by Ray Wood – DMM Ray Wood reports on the DMM Website The Belgian dynamic duo, Nicolas Favresse and Sean Villanueva O´Driscoll, who were particularly impressive on their first visit to Wales during the recent BMC International Meet, have made the second ascent and the first in a day of Gogarth´s The Mad Brown (E7). As fate would have it, Adam Wainwright got a surprise as he abseiled in to do Quartz Icicle in Gogarth´s Wen Zawn: hanging opposite him was a Belgian photographer and across the way was Nicolas Favresse a.k.a Nico, on the belay at the top of pitch one of The Mad Brown E7 (6a/b, 6b, 5b, 6a), a route Adam had made the first ascent of in 1996 with George Smith. And until today it had not had a second ascent, let alone one in a day. When Sean reached Leo Houlding´s high-point from a repeat attempt, marked by a quickdraw on the second pitch, Adam was able to shout directions as to where to go next. Adam commented: “Its really impressive just rocking up in Britain and trying such a specialised North Wales route. They seemed to have much greater faith in the quality of the rock than me and George had!” Full Report with Action Photo´s on the DMM Website View Nico´s own website: nicolasfavresse.com
