Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
|
|
eww! now we're talking...
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
So who was the rogue sar informer?
Weird? I heard it was a climber that made the complaint about the drill but I never knew it was a sar guy.
Who was it?
|
|
Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
|
|
Dogpile on the rogue informer!!!
Heck, the perp prolly is a member of the TacoSalad™
Two, three steps away tops.....
|
|
T2
climber
Cardiff by the sea
|
|
Sweet now instead of this thread being an ethics debate it can be whitch hunt. :)
Thanks for bringing back the article Tarbuster and Mike. Eppies photos are freaking killer. Nice words as well Scott. Adventure Baby that is what it is all about!!
|
|
Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
|
|
Hi,
For me this event was kind of heartbreaking too. It is always a real shock when authority finds its way into special and almost private realms and to find them “on” a big wall is frankly creepy. It is like discovering your partner is CIA or something.
Most of the time we know that “they” are otherwise occupied what with all their other crazed pointless points of interest. Like speeding, vehicle reg, and what they imagine is our Great American Drug War, another really productive American theme, spending many many billions on nothing other than authority-for-itself.
Mike B. did us a favor deciding on posting the Climbing article here!! In current context, their transgression is pretty minor, the devastating outcome is not in scale to the issue. As usual. I am sorry their historic ascent had to turn out this way. For them and for us. All those years ago.
|
|
'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
|
|
What's with all the pre-placed pro in the photos? I thought you guys said you climbed it ground-up? Or did you aid the pitch, and then free it? But you can't call it a free ascent if the gear is pre-placed, can you?
After you worked the pitch to get the free moves, you pulled out all the gear, then led it free from the bottom placing the gear, right?
|
|
Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
|
|
"Lance the surfer guy was the informant."
Surely you can't mean...
The one from Apocalypse Now?
I never would've figured him for that.
[edit]
(oh cripes .... now a non sequitur post ....what to do)
Either I self-destruct this post or leave it because it makes the thread all the richer.
|
|
T2
climber
Cardiff by the sea
|
|
I think that line was more like
"DON'T GET OUT OF THE BOAT, NEVER GET OUT OF THE F*#KING BOAT"
|
|
Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
|
|
Just a question and not meaning to imply any judgement:
After the bolting bust, I remember a round of apologies and "we were wrong" speeches. Maybe I'm wrong but sort of doubt it.
Now I hear "We did nothing wrong. We stand by our actions 100%"
I'm sure there was pressure from many sides for contrition. I'm just wondering what the process was like becoming the fall guys for the demon called powerdrilling and how ya go from doing it, to apologizing for it, and then defending it again.
Again, I'm just trying to learn how these things happen so I'll be wise during my next screwup. Not sayin anything about rite and rong here.
Peace
karl
|
|
the kid
Trad climber
fayetteville, wv
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jan 5, 2009 - 10:35am PT
|
KArl,
Yes there were the apologies as i was sorry to get busted and cause a stir. I would still do it the same way and still stand behind our intentions to get good bolts in the rock. this was 7 years before the ASCA. The nose and may other routes of the day were equipped with power drills (cookie monster).
It was a heart break to work so freakin hard and in the best style we could muster to do this route and then not free that one pitch and have the rangers go undercover and spend a ton of YOUR money to make an example out of 3 rock climbers.
and to answer pete's question- why the pre placed gear. We aided each pitch to clean the grub out of the locks and then go for the onsight to speed up our efforts. 32 pitches takes a long time to free, so i would aid cozies free pitch and he would go for it sight unseen. they call this pink point i believe and this allowed us to move a bit more quickly. the goal was to climb each pitch free and not spend the whole year on it.
again, the key here is having never been on the route in the first place the goal was to find a big adventure and have FUN doing it.
is it perfect, hell no. was it fun, it was until the summit, and then a big bummer. next to losing my father to cancer, the biggest bummer in my life.
now can we get back to climbing and story telling?
ks
|
|
the kid
Trad climber
fayetteville, wv
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jan 5, 2009 - 10:37am PT
|
yea! my post made it to 100!
Now if i could get you guys to take an interest in the mt top mining that is destroying West Virgina and get that post past 100 i would be doing the climbing world a favor by showing you what happens in my back yard.
Clean coal is a myth and we still need it but please don;t chop down the mountains to get it!
ks
|
|
'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
|
|
Thanks for your response, Kurt. I speak as one who retired from trad free climbing some time ago, and never took up sport, so I don't understand anything about pink or red points. Sorry to be a dumbass, but can you please help me clarify my thinking:
You each aided and cleaned the other guy's pitch, so each free climbing leader had not been up there before. Did you leave the gear in place, then lead the pitch clipping the pre-placed gear for protection? Is this a pinkpoint? Is this considered free, or knott?
Please provide a link to the West Va. coal mining thread. I'm a caver, I care.
Cheers,
Pete
|
|
JLP
Social climber
The internet
|
|
Pete - it is was it is and they stated what they did. Go better it, or stfu.
|
|
'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
|
|
Gotcha. Just read the magazine article - a great story! I especially liked the part about hauling all the gear up the wall, and living like kings. Forty minutes to jug to Mammoth with a fifty-pound load is truly amazing. I would absolutely LOVE to see some photos of your "supply chain" - all the dirtbag Camp 4 reprobate free climbers trying to figure out not only how to operate a pair of jugs, which many would not have initially been familiar with, but to do so for a thousand feet while carrying a fifty-pound pig.
Once you get it figured out, it only takes about twenty-five minutes to remove a rusty quarter-incher, drill out the hole to 3/8" and put in a new fatty bolt. I'm glad power drills aren't allowed up there. I'm relieved you guys didn't drill bolts for pro next to a C2 crack like what happened above The Ledge on Dihedral Wall.
I was also wondering, along with Karl, about the apparent change of tone? Weren't you guys required, as part of your sentence, to deliver lectures about the evils of using power drills, and didn't you apologize hand over foot again and again? But then, if I read it properly here in this post, you say you wouldn't have changed anything given the chance, or words to that effect? [Apologies if I have misread or misinterpreted, but that's sort of the feeling I got, or did I miss something?] Or did you mean, it was a great learning experience, and you were glad to have had it, and wouldn't have changed anything in spite of it?
I have problems accepting a pinkpoint ascent as being a legit free ascent, however. If you ever had the chance to watch the Hubers working their free ascent of Zodiac, they were making HUGE runouts and making multiple even huger falls before succeeding. They told me they only placed two of pieces of fixed gear, which were a couple beaks near the base of the Nipple pitch if I recall correctly. Maybe it's time for Tommy to give The Shaft a go?
But it's not relevant so much what one person thinks about pinkpointing a pitch - I'm an aid climber these days, hence I have made a career of "cheating" my way up the wall by standing in aiders - what's important is that the style of ascent was clearly noted in the magazine article.
54 days! Woo-hoo! Now THAT is proud!
Cheers,
Pete
P.S. Do you have any sherpa references you could share with me? Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!!
|
|
Mark Hudon
Trad climber
Hood River, OR
|
|
But it's not relevant so much what one person thinks about pinkpointing a pitch, what's important is that the style of ascent was clearly noted in the magazine article.
Exactly right.
|
|
JakeW
Big Wall climber
CA
|
|
Maybe I haven't read carefully enough, but no one ever seems to know why some people(like me) work, stash, etc. when free climbing long routes. On send day, ITS THE MOST FUN! I don't like hauling, dangling in my harness, dinking with gear, or any of that type of stuff. I like effortless free climbing. Even if I was good enough to onsight an El Cap route, I've learned that really hard onsights aren't what I enjoy the most. When struggling through a challenging onsight I don't usually feel like a very good climber...I'm usually botching everything and suffering extensively. Those are great experiences, but the most fun for me is to walk up to a huge beautiful wall and FLOAT it, climbing like I've always imagined I could, without any hanging in my harness, hauling, jugging, etc., and hopefully no falls. I'd rather have previously done all the work and suffering, and then have a FANTASY DAY. Oh, and I don't care what anyone thinks about my style, I just hope they're doing what's most fun for them! It seems like Kurt and Coz were...thanks for decades of inspiration guys!
|
|
Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
|
|
Okay so Coz can write!
“judgment is facile” that starts it out pretty nice, but heck, for a “know it all” that’s easy to say. Haha.
The next bit that answered my first question, was about the prior Kurt/Coz partnership in the earlier years, so that’s in there and tells the story pretty well.
This is good:
“We soon learned to spot which parties would succeed and which would fail. Those to fail took their stress out on each other and only looked down. Those who made it were laughing, having fun, and only looked toward the summit”
“Then tempers flared” ……. “Epps called a meeting and nearly abandoned ship”
Ha!
Three cheers to Epperson for midwifing the adventure!!!
.......................................
Too bad about all the dustup concerning the use of a Bosch.
Aside from that, as far as any particular criticisms go (warranted or otherwise), just think of publishing or the art world, academics, & medical research. Everybody’s work is subjected to scathing reviews and extreme criticism from peers. It is just the way we humans seem to do it. A certain degree of criticality, cast with productive intent can be good.
‘Pretty darn cool adventure altogether.
This was the year after the The Nose was freed by Lynn yes?
I don’t quite recall how the timelines of these two ascents overlap. I think Lynn did her one day push in '94. Either way I guess it’s pretty obvious that Lynn worked her last pitch from the top down (gulp, I have that right I think?) and you guys decided not to do this.
 Concerning her free ascents of The Nose, any other sort of comparisons, overlaps or things that at the time affected you guys?
What other El Cap free attempts had been happening just before or after your experience (early - mid 90's) that somehow frame the history of all of it and likewise informed your choices & thoughts about style?
And last, (for now), since this article was written, have Coz & Kurt enjoyed any more climbing experiences together?
|
|
bob
climber
|
|
Ahhhhh Jakey! That's why you floated FR in 13 hours. Soooooooooooo, come south and climb small stones with me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Nice to climb with someone who knows what they want and doesn't give a hoot as long as its not hurting others or dissing their style. I just have to buck up and get in shape so I can at least try and follow some of that sh#t.
All you big wall free climbers rock, to me at least!!!!
Bob J.
|
|
JLP
Social climber
The internet
|
|
"If you ever had the chance to watch the Hubers working their free ascent of Zodiac, they were making HUGE runouts and making multiple even huger falls before succeeding."
That's wonderful, but what were these two doing in 1994? I'm thinking they were clipping fat bolts at some sportclimbing euro-shitpile. Free climbing on El Cap is a big f*#king deal and doing it in the late 80's and early 90's was even bigger. If you haven't worked up to at least one of the hard V 5.11 routes out there, your comments here are armchair at best.
|
|
Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
|
|
Maybe that's just Pete's way of pointing out that people are still doing it in bold (maybe bolder) style in Yosemite and El Cap these days.
Not to take away from Kurt and Coz's accomplishments. Unfortunately there were some comments that seemed to lament the forgotten spirit of boldness and adventure that needed to be answered.
PEace
Karl
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!