Boys who wear jorts>>>

Today was a much deserved rest day and began with some delicious French toast from Kneaders. Mmmm. After breakfast, we headed back home to clean the house/vans/everything for a few hours (which was actually super easy because we have the BEST group of kids this year and everyone helped to get the job done).

Once we restocked on groceries, we headed up Big Cottonwood Canyon with hopes of swimming/rope-swinging at Bloods Lake…but we got rained out! Hopefully the next rest day will be sunny enough for us to try again.

Also, Gentry and 2 chainz made some super short jorts today that they will attempt to climb in later…

Now we’re home from dinner at Whole Foods and it’s time to sleep so we can climb hard tomorrow 🙂

Even though it may not sound like we did much, rest days when we are just hanging out together are my favorite. We don’t need to be doing anything exciting to laugh and have a good time. It’s probably the best part about team (for me, at least), and I’m going to miss doing everything and nothing with y’all more than you know next year!

Until tomorrow,

-Claire

RIP Lolo’s Cornrows

Hey y’all! Today was pretty rough because we were three days on…but everyone killed it. We showed up to the gym and split up into two groups. The speed-only kids started with Stan and did laps on laps on laps until lunch. Another group began upstairs and did workout stations with Matt and Ellis. The rest of the kids went with Kyle for some mental training and ATC belay practice. We pretty much worked nonstop until the break before the second session. After lunch we had a speed comp and then were allowed to session or work out until we left the gym for dinner at 6. Even though they were super exhausted after three full days of training, everybody was motivated to get on the wall and get pumped again! Even Kyle got in a few routes.

We are definitely in need of a rest day (especially if it’s going to involve French toast).

After a delicious dinner (where Mattie attempted to eat an ENTIRE CHICKEN), we headed back to the house and got ready for ultimate! This time we were joined by Palmer, Dalton, and Lizzie from the momentum team. It was a great game even though I hit the ground a few times… I think it’s safe to say that our team cares almost as much about ultimate as we do rock climbing.

In other news, Lolo got rid of her cornrows and now has really amazing, poofy hair. RIP rows.

Highlights from the coaches and some of the boys:

Stan’s favorite part of the day was ultimate and watching Bob Dylan catch literally every pass thrown his way. He also did some speed coaching…but ultimate is definitely the priority.

Ellis was really psyched about how hard everybody worked upstairs during the exercise stations.

Matt’s favorite part of the day was hanging out with Ellis and I at the coffee shop and coaching onsighting/the exercise stations.

Kyle enjoyed watching everyone get psyched for the afternoon speed comp. Also, Koen sent three routes today!

2 chainz “got freakin’ plowed” and enjoyed dabbing/whipping to the sick songs in the gym.

Gentry’s favorite part was sitting at home wishing he was playing ultimate… 😦

Nick’s favorite part of the day was knocking me to the ground in ultimate and feeling so bad that he volunteered to make my lunches for the rest of the trip. Thanks dude!

 

Until tomorrow,

-Claire

 

30 Hours…We need showers.

Photos from our brief stop in Moab on Sunday morning. Sorry for the delay in posting! Enjoy.

BEAN FUN

Hello again! Today was so much fun. After another (much appreciated) gentle awakening by Matt, we made our breakfasts, packed our lunches, and headed back to Millcreek. We warmed up for about an hour before starting our speed comp.

In general, everybody had really incredible runs. Beans, Madi, Kiara, Jessica, Izzo, Melo, Emerson, Lolo, Claire (me!), John Brock, Michael, Merritt, 2 chainz, and David all got their personal best times of the trip. There are probably even more that we didn’t write down… Great work y’all!!

After speed, we headed to the lead wall for a competition. We were broken up into categories and each climbed two routes in hopes to earn some points for our junior guide groups. Finally, Madi was put in the hot seat and had to climb a route to determine whether or not the entire team would do a million up-downs… She sent! It was so much fun to watch her try hard (and so much fun not doing up-downs)—way to go girl!

Thankfully, we only climbed in the morning and were able to chill out at the house for a few hours (while Stan destroyed Kyle in a game of golf). Later, obviously, was another game of ultimate before dinner.

Bean Fun is by far the best meal on trip. Lolo, Katie, Emerson, and I (under the mighty leadership of Stan) hand shredded a bunch of grilled chicken and made the most delicious quesadillas of all time. Most of them we call “Bean Fun” aka a quesadilla with refried beans, cheese, and chicken inside. Some of them even had some guacamole! Bean Fun and Guac Fun. What more could you want?

Now that everything is clean and the star charts are tallied, it’s time for bed!

 

Here are the updated scores:

Claire’s group: 36 points (WOOOOO!!)

Grace’s group: 31 points

Gentry’s group: 28 points

Niko’s group: 28 points

 

Highlights from the girl’s room (+Michael and Kyle) include:

Ashton read 10 pages of her book in 30 minutes and then contracted minor hypothermia from her shower.

Michael had an awesome day of speed climbing and cheese-less quesadillas.

Grace was relieved to have only one session of climbing and was also super excited about ultimate!

Kyle’s favorite part of the day was when Melo fell on his route and came down smiling because he had so much fun. And he was also really happy to see Melo get his new personal best time on the speed wall, but in classic Kyle fashion he yelled at him for an hour for not competing in speed at regionals…not really (but seriously).

Lolo liked cuddling with Grace and I on our bed and cooking dinner for all of the ungrateful little children 😉

Izzo got a new personal best time on the speed wall (and played a great game of ultimate).

Katie’s favorite part was Bean Fun and catching a pass that hit Lolo in the face during ultimate.

Ellery had fun onsighting a 12d! “It was lit.”

Emerson liked working hard and having bean fun!

Sophie’s favorite part of her day was eating her lunch.

Maya really enjoyed climbing today (especially the orange egg hold on her onsight route).

And my favorite part was definitely making dinner with the Bean Fun crew.

 

Until tomorrow,

-Claire

PS— We are having a hard time uploading photos from the house, so we will bring the laptop to the gym tomorrow and try again. Sorry for the technical difficulties!

“Hey MTV, Welcome to My Crib” –Bob Dylan (probably)

First of all, getting woken up by Matt instead of Kyle this morning was probably the highlight of my day. Instead of Kyle’s usual yelling/rap/beatboxing and dancing (if you can call it that), Matt very gently said, “good morning girls, we’re leaving in an hour and a half.” Amazing. Kyle, please take notes.

Breakfast and lunch making followed before we headed to Millcreek to climb some rocks. Everyone was so excited to get on the beautiful walls! Not a surprise, this gym is incredible. We warmed up and split into four groups.

Grace, Ashton, Emerson, 2 chainz, Eric, Niko, Michael, and Maverick started with Stan on the speed wall and ran some impressive times considering the altitude and the team’s general sleepiness. Also, Emerson got her new best time (12.4s)!

Sophie, Lauren, Nick, Gentry, John, Claire, and Maya started off bouldering with Ellis and were soon completely wrecked. RIP the skin on my fingers.

Jessica, Kiara, Bob Dylan, Oceana, Mattie, Momo, Madi, and David began with lead and climbed two routes with only one foot and got suuuper pumped.

Katie, Ellery, Mello, Izzo, Ellis, Theo, Beans went upstairs to do some more one footed climbing with Matt on the circuit wall.

After rotating through all of the stations, we split up for lunch and took a break for a while. The second session started at 3:00 and everyone hopped on the speed wall a for several laps before either working out or lead climbing until we left at 6:00.

A game of ultimate frisbee, of course, was next. We headed to the field near our house and ran around until we were too hungry and tired to continue. After a quick meal at Whole Foods, we returned to tally up the star-charts (onsight points for junior guide groups).

Current standings:

Claire’s group: 16 points

Grace’s group: 12 points

Gentry’s group: 10 points

Niko’s group: 9 points

 

Now it’s time for bed! Enjoy what the little kids had to say about the best parts of their days:

David: “Onsighting a blue 11b with one foot and building a super cool sleeping fort.”

Beans: “Getting a PR of 15.58! And hanging out with Koen.”

Momo: “Having fun bonding with all my friends and climbing in a super cool gym.”

Madi: “Having so much fun improving and getting ready for nationals and getting to know my friends better!”

Ellis: “Getting to Utah and seeing all my Texas friends.”

Karen: “Being able to climb on the speed wall and talking to Lolo and Sophie.”

Bob Dylan: “Getting to know all of my friends better and sleeping in my crib.”

Jessica: “Excited to be climbing in a tall gym again and training hard for nationals with my best friends.”

Oceana: “Having a super fun time bonding with all of my teammates and climbing in the best gym ever!”

Mattie: “Bob Dylan getting to sleep in a crib instead of a bed.”

 

Also, in case you didn’t know, Bob Dylan is sleeping in a crib.

Until tomorrow,

-Claire