Thursday, December 9, 2010

Hideaway (v10?), Upside Boulder

Up at the Buttermilks today Ian Cotter-Brown showed me his sweet new line called Hideaway on the Upside Boulder, mentioned earlier on this blog. It turns out to be a really cool problem with some unusual moves for the Buttermilks, traversing across the underside of the Upside Boulder using cross-throughs and heel hooks.

  Ryan Held making the first roll-through on Hideaway (v10?)
There is a hard crux which Ian did with an insecure knee-bar. After doing the move this way my knee was pretty bruised. But since Ian didn't feel like walking all the way down the hill and back up to bring me the knee pad he used, and since I didn't really want to use one anyway, I found a way to do it with a left heel-toe in a shallow hueco. Sure, it might be harder but the movement is amazing!

  Ryan Held moving into the crux on Hideaway (v10?)
After the steep butt-dragging and powerful start, you end up on Early Exit a technical v5 face to top out. Now I want to go back and link it into Upside (the v8 that goes straight up the middle of the boulder).

Ryan setting up to make the crux move using the heel-hook beta.
If you want to check it out, the Upside Boulder is way up on the hillside about 2-3 mins straight uphill from the Saigon/Sharma Traverse area. The problem Hideaway begins under the left side of the west face on an obvious flat jug/pinch. Move right into huecos, then set-up and roll through with the left hand to a good pinch edge, out right to another rough edge, then make the crux roll-through or heinously painful knee bar cop-out. Keep going right via jugs and underclings and finish on the wall at the right side.

That wall at right, Early Exit, and the central face Upside are well worth doing in their own right, either from a sit or a stand start.

4 comments:

Owen Martin said...

What's the word on upside? I checked it out and worked it for quite some time during my last trip in march/april and seemed a bit harder than V8. It is AWESOME up until a point where you get to two small crimps and the hueco is about a full span away. I feel like a hold is missing or something :/

Wills Young said...

Hi Owen,
Go direct rather than right toward the hueco. There is a long press for sure to a hard-to-see fingertips edge in the glassy rock above. Have to get up really high on your feet and press down the good edge. You don't need to touch the hueco at all. Don't sweat the rating, it's not really important.
I heard Charlie Barrett took weeks to get this one done!
Good luck,
Wills

Owen said...

Haha, thanks man, I'll have to go back and check it out when it gets cooler; the line is gorgeous.

Anonymous said...

Just got on this over the weekend and had the same reaction as Owen. I guess I shoulda looked it up first - I tried to trend towards the hueco and got nowhere. Came home convinced a hold broke. I'll try the direct finish next time... thanks!