Training Log Archive: iansmith

The dramatic tale of Ian's Prius in Canada.

The winter of 2019 has been fraught with peril and adventure. Snowfall in the Toronto area has been substantial - totaling 134.3 cm since July 1, well in excess of the 90 cm average over the previous four years, and the most since the 138 cm of 2014. My Prius receives painfully little use on a daily basis, with most of the activity coming on weekends - trips to the grocery store, visits to parks, and so on. These factors, coupled with my indifference to routine, formed a perfect (snow) storm.

I drove my car in late January for a grocery trip to our neighborhood Loblaws and parked it on the street in our neighborhood. There had already been some intermittent snowfall, but I could not have foreseen the doom that awaited our intrepid party. The first blow came with a three day snowstorm that dropped 43 cm of snow on our unsuspecting city. As our heroic party commutes to work via public transportation or on foot, the threat seemed to be minimal. I glanced at my noble car's predicament and dusted off layers of snow with some regularity, but the bustle of snow plows and accumulating embankments made moving the car a moot question.


Depiction of the plight of Ian's car

My use of the car had consisted of occasional visits to run it so the battery stayed charged, digging out the exhaust, and removing the accumulated snow off the top. I had intended to get the oil changed when the opportunity presented itself. Our party had made plans to go to Ottawa for Winterlude on February 15. Unfortunately, our comrades traveling from warmer climes in the tropics had to cancel because of a family tragedy. On the morning of February 15, I set out to remove the car from snow bank only to discover it was firmly lodged in a sheet of ice. On my last visit, I had noted some challenges, but I reasoned a determined effort could dislodge my faithful vessel. Hours of labor with shovel and engine yielded nothing. A helpful local loaned me a sturdier shovel with a metal spade - as opposed to my plastic snowshovel, but the ice was too formidable. Try as I might, nothing seemed to be able to penetrate its vastness.


Our party trying to dislodge the Prius

I devised several plans to try to extract my Prius. The central challenge lay in that the car had been sitting on asphalt when the massive snow fall had occurred, and subsequent snowfalls coupled with brief thaws had only served to entomb the car in its frozen prison. The wheels were thoroughly chocked by 5-10 cm of ice capped with dense snowdrifts. I tried to shovel out paths for the wheels, but the ice was solid. I attacked the ice with a hammer and metal shovel, but it was of such a consistency that it wouldn't shatter - just futilely chip with tremendous effort. I attempted salting the prison near the wheels to gain purchase, but the ice was too great. Physics suggested that boiling water would prove fruitless - requiring approximately an equal mass of boiling water to the ice to melt, assuming the water was able to completely deposit its heat into the ice, and experiment showed this to be optimistic at best. My most promising plan was to jack up the car and clear out the ice from beneath the wheels, but I couldn't get the jack between the car and the ice sheet. After several hours of effort over a weekend, I gave up and elected to wait.


Canada tightens its grip on my car

Conditions were grim, and our party was on the verge of collapse. Fortuitously, apart from our abandoned plans to Ottawa, there was no particular agenda requiring a vehicle, but the absurdity of bringing such a capable machine to the Great White North only to abandon it to an insurmountable ice floe was too great to bear. I considered abandoning all hope and selling the car to some enterprising local. The occasional thaw was stymied by subsequent snowfalls - with 5 of at least 4 cm, including 18 cm on February 27. I swung my hammer until blistered, and accumulated a pile of shoveled ice debris in my desperate efforts. I considered using my CAA membership to request a 5m tow, but this seemed absurd. In hindsight, it was absurd not to call for aid, but such is the plight of the explorer.

But recently, temperatures have climbed above freezing somewhat. With the routine falls below freezing, the ice pack had become a single, solid sheet of glass. Traction was still too fleeting for the underpowered vehicle to pull itself free, even with shingles underneath the front tires for aid. But finally, I was able to get the jack beneath the car. Clearly chipping away with the hammer would be fruitless - in addition to perilous, with the mass of a car precariously poised above. But it occurred to me that I could plug the wheel holes in the ice with ice bricks, essentially building a ramp with the very instrument of my car's imprisonment. I jacked up all four wheels, elevated the rear wheels with ice blocks, added traction to the front wheels, and prepared for one final heroic push. And at long last, our hopes were realized, and the mighty Prius gingerly pulled itself free. The sheet of ice was magnificent in its imperturbability.

So my car is finally free of the prison of my own neglect. Soon, I shall take it for the routine oil change.

C • pics please 9

Climbing with Katie at Basecamp; our outing was about three hours. I bouldered eight routes: V0s LT, V1s EIHQ, and V2s BJX. The only new routes from last time were I and B. It was much quieter this time, as they weren't celebrating the 3rd anniversary party with a bouldering competition. Instead of a community of 40-50 people attacking all the routes, there were perhaps 10-20. There was still good camaraderie - there were a few people of about my skill level working on the V2s that I exchanged tips with.

To reference BGallup, I cheated by "talling" my way through a couple of the pitches - overcoming inadequate technique by using my reach to bypass tricky parts. I have especially long arms, about 77" or 6" longer than my height. On H, the technical route involved some slippery handholds, but I bypassed those entirely by reaching for a distant undercling. I think I climbed it correctly once last week, but I failed in my attempts to climb it the usual way today.

I did a handful of autobelays afterward until my arms were destroyed. I haven't had trouble with any of the 5.6s and 5.7s on the autobelay; I was defeated by a 5.9 with some mickey-mouse shaped holds quite late in the session today.

Katie sent the V1s E and Q, and the V0s LTC. She also sent some 5.5s and 5.6s on top rope to great effect. A good day!

Squash with Laleh.