Alex Honnold Free Climbs the Salathe

Discussion Topic

Return to Forum List

This thread has been locked

Messages 21 - 33 of total 33 in this topic

<< First | < Previous | Show All | Next > | Last >>

Steve Grossman

Trad climber

Seattle, WA

Oct 16, 2007 - 01:05pm PT

Congrats again Alex on an even more awesome season! Way to execute up there in the wild air. Totally inspiring!

James

climber

A tent in the redwoods

Oct 16, 2007 - 01:07pm PT

Sjong and Stack followed the 13b way too.

Levy

Big Wall climber

So Cal

Oct 16, 2007 - 01:17pm PT

One word comes to mind - Proud!

A fine effort, the day is fast approaching when someone will walk up and onsight the thing with no pre-inspection, in a day but for now Alex's ascent is the high water mark and will be a tough act to follow.

Levy

adventurewagen

Trad climber

Seattle

Oct 16, 2007 - 02:02pm PT

NO matter what you consider a redpoint or in a day or not. Ground up no falls is just awesome! Definitely a proud send.

I think Yuji went for the onsight, didn't he? If I read Clints page it says he fell a few times but did the entire route ground up with little to no beta on the route but a little help on gear.

Again, who really cares. Climbing that many pitches from the bottom up with little or no falls, no pulling on gear and releading any pitches you fall on clean is truly amazing.

It's especially amazing if you don't work every pitch into submission and work things ground up. At some point memorizing and TR'ing all the pitches till you get them seems more like an exercise than true hard man climbing skill. Not that any amount of TR'ing would get me a clean ascent on all the pitches!

k-man

Gym climber

SCruz

Oct 16, 2007 - 02:40pm PT

"Redpointing" does not mean no falls ever, it just means no falls when you actually succeed in leading the pitch(es).

You go up to the Moratorium and fly up the first two 5.10 pitches, then fall off the crux. You pull the rope and send. Is that a redpoint of the *route*? Not in my book. Sure, you redpointed the crux after a fall, but not the route.

Does it matter, well yes and no.

climber

The Eye of the Snail

Oct 16, 2007 - 02:59pm PT

The Promised One has arrived.

Oh and smartass edit: On that pitch below the Roof, that 12d or whatever corner, the FA team penjied a few feet left out of that onto a face KB/LA crack that goes up under the roof. Whether the Monster counts or not isn't up to me, but watch out making a strict "original route" argument because the minutia can get pretty damn small with that.

Broken

climber

Texas

Oct 16, 2007 - 03:07pm PT

I think there is a simple way to define free-climbing: if you could magically rewind and take the rope away during your ascent, would you have hit the ground?

Under that definition, to truly free a multi-pitch climb would require no falls.

I realize that the term redpoint is used for other purposes, and that it would require an absurd amount of time for someone to apply that ethic to a really hard big wall free climb (though there are some who do, like Beat Kammerlander - see Alpinist 9:
http://www.alpinist.com/doc/ALP09/kammerlander-mathis);.

And I also know that you could push it to the point of absurdity, like "weighting the anchors = not free climbing." That would, of course, be ridiculous and beside the point. Now, I know that falls on a multi-pitch route with individual redpoints of pitches is generally accepted as redpointed / freed.

Personally, though, I only consider it as free w/ no falls and no hanging belays.

Gene

climber

Oct 16, 2007 - 03:15pm PT

"Personally, though, I only consider it as free w/ no falls and no hanging belays."

In order to do that, wouldn't Caldwell need like a 900 foot rope to free the Dihedral? {Question, not arguement.}

Matt

Trad climber

never ever pissing into the wind

Oct 16, 2007 - 03:18pm PT

re: redpoint / does it matter

it really is insignificant when you are an average climber looking up at the exploits of these elite climbers. either way, it's amazing what they are doing. that said, there are climbers at every level who have decided it's important to them to climb in this style or that style, and that's really where there is or is not a difference, within one's own sense of style.

i guess you could ask jim herson if he thinks it matters or not, but his answer is not the same answer you'd get from others. sitting in the peanut gallery, my opinion is that my opinion doesn't (and shouldn't) matter to those guys anyway. they ought to be out there climbing for themselves and setting their own standards, just like the rest of us do.

edit-
climbing w/ a partner or rope soloing
freeing all pitches while sharing leads
leading all pitches
leading all pitches w/ no falls
returning to a no hands stance and pulling rope after falls
working crux pitches
flashing
on-sighting
climbing the route in a continuous ascent, in a push, in one day

even if we say these don't matter (to us?), that is different from saying there is not a distinction between them.

adventurewagen

Trad climber

Seattle

Oct 16, 2007 - 03:30pm PT

Seems to me the limitation is gear if you want to go that far off the deep end. Ropes are only so long and you can only carry so much gear if you want to make use of said rope. So I guess if you wanted a truly "free" or "redpoint" ascent you'd have to lose the rope and the gear and free solo the route. Then you either make it or you don't. Pretty cut and dry at that point.

For the rest of us sane people I'll stick with my gear and the notion that its ok to hang at the belay which is mostly determined by rope length and/or good logical stopping/belay points. I'll stick with the ideals that if I lead all pitches without ANY falls it's better form than if I piece mealed the ascent together.

If I get an onsight, hooray. If I get a redpoint from ground up attempts, yippee. If I TR it into submission and finally get it then good job on the effort or if I just get it clean on TR then I'd probably be happy as well. Does anybody else care, no.

In other words to each his own. We all know proud sends when we see them and there is no reason to take one persons achievement and toss it because it doesn't measure up to anothers.

Ground up on Salathe with NO falls is pretty cool. Is it better than ground up with a single fall but an eventual clean send of that pitch out of many??? No probably not, it was just another send with one less error than the other guy. Same feat just lost a couple imaginary points for the slip up ;)

James

climber

A tent in the redwoods

Oct 16, 2007 - 03:34pm PT

Kelly,
If you had to pull the rope a couple times on the 12b enduro corner at the top of the freerider, having already sent the business, wouldn't you claim a redpoint? I would. Though I'd probably have the first bolt of Black Dagger clipped too.