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Dapper Dan
climber
The OC
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Topic Author's Original Post - Mar 18, 2005 - 07:56pm PT
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what is everyone's take on taping hands? it often gives you more bomber jams without the pain so can i conjecture that taping hands makes you light? also after spending the last month in josh where i was picking up discarded tape at almost every popular route i am also wondering how something that is supposed to stick to your hands ends up on the ground so much....
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 19, 2005 - 01:47am PT
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I think that Jim Bridwell takes credit for the idea of taping hands during the time of the route grade push in the Valley in the 70's. That and chalk. Jim's not known as a "lightweight" so that is a short answer.
I generally tape for climbs when I know the rock will be rough enough and my technique sorry enough that I would get gobies. The times I have been to JTree I have taped, the rock is so sharp (it seems glorious to have a foot stick after the slick surface of YNP, but not so great when you grate all the skin off the back of your hand). There are areas in the Valley that I will tape on now. I used to avoid taping all together, but a few weekends ago I paid at least a few ounces of flesh to the crack gods.
Taping is a generally accepted practice, I hope the climbing community can try harder not to leave the detritus associated with taping at the base of the climbs.
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Dru
climber
HELL, BABY, HELL!
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Mar 21, 2005 - 05:45pm PT
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Tape is aid, and chicks dig scars.
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John H
climber
Redwood City, CA
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Mar 21, 2005 - 06:18pm PT
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Only a month. Talk about a lite ass. Let us all know when you can spend a whole season. Thats when your tape glove statment will come back to bite you in the ass.
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nature
climber
Flagstaff, AZ
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Mar 21, 2005 - 08:57pm PT
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just curious...
regarding the cheating statement.
what's the difference between tape on your hands and rubber on your feet?
yeah... that's what i thought
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 21, 2005 - 09:09pm PT
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Sometimes tape becomes a hindrance. It gets in the way, and makes your hand thicker.
Huh, .... that’s a good point nature. regarding the cheating statement.
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Moof
Trad climber
A cube at my soul sucking job in Nor. CA
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Mar 21, 2005 - 10:06pm PT
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"what's the difference between tape on your hands and rubber on your feet?"
Didn't your girlfirend tell you the rubber does no good on your feet?
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Eric Chisholm
Trad climber
Sebastopol, CA
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Mar 21, 2005 - 10:14pm PT
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I say use tape if you want to. If you don't want to, don't. Dont worry if some dude thinks you are a week. If you climb for some one else then shame on you. Just dont leave it on the ground when you are done.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Mar 21, 2005 - 10:30pm PT
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I often walk in the sand barefoot. If there is broken glass on the ground, I put on shoes.
Use judgement, gain experience. Tape has drawbacks as well as benefits. Tends to reduce your feel for the jams and taxes your hand muscles more than cranking "naked."
the better your technique, the less you need tape, except for the really sharp stuff, then why wreck your hands for nothing?
And for really long climbs. Most folks tape for the Nose, although I've done it without (cause I forgot it, but I was fine on top)
Peace
karl
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Joe
Social climber
Santa Cruz Mountains/Los Gatos
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Mar 21, 2005 - 11:11pm PT
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Taping your hands to climb crack is like wearing clothes when grinding up an offwidth.
Both are technically considered aid and not free climbing.
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Jaybro
Social climber
The West
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Mar 22, 2005 - 01:40am PT
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Maybe we should start a thread on naked offwidth ascents. The first person with photos starts it.
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nature
climber
Flagstaff, AZ
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Mar 22, 2005 - 05:01am PT
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sarah is nekkid and climbing OW - where ya bin?
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steelmnkey
climber
Phoenix, AZ
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Mar 22, 2005 - 09:26am PT
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Aid? Yeah, just like shoes that stick amazingly to rock, right?
Don't have to limit the trash discussion to tape either... I see tons of crap at the crags these days left behind be climbers. Mostly cig butts. Wear tape, don't wear tape. Leaving sh*t behind is just bad form (to quote JL).
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T2
climber
Cardiff by the sea
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Mar 22, 2005 - 09:31am PT
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climbers or cloth tape make for a great bandaid. A roll and a small tube neosporine go with me on every wall.
As far as free climbing, it's great for those flappers. There are exceptions to the rule, but if you are tapping up like you are going to go a few rounds with Sugar Ray on that that 5.9 hand crack, you need to work on your jamming technique. Besides a couple of gobbies make me feel like I had a good day of climbing.
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Latitute 33
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Mar 22, 2005 - 06:08pm PT
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Karl kinda said it all.
However, for climbing at Josh, there are precious few cracks for which taping might be justified (most are located in Jumbo Rocks CG area, particularly the Jumbo Rocks Corridor). For everything else in Joshua Tree, tape use is more of a cover up for poor technique.
I find that my use of it has been limited to taping hurt fingers (tendons or flapper). Tape can definitely can impare your ability to effectively jam thin cracks and very thin finger locks.
But, to each thier own, as long as they don't leave the used tape at the base of the crags.
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Melissa
Big Wall climber
oakland, ca
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Mar 22, 2005 - 06:11pm PT
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"tape use is more of a cover up for poor technique"
I find that the people that say this tend to have a half inch of shoe leather built up on the backs of their mitts to go along with their 'good technique'.
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can't say
Social climber
Pasadena CA
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Mar 23, 2005 - 09:20am PT
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I was hanging in Josh with Yabo one day when he noticed my hands were trashed from a weeks worth of climbing. I hadn't taped and my bad technique was obvious.
He sort of did his hehehe little laugh and said, "Nay, all you do is don't move your jams after you've weighted em."
While it might seem to be a pretty logical and simple idea, I hadn't been thinking about that when I was climbing back then. But once I started keeping his words in my head as I climbed, I found I suffered much less skin loss after that.
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Latitute 33
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Mar 23, 2005 - 07:12pm PT
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Melissa suggests I find that the people that say this tend to have a half inch of shoe leather built up on the backs of their mitts to go along with their 'good technique'.
As an old quaking has-been, I can assure you that the texture of the backs of my hands is not that tough. But, I can still fake my way up stuff using "good technique" (usually goobie free).
Pat's Yabo story goes to the pithy truth of the matter.
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Melissa
Big Wall climber
oakland, ca
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Mar 23, 2005 - 07:26pm PT
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I have a real question for sketchy and the rest of you who have the leather hands and/or the technique to be both tape and gobi free even when the climbing is hard for you...Do you think that the technique that keeps you gobi free makes you climb better too? I don't always tape...like when I forget the tape or expected to climb face only...and when I'm in these situations I find that I can climb carefully to avoid the gobies, but it's more strenuous to make sure that my hands don't rotate in the jams and that it limits how dynamicly I can move. I feel like I climb stronger with the tape. Do you think that improved technique would reverse that impression?
Since I work with deadly pathogens, gobis aren't a very attractive option for me.
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