Review > Asana > Joes

Asana has been in the holds business for a short time now and they have been able to create some unique shapes from their shop. They offer a hold of the month club so we hold junkies can sample the latest abominations to come fresh out of the mold. The Joes’s are modeled after the sandstone boulders found in Joe’s valley, Utah. So throw away your chalk bag, you won't be needing it to stick to these holds. After an afternoon of climbing on these we lost a couple layers of skin. From shallow jugs to crimps, this set has a bit of everything. They range from large to small, so you get a mixed bag when you pick these up.We've had these around the wall for a while, from some simple bouldering problems to full on get over the roof screaming your heart out routes, and there is one thing that is going to become painfully clear... painfully clear... these holds hurt. Not just hurt a little, they hurt a lot to climb on! I thought that it was just me, but Noodles has backed off of some of the problems that we've set because as he said "I like my skin to stay where it is!", he even backed off of the route in the video that's below a couple of times just because where he was gripping one of the holds (one of the biggest in the set) as his thumb was getting bruised quite badly.Now maybe it's because we set the holds across the roof, but I'm afraid it's not, we set simple problems with a traverse and found that they still hurt. There are good things to be said about the holds thou, they do work on most angled walls but anything over 45 is going to start your skin hurting more than normal, they even work on the roof, if you're brave enough (Or a sadist)

As you can tell by the picture these holds do not have a nice smooth texture and aren’t made to be sweet on the hands, although when you’ve got in your grip they won’t let go, which is why sometimes when you do get off of the wall your fingers will be screaming at you for mercy. We've had small holds on harder routes across the roof and haven't had this kind of skin pain from them, I guess it's just the nature of the beast :)

Now Noodles spoke to Jamey over at Asana and was mentioning that we found the holds painful, and this is what he said "I shaped these holds after I came back from Joe's Valley. They were shaped because I got my ass kicked and I wanted to train specifically for the area", so there is method behind their madness!

SUGGESTED USES




We suggest the above angles for the holds, which as you can see is everything from slabs to 45 degrees over. But the steeper the angle the more your fingers are going to hurt, so bear that in mind.. we didn't include anything steeper than 45 or suggest using them upon a roof unless you're well warmed up, know what you're doing. We're obviously going to try to get them on the roof and the opinion is pretty unanimous over here that they shouldn't really be up there!

Incut and very dimpled!! The Joe's are positive enough they include everything from a big two hand match to small crimpers. The texture and shape of these holds allows you to crimp down on them or use it as pinches. We were able to match every one of these holds although a novice climber will find it challenging to match some of the smaller holds of the set, but you pay the price with skin loss pretty much most of the time :(

OVERALL BUILD
I'd love to see who ever shaped these, they must have been a pain in the ass to make, mind you I think that getting these out of their molds must be a challenge everytime they pour!

The urethane holds up pretty well, and considering that some of the holds have quite shallow areas I was expecting there to be some bending, but there wasn't any that we noticed (and it got pretty warm in the wall). The bolt placements are nice and clean, we didn't suffer from any spinning holds even when we were matched on one side of the largest hold.

The backs of the holds are flat, and there's no big bubbles in the urethane so the mix is nice and consistant. There aren't any huge burrs to mention other than the obvious Joes Valley texture which we found to be pretty hard going on the finger tips. And this being said, if you chalk up alot these holds will take a lot of chalk in the dimples and do take a fair ammount of brushing to get clean.

These holds are a deep red that i've not seen before, so they do stand out on the wall, they are a little dark but at least the red is different from the other shades on the market so you can see the holds when you're chucking to them

RATING
NOODLES SAYS
The latest edition of Urban Climber (Issue 23) has the Joes in there on their gear review page, and here's what they had to say about the Joes:
"Gritty, gnarly, pock-faced Joe's Valley inspired grips. One minute you're sweating blood, biting down on itsy bitsy razor crimps, praying for relief - and the next you're moving off welcoming jugs to, well, more crimps. It's a vicious cycle for the send, but one thats completly worth fighting for. Bring it home"

Thought inspiring text... but I have to agree. I backed off of some of the routes we set on our 30 degree wall and the roof just because the holds were biting my fingers, I wasn't enjoying the pain... outside is a completly different kettle of fish as you'll do anything to get the send, but indoors I prefer to keep my digits with skin on them so I can climb more rather than less. I've got a wicked bruise on my thumb from where I was bearing down on one of the holds on the roof and it just dug in so well I had to drop off (This is why you don't see me in the video, because I get onto the roof and then go "ow" and just let go)

If you're sensible in your setting and don't mind a bit of pain then you'll like these holds, but for me unless i'm taking it nice and easy (moves and angle of wall) and not dynoing to them they're fine, steep walls and roofs on these holds are out for me just because i'm a big girl.

CHRIS SAYS
The larger holds of the set work well on overhanging terrain but aren’t quite big enough to set on a roof. Being the crazy yahoos we are we put them up in the roof anyways. Our problem started on a small crimp undercling and went straight into the roof. It continued into the overhang and back onto the vertical. Initially we put the three biggest holds of the set into the roof. Our sequence went through a couple of overhauls before we realized that they were not meant to be bolted onto the roof. Our test: try hanging on them with one hand, result: FAIL, but here at climbingholdreview we like a challenge so we continued working the sequence. The moves throughout the route are long and the roof is no exception. Although the big boys of the set are positive they don’t go in very deep so when we were on the roof it required the use of our thumbs. I guess that would classify them as crimps on the roof and jugs on a vertical. Even with the assistance of our thumbs we couldn’t manage to get through the roof so we decided to switch one of the jugs with a smaller hold that had a bigger thumb catch. It worked. This made our roof sequence easier to execute and we were able send the project.

When I say easier, I mean painful, the route got sent once and then we dropped it because it's just too painful to have up all of the time. The Joe's are staying on the wall but as parts of easier routes for now, if you're a huge fan of Joe's then these are a great buy, if you're a fan of skin... then we'd shy away from them and would suggest the "Nut Jobs" from the Asana line!

PROS

• A good mix of hold sizes for a good price
• Solid construction
• If you've been to Joe's valley these seem like a good representation of the terrain, that's what they were made to do, and that's what they do do!
  

CONS

• Not skin friendly
• Are ok on most angles, but the steeper you go the more skin you'll probably loose
• These aren't holds that you want to train on for prolonged periods of time
  

PRICE
The set costs $39

Review > Slap Holds > Pinches

Incase you've been hiding under a rock you may have missed the fact that Slap Holds sent us some of their pinches (and screw ons) for review, we're the first people in the America (North or otherwise) to get any of these holds...

Soon as we got them they hit the wall, what we got sent was a mix of two sets...

... The Fat Cats and the DR Pinches. Well the Fat Cats and one of the DR Pinches, and from the following video will show, they're pretty hard to hold... well if you're half awake on a Sunday morning, they're hard to hold :)



The holds are great, you'll spend sometime dialling in the route.. because there is a pretty exact way to hold them. Rotate the holds a little and the problem gets harder or easier depending on the hold. I've managed to set a route that I can tweak so depending upon how hard I want to climb I then change it accordingly. The holds have been all over the wall and they're easiest to climb on when they are set on a slight overhang or vertical terrain, but if you fancy sonething alittle spicier then just grab a wrench and have a turn.

Overall the holds are great, either as slopes or in their pinch format. There are lots of pinches out on the market, but these are a little different, the dynamic duo that shape the holds, Lucy and Dylan (a formidable husband and wife team), are probably some of the hardest working people I've met. Dylan is bad at holding pinches... so they've designed something that will make you work hard for the send. Let's hope he's bad at pockets and slopers as well because if these are anything to go by then they'll be great ol'holds. The one thing that is apparent from the holds we have is that Lucy and Dylan aren't shoddy at shaping. Rather than just shape a flat sided pinch they hit you with a shaped in thumb catch on a sloping pinch so there's alot of scope for where you hold.

Also the devil is in the details with these holds, screw holds to stop them spinning and nice flat bases so they lay flush to the wall.. what I notcied this morning when I was clambering about is that some of the holds have the Slap logo on them.....which is cool, having a logo on a hold is good for when you're sorting through 1000's of holds and they're all pretty similar colors and whilst we're looking at colors Slap offers...
all the above... but what I like is this..
say it with me... "cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese!", imagine having holds that look like this on your wall, you know that they're going to stand out!!

We've got a lot of pinches on the wall here, and its nice to have something that's a little harder to hold onto, if you're looking to sort out your pinching power then look no further than the Fat Cats, but i'd look into the Big Cheese's aswell!

RATING
NOODLES SAYS
Pinchy, pinchy, slopery fun for the entire family. Well if your family is a bunch of climbers anyway, hard to hold but super pleasant to hold onto... they take a while to figure out, as they're harder to read than your normal pinches. People have moved into the holds waaay to fast and have just got spat off of the wall, body position is very important with these holds and you're going to get a serious workout no matter what you do with them. As a first look at a new hold maker i'm impressed with what they're doing, we'll get some more shapes and see if this holds up in the long run... but i'm sure it will!! Overall the shapes are nice and friendly for your hands, matching isn't really an option unless you're super strong or very very careful (You can do it, but its HARD!), the texture is nice so you can catch onto the holds all day without worrying about you skin getting nailed.

[[Sorry about the lack of pictures with us climbing on the holds, our cameras have crapped out :( And we're waiting for them to get repaired]]

CHRIS SAYS
Did you watch the video? Did you? Did you see the fun the Noodles was having getting dropped onto his ass? Did you see him dive for the wrench? That's what he means about dialling in the route, that video was all shot in the space of 10 minutes before we went to the gym, and the shots that you see are sequential... there's one shot missing because the language gets a bit mature at one point whilst he's trying to move off of the 2nd move, so we left it out because it'll make you wince. He was trying super hard to get that route, he'd been trying it the day before for a while and it was good to see him work to get up something. I'd like to say that I flashed it first time, but it took me a while to get it :)

You can tell the Slap worked hard on the shapes, they're tricky to grab and to stick and that's a good thing! If you had holds that you could haul on all day they you'd just get bored.... I like them, there's no hard edges for you to kill your tendons on, and the texture doesn't rip your hands. Overall I like the holds, and I want more more more!!! Noodles just told me that Dylan is in the workshop getting out an order for some Swedes, if the Swedish are ordering these holds the YOU SHOULD probably get some for your wall too.

PROS

• Tendon friendly
• Great for setting hard boulder problems
• If you're in the US or Canada and you get them soon you'll be one of the first to get them!
• Great colors, check out the "Big Cheese" holds... they're pinches as well!
  

CONS

• They might be expensive if you're ordering from the US... (see below point to make it cheaper!!!)
  
• Get them shipped via boat, its longer than UPS or Fed Ex but its worth it in the end
• You're not going to get any beginners climbing a boulder problem on these... so careful where you set with them, they're not really V0 material :P
  

PRICE

• Slap is a UK company so prices are in GBP > Great British Pound
  
• The Fat Cats are 5 holds at 22.00 = 4.40 GBP per hold
• The DR Pinches are 6 holds at 32.00 = 5.33 GBP per hold

Review > Sequence > Virus, Power Blox and Sugar Plates

The triple threat today, reviewing the Virus is kind of apt as my girlfriend is sick. So as illness seems to be todays theme let's get started...

This is the Virus 1 set, there are actually two sets but Virus 2 is undergoing a face lift, I have them both and they've been a staple on the wall since the day they were shipped.

On the whole the holds have a texture that is quite fine, but doesn't get slick and the sets are sold as pinches and I find that its rare that we actually set with them as pinches because they make such nice open hand slopes. We've set routes with these on their own, but normally we end up mixing and matching between sets..

Like this, what we end up doing is having a mix between the Virus 1 & 2, the Power Blox and in the above image the Sugar Plates. This makes for a route that have either mean slopes, mean pinches or really mean crimps / side pulls. At the moment we have some of the Virus' on the roof (!), yup the roof and we're doing a silly pinch / layback hand traverse, its marginal but do-able. There's no way these holds are meant for the roof, unless your last name is Sharma, first name being Chris.

Which ever way you turn these holds gives you a new problem on how to hold it, slopes, pinches, ledges they've got it all...

RATING
NOODLES SAYS:
These holds are pretty big, but built strong and are hollow backed. If you over torque them you could easily crack em, so be careful when tightening. I've set many a warm up route with the Virus' and have spent hours pulling on them, the texture is amazing and for open handed problems they'll make you strong. They do need some brushing from time to time as they can get slick from all the chalk, but we do use alot of chalk, and checking with my local gym where they get alot of use it doesn't seem to be a problem.

I'm waiting to see what Mike pulls our of the bag next.
CHRIS' FINAL WORD
These are pinches? We always use them as slopes... whoops! I'm off to set some pinch problems :) Some of the holds are hard to hold, but that just means you have to try harder!!! Try to set some problems where you have to lower onto the holds and see how that feels...

Onto the Power Blox..
Who sung the song "Anyway You Want It"?
That's a song about the Power Blox, turn them any which way you want and you'll have a different pinch, of if you're going at the holds dead on a sloping edge.

The great thing about these holds is you can set a route and then change how hard it is with just a few wrench turns, just spin the hold about and its the same route... just a different pulling experience. The texture is slightly rougher than the Virus, but as some of the sides are so slopey thats a good thing, the set gives you five holds but I think that Sequence should make some more variations.

RATING
NOODLES SAYS:
The texture is rougher, but you can pull on it as long as you can hold on. On a vertical wall these holds would make some fun routes that would test a beginners skill at holding sloping pinches, on an overhang (which is where we normally have them) it makes for a far more interesting time, and when I say interesting I mean HARD! But you can dial in the difficulty really easily, so you can set how you feelCHRIS' FINAL WORD
These are pinches? That's twice today, we need to go and get the wrenches out again! I generally set with these as slopes with long moves between them, or as a traverse section as they're interesting to hold whichever way you come at them. I wish there were more of these, some a little larger some a little smaller. If you're looking for some devious sloping feet then I sometimes chuck these up, they make big feet but the slope of the hold makes all the difference.

Time for some Sugar...
Lets get something straight from the start, there is nothing sweet about these holds. They are HARD, HARD, HARD! If you're looking to train your balance on a vertical wall then these holds are super technical, on an overhang they are finger rippers.. it may sound like we're being harsh here but they are some really small holds.

But... there are some that are.. I_can_hold_this_if_i'm_gentle.

See! On an overhang :)
Where we find these holds to be great is when you mix them up with other Sequence holds and use of the Plates as feet, really technical horrible, horrible_my_foots_going_to_rip feet. As soon as you see a route with these holds and then you look at where you feet are going to go you start thinking carefully about how you're going to get through the moves.

RATING
NOODLES SAYS:
Ok, the above review sounds a little harsh, but there is good reason. If you're training then you don't want to injure yourself, climbing on anything other than vertical with these holds is a burly experience for sure. Soon as these holds are on anything past about 15 degrees its just a matter of time before you rip off and possibly pop a finger. I love these holds (and I did use a wrong bolt one time and took one to the face (not done that since)) they're great, just be careful when you set and climb on themCHRIS' FINAL WORD
Wise words from the Noodles there... let's ignore him for a second. I love these holds, I love pulling on small holds and these are some small holds. They ARE hard to pull on, and I like that. Noodles likes the big sloping holds so its nice on his hands. I don't mind pulling on the smaller stuff, so its give and take on this review. I'm going to go and smack Nud's in the head, and we'll figure out a score from there.

Review > Crater > Milroy Pinches

After the Sequence Virus review of pinches that I never used as pinches it was nice to have a set of holds that are named pinches, look like your classic pinch and climb.. well lets face it... like pinches.

On opening the box a number of things struck me about the holds we were sent.. (there is another set undergoing vigorous ass_to_ground testing right now) these things being:

• Wow, look at the color. I've not seen a hold that shade of green, and this is a good thing as it means they stand out on a cluttered wall
• Ooo the texture feels a little weird, grippy but as the holds were new grippy but slippery at the same time
• Flipping the holds over (as you do) I checked out the backs. Now we all know holds get chucked onto a belt sander to flatten them out, so they'll sit nice and flush on the wall. Well I have never seen the back of a hold that is so flat and SO uniform. I dropped James a mail asking if they've hired a 400lb gorilla to lean on the holds so they get nice and flat.. the reply that came back was this "We actually have developed a unique process for the sanding aspect. This system guarantees an exactly flat base which is perfectly perpendicular to the bolt stem and perfectly parallel to the washer"... or as I like to put it a 400lb gorilla!

Now saying that the color was going to help pick out the holds on a cluttered wall is one thing, as I'd just stripped our wall in an impact wrench frenzy, we had no problems and besides I wanted nothing to get in the way of what is now known as "Sunday Pinch Madness"

I set a simple double hand pull from the floor.. to a pinch, then to another pinch then finishing with a match on (yes you've got it) the final pinch. As the holds hadn't been chalked the climbing was for want of a better word "hard", the texture thou grippy had a slickness to it, and my skin was feeling some pain. The more chalk we got onto the holds the nicer they got to climb on, but they did get caked quite quickly...

It was a little bit strange, as we found ourselves flying off backwards a lot. Now this is nothing usual, but as the route was nothing more than V2 or maybe V2+ then it should have been easy.
More chalk, more pulling and a little bit of brushing later I learn a new lesson, I've managed to get to the final hold, but cannot match it... then I realize what I've done, I've enforced a match for the finish BUT I have the final hold the wrong way (not that there's a right way!)



















I'd somehow figured that this:











The largest pinch of the set would be nice to grab and then match... WRONG! Look at the side angle on it... it's brutal! (but oh so sweet at the same time)

Anyway... the holds have been moved about and have been repositioned all over the place. Chris is loving them and the more they get climbed the better they feel, I think that having these holds in a commercial wall would be a great idea, as the texture would get a little more evened out with the traffic. Although we've used them primarily as pinches, we also set them rotated horizontally rather than vertically and they make some absolutely wicked flat slopes!! We're currently using them in a mixed Crater route paired with their Sandstone Slopers and although we've not quite managed to get to the end we're loving it :)

RATING
NOODLES SAYS
Crater was a new climbing experience for me, I'm sure that I've climbed on the holds before but haven't noticed. The holds are pretty nice, have a weird texture that i'm finding a little hard to get on with, but as we've said the more traffic they get the better they feel. On a vertical wall these holds are great, you've can force some nice body positions and as we follow with our feet it can make some very very interesting sequences. I'm really really impressed by the quality of the holds, they're light, they have a really nice "emerald" green color and my god the backs are so flat its not even funny.
I've been looking at the Crater site more and more and am making a mental list of the other holds they have, but after these pinches I'm probably going to try to get the other sets in the same line. I know that I say that variety is the spice of life and all that, but when it comes to a classic pinch then that goes out of the window for me.... buy em, try em, they're a little expensive $11.99 per hold and they're not massive, but you're paying for a gorilla to sand them so that's got to be worth something right??CHRIS' LAST WORD
What's that song by that British band that Noodles loves so much.. ah yes "Give Give Give Me More More More" by The Wonderstuff. I think that these are amazing holds, I just wish that we had more of them, Noodles is right about the texture thou... there's something strange, but is by no means a bad thing. I'm probably going to get some sandpaper out as I think there are a few rough spots, nothing serious just little prickly areas that need a little TLC. I've been moving these holds all over the place, set a route, move it, set some more and move it again. I'm really liking them. If I was wearing a hat I'd tip it to the guys over at Crater.. and I've been looking at their website as well.. have you seen this??

It's called the "Chunnel" and Nuds tells me its what the Englanders on the other side of the water call the tunnel between the UK and France... look at this beast! Look at all the iddy biddy dimples in the surface... "Dear Santa, for Christmas can you go past Crater and get me a Chunnel... and a barbie doll. I've been a good boy this year, I've climbed hard and I stretch everyday. And can you give the boys and girls over at Crater lots more polyurethane so they can continue making kick ass climbing holds! Love Chris xxx"