16th March 2025 @ Blackstone Edge, 7A (6C-7A+)

Saw multiple videos, but not referenced in order to send. I don’t think there are too many ways to do the crux. I probably first saw it done in Ollie’s video. I had done the hard move and topped out once before, but the video shows my first valid send of the sit start.

The Lushering is another I’d kind of looked at now and again over the years, having seen it in many videos and it looking doable. However, I could never really work out how to pop up for that slopey gaston and latch it. This seemed to change in March this year when I went for a go after messing around on Patiopia. I tried to go from the big slopey jug and managed to latch it! I got my camera out, and on the second go, latched and pulled through, getting to the top.

I was pretty happy with this one, except once home, when I remembered that the problem was a sit start, and I’d gone from a couple of (very easy) moves in!

Bearing this in mind, after another session on Patiopia (I think I sent the 6C variant on that session) I wandered over with the intention of doing it from the sit. It felt like a totally different climb. Not because of the sit start – those moves are very easy. I think sometimes you’re just not quite aware of exactly what you’re body is doing. Some days it’s getting everything right on autopilot, and other days you need to take manual control of nearly every movement. One factor may have been that this was a weekend on a sunny day, and so the area always had a group of walkers around, usually taking pictures at the trig point. But as much as I like to be alone, I don’t think that had much effect.

Anyway, one breakthrough on this day was realising that I could latch the gaston, and once caught, I could bring my thumb into play and this made the hold feel more secure when pulling through. This meant I could usually get the top. The main problem then was barn-dooring off, a problem I just didn’t have when I’d done it before. Before, I was holding the top but staying low as possible whilst I walked my feet up and left, so the barn door wasn’t possible. I just wasn’t doing that for these attempts.

Perhaps a case of forgetting how to climb, or maybe the hold I was using felt less solid, or more probably, a case of send fever. However, I ended up holding one of the swings and scrapping my way to the top. To be honest, I don’t even mind that I messed up so much because of the colours captured. At this point, I hadn’t got myself a big tripod yet, and the big rock on the right is a bit in the way, but apart from that, I really the scenery.