a new year, a new blog!

­­­On the first day of the New Year, writing the first post of my new blog, I felt like I should briefly summarise my 2007, so that people who don’t know me, will get an idea of what I got up to.
2007 was a very busy and productive year for me. A lot of my hopes and dreams seemed to start to fall into place and that is all thanks to people like you and the help and support you give me.
At the beginning of 2007 I completed one of the most famous projects on Gritstone. "The Promise" E10 7a is now the hardest route on Gritstone. During the process of working the route and on the actual ascent I was filmed by 2 separate production companies. The finished footage has already appeared in one, full length, climbing film (Commited, HotAches productions 2007) and will appear in another film due out in 2008.
In the first half of 2007 I took a few trips bouldering trips Switzerland. I began to focus on "flashing" hard boulder problems and in March I became the first person in the world to Flash a confirmed V13 boulder problem when I flashed "The Ganymede Takeover" at Brione, Ticino. My ascent, along with many other hard problems was filmed by Crabstix productions and will be released in a film about myself in 2008.
In April, after a specific training program, I flashed a second V13 boulder problem, "The Great Shark Hunt" at Chironico. Again, my ascent was captured on film by Crabstix productions.
I traveled to Asia during the summer and spent some of my time sport climbing and developing the local Bouldering and Deep Water Soloing. I wrote an article about my trip which appeared on a British website and also scoped out the potential for future bouldering and trad climbing trips.
I returned to Switzerland in November and had another fantastic trip. Amongst other things I flashed my 3rd V13, "Schule des Lebens" which again was captured on film.
After having a great (very relaxing) time in Mexico, I flew into Colorado to catch up with some friends and hopefully do a little climbing. It was really cold and snowed heavily (well heavy compared to England) for a lot of the time but I managed to get a few things done and have fun.
Just before the year was out I got chance to look at a few trad climbing projects I had been told about in the past. I was really impressed and very psyched to invest some time into them. They are all fantastic lines, and super hard, just what I was looking for.
2008 has all the ingredients for a fantastic year. I am really looking forward to the TNF trips to China and the Czech Sandstone and whilst I am not away traveling, I should have plenty to occupy me back home in England.

Here’s to a great 08

James