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Dr.Sprock
Boulder climber
I'm James Brown, Bi-atch!
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Jan 11, 2015 - 01:01am PT
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cold weather builds stronger muscles,
all the power lifters are from Siberia, not the equator,
bunch of skinny-azz soccer players down there, arms hang limp,
will these guys be charged for camp fees?
what about that new hang dogging ordinance for anything over 500 ft?
like one long Bacher Yerian, these guys should get a deal with Cliff Bar,
jus sayin...WTF, over?
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Jan 11, 2015 - 08:31am PT
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Amazing video. It looks so easy and controlled. Really good climbers make it look like it is easy.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Jan 11, 2015 - 09:12am PT
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Raind like a tall cow.... Sat night between barstow & vegas - hope it stays better, for them!
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Jan 11, 2015 - 09:20am PT
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Maybe a storm rolling in around April... :-)
Damn nice weather for January! I was there in early February once; the sunny slabs, usually kinda greasy and crowded, were perfect then.
All the best to Tommy and Kevin!
EDIT: well, from the photos, it seems plenty warm on El Cap currently for climbing comfortably.
But yeah, while it appears the weather will hold up for a few more days, it's a high stakes game being near the top of a big wall in winter. But they know all about that. I'm sure the weather is likely the big topic of conversation, 24/7.
http://www.nps.gov/yose/photosmultimedia/webcams.htm
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 11, 2015 - 11:28am PT
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Are they following the Mescalito route, a different route?
Are they putting in some new pitches to bypass "impossible" sections?
Fred,
Mostly following Mescalito, with parts of other routes and new connector pitches.
Sloan's topo shows it fairly well.
p1-5. Mescalito
p6-7. Adrift
p8. new
p9. new + Mescalito
p10-13. Mescalito
p14-p15. new (Dike Traverse)
p16. Dyno new
p16. Loop new + Dawn
p17-18. Dawn
p19. Dawn + new
p20. new just left of Dawn Dihedral
p21. new just right of Dawn
p22-23. Dawn
p24. Dawn + new
p25. new
p26-28. Mescalito
p29. Mescalito + new
p30. new
p31. new + Tempest
p32. Tempest
Pitch counts:
13 Mescalito
10-10.5 new (10.5 via Dyno)
5-5.5 Dawn (5.5 via Loop)
2 Adrift
1.5 Tempest
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Kalimon
Social climber
Ridgway, CO
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Jan 11, 2015 - 11:53am PT
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No snow in EC Meadow . . . California is in for another dry year.
Nice pitch breakdown Clint!
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jgill
Boulder climber
Colorado
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Jan 11, 2015 - 12:27pm PT
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Huge headline and front page article in the Sunday Denver Post. Large photo spotlighting TC as he climbs. Absolutely amazing climb. Every time you think there is an upper bound to climbing performance something spectacular is done and you reset your expectations!
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 12, 2015 - 01:49am PT
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Phone interview with Kevin Jorgeson on Saturday in Andrew Bisharat's latest National Geographic article:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/01/140111-interview-kevin-jorgeson-dawn-wall-yosemite-adventure/
Interesting idea that Kevin used to help him get p15:
It was actually a scientific breakthrough, if you will. I asked [one of the filmmakers] Kyle Berkompas to render me a video of all my attempts on pitch 15 so that I could analyze it.
I realized that my right foot was ever so slightly out of position. That was making a big difference. If you feel like your foot is just going to blow off the wall, everything tenses up. I realized I needed to change my foot sequence to get much better friction on the foothold.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Jan 12, 2015 - 03:30am PT
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Hey Karl,
There is a path that this sort of climb is never repeated. If a climber were good enough and committed enough to do a 2nd, they might rather go off and do their own mind-bending FFA. I think it probably depends on how close we are to the absolute limits of capability.
Kevin watching videos of his own attempts links back to the visualization and memorizing the moves and balance points that I think free climbers have been doing for a long time. Watching a video opens up a whole new way to extend this. They need more cameras and Kevin should wear a suit with position markers.
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clinker
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, California
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Jan 12, 2015 - 06:21am PT
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how close we are to the absolute limits of capability.
A long ways.
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WBraun
climber
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Jan 12, 2015 - 08:38am PT
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Watching a video opens up a whole new way to extend this.
They need more cameras and Kevin should wear a suit with position markers.
Yep .... they'll eventually completely go this route in the sport climbing world.
They will continuously claim harder and harder grades being done by these mechanical, technological and software aids.
I prefer the Honnold method.
Not because he free solo's, that's not the only thing he does.
It's because he just plain walks up to sh!t and starts climbing without all that aid .....
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throwpie
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Jan 12, 2015 - 09:31am PT
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Free climbing as I understand it....start at the bottom, place gear as you go or use what was agreeably fixed on lead, don't grab or stand on anything that isn't rock, do whatever is safe at the anchor, repeat till you get to the top. Right?
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jan 12, 2015 - 10:05am PT
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FOr a historian, this effort is a remarkable example of the way that sport and gym climbing have fused with old-fashioned expedition climbing.
For much of the 20th century, expedition climbing was a common feature of big objectives from the Himalayas to here. In the 1960s and 1970s, the turn toward "alpine style" ascents, with no fixed ropes or porters, was the name of the game, partly because the environmental impact of large expeditions had become so visible. The original Dawn Wall was controversial precisely because it seemed to many like a retrograde move back to expedition style.
Wings of Steel provoked a similar controversy, and Todd and Paul's application of some of the practices of sport climbing to free The Salathe fairly divided rock climbers.
But El Cap and Yosemite also, gradually, but fairly firmly, slipped out of a strict mountaineering tradition and into a crag climbing tradition. The possibility of rescue, the proliferation of fixed and rappel anchors, the easy access and comparatively stable weather (compared with, say, the Alps much less the HImalaya), simply changed the game.
For cynics, this looks like a Lotus eaters version of Eigerwand in the 1930s, but without all that unfortunate Nazi business.
That said, I really admire the unusual kind of mental toughness involved-- putting this much work into a project on this scale, and dealing with the strain of boundary limit slab climbing over such an expanse of time and rock, and such long periods of immobility, is amazing to watch.
Without a succession of drought years, it might not have come together.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Jan 12, 2015 - 10:34am PT
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Ian
Thanks for the link. The Yosemite Big Wall topo made it all very clear.
Clint, thanks also for the help.
Kevin
I asked [one of the filmmakers] Kyle Berkompas to render me a video of all my attempts on pitch 15 so that I could analyze it. A new kind of artificial aid?
Just kidding.
This is truly an amazing project.
I hope Tom Evans gets a chorus of Fat Ladies together in the meadow to sing when they top out.
Possibly something Wagnerian? Ritt der Walküren?
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 12, 2015 - 09:12pm PT
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John Branch @JohnBranchNYT · 0 hours ago
On his his third attempt of the night, @kjorgeson sends Pitch 20. At Wino Tower, with open path to the top of #dawnwall
Kevin Jorgeson @kjorgeson · 0 hours ago
Wino Tower. #dawnwall
Kevin Jorgeson @kjorgeson · 3 hours ago
Can someone turn the humidity down by about 90%?
Kevin Jorgeson @kjorgeson · 3 hours ago
Sitting on Wino Tower engulfed in a cloud after a foot slip at the top of pitch 20. Felt strong. Just a matter of time. #dawnwall
Kevin Jorgeson @kjorgeson · 6 hours ago
Two down. One more pitch to Wino.
Kevin Jorgeson @kjorgeson · 10 hours ago
Nothing like clouds and a cold breeze to boost motivation for the hard day ahead. #dawnwall |
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GDavis
Social climber
SOL CAL
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Jan 12, 2015 - 10:03pm PT
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Probably another generation...
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 12, 2015 - 10:12pm PT
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The original Dawn Wall was controversial precisely because it seemed to many like a retrograde move back to expedition style. Hmmm, they didn't use fixed ropes, but they were slow/heavy.
I believe the controversy was more because they used 330 bolts.
Extensive rivet ladders. They were also partly unlucky because "The Dihedrals" turned out to be blank.
A few years later, Mescalito was done with copperheads and a lot fewer rivets.
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GDavis
Social climber
SOL CAL
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Jan 12, 2015 - 11:21pm PT
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Looks like they are both on Wino :) Only 5.12 from here on out!
*only*
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Jan 12, 2015 - 11:39pm PT
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Granite climbing gets little respect in the ratings. Rating those crux pitches only 14.d is sort of an act of humility. Granite doesn't seem to qualify for 5.15 no matter how few of the world's best could ever do those traversing pitches. It's says 14.d on the topo but you have to be better than that to climb them, or at least better than a some 5.15 climbers who couldn't touch them.
Not that I really know cause my 5.14 and 5.15 climbs are in my dreams, but just looking at Tommy's credentials and how hard it's been for him to do this, I gotta think those numbers are almost arbitrary, like the great roof wasn't really the 13b that Lynne originally rated it
Peace
Karl Baba
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