PHOTOS: CLARA ILLES-WILBOURN
MEMBER'S ADVENTURE
LOCKDO
LIFE IN I
n the beginning, we were relaxed, too lax, and lockdown swiftly followed. Times became tough. Life was restricted to our own four walls just as the weather turned unseasonably bright. Having to make do with what we could rustle up
inside our own homes and gardens, the era of quarantraining arrived. These are the chronicles of the locked up BMC members, those that lost the spring of 2020 – the sunniest UK spring since records began.
Joking aside, the lockdown was absolutely necessary to prevent further spreading the coronavirus and limit the strain on the NHS. Thankfully, the outdoor community was as supportive and understanding as ever – we all knew we had to do our part, find creative ways to continue our hobbies and enjoy our now limited freedoms as best we could. And we really did.
Aside from the huge uptake in running, cycling and other park-based fitness regimes, it seemed that every climber was now into training, and nearly every climber’s backyard was a bedlam of crash courses in building your own wall. Timber merchants were sent scrambling for supplies, wood holds became more valuable than diamonds and people went searching in their cellars for those dusty, forgotten resin holds they had left to molder years ago. Soon social media was flooded with videos of 45 degree angles and feet cutting loose. Those that didn’t have space for a home wall were not letting themselves fall behind. Sales of fingerboards soared while used weight
R Clara's recycled and upcycled
training equipment, now taking orders!
22 | CLIMB. WALK. JOIN.
plates were now worth their weight in gold. With little at hand, it was time to adapt and become as resourceful as possible, much like Clara Illes-Wilbourn: “I have had to be particularly creative in my garden-based training! My lack of pull-up bar has been a long-term issue (and possible excuse), but I finally found the motivation to solve the problem. A vaguely horizontal branch, a piece of wood and some baling twine later and I now have my very own pull-up bar. “To top things off, an old chest of drawers has become a brand new finger board with not one but two different edge sizes! It has been great to see what I can manage to work on and achieve from home, and I love seeing what other people are coming up with.”
The stories, photos and memories of BMC members during the early months of the pandemic.
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