North West Region MTA workshop 31st May 2015

8 members gathered on a wet and blustery Sunday (31st May) at Binn Green car park, Greenfield to attend the North West MTA 'management on steep ground' workshop.  Everyone was keen to refresh and revise skills of the ML syllabus.  Stuart Igoe (ML provider), James Mealing and Dave Robinson had recently attended a MT provider workshop hosted at PYB so were available to provide the latest updates and practises.  After a briefing on the updates followed by a revision of the various ropes available on the market the group then moved onto an area of steep ground around Alderman's Rocks.  The group moved through the topics of anchor selection, direct belays, indirect belays, South African abseil and confidence roping, with everyone inputting their thoughts and experiences.  Whilst having a soggy sandwich and flask of Tea the group discussed group management and 'spotting' along with how younger groups are management on 'rocky rambles'.  To end the afternoon the sun even came out.  Great day, thanks to those attending and your input.  Future workshops, for the North West region, such as GPS, geology, intro to the IML scheme are being planned and hopefully a climbing/Mtn biking social around the start of September.