[erm, sam]

I have been climbing since I was even weaker 15 year old, (now 34). Being good on slabs, good footwork and inventive in sequence finding has always been my strength.. During periods of not climbing through injury etc those skills never left me, though they might need a bit of polishing up at the begining of a climbing phase.
I have always beleived that those good climbing engrams were deeply encoded in me and would be there for ever. As the periods between climbing out doors get longer and longer, and I climb more and more exclusivly on my 40 degree board is there any risk that I would be able to overwrite the good engrams and not be able to re active them when the time comes.
I mostly plan on climbing outdoors on an annual or biannual week in Font. I expect that a couple of days intensivly climbing easyer probs and focussing on technique etc will get me half way back to decent technique for the rest of the trip. I expect that it will take longer to reactive the good engrams as the gaps inbetween get longer, but is it possible I would lose them totally and become a total buffoon?

[Jaspersharpe]

I had approx 12 years off and when I started climbing again (last April) I almost exclusively climbed indoors (with maybe three or four sessions outdoors) before going to Font the following August. This was mainly due to time restrictions but also because my technique still felt pretty good in comparison to my utter weakness. Font went better than expected and I certainly didn't feel that I was held back by a lack of technique. Just power.

Since then I've tried to get out as much as possible but haven't done nearly as much as I would have liked to and most of my climbing has been indoors. I still don't feel like my strength levels have got any where near where I am technically. My brain is still writing cheques that my body can't cash for reasons of pure power.

Where I do think you lose out is on the specific strengths necessary for certain types of rock. Font suits me. Always has, probably due to my SS upbringing, so it's normal that I should feel ok there despite such a long lay off from proper climbing. On the grit and lime I don't feel lacking technically but I don't have the requisite specific power(s) to be at the top of my game. For me this can only be gained by more time on the rock.

To summarise. I don't think you lose much technically if you had decent technique to start with but there's still no substitute for a balance of indoor and outdoor climbing if you want to reach your potential.

Hope this makes sense. It does to me but reading back it looks rather confused!

[Houdini]

Never had 12 years off but it's normal for me to climb/work/travel in blocks of upto 3 months at a time.

The only thing I lose in the time off is brute power, but then I cross-train like a fucking lunatic.