Meeting Bob Cormany

So, the LRC trip was tons of fun...but one event stuck out a little more than others in my mind, and it wasn't one of my sends. As I mentioned in my last post, I stopped off at Boat Rock in Atlanta on my ride home from Chatty. While I was at Boat Rock and working the super sweet slab problem The Surgeon, I ran into one of my heroes...Bob Cormany. Bob is a near famous Southeast boulderer/climber, he's one of the old school originals of the game and has blazed the trail for many to follow. He's climbed spots out before others even knew they existed. He is one of the folks that helped to save Boat Rock, an in essence, he has had his hand in saving many more SE crags than most people might realize. In both of the new bouldering guidebooks to Horse Pens and Little Rock City, there are some nice little essays by Bob to help give his perspective of these areas. I've seen him at different events, but never had a chance to actually meet and talk to him until now. It all started out with a little beta for The Surgeon, one of his routes, and turned into a wonderful conversation on many topics.



We had a great conversation about many of the boulderfields in the south...Lilly, Little Rock City, Boat Rock, Horse Pens and several secret spots I had never heard of were discussed. I have been climbing for about 15-20 years and have seen many places change over time. ..I think we all have our own history of our favorite crags and snapshots of specific climbs or moments. I always enjoy getting this perspective from someone that's been at it much longer than I have, its humbling and helps us remember the roots of the places we love. Bob's perspective and discussion about southeast climbing and bouldering was awesome and refreshing. But what really impressed me more was our discussion of physiology. If you don't know, I'm an Anatomy and Physiology professor at a local college, this is not only my life, but one of my passions also...so being able to talk more than just climbing shop with Bob was really cool. He talked about some of the research he helped out with at UT, while he was up in Knoxville. We went into a long discussion of the intricacies of the corpus luteum in female pig ovaries and the amazing ability of scar tissue to become an endocrine gland and control a major component of reproduction...yeah super thrilling to only the physiology geeks:) It was pretty neat to connect with him on more than just a pebble wrestling platform, and learn a lot about who he was and is.

I left the Boat with not only a sense of accomplishment from the previous days at LRC, but also with a valuable experience that will remain fresh in my mind for many years to come.