Well, for anyone who doesn’t know me, my name is Jon Rippe…Derek’s younger brother. He seems to want me to start posting some of my own climbing stories and thoughts, and seeing as how I’m bored at work at the moment, I’m making my first post.
I’ve been climbing now for a month. Derek took me and our younger brother out to Sportrock on Christmas Eve to do some climbing, and I signed up for my own membership that day. I usually try to get there 3-4 times a week for a couple hours. Now I’ve been taking kickboxing for almost a year (currently training to be an instructor), so I certainly had a bit of an advantage starting out with a low body weight of 130lbs and a decent amount of upper body strength. I started climbing with the ability to climb a 5.8, a couple 5.9′s, and some V1′s.
