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mikebee
May 16, 2011, 8:14 AM
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In reply to: I think chipping has been accepted as not legit in general. With that said, some heavy cleaning can come very close to chipping for sure.
I reckon the difference between cleaning and chipping lies in the motivation.
If you're cleaning a route to get rid of loose rock that may end up injuring a climber, belayer or damaging a climbing rope, then that is fine, and generally accepted.
If you clean part of a route not from the point of view of safety, but because you can't do the moves there, and you hope that by unearthing different rock you'll be able to do the moves, then you're chipping and you should be hung, drawn and quartered.
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 2:15 PM
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rgold wrote: rangerrob wrote: My personal opinion is that there is very little more adventurous than heading up a steep crackless wall with a hammer and hand drill without any clue about where one might be able to stop and drill, and I think routes done that way are as trad as they get. I'm prepared to go further and say that ground-up ascents of even steeper crackless walls that employ hooks for aid in placing bolts are analogously adventurous and still deserve to be viewed as trad climbing. Once more elaborate direct aid techniques are employed or top ropes are used to place even a single bolt, it isn't trad climbing any more in my book. I agree 100% that this is the epitome of trad climbing FOR THOSE THAT GET TO DO THE FA. For all repeats - not so much. And this includes the B-Y that has been and will be in the future brought out as an example in all these discussions. I think there is some inconsistencies in your stance that ground up bolted on the lead routes are a-ok trad but bolted belays (at least assuming that decent gear alternatives exist) are bad. They certainly lead to the light and fast often cavalier behavior you describe but that is true to some extent anyplace fixed gear exists. One the gear is fixed - rather for running pro or anchors - the route is altered and it is just a matter of deciding where on the trad-sport spectrum it lies. How many would try Never-never land, Fat City etc. without the fixed gear? trad or sport? I am sticking by my statement (umpteen pages ago) that once there is any sort of fixed gear that a route is not 100$ trad - that probably includes 95+% at your beloved Gunks. Didn't know you were a sport climbing pioneer did you? fun though isn't it?
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cracklover
May 16, 2011, 3:35 PM
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There is a lot of subtlety that can get lost in the distinction between the FA party, and the experience they have, versus subsequent parties.
That's why I asked HealyJ about cracks filled with muck, and also why I felt the necessity to break down "what is a trad route" versus "what is trad climbing" in my definitions.
A trad route is what is left behind when a party with a trad mindset does an FA. It's as simple as that. The remarkable thing is that the routes "created" (if you'll pardon the word) by these FAs do tend to share a set of characteristics, which is why we can talk about "trad climbs" at all.
Defining the action of trad climbing as opposed to the thing of trad routes is more complicated because it deals with two distinct elements. The first element that shapes trad climbing is that it happens on a trad route (see above), and the second is the style used to ascend that route. Most importantly, though, it deals with non-FA parties, and that's why it's a different experience.
The thing about trad climbing, though, is that it tends to make the experience for non-FA parties feel as much as possible like the experience of the FA. In a big way, that's what defines trad climbing to me. It's about heading into the (relatively) unknown, melding your skills to what the rock has to offer in order to ascend (without resorting to any direct aid if possible.) This same goal is shared between FA parties and subsequent parties.
Of course subsequent parties have two additional tools that the FA didn't have (they know the line goes free, and they know the grade) and in exchange they lose one tool (they may not place additional fixed gear). Aside from that, the FA and subsequent parties should be playing about the same game.
That's not at all the case in sport climbing.
GO
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jacques
May 16, 2011, 3:58 PM
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What's in a name?
Tradition is a more basic emotion. Why the people begin to climb? How the tradition begin?
Going to the summit of a mountain is the begining of the adventure. The first ascent of the mount blanc. The ascent of the Eiger. Alpine? because it was done in the alp, or a suscession of snow, ice and rock cliff. Before, we can train on rock, like canon, on ice, like pinacle or on snow like webster. But to do alpine, we must have What.
Today, a ramification of rock cliff climbing is made. One call that sport and the other call that trad. It is also alpine climbing if you do the nose or the cerro tore and it can be all in rock.
What is the difference? Boulder is one move and the harder climb is aid.
If you begin to hike and want to climb, the important think is to have a chalenge higt enought to be stress, but not to be in danger. Your mentality will be to know enought about safety to climb at your level and not too much of climbing technique to climb over your helmet. In that mentality, you can climb hard every day without even climbing 5.11.
if you begin in a gym and want to climb because of the emulation of the other, the important think is to chalenge other. To be strong, not afraid, to be agressive to sustain pain, to be the better than other is there let motive.
But it's happen that, some day, you feel to compete and the other to make a team with your partner. Some day, you will trad and some other you will sport. You are 40% trad and 60% sport or, in my case, 10%sport and 90% trad.
On a line from one to ten... I am at one...meaning trad is one and sport is ten. What do i decide that trad is one....it is because sport compete and the number, for them is important.
In biology, the plant need water to survive. A cactus will sustain dry situation and an algue always need water. In a scale from ont to ten, you can set the need of a plant in quantity of water. But to describe the situation, you must have a clear description of the desert, dry sand, and a lake, only water.
So, how can you describe sport and trad in a scale from one to ten is to describe what is a pure trad and what is a pure sport...not all the possibility
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rgold
May 16, 2011, 5:08 PM
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olderic wrote: I agree 100% that this is the epitome of trad climbing FOR THOSE THAT GET TO DO THE FA. For all repeats - not so much. And this includes the B-Y that has been and will be in the future brought out as an example in all these discussions.
Well then, we disagree. Certainly the FA party had a lot more adventure than subsequent ones, but everyone has to make use of placements (in this case bolts) whose location was dictated by the stances nature provided. Repeating many of these ascents is not as bold as the FA but still constitutes trad climbing in my book. And yes, the B-Y is a case in point---that ain't no sport climb Jack.
In reply to: I think there is some inconsistencies in your stance that ground up bolted on the lead routes are a-ok trad but bolted belays (at least assuming that decent gear alternatives exist) are bad.
My description of trad ground-up bolting made use of the term "crackless walls." Putting bolts next to usable cracks isn't trad climbing under anyone's definition. I see no inconsistency in my claims here, even if they are extreme.
In reply to: They certainly lead to the light and fast often cavalier behavior you describe but that is true to some extent anyplace fixed gear exists. One the gear is fixed - rather for running pro or anchors - the route is altered and it is just a matter of deciding where on the trad-sport spectrum it lies.
Ok, except unlike your implication, I don't think that is a trivial decision.
In reply to: How many would try Never-never land, Fat City etc. without the fixed gear?
Fewer people for sure. The pin on Fat City was placed on the lead by Gary Brown, so that fits into the trad mold in the same way drilling from stances does. Of course, those of us who clip it are not doing anything as daring as what Gary did, but I have no problem viewing that as trad climbing.
The bolt on Never-Never land is far more questionable. It was placed and used for aid by Art Gran and then Dave Craft came along and freed the route. There are a number of aid bolt ladders, not just single aid bolts, that have been freed over the years, for instance on the East Buttress of Middle Cathedral Rock. It's pretty hard to call that trad climbing with a straight face, even though the rest of the route is. Never-Never land is tainted too.
In reply to: trad or sport? I am sticking by my statement (umpteen pages ago) that once there is any sort of fixed gear that a route is not 100$ trad - that probably includes 95+% at your beloved Gunks. Didn't know you were a sport climbing pioneer did you? fun though isn't it?
Well, you can make any definitions you want. We can have routes that are 99% trad and others that are 38.65% trad. But as far as I can tell in my travels, the Gunks are about as trad as it gets.
If you count the full range of crags at the Gunks, that 95% figure is wildly off. In fact, the Trapps (I know, a lot of people think the Trapps is the Gunks) is the only crag you'd stand a chance with that estimate, and even there I doubt it. Fixed gear is continually weathering out without replacement, and much of what is left is no good anyway. A very sizable number of routes were put in with no fixed protection and have none today. And, for example, there are no bolts and only a handful of almost entirely worthless WWII vintage pitons at Millbrook.
In reply to: Didn't know you were a sport climbing pioneer did you?
Didn't know and wasn't. Whatever smidgen of pioneering I might have claimed was immediately and decisively overshadowed by Stannard, Wunsch, Barber, and Bragg. In fact, since most of my best routes were done before 1970, I could be better described as a relic of the iron age, now slowly rusting away like the pitons I started out using.
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 5:48 PM
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I don't want to get into a whole point by point response - although mostly I agree with you.
I do think that the Gunks are more trad like now then they were when I first climbed there (just about exactly 40 years ago), With the exception of the blossoming rap anchors there is less fixed gear now - and as you say less worthwhile fixed gear. Although I still think that even if you limit your statistics to Millbrook, Lost City the Bayards - everything not Trapps - you will still find some relics of passage on 75+%. A lot of what I call the classic 10's - most of what's on the Mac wall for instance - require a lot more gear to be placed then when I first did them 35 years ago. In fact - this might get your attention - I would claim that the vast majority of the FFA's at the Gunks in the 10-15 year span from the mid 60's to late 70's relied pretty heavily on fixed gear. So in my mind they had more in common with today's typical sport climbing mindset then most definitions of trad climbing. And yet these are usually held up as shining examples of trad climbs and trad climbing at its best.
This thread has gone round and round attempting to define definitions of trad climbs and trad climbing style and waffled on whether one is a pre-requisite for the other. For me the essence of a trad climb and trad climbing style boils down as to whether you can have the exact same experience as the FA party. Obviously there are some examples where that holds but its going to be a rare case within 100 miles of the city. So most of the quibbling comes about trying to establish rules that allow people to replicate that experience as closely as possible.
The fatal flaw in this is the binary logic - its either a or b - no grey area - whereas most of both the climbing and the climbs - especially at the Gunks (or equivalent) is smack dab in the grey zone). The "ain't no sport climb jack" postering doesn't take the B-Y out of the grey area. When someone does it on gear placed on the lead - and it will happen - then maybe... At least for sports climbing it is pretty well accepted as to what defines the climbing and style. Stop trying to shoehorn everything else is the trad bucket - although I'd rather have you do that then starting to "sprad".
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rangerrob
May 16, 2011, 7:02 PM
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Can we all at least agree that we are cooler than the sport weenies like jt?
Jt, if you think all trad routes are low angled and moderate, you need to travel a bit more.
Friends don't friends climb slabs
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cracklover
May 16, 2011, 7:52 PM
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rangerrob wrote: Can we all at least agree that we are cooler than the sport weenies like jt? Jt, if you think all trad routes are low angled and moderate, you need to travel a bit more. Friends don't friends climb slabs
No, that's not what he said. He's ragging on Jaques for doing the moderate trad routes, and thinking he's bad-ass simply because they're trad.
GO
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jt512
May 16, 2011, 8:01 PM
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mikebee wrote: In reply to: I think chipping has been accepted as not legit in general. With that said, some heavy cleaning can come very close to chipping for sure. I reckon the difference between cleaning and chipping lies in the motivation. If you're cleaning a route to get rid of loose rock that may end up injuring a climber, belayer or damaging a climbing rope, then that is fine, and generally accepted. If you clean part of a route not from the point of view of safety, but because you can't do the moves there, and you hope that by unearthing different rock you'll be able to do the moves, then you're chipping and you should be hung, drawn and quartered.
What about pulling off holds to make the climb harder?
Jay
(This post was edited by jt512 on May 16, 2011, 8:12 PM)
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 8:02 PM
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So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,,
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redlude97
May 16, 2011, 8:13 PM
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olderic wrote: So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,,
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 8:19 PM
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redlude97 wrote: olderic wrote: So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,, You are assuming JT has never climbed trad before.
I am not - he has pontificated many times about his trad roots (routes?) and how he has consciously chosen to move past them because that style of climbing is "of little/no interest" to him now. In fact that is one of his canned/standard gambits.
I also didn't state whether my day of climbing with my chosen partner would be trad or sport. My choice of partner wouldn't change.
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 9:09 PM
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cracklover wrote: olderic wrote: So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,, Now why would you think that? Because I corrected someone who was taking a cheap shot? GO
Not based on any single exchange - although I don't think there really was a cheap shot where you perceived there to be one. Nope I made my assertion based on the assumption (and it was an assumption by me that might well not be valid) that you would be or already were - on the bandwagon that puts one of our protagonists in the clueless babbling incompetent bucket and the other in the crotchety but lovable genius bucket.
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cracklover
May 16, 2011, 9:43 PM
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olderic wrote: cracklover wrote: olderic wrote: So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,, Now why would you think that? Because I corrected someone who was taking a cheap shot? GO Not based on any single exchange - although I don't think there really was a cheap shot where you perceived there to be one. Nope I made my assertion based on the assumption (and it was an assumption by me that might well not be valid) that you would be or already were - on the bandwagon that puts one of our protagonists in the clueless babbling incompetent bucket and the other in the crotchety but lovable genius bucket.
Oh, sorry, I misunderstood. I thought you were asking about Joe Healy versus Jay Young, simply because those are the two that post as "J".
But yeah, if you want to take this to the personal level, you're right, I'd have little to no interest in climbing with Jaques based on what I gather from him here. If you've climbed with him and could give a different story, I'd certainly be willing to hear differently.
I dunno if Jay's a genius or not, and don't really care. Sure, I'd climb with him. I think it'd be a fun day. He seems motivated to train hard, and is an interesting guy. I think I'd enjoy climbing with most of the folks in this thread, yourself included. IIRC, we climbed, if not together, at least next to each other, at Romancing the Stone the day after the stone fell out. It was fun, and I enjoyed your company.
GO
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olderic
May 16, 2011, 9:50 PM
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cracklover wrote: olderic wrote: cracklover wrote: olderic wrote: So given the choice of which of the two J people you'd rather have as a climbing partner for the day - I expect we'd have very different answers.,,, Now why would you think that? Because I corrected someone who was taking a cheap shot? GO Not based on any single exchange - although I don't think there really was a cheap shot where you perceived there to be one. Nope I made my assertion based on the assumption (and it was an assumption by me that might well not be valid) that you would be or already were - on the bandwagon that puts one of our protagonists in the clueless babbling incompetent bucket and the other in the crotchety but lovable genius bucket. Oh, sorry, I misunderstood. I thought you were asking about Joe Healy versus Jay Young, simply because those are the two that post as "J". But yeah, if you want to take this to the personal level, you're right, I'd have little to no interest in climbing with Jaques based on what I gather from him here. If you've climbed with him and could give a different story, I'd certainly be willing to hear differently. I dunno if Jay's a genius or not, and don't really care. Sure, I'd climb with him. I think it'd be a fun day. He seems motivated to train hard, and is an interesting guy. I think I'd enjoy climbing with most of the folks in this thread, yourself included. IIRC, we climbed, if not together, at least next to each other, at Romancing the Stone the day after the stone fell out. It was fun, and I enjoyed your company. GO
I had a fun day at the Gunks Saturday - how about that?
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tomcecil
May 16, 2011, 10:19 PM
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a couple days ago we found a beautiful new cliff a few miles down the road, tomorrow we are going to put up an awesome crack line and it will be called "that ain't no sport climb Jack"--
Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this thread, it's fascinating to read your views, I've learned a lot!
I wish JB were here to tell us what the B-Y is...
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healyje
May 16, 2011, 11:47 PM
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Finally able to get back around to all this and I see a lot of interesting discussion has been going on.
For me it's all about 'context' and by that I mean doing beta-less, ground-up, free FAs - ideally doing the FA onsight, but that's generally always been the exception rather than the rule.
Either way, when you walk up to an unclimbed rock you've never seen, eyeball it, pick a line, and jump on it - you are having an incredibly unique experience and one where you have only the roughest of ideas what you may encounter and what will transpire before it's over. If it's a hard line you could well end up repeatedly runout, and not just runout, but runout over difficult, marginal pro. You can end up in situations you cannot protect, cannot reverse, better not fall, and where you are unsure of where to go next or how. For me that's the baseline and benchmark. You can't rest on the rope, you can't work the moves, you have to figure out both the pro and the moves on-the-fly while climbing, usually with a clock rapidly ticking down in any given spot you stop and try to rest and / or figure things out.
It's just a profoundly different experience then resting on a rope repeatedly aerial bouldering a line into submission working out and memorizing each move in turn until you can eventually do a free ascent - and that's without even discussing the climb-by-the-dots mentality inherent in chalk use (sport or trad). Trad is an all-or-nothing, climbing-or-falling, think-fast-on-the-fly deal - again, it has more in common with DWS or overhung TRs than anything else.
Forget about the edge cases, forget bolts versus gear, forget about onsighting or not - in the end it's all about can you climb something without having to rest on the rope in order to figure it out? Can you figure it out while actually climbing it? Add to that, can you not only figure it out while climbing - but can you figure out both the moves and the protection while you are climbing? Figuring out hard moves on the fly is challenging enough, add difficult / obscure / technical / marginal protection while you're at it and you really better have a seamless physical / emotional / technical act together.
That's it - that's the heart and soul of trad climbing right there - basically just a loosely codified ideal, attitude, style, and ethic derived directly from the experience of being out on the edge doing [hard] sight-unseen FAs over unknown terrain. For me it's so radically different an experience from resting in bolted space serially working and memorizing moves as to be as different an activity as caving is from climbing - yeah, you're using the same gear, but you're doing something entirely different. Different bad? No, just very, very different. But I do find it somewhat ironic that, by-and-large, this "rest/rote/'send'" cycling is what has come to define what 'climbing' for the vast majority of people who don a harness today - very ironic actually.
From there we can discuss all manner of departures from that basic idea. Questions like can you do routes like 'The Prophet' in pure trad? Well, from quantity and size of the tick marks I'd say the answer is obviously no. And guess what? We knew in the mid 70's there were limits to what you could do in a pure trad style and that at some level of difficulty you were going to have to do it the Brit way (TR / headpoint) or the French way (dog / sport) in order to get up extremely hard lines. Wasn't a surprise to us then, shouldn't be to anyone now, and doesn't make 'The Prophet' any less impressive a feat.
And guess what else (given the climbing vs routes back and forth)? I trad climb sport climbs when [very rarely] I find myself on one - I don't want any beta, I don't want to know how hard it is, I lower if I fall, I pull the rope - the only difference is I'm relieved of the need to protect myself (which by itself is a huge reduction in stress and what's demanded of me to climb something).
The bolts mainly became an issue because of rapacious rate of their installation and various instances of retro-bolting - but it was always a secondary issue at best.
Then there is the commentary around "why should such techniques be reserved for just very hard routes?" And in that question you have the essence of why it is that the vast majority of people understand and define climbing as a "rest/rote/'send'" cycle. For me that question is (over caught's objection) like asking, "why should towing in be reserved only for surfing big waves" - next thing you know everyone is towing into four foot waves. But then who knows? Maybe in thirty years people will think of paddling out through waves as 'adventure surfing'.
The other commentary around 'onsight' or "why bother after I blow the onsight attempt?" are not surprising either I suppose - but again, from my personal approach an onsight, while great, is not a common occurence if I'm getting on things at or beyond my limit. For me personally it goes back to the fact that I feel like I could eventually climb pretty much anything if I rested on the rope and sorted it out. I just find it totally lacks emotional 'bang-for-the-buck' and feels like a [dry and boring] endless cycle of "work it, work it - next line", "work it, work it - next line", ad infinitum. It just doesn't hold my attention and has no allure for me. I'd rather go windsurfing or, if I'm going to do something that repetitive, maybe a run or a swim. But I started out doing FAs and so that's just my particular addiction and what all my climbing is geared towards. I've also climbed for a long time and I just don't find it all that interesting without the protection and FA aspects of it.
Last I'd also say that while being strong can be great and you can get there fast sport climbing, it's only of so much of a help if you don't have the right head for trad climbing and you'll likely have to unlearn a lot of physical and emotional habits which is what makes the crossover challenging for a lot of folks. That's why folks here generally say they climb trad several grades lower than sport. That and the fact that no matter what anyone says, I'm here to tell you dogging on trad gear will likely bite you hard on the ass sooner or later - it's just a real lousy habit to carry over and get into.
(This post was edited by healyje on May 17, 2011, 7:43 AM)
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jacques
May 17, 2011, 3:02 AM
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cracklover wrote: But yeah, if you want to take this to the personal level, you're right, I'd have little to no interest in climbing with Jaques based on what I gather from him here. If you've climbed with him and could give a different story, I'd certainly be willing to hear differently.
Curiously, we lead trad climb at the same level.
As I don't want to climb 5.12 with sport technique, it is normal that we don't want to climb togheter. Fifteen years ago, I understand that it is not because I can climb an"hard route" that I can have a good route finding. So, I stop to try to climb 5.12 route.
There is a lot of bad climber like me and weaker too. What's happen to them: they climb one or two years and sold there equipment or climb once or two per year. I just hope that they can have a better idea of trad so they will climb more often for fun, not to be considered good by the other. I do respect more a 5.7 climber who do his first ascent of funhouse at cathedral than a 5.12 climber doing a 5.10 route in trad. In the former case, the climber climb at his 5.7 limit, he is better than before if he made it; in the later case the climber is not as good as he tought if he falled two grade below is leading level.
Olderick present the possibility to choose the style of climbing. On your profile, you explain that the difference exist. Who really need to know which one is better.
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guangzhou
May 17, 2011, 5:07 AM
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Some good stuff added, will write more when I am done climbing. Sorry, climbing takes priority or posting.
On the comment, would you climb with "J," I can honestly say I would climb with any of the people who have posted on this thread so far. At least one day. I find some people are very different face to face compared to onlline.
With JT, I would love to spend a day clipping bolts in Southern Cal. My mother lives 20 minutes from Malibu Creek, so this may happen one day.
With French J, I'd climb with him too. Trad or sport, I'd get to climb and practice my french too. (Emmanuel Lacoste)
With RG, I would love to get him here in Indonesia to develop some long trad routes with me. Some long basalt cracks, or some granite face climbs. 800ft to 2000 ft.
E
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rgold
May 17, 2011, 5:14 AM
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olderic wrote: I still think that even if you limit your statistics to Millbrook, Lost City the Bayards - everything not Trapps - you will still find some relics of passage on 75+%.
If you are still speaking of fixed gear, you aren't even in the ballpark. At Millbrook, for example, the figure is under 10% and maybe under 5%. And if you think Millbrook, Lost City, and Bayards is "everything not Trapps" then there is a lot about the Gunks you don't know. Maybe you are basing your impressions on a bunch of "classics" in the Trapps? Even in the Near Trapps I'd guess the figure is under 50%.
In reply to: A lot of what I call the classic 10's - most of what's on the Mac wall for instance - require a lot more gear to be placed then when I first did them 35 years ago. In fact - this might get your attention - I would claim that the vast majority of the FFA's at the Gunks in the 10-15 year span from the mid 60's to late 70's relied pretty heavily on fixed gear.
You picked a peculiar time span, since about a third of it was part of the iron age before nuts were introduced and accepted. And the Mac wall fits mostly into the iron age part of that span.
Let's see: Something Interesting, FFA in the 1950's, before chromolly pitons. Old soft iron stuff didn't come out so fixed gear present at the crux.
Higher Stannard. Done in 1967, piton protected. None in place and none left in so no fixed gear used.
Birdie Party. Done in 1959 with soft iron and aid at the roof. Some fixed pins left in the 5.8 section. Freed in 1966 with crux pitons placed on the lead, so fixed gear in 5.8 sections but not in 5.10 crux.
Interstice and Mother's Day Party, climbed in the early to mid 70's during the piton-nut transition, probably with nuts. No fixed gear in place.
MF. Done in 1960 with pitons placed on the lead so no fixed gear.
Men at Arms. Done in 1966 with pitons placed on the lead so no fixed gear.
Try Again. Done in 1967 with pitons placed on the lead so no fixed gear.
Coexistence. Done in 1967 with pitons placed on the lead. But, two fixed pitons from previous aid ascents made the falls at the crux shorter.
Star Action. Done in 1973 with pitons placed on the lead so no fixed gear.
Graveyard Shift. Done in 1978 after transition to nuts; no fixed gear.
Tough Shift. Done in 1961 with soft iron pitons placed on the lead so no fixed gear.
So out of 11 Mac Wall classics, two had fixed gear at the crux on the FA or FFA. and one of these was Something Interesting at (sandbagged) 5.7. Coexistence is really the only route on the Mac Wall that fits your description of relying on fixed gear. And I might add that although the pins were there and were clipped, I placed a piton just below because I didn't trust them, and the route would have gone exactly the same whether or not the fixed pins had been there.
Whether that makes the reliance on them "heavy" I leave to others to decide, but in any case no more than one FA or FFA on the Mac wall "relied heavily" on fixed gear.
All these routes except Graveyard Shift were either climbed in the iron age or at the dawn of the nut age and entirely before the cam age. Several of these routes were quite a bit more adventurous to lead with pitons placed for protection than they are with today's spectrum of gear.
It is true that some of the routes acquired more fixed protection after their FA's or FFA's and so became lesser achievements. Part of this was because of a growing reluctance to pound pitons in and out and scar the rock, a dilemma that was solved by the clean climbing revolution.
In about three years from 1969 to 1972, most Gunks climbers had completely changed over to passive protection. The great Stannard onslaught began, followed by Wunsch, Bragg, and Barber. They clipped the odd fixed pin, but so much of what they did was so bold that todays climbers, armed with gadgets the pioneers couldn't even imagine, are notably absent from a large number of those 5.11 and 5.12 FFA's, which couldn't even remotely be characterized as relying heavily, if at all, on fixed pro.
That's the way I see it.
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healyje
May 17, 2011, 5:26 AM
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rgold wrote: They clipped the odd fixed pin, but so much of what they did was so bold that todays climbers, armed with gadgets the pioneers couldn't even imagine, are notably absent from a large number of those 5.11 and 5.12 FFA's, which couldn't even remotely be characterized as relying heavily, if at all, on fixed pro. That's the way I see it.
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healyje
May 17, 2011, 7:45 AM
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I'd be happy to climb with you and have worked in many of the same countries as you before I had a family. Now that my daughter is grown we'll be thinking about getting out and about more so you never know...
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olderic
May 17, 2011, 1:47 PM
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I guess we don't agree on much or remember things the same after all.
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rgold
May 17, 2011, 3:46 PM
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Apparently not. But don't try to characterize this as a simple clash of memories, Eric.
You made claims about the nature of first ascents you weren't present for and which happened before you had come to the Gunks, in some cases as much as ten years earlier. That's not a memory issue---you weren't there to remember anything.
You made claims to the effect that, for example, there are around 75 climbs at Millbrook with fixed protection in them. That's not a memory issue either, unless you are prepared to deliver a list of 75 or so Millbrook routes you've climbed that have fixed pro on them now.
I don't doubt that your memories are accurate reflections of your experiences, based on the sample of routes you climbed, at the time you were climbing them, and with the people you climbed with. Present your observations that way, without extrapolating to situations you don't actually know about, and we won't be disagreeing.
The issues of what trad climbing is today, what is was in the past, and how the ideas evolved are cloudy enough all by themselves. And it is fair to say, as I think you are suggesting, that the real history is not some progression from god-like purity to degradation and hypocrisy. Plenty of folks have put on rose-colored glasses whose filtration of reality supports their present perspectives. Perhaps this is an unavoidable aspect of the human condition, which makes it all the more important to try to stick to what we actually know to be true.
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