What Is Trad ?????????

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Jaybro

Social climber

Wolf City, Wyoming

Apr 13, 2013 - 02:37pm PT

Here's what trad looks like today, and it's my lead and I'm scared
fukc still flipped
Oops ran out of fours! Grug's turn!

Dingus McGee

Social climber

Laramie

Apr 13, 2013 - 02:39pm PT

Now of some of you have said you would rather be climbing than posting. And yes that is what i have been doing since my last entry.

But hiking back to the van, Erickson was a cook without a coo. 100% of the sport climbers would agree with me! No one else here today. Finally I successfully grigri toproped an overhanging crimper route I have been working on for some time.

For you golden boys this story is possible: walk up to a crack and lead it or ignore it as it is too dirty. In 1979 Chip Saloun wrote a Climbing mag letter telling of how he had been victimized. It's the story of how I stole his route, previewed his route when I cleaned it and then lied about DOING IT FREE. I GOT to see Chip on his attempt and I see we had different levels of skill. He was good at touting Erickson and I has some skill at roof and thin cracks.

tradmanclimbs

Ice climber

Pomfert VT

Apr 13, 2013 - 02:41pm PT

It always sucks major dog snot when a group of young kids read a henry barber book, have a rennsance and then turn into the rock police! Funny thing is you run into them a decade later and they are usually a bit more resonable...

ydpl8s

Trad climber

Santa Monica, California

Apr 13, 2013 - 02:44pm PT

Amen Locker! That reminds me of the 4th of July 1976 (Bicenntenial), I was climbing the Ellingwood Ledges on Crestone Needle with Jim Nigro, and a friend of his named Mick. The last 2 pitches are the only real technical ones, so the 3 of us were just 3rd classing up and right, all on different routes, through the grassy ledges to meet the headwall where we were going to rope up. There was a group from the Texas Mountaineering Club on the lower pitches of Ellingwood that yelled over to us "what climb are you guys on?" Jim Nigro yelled back "the arete", and they yelled back "you guys are way off route, you need to go back down and start below us!" All of us were laughing so hard that we almost fell off of our respective 5.4 holds. When we got to the summit, long before they did, Mick left a Philo type, graphic picture of a flaming red as*hole, and a note hoping they enjoyed their climb.

I know it was childish, but the whole reason we were there in the first place was to get away from the rules and regs of daily life!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 02:49pm PT

"you guys are way off route, you need to go back down and start below us!"

Hilarious: that's a true gem!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 02:52pm PT

Dingus McGee your problem is you just haven't worn out like the rest of us; know go back and kick ass on some more overhanging crimps for me won't you?

McHale's Navy

Trad climber

Panorama City, California & living in Seattle

Apr 13, 2013 - 02:55pm PT

If a pitch has 1 or 2 gear placements and a dozen bolts, why not just bolt the whole pitch? Especially if the surrounding routes and area are mostly sport and the bolts on the pitch are rap placed....

Viva La Difference!

I put up a little climb once called the Drop-Dead traverse. It was a free route. It had a knife-blade placement and a bolt. I always enjoyed putting that blade in - it kind of made the route for me for some reason. Maybe it was the deliberatness of the act. It gave the route a trad character and that was about 1970. These different aspects of a climb are part of what gives them their character.

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 02:57pm PT

Let's hear it for Mount Woodson!
That place is still pretty trad and that's probably not going to change anytime soon.

Mike Paul in the late 1800s, Hear My Train A Comin' :

photo Russ Walling

Jaybro

Social climber

Wolf City, Wyoming

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:13pm PT

Speaking of Woodson
The mighty Grug!

And if anyone knows how to mikes phone jump horizontal in the field spill! I tried Every orientation!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 03:17pm PT

JayBro's all about lateral yardage; when the going gets tough the tough go sideways.

Jaybro

Social climber

Wolf City, Wyoming

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:17pm PT

Mirrors locker, mirrors!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 03:17pm PT

Mt. Woodson 2007:
Let's hear it for boring, repetitive, thuggish cracks!
And a big double hand clap for burned-out, crusty brittle old trad dads who never got the memo!!!

Jaybro

Social climber

Wolf City, Wyoming

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:26pm PT

You're uploading faster than we're climbing!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 03:31pm PT

I bet you three finger locks and two beers I hurt worse!

Jaybro

Social climber

Wolf City, Wyoming

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:33pm PT

Wish I didn't believe you Roy!

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Topic Author's Reply - Apr 13, 2013 - 03:35pm PT

I know locker huh.
Trad climbers have all the silly ass rules.
Like Yabo used to say: Stonemaster must never, under any circumstances ever use a roach clip.

Mark Force

Trad climber

Cave Creek, AZ

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:37pm PT

Locker, knock yourself out. Climb anyway you want. Nobody really cares how you climb or how I climb as long as we're not effing up the rock a whole bunch when we're doing it. Climbing is really all about doing what ever you want to do with willing partners that ends up making you feel good (just like good sex)!

rgold

Trad climber

Poughkeepsie, NY

Apr 13, 2013 - 03:40pm PT

Plaisir climbing is movement in Europe with Switzerland as its epicenter, to create climbs that are totally safe and free from anxiety. Many of these routes have many pitches, closely bolted from top to bottom, including crack climbs that could be protected in their entirety with trad gear. There are enough plaisir climbs that there are multiple guidebooks with plaisir climbing in the title.

The role of commercial interests in this is substantial, since the plaisir climbs make for eminently guideable routes; note the comments in tradmanclimbs last post in this regard for the beginnings of the corresponding U.S. reaction.

The European guide organizations have also been active in comfortizing other routes to enhance guideability, e.g. installing bolted belay anchors on the NW Face of the Piz Badile (climbed in 1937 by Cassin et. al.) and the Zmutt ridge of the Matterhorb (climbed in 1897 by Mummery). The guides have not, however, turned these into plaisir climbs by bolting the pitches---the anchors are about 30m apart---in the hope that they will not reduce their client base by making the routes too easy to lead.

We've seen only the tiniest beginnings of commercial influence in this country. For example, the Exum guides put a bolt on the scramble from lower to upper saddle years ago. Bolts to make routes safer for clients have come and gone on Whitehorse and Cathedral ledges (I don't know the current status).

I think anyone who wants to know where things are headed ought to pay attention to what has happened in Europe, which provides a by-no-means-hypothetical slippery slope vision for what is possible when a sport-climbing mentality flows unrestricted beyond its natural environmental bounds, aided and abetted by an unholy alliance with commercial interests, and thinly overlaid with pious safety proclamations aimed at controlling authorities.