March seemed to become a month of bouldering and saw a lot of progression. At the beginning of the month a trip to the Lake District produced some good results. The weather was on and off all week but between the showers of rain, sleet, hail and snow I managed to get in a good session at the Bowderstone, the Langdale boulders and the Chapel Stile Circuit.
Following a night of heavy snow in the mountains, the Bowderstone was chosen as our first bouldering venue of the week. After some nervousness about the damp conditions on the topout I quickly completed 'The Crack' f6c, 'The Crack Direct' f6c+ and 'The Crack Super Direct' f7a. We then moved around the corner and began working on 'Picnic Sarcastic' f7a+. This was the first time I had tried a problem of this grade and I didn't really expect to succeed on it. However, after some advice from a local and a good rest it went within an hour.
Later that week I managed to get in a quick session with James Forbes at the Langdale boulders where I flashed 'The Pocket' f6c+ as well as completing several other problems of the same grade. A couple of days later we managed to get to the Chapel Stile Circuit with Noodles. James had success on a tough f6c+ that I couldn't get close to getting. The rain and darkness seemed to arrive at the same time and just as I thought it was going to be a bit poor session for me, I completed my second f7a+ with 'Snatching the Rough', a great, short problem with fantastic friction.
At the end of the month I returned to Clodgy Point at St Ives, somewhere that I had visited briefly a month earlier. The weather was miserable and the rock was pretty greasy so I had little hope for much success, however as the morning progressed I became more optimistic. After climbing 'Uluru' f7a pretty quickly I then went to have a look at 'Bloodlust', also f7a. Despite it being pretty wet I surprised myself when I flashed it. This gave me the confidence I needed to go and work on 'Boomerang' f7a+, a problem that I had tried before. On my previous session on Boomerang I felt as though it was quite far off but this time things felt better. I spent most of the morning trying to get the bottom wired and spent a brief amount of time working the top but the part I was struggling on the most was linking the two. After numerous failed attempts, some within touching distance of the top, I finally completed the problem, much to the joy of the rest of my college group who by that point were freezing and ready to go home!