The Pick

Most people with no instruction try to get their fingers under the rounded end of the caber. It seems to me that I once placed the end on a clump of grass just so I had some purchase. You can also imagine praying for a gopher hole. Well, how the hell do you get it up off the ground? First of all, we cheat! We have this goopy brown paste we call stickem or some such spelling which is pitch and some other stuff to keep it from drying - probably another carcinogen! You put enough on your fingers and palms to be able to grasp the stick. Interlace your fingers almost to the palms, get as much palm surface spread around the base as you can a big reason to get as close to the bottom as possible, dig the heels of your hands in as hard as you can and stand up. Use your legs! You do not want to muscle the caber off the ground with your arms: standing up simply brings the caber up with you.

Up to now it was tricky, now it gets complicated. Using the upward moment imparted by your legs, drop your palms under the base of the caber. This is trickier than it sounds: you keep your fingers laced. Look at the wallpaper of this page and youll see how Ryan has grasped the base of his caber. At the same time you begin what the late West Coast Youth Caber Director / Athletic Director / Judge / Announcer / Amateur Athlete Cletus Abbott called: the Spider Dance. 80 to 90% of the cabers weight is above the fulcrum point and you have just done a bunch of moves that almost guarantee the stick to be out of balance. So you step left to compensate and then its going the other way and also forward and you start forward but not fast enuf and so you start running after the caber, trying not to lose it. It can look pretty funny at times, but eventually you do learn the spider dance with some degree of finesse and once this balance is established you can start your run.