We are very psyched to announce that Stu Smith has completed the crown jewel in his development career with the recent first ascent of E.M.U.B.I.G.S (Everyone’s Moving Up But I’m Going Sideways) 5.13+ R.
Below is a write up by Stu regarding the route!
With the Squamish season slowly closing I managed to finally close the chapter on a new route project of mine. This was a special one, the crown jewl of my new routing career is how I referred to it many times in the past few months. This one required me to find the perfect balance of physical strength and mental fortitude, something that attracts me to a route the way pure difficulty just doesn’t. When it all comes together in one perfect hot mess it’s a rare treasure.
Trying this route on and off for the past few months started out great challenging myself to try hard and fall big on spicy gear was freeing. But once I was getting the route honed and started creeping further and further away from that last piece of gear, fear and doubt set in around the route. Just rehursing the moves in my mind raised my heart beat to a rour and made me weak, on the hikes into the route I felt like I could puke and holding any form of conversation with my poor belayer was impossible. On the route I would turn into a quivering mass of jello upon entering the finely run for the anchor. I quit this route countless times with my tail between my legs and ego abolished. On this last visit the point was made to have FUN I made my self joke with my partner, rough house with my beautiful dog and in general just be content with being in such a place with such a activity to partake in. And I clipped the chains. Struggles like this don’t come often in life so when they do commit and enjoy the process.
10-15m of great vertical dyke climbing leads to a leftward horizontal seam the start has good holds that get smaller and smaller, a explosive dead point opens up the crux of the route and from there on its pedal to the metal on heinous edges/slopers and techy footwork with the gear far behind. In total around 30m of climbing. Moving on with life!