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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Original Post - May 23, 2007 - 11:58am PT
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Count the ways...
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dirtbag
climber
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May 23, 2007 - 12:16pm PT
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But are those ultra light nerd glasses?
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Ricky D
Trad climber
Sierra Westside
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May 23, 2007 - 12:19pm PT
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MY EYES, my eyes....
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Matt
Trad climber
places you shouldn't talk about in polite company
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May 23, 2007 - 12:19pm PT
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rasberry beret
(...the kind you buy at a second hand store)
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rockermike
Mountain climber
Berkeley
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May 23, 2007 - 12:25pm PT
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Cool photo.
Socks under EBs.
and I think I detect some kind of weird homemade mechanical devices stuffed into that crack. How can he trust his life to those.
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TwistedCrank
climber
Hell
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May 23, 2007 - 12:33pm PT
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Protection placed on lead? Oh the horror.
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up2top
Big Wall climber
Phoenix, AZ
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May 23, 2007 - 02:02pm PT
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Is he as much of an eccentric, egotistical kook as he comes across in his ultra-light hiking books?
Ed
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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May 23, 2007 - 02:14pm PT
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i've got a story that could answer that question in spades.
but i'm trying to be a better person and rid my life of negativity, so i'm gonna keep it to myself.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Reply - May 23, 2007 - 02:19pm PT
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Hey Ed,
I haven't spoken to Ray in about 30 yaers, but he was not egotistical then. It would have been hard to judge kookiness, as this would have required some 'normal' personality standard. Let's see: Werner? the Jims? Ray? Rik? the Johns? Bev? Kim? Jorge? Kevin? Ron? Dale? Alan? Ed? the Marks? Barry? Steve? Lloyd? Rick? the Mikes? Hummm.
All no's so far.
Ah, here is one, Roger. Yes, that would have been a good standard for 'normal.' So, by that standard, Ray was way kooky. Look at the dress code forcryingoutloud.
As you can probably gather from the posts of all us here on ST, nobody was 'normal.'
Roger
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dirtineye
Trad climber
the south
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May 23, 2007 - 03:04pm PT
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BUmp for climbing thread
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Jerry Dodrill
climber
Bodega, CA
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May 23, 2007 - 03:05pm PT
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Damn, Ray's got some long legs.
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handsome B
Gym climber
SL,UT
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May 23, 2007 - 03:09pm PT
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does he have a dead puma on his back?
great pic, please keep them coming!
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KP Ariza
climber
SCC
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May 23, 2007 - 03:15pm PT
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Classic shot of Jardine sending S.R. in its origional state before the lip broke off. Would have been cool to have done it w/the mandatory jams at the end-
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Oli
Trad climber
Fruita, Colorado
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May 24, 2007 - 02:39am PT
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Ray was a very nice guy when I climbed with him in the Valley years ago. He wasn't greatly talented, could barely follow me up Gollum, at that time, a 5.10 offwidth along the base of El Cap (right of Nose), but he had that tenacity and vision and desie to break through his barriers. He played the game according to his likes and his rules. I guess it didn't surprise me when I heard of the routes he was starting to conceive and...do.
Pat
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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May 24, 2007 - 03:48am PT
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Is he plugging a cam in that shot or reaching for something? Seems late in the game to bother with a cam there, particularly if there's one behind his head. Love the hook. Being roofers my friends and I have always looked at this route and basically wondered if we could do the line up to it which, always in odd perspective, looks worse to us than the roof.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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May 24, 2007 - 10:22am PT
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Roger, what a weird shot...who took it? Looks like a very very tight lead rope while there is something in just behind his left shoulder...
Yes Up2Top's suspicions are correct. Ray was "an eccentric, egotistical kook". Sorry Kids, but I won't mince around with this one either nor play to the "everything's relative" point.
He hid his "friends" devices from the rest of the climbing community for years. He therefore used them cheater-style and, but worse, also hung on tons of stuff, these secret friends included, without reporting it. Just one example: he tried to claim he and Vern Clevenger accomplished an early free ascent of Astroman, while Dale and others secretly watched from the ground with glasses, finding the team hung all over it. Ray chopped in the Jardine Traverse on the Nose, as if it were an ice climb. His deceit did not have much stopping it, and to top it off his cloying Christian orientation just made the whole picture even more contradictory and therefore repulsive.
His interactions with the rest of us were not clean and straightforward but perversely subtexted and devious---after all he was lying so much. As far as Oli/Ament's comments go, I will only agree that, right, Ray was not talented, but rather thick and uninsightful however dogged. That he now is a hiking guru is appropriate. His coy modesty was just the ability to call attention to whatever it was he was being humble about.
Peter Haan
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Jaybro
Social climber
The West
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May 24, 2007 - 10:26am PT
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To save weight, there is no earpeice on the side away from the camera.
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Watusi
Social climber
Joshua Tree, CA
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May 24, 2007 - 11:03am PT
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Cool! I remember this shot! Yeah I didn't get to lead this until after the lip broke as well...it was considerably harder back then!
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Reply - May 24, 2007 - 11:11am PT
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Hi Peter,
I don't know who took the picture. It is a post card. The copyright date on the back is 1981. I'll post the back of it tonight. When I think about it, it might be staged as opposed to live action.
I am less judgemental about Ray than you. I came to accept that his 'hang dogging' style was a net benefit to climbing progression, allowing more talented climbers like Kauk and Bachar to set new standards more quickly than they would have otherwise. (I still have my notes and letters to Ken Wilson when we were trying to work out how to report his ascents in Mountain--maybe I can scan them and post them up.)
All that said, I cannot forgive and forget what he did to the Nose. Ray is an easy target and the Nose is a special case, but I try not to be more harsh on Ray than on Jim or Dale for doing the same thing on some of their climbs.
It seems that about the only thing that any of us stays upset about for years is someone lying about their accomplishments. Or, maybe more commonly, not disclosing the whole truth. (Another thread is opening up old wounds on this subject about a Meadows climb.) In Ray's case, I always thought that he was up-front about what he was doing and how he was doing it--hanging on everything until he had the climb wired then climbing it ground up while placing gear. Modern free would not exist if not for this style.
Best, Roger
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snyd
Boulder climber
Asheville, NC
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May 24, 2007 - 11:17am PT
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Whatever! Perving from the base is ghey! Like you have never hung on a route!
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