Fred Nicole: Trice V12

We spent a few weeks in Colorado back in October for the occasion of a prAna meeting in Boulder. It was a short vacation but an inspiring one. We stayed with Chuck Fryberger and his girlfriend Sarah Marvez very good friends as well as both excellent climbers; they showed us many places, most of them new for us. It is always fascinating to spend time in a place with so much background and climbing history as Colorado. It is kind of the birth place of bouldering in the new world. Big personalities like John Gill first, Pat Ament, Bob Williams (and many more)…Followed by Jim Holloway, Jim Michael, Steve Mammen, Jim Karn, Christian Griffith to the actual stars like Dave Graham, Daniel Woods, Paul Robinson, Angie Payne, Carlo Traversi, etc. This is one of the most active scenes around the world and there is a big range of boulder illustrating each period.

One of the nicest climbing moments of this trip was the ascent of one of the famous Holloway problems from 1975: “Trice”. It waited more than 30 years for the first repeat by Carlo Traversi. Since then Chuck told me it got maybe ten ascents. This way the consensus grade was 8a+ or v12. It was still some discussions going on because every repeater used a left foothole (not used by Holloway) that some considered off line and changing the original character and difficulty.

The prAna meeting was very close to Flagstaff, so we spent a few days there and eventually I took the opportunity to try this famous “Trice”. The upper left foot felt really crunchy to me and so I tried what could have been the original way. This means: feet straight below the bulge, the left foot kind of smearing and the right foot low on a small vertical edge, lock your fingers on a shallow pocket and go controlled to a small sloppy edge then jump to the top. The last climbing day just before a snow storm, conditions were perfect and after some warm ups and a few tries, a cold wind came and finally friction was good enough to complete the problem. It felt really satisfying to stick this last move. Retrospectively I would like to tell all my respect to Jim Holloway for his performances in bouldering, which are still great inspiration for all of us.

~Fred Nicole, prAna Ambassador

Here is some classic Fred…

Join Us On Facebook, Twitter, Vimeo & YouTube

Functional Apparel for the Unconventional Spirit

Check out the prAna Ambassadors