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marky
climber
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Topic Author's Original Post - Aug 18, 2008 - 09:22pm PT
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is it that a couple of Christian dudes spent 40 days nailing on El Cap? is that it?
please don't direct me to an unreadable thread.
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Captain...or Skully
Big Wall climber
Yonder (in the sagebrush)
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Aug 18, 2008 - 09:33pm PT
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There's a bit more to it, but that's the gist....It's a squeezer, though. Maybe they got tired & ran over to the Aquarian Wall to escape....I've never spoken to zem....
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hafilax
Trad climber
East Van
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Aug 18, 2008 - 09:47pm PT
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Buy Wings of Steel: A Climber's Perspective of the Christian Life, and the Story of a World Record 39 Continuous Days and Nights on the Side of El Capitan
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Ihateplastic
Trad climber
Lake Oswego, Oregon
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Aug 18, 2008 - 09:50pm PT
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There was some poop involved also.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Aug 18, 2008 - 11:13pm PT
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I finally read the book - it's pretty good! You can get it for like six bucks.
Still unrepeated. We replaced the bolts and rivets on the legit first pitch. Someone needs to have a go at it. There are at least four 2-4's up for grabs, maybe a fifth since I'd throw one in.
Mark and Richard are cool, not preachy. They stuck it out in spite of tremendous opposition from their detractors, which obviously motivated them. Expect plenty of fifty-footers as you try to figure out the nearly-impossible hooking sequences. The route is too hard and scary for the likes of me.
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 18, 2008 - 11:19pm PT
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Yeah, I remember when the two God like ones did that route. As I re-call they lasted about a half an hour on the ground before they were epically ran out of the Valley.With much fan fair.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Aug 18, 2008 - 11:22pm PT
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What do you mean, dogtown? Please elucidate. My observation of Mark and Richard is that while they are practising Christians - who by definition should try to exhibit Christ-like behaviour, which they do for the most part - they are anything but God-like. Pretty regular guys, actually. They just happen to believe, which is not only pretty cool, but in this secular world takes some balls.
Kinda like climbing.
Edit with reference to Coz' comments below: not entirely sure what you mean by the reference to drilling massive amounts of bolts, and if you are referring to Mark and Richard, or someone else. At any rate, Wings of Steel is hugely runout, with amazingly few bolts. Scary stuff, Count Floyd.
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 18, 2008 - 11:34pm PT
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If I re-call properly the mood in camp 4 was people were pretty pissed about the line they took and all the drilling. So when on the ground in the after math, the heckling began. And it was pretty harsh.
Oh,And Pete cool Video.
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 18, 2008 - 11:43pm PT
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Pete;
Don't get me wrong I have nothing against Christians or any one for that matter.For me to stay on the wall that long I would need to be God like.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 12:00am PT
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Gotcha, dogtown - thanks.
I was extremely intrigued with the whole Wings of Steel thing, and initially wondered if maybe Mark and Richard got a bum rap. So I decided to check into it, to meet Mark and Richard, and to try to climb their route.
Mark and Richard were accused of over-drilling - "a thousand bolts to Horse Chute" - so I hoped that their route would be reasonably climbable for me. This in spite of it being unrepeated for a quarter-century, though not without attempts. But what I found was a surprise - Wings of Steel is actually insanely difficult, with widely-spaced bolts requiring huge runouts over totally sick hooking. Dude! I've climbed 35 different El Cap routes, including plenty known for their serious hooking - Sea of Dreams, Jolly Roger, BUBS, etc. - and none of the routes I've climbed come remotely close in hooking difficulty to the hooking on Wings of Steel, which is truly sick. I retreated with my tail between my legs.
The whole Wings of Steel debacle is a positively amazing story of the human condition, with all the elements - competition, jealousy, motivation, all of the best and all of the worst of humankind.
Mark and Richard's detractors claimed that they had over-bolted the slab, but clearly this is not the case as the bolts and rivets are way run-out. It's as though the denizens of the day decided - from the distance of the SAR site in Camp 4 - that the outsiders Mark and Richard were unworthy, and without even GOING UP TO THE CLIFF AND LOOKING, they decided the route was over-bolted! If you stand at the base with a pair of binocs, you can easily see how far apart the bolts and rivets are.
It's a masterpiece of insane hooking, mate. These guys accomplished something that may not be recognized for perhaps another quarter-century, they were so far ahead of their time. It's impossible for me to imagine them standing in their top-steps and drilling off of hook placements typically as sick as this:
Eeeeeeesh..... {shivers}
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 12:27am PT
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Pete;
You just had to re-mind me that it was Twenty five years ago. Eh?
Sounds like they did get a bum rap?
If it's as bad ass as you say. And I have no doubt that it is considering your reputation for doing some pretty wild stuff yourself.
All the best, Cheers
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 12:39am PT
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Thanks, dog. We're getting old, eh?
Here's a link to [url="http://www.jensenconsultations.com/climbing/wos/wos.html"]Richard Jensen's photo essay of the FA of Wings of Steel.[/url] It's definitely worth a click, with some pretty classic photos and stories.
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Matt
Trad climber
primordial soup
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Aug 19, 2008 - 02:56am PT
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i find it really entertaining that these things are always popping back up-
where does it pop back up from? (who can say...)
re:
"It's a masterpiece of insane hooking, mate. These guys accomplished something that may not be recognized for perhaps another quarter-century, they were so far ahead of their time."
other VERY qualified parties have said, in so many words, that it was contrived, inobvious, and not very fun. further, the FA party has admitted to the "very slight enhancement" (this was discussed, or not discussed, at length, eventually leading to nobody's satisfaction, as i recall) of some unknown (apparently unrecorded) # of hook placements. "enhancements" (again, the extent or true nature of which was very hard to define in he context of all the he-said/she-said associated w/ the route) which were on the one hand necessary for their passage, but on the other hand so mild, inobvious, and slight that they are not generally visually identifiable by another party. that (albeit from my comfy couch), seems to put subsequent parties in the unenviable position of choosing between hooking their way up a poorly protected, bolted and riveted slab without ether the freedom or the tactics that the FA had available to them (and without even the remnant mfg'd route to follow), or being willing themselves to scratch out some undetermined # of hook placements...
so yer sayin nobody has repeated it?
hmmmm...
i'm just sayin-
oh-
and btw-
the falls aren't so clean either.
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 04:46am PT
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Pete;
I went to that link you posted and got my mind totally blown away when I saw the photo of the guys sitting in front of the water bottles. The Guy with the dark fro and glasses is Mark Smith right? Well I met Mark in I want to say 78, 79, at Big Rock at lake Perris CA. he free soloed every route on the rock that day much to my amazement at the time. I had no idea it was the same Mark Smith for all these years. For Mark Smith is a pretty common name obviously. So when all this went down with Wings I was in the valley and heard all the hub bub. I never put two & two to gather. Nor did I care, people bitch all the time and I had my Owen projects to be concerned with. Anyway I have a few stories that I tell about Mark. After I met Mark I kept bumping into him at the crag (Tahquitz & Suicide) mainly and we did some leds to gather, Let me tell you it was always hairy routes ones that at the time I would of never pick for myself. Mark is obviously a great aid climber which over shadows his free climbing which is among the best I have ever seen. Considering I have been climbing for the better part thirty years, well you get my point. I seen him pull off this mantle problem 5.11d I have never seen anyone else pull it off ever. He told me afterward that he thought it was a bit of a sandbag at 11.d more like 12.b.I believe it this thing is so in your face it is ridicules. In those days 5.12 as you know was HUGE !
I didn't see Mark for few season's after that until one day I was driving down interstate 10 in Riverside going by this crag I had noticed before so I thought I would go check it out to see if there was any climbable stone there. So I pull in to the crag, back then you could drive right up to the stone and belay from your bumper. So low and behold not only is there climbable stone but the new route seen is ON! I get out of me car and start checking out some lines thinking that I can come back with someone and bag some new lines, Hell who knows maybe have a hand in developing the whole damn crag !!! Just about then I hear OFF BELAY!!!! So sh#t I back up to see if I can see the climbers and up about 250 feet I see this red shirt under this huge roof. Its Mark, the roof is A5 and they had been working on it for Two days. I hanged out for a bit till they rapped and Mark showed me around the crag that he had been developing.
The Riverside Quarry.
Have him Email me if you would? What a trip !
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Gunkie
climber
East Coast US
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Aug 19, 2008 - 07:56am PT
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I think Ammon hit the nail on the head with his comment, and I'm paraphrasing, "Do I really want to spend 30 minutes looking for each hook move on a climb that is mostly hook moves?"
I wouldn't.
Maybe the El Cap apron should be opened up to a few longish free climbs protected mostly by bolts, but don't make them pure sport climbs? Folks on Dihedral Wall and Aquarian Wall could send bags of poop down on to the slab to create extra excitement.
Oh yeah, I also read the book. Good read as long as I jumped over the extensive sections of parables. That's just not my thing.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 11:39am PT
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Yeah, book is a great read. If you've read the threads, then you oughta grab the book. For six bucks or so plus shipping, it's cheaper than a couple beers at the Mountain Room bar.
The arguments against the route Wings of Steel above are certainly valid. Hooking for the sake of hooking could be considered contrived, as there is no natural line of weakness. It isn't a route for everyone, that's for sure. It takes a long long time to figure out the hooking sequences, the hook placements really are for the most part a lot of what you see in the photo above - very very small and barely useable - and falling is not a possibility, it is a certainty. Nor are the falls clean - there are ankle-breaking ledges on the first pitch, one of which took out Richard's ankle via dislocation - he was just lucky.
Ammon took three fifty-footers on the second pitch, coming in from the Bogus Start on the left which bypasses the crux hooking at the bottom of the second pitch, which you can see here:
The bottom of the second pitch - which you see directly above - and which you gain by climbing the first pitch [the original legit start] has the crux hooking. The Bogus Start is easier, and was created after Mark and Richard's detractors chopped their first two pitches, and then defecated on their ropes. Mark led the crux hooking pitch, and took falls so long and hard and serious with such high fall factors, he trashed the lead rope.
I don't have the balls to go up there and take fifty-footers, again and again, to figure out how to do the sequence! I've climbed thirty-five different El Cap routes, and the longest fall I've ever taken in my life is only about thirty or at most thirty-five feet, and that was clean air. My failed attempt was on toprope after I basically cheat-sticked my way up the first pitch. I thought maybe I could "headpoint" the pitch - KNOTT.
The other argument against the route's repeatability is also valid. I think one of Mark's and especially Richard's mistake [he does like to over-rant at times] is that they are "too honest". I think this was something of a gut reflex they developed after being shat upon [metaphorically, at least in this instance] over the last twenty-five years. Kinda like a dog who gets kicked all the time, if you walk near them, the first thing they do is growl and maybe lash out, even if you just wanted to pet them! You would probably feel the same way if the entire world climbing community appeared to be against you, basing their condemnation not on truth, but on hearsay and perpetuated lies. As we all know, a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is just getting its britches on.
So Mark and Richard rather painstakingly [I would argue excruciatingly] explained here on McTopo that they enhanced approximately six to ten hook placements over the entire length of the slab, which is about nine or ten pitches. Their enhancements were actually far less onerous than the blatantly obvious ones on other hard routes, like Sea of Dreams, and they described making enhancements by knocking a few crystals off the top of an edge to make it useable. The crystals on this part of the wall are extremely fine, so you're talking about enhancements involving the chipping away of a few grains of sand.
Is this legit? Well, I think in the situation they did it, it is, but that's always open to discussion. I think it's better than drilling an extra rivet or bolt. Again, look at the photo of the hook placement above, and you get an idea of how truly small their enhancements were.
Detractors can argue that chipping is chipping, and if you take drill tip to rock you have cheated. I agree. But there is at least one leading first ascensionist on this forum who has told me that he would rather trench a head placement on a new route than drill a rivet if in his opinion it seems justified and relevant in the context of the climb, and a head trench removes one or possibly two orders of magnitude more rock than a micro-crystal Wings Of Steel hook enhancement.
Again, the argument against repeatability comes into play - water flows over the slab, and after twenty-five years, it's possible if not probable that these micro-enhancements are no longer visible, or even there, because the water has smoothed them out to the point of invisibility and unusability. I saw no evidence whatsoever of any enhanced placements on the first two pitches of Wings of Steel, and I was specifically looking for them. You see enhanced hook placements all over other El Cap routes, although admittedly most are not from the first ascensionists.
So this dilemma faces any would-be second ascensionists - when to micro-enhance and when not to. At any rate, Tom has re-equipped the first two [legit] pitches with new bolts and rivets, so someone really ought to get up there and give it a try.
Be sure to click the link to see the rest of Richard's excellent photos!
Cheers,
Pete
The arguments against the legitimacy of the climb itself are valid. I think what most hurt and angered Mark and Richard were the attempted assassinations of their character - lies which were believed by most [including me] for nearly twenty-five years. It's great when guys like you, Bruce, step out of the moldy cobwebbed woodwork and provide us with some firsthand observations from the past - thanks, mate!
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dogtown
climber
Where I once was,I think?
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Aug 19, 2008 - 09:31pm PT
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It's Cool Pete;
Theses Guy's are Great Climbers with tremendous courage and abilities. Wings of Steel reminded me of the entire controversial BS surrounding Harding's Wall of the Early Morning light. For years the thinking was (this how not to do a route) a true hammer and drill assent. Couldn't find it in a guide book for decades and it was rarely climbed. Now it seems because of Harding's legionnaire stats it has became a Classic. (Go figure) Maybe after Wings is repeated a few times it will get some respect. But I doubt it.
Cheers, Bruce
Steps out of the moldy cobwebbed woodwork?
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