The Count Down Is Over | Don’t Call it a Comeback With Jon Partridge Ep.4

A very good afternoon and welcome to Sheffield City Centre. I'm Mike Langley and I'm joined as ever by Gaz Parry, climbing legend, seven times British champion. Thanks very much Michael, it's looking fantastic. The wall's ready, the competitors are ready and the sun's shining, what more can we ask for? I just want to say we've not got long now to wait before the athletes get introduced to us on the stage behind us. It's really going to be a hard weekend's work for them. Before I arrived here I didn't sleep well last night but when I got here, yeah, it was like some friendly faces, people relaxed me but then I started to question the whole process. There's the pressure that one, the only pressure is the pressure that you put on yourself, isn't that the old, the old adage? That's the worst kind as well. It's like, as I say, I don't know how these kids do it. I watched like some of them and they've been warming up for like an hour and a half. I've got a good hour and a half in me. Well he's a legend isn't he? Yeah, an old legend but definitely a legend. For me, I remember seeing John 2006, 2007 in the competitions at the Carlton back in the day and then he came to Blockfest 2012 when that started, took away the first three overall titles. For me, coming back this year and competing again, climbing well again and coming to the Blockfest at the Castle and winning that event. It was emotional. Like yeah, just totally emotional. I was really excited to see him compete again. It's always great to see like old friends and it's great to see people do well. It's cool to see like people climbing and enjoying themselves and it's nice to see like him and like Barons and kind of the old guard kind of keeping up. He brings two elements to this weekend. One is this like laser sharp focus but also it's always smiles and greetings and really happy to see everybody else that's within the scene. He's a role model for the younger athletes. He's showing them, like I said, how to behave, how to deal with the pressure of the media, how to just go about your weekend and compete to the best of your ability. It's pretty inspiring Mum and Papa are big fans, big fans. They love to come to like watch comps. It's because mum and dad have just wanted, they've been wanting to feed me last 100 days and I've been like not eating their food, if you know what I mean. So mum's just like, just want you to have a good meal. I'm sure he'll do fine. Like although he's not trained as much and he's been injured, you'll still have that base level of strength that will get you up quite a lot of the boulders in a qualifier. He just needs to read the problems right. I would say running up to the BBC's, I probably didn't have that much expectation of John. I would imagine he had more expectation of himself. I think it's changed quite a lot competing since he's been out of the loop. Like the style has changed quite a lot and I would say it's changed further away from John's comfort zone. John's potential for this weekend is really unknown. He's not competed at this level for quite a long time. Obviously he can do all the physical preparation, the training preparation, but really I think what it comes down to at these events is the mental side of the game and you just don't know which way that's going to go until you actually step out on the mat. Impression from the BBC is you know John's going to turn up, you know he's going to take it seriously, you know he's going to bring those years of experience and he's going to put that down on watch and go. I got off the blocks and everyone was looking at me like oh I don't know. I felt like a jivering wreck. The first three were pretty steady, flashed the first two and then the third one took a couple of tries and that definitely got me psyched and settled the nerves. It's always good to get a couple of easy ones out of the way. You know what, it felt good, it felt really good. I've put a lot into the last hundred days and it felt good to like have that bit of validation and then there was a bit like oh god I've got to do this tomorrow. But tomorrow will be more fun, I won't be in ISO for as long, it'll be a bit cooler, I'll have fresher holds so see what happens, see what happens. I mean I've made my goal so yeah. I was a bit emotional after the end of the process you know. Obviously I've invested a lot of time and effort, had a few minutes to think about it and it was fun. I never expected to make finals, like genuinely never expected. The standard of the field that there is now you know, these guys are like operating at an incredible level and it just felt really good to be out there on the mats with them. But I definitely feel like I need to experiment with some more types of climbing and experiences and this is such a specific and all-consuming part of climbing and I did enjoy it, it was fun. Is it going to sustain me forever? No and I think that's now what I need to do. I need to continue trying to find what my association is with climbing you know. What have I enjoyed? I've enjoyed the process, I've enjoyed mentally and physically, I feel in a much happier place. I feel like I've got a sense of direction again and identity. Yeah I just want to continue and try and challenge myself and see what the next thing is. The amazing vistas of Red Rock Canyon, I mean look at the vastness of it, look at the vastness of the climbing and these two chumps unable to down climb a VZO. Josh and John on another whirlwind adventure. We have beers waiting for the sunset. Yeah it's just there. So why did we go over there John? Yes! Yes John! Yes! Say hi John.