Posted on 30 December 2011 at 12:08h

I've just finished reading Johnny Dawes autobiography "Full of Myself". Johnny was a rock climber who did things a bit differently to the rest of the crowd, when everyone was into bolts and competition he stuck to tradition and adventure. Johnny is very much into analysing the way he moves on rock and tarmac, so he knows a lot about friction and gravity. One of his climbs is called Kaluza Klein, the theory that tried to unify the forces of gravity and electromagnetism very apt since Johnny uses the electromagnetic force between the molecules of his shoes and the rock to overcome gravity. Johnny is a very fluid climber. in fact he doesn't really climb he scampers, moving from hold to hold without stopping. In the book he talks about using momentum. A rock climb is basically a line of holds some of them big enough to hang on with one hand others not, the idea is to apply enough downward force on the holds to project oneself upwards with enough velocity to reach the next. If you can catch the second hold on the way up then you don't have to apply so much force to hold onto it.

The video below shows this nicely on a few occasions, pulling with both hands catching the next hold with one. Apologies to any Czech viewers as I'm sure Adam uses a couple of rude words when he falls off.

ADAM ONDRA - FIRST 8C BOULDERS from BERNARTWOOD on Vimeo.