Strong or fit for climbing, by Stevie Haston.

Feeling weak recently led me to change my training routine, and dramatically at that. I had been feeling very tired after climbing for 5 months and was sick from a rubbish diet full of toxins. All of my friends thought it was old age creeping up on me and catching me. I was desperately hoping it wasn't. Anyway nothing was really working, until a final bit of the puzzle fell into place, or should I say out!

After an emergency visit to a dentist, some horrible stuff, and a serious infection was sorted out. This coupled, with a strict and low volume, but hight intensity training workout, has resulted in feeling strong again, I hesitate to say fit, because I don't think I am fit, I,am strong. I also put on a few pounds of fat, due laying around. So it looks like you can defiantly perk yourself by eating good eggs and a bit of heavy pulling. Its done little for my climbing, but I don't care, I'd rather feel strong. Plenty of time to get good at climbing now that I feel young again.

So 5 sets of pulls with  a charge

     5 sets of bent over rows heavy as you can

     5 sets of pull overs

    3 sets of clean and jerk,  with about 10 or 12 reps

And a few dozen eggs a week. Lots of sleep. Its very boring, but seems to work.

Up the green revolution, by Stevie Che Haston.

My garden is great, it's got no weird chemicals or stupid GMOs in it, if I could stay in my garden my life would be great. But I have to travel away from it, into a polluted madness. 

The unspoilt, unpolluted world is getting smaller, people breath shitty air, eat shitty food, and live a vicarious life thru others living. I always wanted to go swimming in the Pacific for a year, but it looks like the fish will glow bright in the dark from radiation due to a Japanese atomic plant going tits up, thank you very much, another dream incinerated. 

This tomato is so sweet and large its hard to think of it as a vegetable, the EU have plans to make farmers buy seed rather than just keep seed, a bunch of crooks is what they are.

A few years ago the EU or French government tried to outlaw nettle compost water, they said it wasn't tested! It's been around for ever and is fantastic and harmless, they banned it cos its free! 'They' are crooked because they take bribes, and are in the pocket of who ever, trying to con you with payed for false testing and any other trick they can con you with.

These things basically ran wild in my garden, the one on the right tastes of chestnuts it's yummy.

I need a bit more land, no one will sell me any cos they are all playing the property market! Russia is now playing the oil business in the Arctic, Britain is Fracking, the USA and Canada are Fracking madder! Energy is basically free, its called the Sun, if it wasn't for the car industry and the Petro Chemical crooks control over America and the rest of the World we would all know that.  Crooks don't always wear masks, the baddies are not the obvious few terrorists in the world, the real crook is this unethical corrupt society we call the free democratic west, its free to be manipulated by big greedy industry and the parasitic Banking system. 

Heres one for my America friends, grow stuff in your garden, Oh I forgot you can't in most places because its illegal! And heres another one dry your clothes in the wind in your garden, oh I forgot, you can't its illegal. If it becomes illegal for me to save seeds, I will protest in the strongest way I can.   

Invite me to a war party, by Stevie Haston.

Eddie Grants famous beautiful words; Invite me to a war party, me no wanna go. Theres so many weird people in the world causing trouble, you know who I mean, Politicians, they lie, they connive they work for business not people. Well you know you gotta fight them, you can't just sing about it, cos we aint got that charming voice like Eddie, or his strong six pack to impress zee girls.  

This is a story Once apon a time in Malta, about ego and power, if you don't understand just look at the photos. If you have a great painting and you keep it in a vault, who gets to see it apart from you? Me an Eddie we don't wanna go to no war party, we don't wanna fight. I personally want to put up great routes for people to take pleasure in visually and physically. I don't want to destroy, I want to make. Basically more fun and success.

This is a great powerful little 8a on the big island of Malta, always sunny and smiling at you. Thank you John for bolting it, and I'll pass on the thanks of a few others for putting the work in mate, thanks a bunch from Jeff and Rael.

So lovely to be there...flowers and deep blue sea..

 This little route is gonna need a bit of repair work, cos the rock is sadly not that good but it will be worth it you might agree, but work, well ... who wants to do it?

Magic little cliff in the sun, 60 routes or more, it needs paths sorted, access agreed, it needs litter removed and it needs young kids climbing on it. Who is going to do this?

 This is the White tower, a great cliff, I haven't had time to pick up the thousands of plastic shotgun cart rages, and of course the lead is in the soil. This is Jeff climbing he works full time then spends all his spare time equipping and climbing.

Old men climb too sometimes, climbing is a joy, so don't rock my boat.

Aint done this one yet! You can do it if you want, its free, I have had my chance to climb it, it's a free project.

Classic sea side climbing in a place that was a disgusting sewage outlet, its been cleaned up and we need to clean a few bits of metal and rubbish and it will be new again, come and help, why don't you?

 Oh solo mio, I will be here in your warm embrace, charge me up with free vitamin D, and charge me soul.

Scoop de Jour, great route, 6c, very slaby. Ready for another belay Simon?

Galloping towards Malta, by Stevie Haston.

 It went from summer to a rain splattered autumn before I had done any climbing so with an invitation and eager mates I'ave decided to go back. Why do I go, well because of the weather its so constant over the winter months and the routes are just a delight. 

This is strong Jeff on the first bit of King, one of my pals and the man the Maltese climbers should thank the most for all his hard work.

Tilted photo of me on a slab! But to be honest that's how it feels, ha ha, maybe it will feel steeper for you come and try.

This is the route people like to try, do, or fall off, grade seems to vary from 4 to 6c depending which particular family of baboons you owe loyalty to.

One of the incredible easy fantastic lines you can do, probably first done by a drunk Gozo fisherman 1000 years ago!

This is Jeff sampling the condition dependent crux of Dinosaur Balls 8a+, its tricky and very exposed!

This is a lovely 7a I have fallen off occasionally, by my village there some gorgeous rock and lovely views, it's not bad at all.

 Jeff getting psyched for something, he looks serious, he's on top of the crag called the Underworld, one of the best parts of the universe, and I can't wait to get back.

Inigo looking masterful, without his cameras enjoying the black slab, time to get on steeper hellish terroitory and get terrified mate, I am coming, prepare to meet your nemesis.   Cant bloody wait, got a bit of time to shed some kilos before Malta shreds me with its sharp rock. 

Dead lifting for climbing? by Stevie Haston.

Is the classic bodybuilders deadlift good for climbing? I don't really know. It's very good for all round strength, but emphasizes leg, buttock, and lower back the most. Perhaps up to a point, its useful, and then becomes a hinderance, as it will just adds on extra muscle in places a climber doesn't want. Above is a single hand pull on a ring which allows a surprising amount of weight to be used and hardly any extra  un necessary muscle bulk to be added. People think its dangerous because it uses one side of the body more but in the version above its not too hard to do safely.

With this one handed lift, you might expect the fingers to pull as above, safe, and with some carry over to climbing because it stresses the index finger, and the pinkie on the second phalange or even the first. 

It can be alotta fun, and might be useful, who knows? I am finding dead lifting of some use to getting my body moving and can feel a bit of benefit from it. But I am all ready at 2 x body weight which is probably where a climber should leave it.

The classic hand grip on a good edge has always been a winner with me, and it is what I want to concentrate on, its totally safe and at this size it's possible to use one handed.

Here we have the double overhand dead lift, the normal dead lift is done with a mixed grip. A mixed grip with one hand in the undercut position is easier because it stops the bar from rolling out, and can cause a pectoral tear or an imbalance. Any way, there you go, something to think about. 

The dog, the shoe, the overhang. by Stevie Haston

So the climbing was funny, 8a, 7a, 7b, 8b, nearly fell off the 6b, When is a 6b not a 6b? That's why I used to like lifting iron, a set weight is a set weight, you know where you are with iron. Now this dog followed us to the crag, and if I put my shoes down it would run off, so we had a warm up or two! His puffing master had to make the journey up the hill, twice, poor old bloke.

 Grip strength is essential, this new exercise is a bit expensive, but dog gob seems very sticky judging from my sucess.  

Went climbing, felt useless, did my hardest route for quite awhile, funny dat!  The dead lift is hard especially if you do it wrong, like me. My form is half way between a dead and a Romanian then turns into a stiff legged dead lift, so it is really a Dead stiff legged romanian!  

I did some brief training sessions lately like the one above, which seemed to help. Then I stacked 6 tones of wood with Laurence which killed us both! Laurence has a few of climbers in her classes now and thinks they will climb harder.

Training today, training tomorrow by Stevie Haston

Diet of bio eggs, and veg is slowly working. Cut down a lot on volume and had to go back to some basic movements. This is all in an effort to control my low hormone levels.

Double overhand dead lifts, some bent over rows and romanian dead lift. My legs are at their thinnest and weakest ever! This might be one of the reasons my hormones seem low and I feel weak, its the big muscles that trigger hormone release. Core is still strong and can do back levers and front levers but only just managed a very poor one arm. I hope I get better. I will try obviously. Good luck with every bodies training.