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WBraun
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 11, 2007 - 11:18pm PT
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Oh yes it does. It makes sense. The FA did it and it stands forever .
Well at least for 427,000 more years ......
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john hansen
climber
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:19pm PT
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I'm sure alot of routes were intentionally run out but there were probably alot where there just wasn't a spot to stop and drill and they couldn't reverse the moves, and the only thing to do is just keep moving before you run out of grip.
It's easy to think in the Rap bolting era that the route needs a bolt in a certain spot. But could you place it there on lead?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:28pm PT
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The nerve of these climber types.
I just don't get how anybody could be so presumptuous as to start a new route at the bottom and then deal with whatever limitations might be encountered on the way to the top. Man that is just egotistical hooey.
And to think entire climbing communities once supported, even strove to expand such an approach...
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:40pm PT
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It is presumptuous to assert some guy who (i) just broke up with his girlfriend, (ii) is suicidal, (iii) is high on angel dust or whatever drug was popular in 1976, or (iv) just plain crazy, forever dictates how a given piece of rock is climbed.
I've only ever done routes ground up, and never added a bolt to anyone's climb and seriously doubt I would. But I still don't understand the sense of entitlement evidenced here.
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WBraun
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 11, 2007 - 11:46pm PT
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on the edge
You missed the boat seriously.
The rock is entitled and the climber is only part of it.
The two go together to make one and a whole.
Not everything can be understood with our limited minds only.
But when the soul of the climb speaks to your heart, you will then "see".
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:50pm PT
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Well, it's not the first boat I've missed, even though I might be trolling a bit here. Gotta get back to the brief I am supposed to be writing and the giant's game- it's getting good.
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bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:52pm PT
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My take on it...I think it's somewhat unfair for a 5.12 climber to establish run-out 5.9 routes.
But a 5.12/5.11/5.10 etc.. climber doing runout routes close to or at their limit is quite a beautiful thing.
Not a testimony of one's gear but a testimony of keeping the mind and body together and doing it with the lack of.
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john hansen
climber
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Sep 11, 2007 - 11:59pm PT
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on the edge...what about a guy just climbing. Making moves with confidence, knowing his limitations and staying within them. Just putting up another route.
Like Peter Croft or Bacher.
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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Sep 12, 2007 - 12:07am PT
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John Hansen- routes put up in the style you speak of are probably routes no one would ever consider altering. Lots of areas have test pieces that should be let alone. However, there are lot a of routes out there that don't fall into that category and are dangerous for reasons having nothing to do with boldness, vision or flow. I think anyone who has climbed for a while can tell the difference.
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bachar
Trad climber
Mammoth Lakes, CA
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Sep 12, 2007 - 12:35am PT
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Russ - good one bro, I owe ya' a brew....
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Sep 12, 2007 - 12:38am PT
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It is presumptuous to assert some guy who (i) just broke up with his girlfriend, (ii) is suicidal, (iii) is high on angel dust or whatever drug was popular in 1976, or (iv) just plain crazy, forever dictates how a given piece of rock is climbed.
I think this is disrespectful of most of the FAs and FFAs as the leaders of those teams overcame their fears and pushed a way through. They worked their routes with no knowledge of what difficulties they would encounter, whether or not they would be able to get protection in, or if they would be able to pull the necessary moves. I'd say that all routes are much more difficult the first time up than on any subsequent trip. The FA teams deserve our respect for doing what they did.
For those teams who fall under one of the categories (i) through (iv) above, I defend them also. Is the art of an artist stoned out of his mind on absinthe, so distraut in love that he cuts his ear off any less beautiful than the artist who is socially well adjusted? If you assume that the FA was just reckless than perhaps you might question the validity of the ascent, but many of these same people had put up many climbs at the limits of climbing... it wasn't that they needed temporary insanity to accomplish these feats, it was that they were excellent climbers.
Climbing is not just the atheletic physical performance of a well trained climber. It requires physical improvisation in response to a changing medium and the capability to think through the physical moves in response to those changes. On a first ascent, the changes are not even known and it becomes all the more beautiful an experience. The successful improvisation becomes a route, and the changes known... those that follow can prepare both physically and mentally.
For routes put up in that style, I believe that we should allow them to remain as much as they were when the FA put them up.
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rick d
Social climber
tucson, az
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Sep 12, 2007 - 12:42am PT
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so what about gear then?
The jerkoff "Alf" suggested everything should had only bolts (even back country stuff) circa 1987. To take Hedge's comments a little further- everything should be super safe and have bolts added to remove all fall factor.
JB, Largo- ready to go bolt bottom to top Astroman?
new pro for the route: 17 'draws' and a cordelette (I own neither)
I've done a lot of FA's where I wanted to leave few 'footprints' for others to follow. (of course, I never expect anyone to find my routes for the most part) Repeat leaders can find their own way and "play the chess game" to determine the line of least resistance. Skinner once said of the Czech towers he visited that local ethics limited bolts to 3 per 80 feet (those big ring things). I simply duplicated that for standard free pitches to 6 bolts per 160 feet. Pitches that required more than 6 bolts- I would not drill. Hopefully, they would take clean pro or even a fixed pin first. I have seen others create great drilled lines exceeding this limit- but I have seen tens of thousands of crap routes exceeding this.
Just remember Shiprock and the stink of bolts there- and Arizona's own Ray Garner blowing it for the Canadian Rockies on Mt Brussels.
Oh well, I'm off Thursday to tackle a 4-6" 30' crack to overhanging 35' 4-8" crack. My partner and I won't need the bolts for that.
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Out on the sand.... man.....
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Sep 12, 2007 - 12:56am PT
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What was this thread about again???? anyway.... so I'm in the "meadows" as the beautiful people call it, just last week..... There are tons of routes there that I'm just flat out too scared or too out of shape to do.... maybe I'll never be able to do them.... and that is fine too, but the key is that they are there and available if I want to do them. I don't want them to be "sanitized". So I grow like one or maybe two hairs on my sack and decide to do a route that is sorta run out. Sure, it is piss easy at 5.9c or so, but you could still take some giant falls if you blew it.... but it was the best route I did the entire trip, and maybe all year.... why? not because it was hard, but because it was challenging and brought something more than a clip-up to the game. If there were bolts every few feet, it would be yet another exercise of pulling in safety. There is not much attraction in that for me, and I am sure glad the route has retained some teeth after all these years. I did plenty of these easy and well protected slabs on this last trip, and they are are all kinda ho-hum, whatever..... they will never give the same feeling of vitality and exhilaration that a run out route can provide, at least for me. I suppose a fair question is, which is more important: leaving a so called Museum Climb for the one or two guys who do the route each year and get a big stoke from it, or retro bolting all the museum climbs so the average punter can clip up the things in relative safety? I say have something left to dream about and aspire to. Another clip up is not really the answer.
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Wonder
climber
WA
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Sep 12, 2007 - 01:11am PT
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Another crappy ass skatepark will never give me the stoke...
as one we could build ourselves...
PS Russ & Maysho & Watusi & all the rest of you I will answer your emails when I build up the courage to do so. Sooon.
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Anastasia
Trad climber
California
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Sep 12, 2007 - 02:08am PT
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If you want "safe" climbing, go to the gym. At least they have insurance and the right to worry about making climbs achievable for most of their clients.
As for museum climbs, I will be very offended if anyone changed a Kamps route just to make it "safer." Kamps did most of his climbs in hiking boots for God sakes! He didn't even have sticky rubber! IT is true that his routes are run out and are very HARD for their ratings! That is what makes them CLASSIC!
That is why thinking about him putting a bolt from the ground up on some of those slabs gives me the willies...
Let me just say that for those of you that think a 5.9 route in the Meadows is harder than what you are use to at the gym or sport routes... Then stop climbing in the gym/sport crags and learn how to trad climb a 5.9 in the Meadows. DON'T try to make a trad route into a gym or sport's route!!! If you changed the climb to fit your needs/ability, it would be like trying to appreciate Shakespeare from only reading a one paragraph summary of all his works. Doing such an act would destroy for all generations the chance to measure their abilities against the people before them.
In fact if you need to change a route just to make it safer (which actually is about making it easier to climb...) STAY HOME AND DON'T DARE GO NEAR ANY KAMPS, REARICK, HIGGINS, ROYAL, etc. ROUTE.
IN FACT STAY INDOORS AND AWAY FROM ANY REAL CLIMBING AREAS. Since you can't handle the climb, then don't pretend. Stay home and leave it for someone who can.
Anastasia
P.S.
By the way "old guys..." Since I am thirty-four, I represent a new generation that wants to keep the FA's as they are forever. If I can lead "You Ask for It," like the original FA, can you imagine what that would imply? That would be "incredible!"
That brings in the point that the original routes are untouched so the next generation can measure itself accurately! Nothing is wrong in being humbled by those that came before us...
AF
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Sep 12, 2007 - 02:47am PT
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Let's all move beyond the silly protection habit anyhow and just air it all out, shall we? Dresden Style.
Plain old fashioned "pants filling airfalls!" LOL Ascent 1974
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Jaybro
Social climber
The West
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Sep 12, 2007 - 03:07am PT
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If, when you go out for a day of craggin', and you don't at least wonder, in the back of your mind, if you might not be risking a potential pants full ... Then why bother?
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Anastasia
Trad climber
California
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Sep 12, 2007 - 04:03am PT
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A detail from a Roger Brown photo of Bob Kamps at Rock One Stoney Point, probably 1959.
Bob Kamps and Dave Rearick were heading east on old Rt. 66. They saw a photo of this formation on the wall of a diner. The rancher owner bet them a steak dinner they couldn't climb it. They won the bet but Bob lost the seat of his pants riding out to the pinnacle in the back of the rancher's pickup. Photo by Dave Rearick.
Uploaded from:
http://www.bobkamps.com/
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BadInfluence
Mountain climber
Dak side
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Sep 12, 2007 - 07:14am PT
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it should remain the way the FFA did the climb!
know why because if the FA ascentist did not put up a climb, spurto's would just drive by, look at the guidebook and say well no climbs here let's go to New crap city & clip some shiners. we all know spurto's lack vision. werner i'm kind of young and F**kin hate bolts.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Sep 12, 2007 - 10:36am PT
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Little metal worry boogers......and usually not museum quality!
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