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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:11am PT
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It is not unexpected that people who put up routes are reluctant to agree that there is a best style, as they do not often put up routes in the best style.
That leads to the requirement to justify why...
I find it strange. But you could take the OP definition of style and describe it...
An example of a climb put up in "best style" is Fireside Chat that Shippley and Middendorf put up on Fireside Bluff, a cliff frequented by few others (though they have posted here)...
abelgabel and I put up a route Natural which probably follows the same line, we didn't advertise it, but we also didn't alter it...
I think Clint and partner may have done it, or seen it too... and maybe Sean Jones who had been up there...
A natural passage up the cliff's weakness with so few alterations that the "second ascent" thought it was doing a first ascent. Here alteration is extended to include knowledge...
I still maintain that we all would agree that a first ascent in the style I had stated in the OP is "best style"
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:12am PT
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Are we confusing style with ethics again? I question whether an objective best style exists. To declare any particular style "best" has as much validity, to me, as my saying that Beethoven's piano music is the best. I find it that, but why should anyone else?
I do, however, agree that the best ethic would be to leave the route in such a condition that the next climbers can have the same experience -- with all its uncertainties -- that the first ascenders had. I guess that means do it without altering anything on the mountain and then don't tell anybody.
To me, the unique thing about a first ascent is the uncertainty of whether the route will go in the style [there's that word again] in which I am attempting it. As soon as the climbing community knows that a route goes, say, free with natural protection, that uncertainty disappears.
My own feeling on style owes a lot to Lito Tejada-Flores in "Games Climbers Play." We start with bouldering and work up to expeditionary tactics. Maybe because I started climbing by bouldering, that remains the purest -- and therefore best -- style to me.
John
Edit: Ed, I read your last post after I posted mine. We seem to agree in our outlook.
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:13am PT
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The point being where technology enables anyone the ability to get up anything.
And that IS the point, and the point has ever been with us. The minute a mountaineer puts on plastic boots or a parka, it's "aid."
Climbing shoes are "aid."
As you said, chalk is "aid."
You seem to want to back up from the buck-naked, onsight, unroped solo of all first ascents as the sole or pure exemplar of your definition; but but that is precisely what your definition entails.
The minute a "climber" changes the game from that standard of "purity," they are doing "aid" climbing, and all bets are off. Then we're just playing around in the realm of preference.
Or, there's something fundamentally wrong with your definition.
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Laine
Trad climber
Reno, NV
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:16am PT
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You start at the ground and climb to the top without resorting to any aid, and making the minimum possible alteration of the route from the state that you found it. Not able to maintain this style, the first ascent attempt is abandoned in a manner that leaves it as unaltered as possible making it available for future attempts.
I would agree there is pretty good consensus that GU FAs are the "best" method to establish a route.
However the lines get fuzzy, especially when it comes to establishing harder climbs. Lots of people will climb a new route on TR, but don't consider the FA to occur until it is lead clean (which by definition I believe is untrue). Conversely lots of great free routes were often FA'd on aid. Often is the case on shorter routes, people will sanitize the line prior to sending it (cleaning, trundling, etc.).
I'm wondering if staunch GU FAists feel these are violations of the "best style" principle. Also, I wonder how much the sport would have progressed (or not progressed) if these ideals were strictly adhered to by all. For example, many of the big Valley climbs might still be undone.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:16am PT
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consider an aid climb that becomes a free climb (like many of the routes on El Capitan today)
think what climbing might have been had we waited for our craft to have so advanced that Lynne's FFA of the Nose would have been the FA
what would we have lost, what would we have gained, had that style prevailed?
so aid climbs are established with "less than best style"
that doesn't invalidate them, or say they shouldn't have been done, but it does define the FA
it is fascinating that climbers feel threatened by this discussion, especially those doing first ascents.
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:20am PT
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Lol!
Best!! What's best?!
There is no best!!
Only perceptions!!
Shame on you Ed!
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Vitaliy M.
Mountain climber
San Francisco
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:21am PT
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Simple answer to the question...
To me the best style would be hiking in somewhere far from the road, spent a night below a giant rock face that makes me want to sh#t myself, than waking up and picking a line up the middle. Climbing at my limit for majority of the day, doing it on gear (just because putting in bolts is a lot of work and requires extra gear), no falls/no hangs/no aid, topping out, getting to the top with someone I enjoy climbing with, getting back to camp with just enough time to have an awesome dinner, reflecting on experience and passing the f*#k out after a jug of hot chocolate. That is what I would like the most. I would have the most fun this way.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:22am PT
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I could have replaced "best" by "global minimum of the cost function" and proceeded to lecture on what that means...
but I'll stick to my guns, you are all being intentionally argumentative
I have stated what the consensus "best style first ascent" is...
...you all know that.
What you are arguing over is why you don't always do a "best style first ascent"
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
Nothing creative to say
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:25am PT
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if the style of the first ascent requires fixed gear (thereby making style an ethical issue), then best style needs to appeal to some other principle?
no? (honest question)
remove the fixed gear question, and all you have is style. As such, style is limited to the best style... for you. Else style is a comparative. If comparative, is it then competition? Does that motivate the 'race to be first?' As such, the race to be first informs the style and ethic?
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:28am PT
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that doesn't invalidate them, or say the shouldn't have been done, but it does define the FA
I'm glad Harding did the Nose when he did it, and I think it's undeniable that the climbing community has vastly benefited from what he did when he did it.
What definitions like yours, Ed, struggle with are the intangibles of climbing that cannot be captured by such austere definitions of "best style." You cannot effectively objectify "best style" as a one-size-fits-all analysis. What people gain from climbing is so varied, and what counts as "best" for the climbing community is so tied to what many/most are seeking when they climb, and that subjective valuation changes so much over time and with technological changes themselves, that even the attempt at objectivity is a profound distortion of value.
it is fascinating that climbers feel threatened by this discussion, especially those doing first ascents.
What evidence do you have that anybody is feeling threatened?
I, for one, simply think your definition is mistaken and that it loads the discussion toward "objective assessment" of "style," when I deny that this can be done.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:30am PT
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it is fascinating that climbers feel threatened by this discussion, especially those doing first ascents.
Interesting observation. I think it reflects our underlying desire to beat somebody (Again, I borrow this from Lito Tejada-Flores). If there is a "best" FA style, then I must be better than someone else if I do my FA in a "better" style than that someone else.
I'm still pondering your discussion about the Nose, though. I'm applying that to a different FA, namely that of Higher Cathedral Spire. By the end of WWII, the Spire was climbed all free. Was the FFA done in better style than the FA? In one sense, yes, because it involved no aid, but it also involved a lot less uncertainty and pushing into unknown territory. Using 1934 California climbing technology to climb the Spire was, to me, an amazingly bold feat. As great as the FFA was, it just doesn't seem as bold a thrust as the FA.
I suspect that the set of climbing styles may not be well-ordered.
John
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:35am PT
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I have stated what the consensus "best style first ascent" is...
...you all know that.
Read: "I'm right, and you all know that."
What you are arguing over is why you don't always do a "best style first ascent"
Read: "The very fact that you are arguing with me demonstrates the moral turpitude that disallows you from doing anything valuable in climbing."
LOL
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:35am PT
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I, for one, simply think your definition is mistaken and that it loads the discussion toward "objective assessment" of "style," when I deny that this can be done.
so you advocate that there is no style? or that there is no definable style? or no definable "best" style?
I think you would be wrong to assert any of those. I think your ideas have more to to with intention then with style, and we climb with many different intentions, intentions often justify the style we climb with...
I also think you feel that you would be held to a "best style" definition, but that is not my intention... it is not a matter of judging good or bad... but a comparison with what is "best"
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jstan
climber
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:35am PT
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYG0ZuTv5rs
Those interested in why we climb and why we climb the way we do, might consider watching the above study of levels of stress found among monkey cultures and among human societies. Very strong parallels exist. So strong I expect their language will immediately become understandable once we identify the vocalization that translates as "you f*#king as#@&%e." ST like even as to the practice of banning.
Enjoy.
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Laine
Trad climber
Reno, NV
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:47am PT
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I don't think doing it in the best style really matters to the climbing community as a whole, but to the individual. If I put up a route in the best style possible, it feels better than a TD FA. But over time those feels fade and what is left is simply the route itself. So long as it is a good one, I'm happy. But then again I'm just a average dude with nothing to prove. I'm with V on this one - girls just wanna have fun.
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:49am PT
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I'm just teasing Ed.
But seriously, if there was Bosch bulldogs in 1955 we wouldn't even consider having this conversation.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:49am PT
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a first ascent usually "takes" the route
once taken, it is not available to anyone else in the community to do a "first ascent" on
so it is a matter of concern to the community.
further, the style with which the first ascent is done in may trigger other consequences, e.g. climbing bans by land managers
it is not just an "individual matter" it has consequences for the entire community
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:50am PT
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I also think you feel that you would be held to a "best style" definition, but that is not my intention... it is not a matter of judging good or bad... but a comparison with what is "best"
I'm now confident that I don't understand you fully, because the passage just quoted seems contradictory to me.
Are you treating "good" and "bad" as absolutes and "comparison with what is 'best'" as on a sliding scale?
Climbers do judge the "style" of first ascents. My contention with your definition and even approach has to do with the fact, not supposition but fact, that the evaluation contemplates a vast array of "variables" that are not objectively quantifiable (intention being just one tiny one).
You seem to want to isolate "style" according to your definition, but that then co-opts that term in a way that literally makes it unavailable in its otherwise WIDELY used contexts! What term would you then put in its place in such contexts? "Ethics?" (Oh, please, God, no!)
We DO mean by "style" a host of intangibles that your definition simply does not and cannot capture. And that fact is what makes the inevitable "judging" of first ascents so fraught with controversy. The "judges" are using varying and moving targets of "best."
I certainly understand the desire to quantify "best," but your stab at it reveals exactly why the effort is doomed.
No, instead, climbers will continue to passionately talk past each other, as well they should, because they are often not talking about "the same thing" at all.
No problem. Most of the time we work our way closer to understanding of each other, which is the point of discussion in the first place.
Reminds me of a quote from somebody: "The biggest mistake in communication is the belief that it is happening at all."
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jun 20, 2014 - 11:56am PT
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I disagree,
and I think you are arguing from a position of anticipating being judged for FAs you've done...
that isn't my intention, however, defining "best style" doesn't have to include any "law" regarding adherence to that style... I'm not advocating that....
you could then ask, legitimately, what is the purpose of defining a "best style" if not to beat everyone into submission... but there is where we discuss why we use "less then best style"
Vitaliy M. gave a description of a climb that fits all of our ideals of a first ascent, it is done in "the best style"
you disagree?
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Vitaliy M.
Mountain climber
San Francisco
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Jun 20, 2014 - 12:06pm PT
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I disagree with it being universally best. Because each climber is unique. Each climber can seek different experience from their FA on a different day too. Maybe some day what I described is best, but on some other day he feels like rap bolting a beautiful face pitch, or putting up a bolted slab death route. Moods change. There is no universal best. I don't think there is at least. Just my opinion.
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