scoop and Smith's Route, plus of course a new route climbed by Simon 'The Knowledge' Richardson called Big Wednesday.

At the world class dry-tooling venue of Birnham Quarry, routes that were climbed included Fast and Furious, Too Fast Too Furious, Roofilicious, Va Va Vroom, Happy Hooker, Groovilicious and Bonzai.

Lectures and slide-shows came from Zoe Hart (USA), Dave MacLeod (UK), Pavel Vritic (Czech) and Kei Taniguchi & Yusuke Sato (Japan).

photo
Stu McAleese and Luka Lindic wet but happy
© Jack Geldard

The event was organised by Becky McGovern and Nick Colton of the BMC. You can watch Nick hard at work in this exciting video:


The event was supported by Rab and DMM.

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3 Mar, 2009
There's some pics over on my blog, including ones of actual winter conditions - honest! A good week and great reflection on the generous spirits of climbers world wide as it would have been easy for the visitors to throw their toys out the pram when they saw what we were asking them to walk 5 hours a day for. By the way who did the Secret and Sioux Wall - was that the Petzl crew on Friday? Or did some of the guests hang around for Sunday when winter was due to return?
3 Mar, 2009
//ueli-steck.petzlteam.com//index.php/post/2009/03/02/Scottish-Ice-Trip-Day-6-the-Secret Some nice comments, glad he got at least one good day.
3 Mar, 2009
Nice link Ian. Luka and Stu McAleese did Sioux Wall that same day. Jack
3 Mar, 2009
A small point of order. The dry tooling is at Newtyle Quarry, not Birnham Quarry! Birnam Quarry is the slate quarry on the other side of the River Tay, where by the way a new crag has recently been created (a 25m high slab) since material was removed for the new Ballinluig road junction.
3 Mar, 2009
What Ueli doesn't say is that it took him about half an hour to lead the main pitch on the secret, impressive stuff.
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