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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Original Post - Nov 4, 2011 - 05:05pm PT
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Or at least the early days of highballing.
We're reissuing my first book, Gorilla Monsoon, and I came across these old photos from when I was still in High School and Bachar, Graham and I were first starting to get off the deck a ways out at Josh, and here at Black Mountain. Crappy shots off a proof sheet, but great memories.
I must have been a senior because during my soph. and junior years in High School I was in RRs and PAs respectively, and here I have the EBs.
The OK Corall problem was downright dangerous - maybe 40 feet high (5.12b) and you had to climb down a super thin tree (horrific) to get off it.
JL
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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So it never occurred to you to top rope those?? Yikes!
I'd like to score a sweet autographed copy of the new issue. Got a web site?
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 4, 2011 - 05:33pm PT
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Joe Brown indeed. I downloaded the wrong shot. Still the 5.11 route up the middle of JB was stout BITD sans cord.
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Dos XX
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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My shoe progression was the same: RRs, PAs (slick as snot after you used 'em for a while), and EBs. My climbing progression, on the other hand, not the slightest resemblance to Largo's... 5.12?? only in my dreams.
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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Gnarly....
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micronut
Trad climber
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Awesome. Thanks for sharing a piece of americana. Looking forward to the book.
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John Butler
Social climber
SLC, Utah
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Use a rope? They cost too much back then (when earning little more than minimum wage). They were reserved for special occasions...
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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John Gill, of course, was far ahead of his time
and doing some genuine highballs both in the Tetons
but of course in the Needles, such as his Thimble route.
In Boulder in the early-mid '60s we did some pretty
high boulders, the kind you wouldn't want to fall off of.
We certainly did some buildering that was ferociously high
off the ground and difficult. Larry Dalke and I
tandem soloed several things that weren't technically
so hard but were vertical, with broken rock, some loose
holds, and on one occasion at night, as an example
one evening in our dress clothes,
on a break in a gig our jazz band was doing... Probably one
could view something like Pete Cleveland's Superpin as
a "highball," but as well routes by individuals such as Oliver Perry-
Smith who regularly did routes entirely unprotected....
In the late '60s and also early '70s we
did some 5.11-type highballs at Split Rocks, for sure,
where if you fell it was probably over. No pads.
We didn't call them highballs. That was a term that came
much later.
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scuffy b
climber
dissected alluvial deposits, late Pleistocene
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Largo, I saw you climbing in red/black PAs at Suicide, Autumn 72 and at
Joshua Tree, Jan 73, if that helps your calibration.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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What is the definition of a highball? Or are we meant to "know one when we see one"?
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Chicken Skinner
Trad climber
Yosemite
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From Urban Dictionary.
1. (adjective) - highballer:
someone who sets their standards very high for what they or others can accomplish.
2. (verb) - highballing:
the act of setting high expectations or thinking beyond the bounds of a situation.
1. Railroad slang for a green light or permission to proceed. Go = highball
Ken
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Well, in freight train language, a highball is
the fast train the others pull over for. It's best
to get the highball, as it goes on through fast.
Here we're talking about routes rather high above the
ground, the kind not so easy to jump off...
We saw lots of climbers do scary highballs who had
first wired the moves.... Or at least done the route
more than once and knew they could do it. In the
early '70s several climbers did 5.12 routes that were
really highball, such as N.E.D. in Eldorado, but in
each case they had done the route at least once before.
I'm sure if I think about it for awhile
I will think of some people who did onsight highballs...
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tom Carter
Social climber
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Love those B&W's John - thanks
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Friend
climber
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Wow, very inspiring stuff, JL. More photos please!
I'll bump this with some recent shots of a couple classics from the original "Pumping Granite"...
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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Largo Scoop. Didn't really feel all that Highball, but if you jumped off it was wierd. Had to set up to do an intermediate bounce off that ledge at the bottom of the problem...
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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1900
ca 1893
Just to offer historical perspective . . .
Long before J. Gill, or ,later, J. Long or J. Bachar there were the fearless Brits
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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The Anasazi were certainly high balling when they put in some of their petroglyphs.
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Keith Leaman
Trad climber
Seattle
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Nov 15, 2011 - 11:51am PT
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Gotta love the old photos JGill. I'll bump this thread with an observation that the line between bouldering and free soloing is frequently blurred.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 15, 2011 - 02:14pm PT
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Yeah, but those old farts weren't as stupid as we were, as evidenced by this tennis shoe ascent of So High, where I almost pitched off the top slab moves twenty feet higher.
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