Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
fink
Novice climber
myhole
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 09:47am PT
|
Bachar and Bridwell chipped a hold or two in their time as well! That doesn't mean they made a practice of it and it doesn't mean that Todd did it in Yosemite. Ethics might be different in their home crag. Now removing heads and fixed pins so they can put their fingers in there, they definately do that.
They freed the Salathe the hard way and spend months working on stuff, they deserve respect. I went to do the direct when they were working on it and they didn't "close" it to us
r. Fink
|
|
MIke
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 10:03am PT
|
What they've done at Sinks Canyon and Wild Iris ("comfortizing") may be shady, but it's not chipping. Chipping is adding a hold where it didn't exist before, what they have done is made painful holds more comfortable, albeit with questionable tools, but it is still a practice that is used at every limestone crag in the world, it's just that most people are more discreet about it.
I don't see the difference between clipping a bolt and clipping a fixed head...either way you're standing on someone ele's shoulders. If you're such a hard man, go to AK and do a FA.
|
|
the shadow
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 10:58am PT
|
free climbing on bolts is contrived fun. aid climbing is contrived fun. free climbing without bolts or guns in kyrgyzistan takes nuts.
|
|
hammer
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 11:15am PT
|
FYI - The difference between clipping a bolt and clipping a fixed head is the probability of airtime.
The difference between being way runout on a trad lead and being way runout on aid (three or four pieces below you that will definately zipper if you fall) is this. When the trad leader reaches up and gets a questionable placement he/she is going to climb past it and will never know if it would have held a fall.
When the aid leader reaches up and gets a questionable placement he/she has to stand on it to see if it will hold, that takes 'sack' as they say. In both cases it takes 'sack' to climb on by.
In addition, trad leaders try to not be way runout and often avoid R rated routes. Hard aid climbers (A3 and up)are ALWAYS way runout and often seek out routes with the most potential airtime.
In my experience it is people who have never climbed aid who are so down on it. Lighten up and respect each others styles OK?
|
|
MOAC Man.
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 11:31am PT
|
All gesting apart I really do respect all aspects and types of climbing but chipping, modifying or any other alteration of existing holds NO! I really do not care who it is, how good they are or were, this in my book is not climbing. Sorry.
|
|
dufas
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 11:42am PT
|
then don't climb at pinnacles. high odds of modifying the holds when you yank one out.
|
|
former wyomingite
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 11:49am PT
|
In these cases, isn't it "traditional" to seek the approval of the first ascent team? Which IIRC included a Wyomingite, Angus Thuermer, who still lives there (in Jackson).
Did Todd get permission?
Now whether the FA team has the right to grant such permission is another debate...
|
|
69
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 11:50am PT
|
What bothers me about this free-sieging sh#t (beyond the new bolts, which is lame; take Piana's hatchet job on that route on Gran Trono Blanco, for instance) is that it's somehow considered a step up in style. Let me get this straight: you aid up the entire route, fix ropes down the entire route, toprope every pitch, and in the mean time I could have climbed the route in standard wall style (not even speed tactics) thirty or forty times, had I been able to elbow my way past all the sh#t, which is unlikely. Numerous parties have been guilty of this noncommitting, hairsplitting, and then they and the mags say it's an amazing achievement. Only in stubbornness.
Walk up to the route, send in the best style you can, and go home.
|
|
dufas
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 12:00pm PT
|
sons of yesterday: excellent, non-manufactured, and when added with the manufactured serenity, makes what many experienced, ethical climbers call one of the best days in yosemite. how many of you have climbed sons by the non-manufactured way?
so if it's good enough, it's ok?
|
|
?
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 12:15pm PT
|
Now you're talking about pin scars being mfg'd holds?
I think that would be a grey area at best. If you decide to call that mfg'd, there are certainly a ton of mfg'd routes in the Yosemite... I'm not saying those are natural holds or gear opportunities, just that the intention of the pin scar was not for the route to be freed.
|
|
dufas
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:01pm PT
|
apparently then, those terrible manufactured holds are only those that fit your definition of poor ethics which of course are on climbs you don't want to or can't do. how convenient.
|
|
?
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:06pm PT
|
U better not ever climb anything on el cap or any other even close to steep face in the valley if you feel that way, you dufas. they are all changed lines by now, not to mention that even the clean splitter cracks have all generally been gardened so they can be climbed. what about all the innocent micro-organisms in the soil that was pulled out of there for FA? i think you should picket the cookie all winter in protest...
dufas.
|
|
dufas
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:17pm PT
|
uhhh "?", I'm not the one saying don't climb manufactured holds. just pointing out the facts. I love serenity and sons. One of my favorite all time climbs.
pleasantly, dufas.
|
|
Melissa
Novice climber
SF, CA
|
|
|
Nov 19, 2002 - 01:24pm PT
|
I'll chime into this gossip fest to say, I don't know what went on up there, but I don't think any of you have any grounds to say that Todd chips the walls that he frees. Intermediate belays and added bolts may well be another issue.
Earlier this year I was talking to a certain big wall free climber who had set out to climb the direct but got shut down. He claims that on the crux pitch its humanly impossible to do a particular move off of a ledge and that Todd must have pulled on a sling to do the move. Granted this climber is a lot smaller than Todd, so who I kind of questioned his point of view.
A couple of weeks after this discussion a couple of my other friends who are also capable (and taller) big wall free climbers went up to try this route. They both found the notion of free climbing this pitch so unfathomable that one said, "If all Todd did was pull on one sling to get up that pitch, then my hat is off to him." They weren't trying to say that they thought that he pulled on the sling, just that the pitch was so blank and so steep, that you'd have to become intimately equainted with every dimple on the rock to even have a shot at it...And it was in no way 'sport bolted' to allow for cheating. If Todd had chipped, my friends didn't find any evidence of it. Working that pitch, you'd log a lot of air time. I'm sure Todd did. He spent over 60 days on that pitch.
I met Todd and Paul last year when they were working the Dihedral. They were there for ~3 months last fall. I'm pretty sure that they were there before that in the spring. They were on WDD earlier this year. Now they're back. If you were going to chip your way up a wall, why would you spend so much time doing it?
Melissa
|
|
?
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:24pm PT
|
My version of the facts is that those pin scars were not put there so that it could be climbed, and are therefore vastly different from man made holds put into rock faces specifically w/ the intention of making the rock more climbable.
pleasantly "?"
|
|
dufas
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:26pm PT
|
"?", you are obviously a skilled attorney. thanks for your insight.
|
|
?
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:29pm PT
|
Melissa-
I think someone was saying he has chipped stuff elsewhere, in the past. I didn't see where thay were saying he chipped everything he ever climbed.
|
|
the horror
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:34pm PT
|
Todd and Paul have an important ethic (perhaps the most important) that you dumbshits seem to lack - they are friendly and nice.
|
|
Melissa
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:36pm PT
|
?,
crystalpsycho specifically said that he was chiseling on the direct and this whole thread is in the context of what he's up to on WDD. He could have carved Mt. Rushmore in the past, but my point is that I don't think any of it comes to bear on what he's doing as far as manufacturing holds in yosemite.
I have heard from others who have recently done the Dihedral that he cleaned a lot of old fixed junk out of it thus 'creating' new clean placements for us ladder climbers and probably holds for himself. I consider this a service.
Melissa
|
|
?
Novice climber
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2002 - 01:39pm PT
|
Man-
You really have to take copious notes to keep up around here!
I stand corrected.
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!