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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Bolted sport climbs are for children;....one step above a boy's birthday party at a climbing gym....
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inyoupyos
climber
California
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Seems there are far more incidents and accidents nowadays in rock climbing from the numbers of people who go out to climb expecting a more gym-like experience than can ever be possible without management, a paid overseer,... Like it or not, the unknown and unknowable lurks. It is important that people going out to climb, familiarize ourselves with the fact that 5.8 doesn't always mean easy or straighttforward like in the gym... and to keep wits about us.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Todd, this is a great picture. Rebar anchors!
We need a new thread:
If it was rebared on lead....was it still construction climbing?
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kev
climber
A pile of dirt.
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This thread is of virtually no relevance to this group of users. The few that still bolt routes don't really give a sh#t what some other crusty old bastard has to say about it. What's to discuss????
Dingus I disagree - Of the dozen or so partners I climb with over half of them regularly do FA's. I spoke to one last night who was watching/reading this thread so I do suspect there are others out too. How much we give a sh#t is a different question but this topic comes up WAY to often (ad nausium) around our campfires so different opinions are good to read (although we'd all prefer everyone thought like us - right?)
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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It's sort of shocking to see that anyone would think they were wiser in their youth than they are now.
For a third time - old, weak, and republican - what's shocking is to think anyone but a few would think they are bolder as old men than they were in their youth. If climbing was about youth being 'wise' their wouldn't be climbing. Oh there are bold and wise young climbers - and we have Darwin to thank for that.
How sustainable can our ethics be if we give the FA party final say over any line they put up and then ignore their wishes later in life?
'Our' ethics won't be sustainable at all if 'wise' men consent to let revisionists retrobolt away our history. And that's more the question - how sustainable is our history? Anytime I hear pressure from risk-averse 'climbers' squealing about 'wasted resources' I know someone's got an 36v eraser in their hand and is just jonesing to pull the trigger.
All sorts of difficult climbing ethics problems continue to come up, we need some way to have an open and honest debate about how to handle them. There are certainly several people posting in this thread saying "When I was a boy, we had to walk to school in the snow, up hill both ways, and feet hadn't yet been invented! We post holed our way there on our ankles! Kids these days have it easy!". While I have no doubt that some of you predate the invention of feet, that fact does little to advance the debate about bolting ethics.
Total crock. And many of us don't see a "debate about bolting ethics", we see a voracious and vacuous appetite for new rock to bolt and pressure to retrobolt the risk out of existing routes under the guise of 'appropriate resource use'. Weak all the way around, in every respect.
Personally, I find it more than a little stunning to have watched the Siamese twins of gym/sport all but completely reconceptualized what climbing 'is' for the vast majority of people to mean repetitively dogging in space aerial bouldering a stack of moves one after the other until they can be done clean - bolts or gear - and done it in a mere thirty years. And given that what climbing 'is' is to people these days, it's understandable they think every route possible needs to be equipped to do it. Hence the continuous pressure to bolt and retrobolt.
And it's really no different with 'trad climbing' these days which to the majority of climbers using gear simply means doing the exact same thing on gear - dogging their way up a route a piece of gear at a time until they can do it clean once - i.e., they are sport climbing on gear, or 'sprad climbing', because that's what they think climbing is.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Says the wise old man...
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Since we seem to be in partial thread drift, I need to interject one factor present in a first ascent and absent elsewhere. On the face-climibing FA's I've done (which amount to maybe ten -- but all on "new" crags) I never knew for sure if my route would go. If I rap-bolted the route, I would at least have known that there were protection points available, and this would have taken away some of the adventure.
If someone has top-roped, rehearsed, or otherwise pre-climbed a lead -- and I know about it -- it's no longer the same experience as a true, ground-up FA.
Admittedly, FA's are getting hard to come by, but when there's a bit of runout or uncertainty about where the protection points will be, some of the FA adventure remains for subsequent leaders. Retro-bolting can destroy that.
I'll leave it to others to guess whether unilateral retro-bolting is Democrat or Republican, (but hint: Republicans believe if you want something, you work for it.) but there is no question that it removes part of the game from the experience of those who follow.
John
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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How much retro/grid bolting is actually going on?
It seems to me that most new multi-pitch routes will continue to be done ground up. It's my meaningless opinion that's as it should be.
Who gives a shite about how a single pitch climb at the latest pile is equipped? I sure don't, beyond asking that the bolts be put in a logical spot--a seemingly difficult concept for many.
It will be interesting in a generation or two when asking the FA party about retro bolting is not an option. Hopefully climbers will be able to make the distinction between testpieces and a wasted resource.
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the Fet
climber
Tu-Tok-A-Nu-La
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I think it's great that climbing has evolved to include more and more different types of climbs and more and more different types of climbers.
There are probably more staunch ground up climbers than there have even been. It's just they are a smaller and smaller percent of the overall climber population.
When I see kids in the gym having fun. I don't worry that they won't learn the traditional style. I wonder if one of them will be the next Alex Honnold and free solo something even more bad ass than the face of Half Dome.
When I see climbs like jumbo love I don't bemoan that it wasn't put up on lead or that it took many, many tries to finally send it.
When I see dudes race up the Nose in 2.5 hours I don't get all offended that the are 'reducing a rock climb to a race track'.
These threads are great for armchair warriors to spout their view of what climbing IS. I think they might get more out of it by actually listening to other people's idea of what climbing IS for them.
But armchair warriors often fail. And we've been poisoned by these fairy tales.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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The fet,
I care about preservatin of the rock resource. Otherwise, I don't care how someone else climbings something. If a 5.15 lead has a bolt every five feet, so what? In isolation, it doesn't matter. Until I know how it affects the existing uses of the rock resource, I have no opinion about it. Similarly, if someone wants to use that climb for bolt ladder aiding parctice, I also don't care -- as long as they don't interefere with the others using the route at the same time.
It does matter, however, both in preserving our history, and in preserving the opportunity to improve as a leader. If, for example, we added some bolts on the second pitch of the Crack of Doom in Yosemite, what would change? After all, people do 5.8 all the time unroped. My problem would be twofold. First, when Pratt led that pitch, almost no one else in the Valley would have done that. That alone gives it historical significance. Second, at some point in one's carreer, doing a lead like that represents a real milestone. It's not the same if the bolts were there. Even if you didn't intend to use them, they're always an option for bailing.
Since I'm 9 days away from turning 60, I'll never be able to climb as I did 40 years ago, but that doesn't make me an "armchair climber" (Though I'm certainly either a "has been" or "never was.") I'm still out there climbing, and hoping that my grandchildren will be able to enjoy the same feelings that I loved, and still love, for all these decades.
John
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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I think it's great that climbing has evolved to include more and more different types of climbs and more and more different types of climbers.
Except that's not what's happening. What's happening is roped climbing has basically been reconceptualized and devolved to 'aerial bouldering to a redpoint' whether on bolts or gear - i.e. rather than diversifying it's been heavily homogenized to a lowest common denominator of "dog, dog, send, next".
The best way to blow minds today and come off as complete lunatic old is to suggest a kid not hang on the rope while climbing on gear. They look at you like you're a frigging Martian.
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this just in
climber
north fork
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Guess what some of us "kids " were taught outdoors by you staunch ground uppers. I didn't learn in a gym and have only been to a gym twice. I don't hang dog then claim I climbed it. I also have a smaller ego than yourself.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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I don't hang dog then claim I climbed it. I also have a smaller ego than yourself.
The question isn't claiming you climbed it so much as do you dog on gear until you have it wired, send it, then claim you climbed it. If so, you're sprad, not trad climbing.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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The best way to blow minds today and come off as complete lunatic old is to suggest a kid not hang on the rope while climbing on gear. They look at you like you're a frigging Martian.
So, you never fall or hang on gear? Ie, you never do something at or maybe a tad above your comfort level?
Doesn't sound very adventerous to me...
Why bother even using a rope?
Yeah, folks hangdog. Big whoop. Every time I think I should get on my high horse about it, I find myself at my limit, hanging on a route, and I think...wow, now I'm "that guy" too.
Just too bad you don't end up in a sprayfest at the same cocktail party. Then you could set those folks straight...ha ha.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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I fall all the time, what I don't do is dog and then call that trad climbing. And I couldn't care less if you or others dog up routes, what I do care about is kids thinking trad climbing is just sport climbing on gear.
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kev
climber
A pile of dirt.
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Admittedly, FA's are getting hard to come by,
No they aren't. Not even is VERY well established areas. What's hard to come by (in established areas) are moderate splitter plumb lines 5 minutes from parking.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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And I couldn't care less if you or others dog up routes, what I do care about is kids thinking trad climbing is just sport climbing on gear.
Why, for cryin' out loud?
Seems like a silly thing to get your panties in a wad over...
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kev
climber
A pile of dirt.
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Oh I for got to add - that haven't seen an ascent.
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this just in
climber
north fork
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So are aid climbers sprad or do you have a better name for the kids who aid climb these days? No way they could be anywhere near your level of aid so hopefully you have another condescending name for them.
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