If you've been to Ironworks, chanches are you've seen climbers busting out pull-ups. A lot of the tougher rock jocks will attempt one armed pull-ups with marginal degrees of success. Catch Cisco at the gym though and you'll see some impressive feats.

As a young kid in california, Cisco was no stranger to the monkey bars and rooftops, scrambling around buildings and dangling from the monkey bars. Since he was in pre-school, Cisco Gonzalez, a 32 year old gymnastic instructor from Berkeley, has been involved in gymnastics. In 6th grade he enrolled at Windmill Gymnastics in Richmond and later began coaching there. Cisco currently works at MEGA, Marin Elite Gymnastics Academy since early 2002 and has coached gymnastics for the past 17 years.

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MetalMark, the new Touchstone Gym in Fresno, was named after a California butterfly with distinctive, metallic markings. The name was inspired by the simple idea of metamorphosis, by the physical and mental changes we experience as rock climbers. The form of the Touchstone butterfly is transformed as well; it is modeled on the engineering of aluminum cams used in outdoor climbing.

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Wolter Byron, a 27 year old Marin resident, put together this awesome video of some bay area crushers climbing out in Bishop.

Check out Spencer Tang-Smith sending Iron Fly, Wolter Byron sticking it on High Plains Drifter, and Touchstone route setter Brian "Cuz" Hedrick killing it on the Vhard problems out there.

The Fall from ByronWolter on Vimeo.

Here's another one of Byron's quick hits with Cuz sending the Iron Monkey traverse and trying the Impossible Traverse up at Mortar.

Iron Monkey and the Impossible Traverse from ByronWolter on Vimeo.

Last weekend, 16 Cub scouts and parents from San Ramon spent the night at Diablo Rock Gym. The 6 to 10 year-olds started the night off with pizza, climbing, and then some sleep that night in the gym. Climbing fits in perfectly with the Cub Scouts theme. The cubs often go hiking, camping, and on other outdoor adventures.

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For the past two weeks, hardcore rock jock and Touchstone climber Ethan Pringle has been climbing on the amazing limestone of Spain.

“The mode here has been muy tranquillo,” said Pringle.

Pringle flew over to Spain, where he met with hardcore sport climber and ex-pat Chris Sharma. The pair settled into Sharma’s crag side home of Oliana, the second largest town in the comarca of the Alt Urgell in Catalonia Spain. Chris and Ethan, along with Chris’ lady friend Dalia, have been climbing in town. “We’ve only gone to Oliana but even on the ‘hot’ days (which are nothing like most days at Jail House past 2 pm) it gets nice and cold and breezy as soon as the sun goes behind the cliff which happens around 3 pm this time of year,” wrote Pringle on his blog. “Because of the late hour in which the cliff goes into the shade we’ve been getting really late starts- waking up around 10, leaving for the cliff around 11 and starting the warm-up around noon- 1pm.”

The Spanish town where Ethan is staying.

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Touchstone just picked up a bunch of new gear for those climbers who want to get tradical this summer. In stores now are the TC Pros, high top edging shoes that will shrink El Cap into Swan Slab, 4 step aiders for cruising up Washington Column, ultra light curve nuts, and the standard BD cams including C4s, C3s, and HB brass offsets.

The best place to start building your trad climbing gear is on your feet. High top shoes are nice because they protect your ankles in many of the grueling offwidths in the Valley.

Chris McNamara reviewed the TC Pro for Supertopo. It's an awesome shoe!

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