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ergophobe
Oct 20, 2003, 7:31 PM
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Yuji Hirayama just completed one of the most amazing ascents ever of an El Cap route. He free climbed El Nino on sight (no pre-inspection) with only two falls. I can see all the vocab weenies saying "what's an onsight with falls"? [edit as per JohnfromOhio: I did not mean to imply that this was an "onsight" ascent, but simply as I say here, no pre-inspection, ground-up] He started at the bottom, having never seen the route and climbed it to the top, falling only on two of the 30 pitches, and redpointing both of those pitches on his second try. This involved several 5.13 and 5.12 onsights up to 5.13c. More amazing to me is that he onsighted everything on his last day on the wall, including several super hard pitches up to 5.13c I think. On day one, he climbed three pitches, all onsight, up to 5.13b. He had planned to go higher, but he had to wait until after 4:30 to start and after spending over an hour onsighting a 5.13b, it was too dark to continue so he rapped to the ground and went home to sleep. On day two, he also started around 4:45 with the hope simply of onsighting pitches 4 and 5 (5.13a and 5.13c) before dark. On pitch 4 he got out of sequence, but then saw the holds he wanted. He called to his belayer for slack and then his foot popped. He redpointed that pitch on the next try. He onsighted the 13c above it. He again descended to the ground and took a rest day. On day four, he started super early and climbed over a dozen pitches, onsighting all but one when he popped off on a boulder problem move. He and his crew rapped a few pitches and slept on Big Sur Ledge. On his last day, he onsighted another 12 pitches, up to 5.13c and took no falls at all. As far as I know, this is the closest anyone has come to a free onsight of an El Cap route, with the second closest being Yuji's climb of the Salathe with three falls. Don't quote me on that, though, since my wife insists he only took one fall on the Salathe. Anyway, a completely amazing effort that begs to be challenged by someone! There are some pictures, videos and other details at http://www.yujihirayama.com It seems that to view the videos (at least on my computer), I have to first right click and save them on my disk, and then view them. This means goodbye to Yosemite for Yuji, Kenji, Kosuke, Tommatsu, Katoh sensei, Shieh and the kids. I'm by no means a suitable climbing partner, climbing several grades below these guys, but did share a house with them and will miss them so much when they go. They are all super and Yosemite is going to seem a bit empty tomorrow when they go home.
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johnfromohio
Oct 20, 2003, 7:49 PM
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[quote="ergophobe"]Yuji Hirayama just completed one of the most amazing ascents ever of an El Cap route. He free climbed El Nino onsight with only two falls. I can see all the vocab weenies saying "what's an onsight with falls"? He started at the bottom, having never seen the route and climbed it to the top, falling only on two of the 30 pitches, and redpointing both of those pitches on his second try. {/quote] umm *scratches nuts (trad nuts i mean) * taking a fall and weighting rope is not an onsight climb. My friend you have 28 onsight pitches climbed, 2 redpointed pitches, therefor the free climb onsight is not to be. It is a free climb though.
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alwaysforward
Oct 20, 2003, 7:57 PM
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[quote="johnfromohio"]In reply to: Yuji Hirayama just completed one of the most amazing ascents ever of an El Cap route. He free climbed El Nino onsight with only two falls. I can see all the vocab weenies saying "what's an onsight with falls"? He started at the bottom, having never seen the route and climbed it to the top, falling only on two of the 30 pitches, and redpointing both of those pitches on his second try. {/quote] umm *scratches nuts (trad nuts i mean) * taking a fall and weighting rope is not an onsight climb. My friend you have 28 onsight pitches climbed, 2 redpointed pitches, therefor the free climb onsight is not to be. It is a free climb though. Nitpicking. We all understand the terms.
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ergophobe
Oct 20, 2003, 8:20 PM
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In reply to: umm *scratches nuts (trad nuts i mean) * taking a fall and weighting rope is not an onsight climb. My friend you have 28 onsight pitches climbed, 2 redpointed pitches, therefor the free climb onsight is not to be. It is a free climb though. Whatever. I was writing fast and looking for a way to point out that Yuji had done no pre-inspection of the route, unlike almost every other attempt to free El Cap. The point is this: He started at the bottom without pre-inspection (except through telescope) and he onsighted 28 of 30 pitches, including several 5.13s. An amazing effort. Tom
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boulderman
Oct 20, 2003, 8:42 PM
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Then just call it that, an amazing effort! Not an onsight of of a free route. I agree he may have onsighted many of the pitches, but if he fell on a couple then he fell. If he did it all on the final day without a single fall then he redpointed the route.
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ergophobe
Oct 20, 2003, 9:09 PM
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As I said, poor choice of words since I was writing fast. I think the meaning was clear in the original title, the original post and the followup and in no way claimed anything beyond what was actually done.
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yosemite
Oct 20, 2003, 9:19 PM
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Wow. Great accomplishment. He walked up to the route after only seeing it through a scope and reviewing a topo and proceeded to climb the overhanging SE side of the Captain with only two falls. No pre-inspection. No tic marks on holds (ala Huber). No working it for weeks. I assume he used gear he placed himself and whatever was fixed on the route. This has got to be the best free climb of the Big Stone yet, with the exception of Lynn Hill's, which cannot be bettered. How did he do the "Man Powered Rappel?" Is there a free variation around it? In regard to the "It's a redpoint, not an onsight" crowd.....Aren't most high end sport climbing "redpoints" actually "pinkpoints" cuz the draws are in place? Perhaps we need yet another term to describe the style of ascent Yuji made on El Nino. Maybe "magic" or "levitation". Outstanding
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micronut
Oct 20, 2003, 9:54 PM
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What about Leo Houlding's accent of El Nino? Didn't he just have a couple slips as well?
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ergophobe
Oct 20, 2003, 10:13 PM
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In reply to: What about Leo Houlding's accent of El Nino? Didn't he just have a couple slips as well? Sorry, I don't know anything about that one. Gene, given your handle, I'm not surprised you appreciate how amazing it is. I'll try to answer your questions, but let me emphasize that I was merely a spectator and was not around when Yuji spoke to the Hubers or anything like that, so take what I say here with a grain of salt subject to confirmation. I watched many pitches from the base or the meadows, but there was a lot I didn't see.
In reply to: Wow. Great accomplishment. He walked up to the route after only seeing it through a scope and reviewing a topo And talking to Steve Schneider and the Hubers, who were all very generous and forthcoming with their information and really psyched to see Yuji succeed as near as I can tell.
In reply to: No pre-inspection Nothing except what he could see from the ground and through a telescope. I should add that the first two pitches are 5.5 and 5.9, so what you see from the ground is not very helpful.
In reply to: No tic marks on holds (ala Huber) Hans Florine was doing rigging and camera work for him. There was one, maybe two pitches that Hans played on while waiting around, so there was a bit of chalk on a couple of pitches... out of 30. I think there may have been some residual chalk on some overhanging pitches, but on the 13s near the ground, not only were there no tick marks, they were totally washed clean of chalk, like a virgin wall (except for a couple of bolts of course).
In reply to: No working it for weeks. Four days total climbing, including 25 pitches on the last two days. Incidentally, in preparation for this, Yuji freed Golden Gate, a 41-pitch route that splits off from the Salathe at El Cap Spire. He did that route in two days, with just a couple of falls. Before that, he onsighted one of the new 5.13 routes on Sentinel (Uncertainty Principle?) and then freed Freerider (no onsight because he had done it before, but I think without falls) for a two-day total of 50 pitches and five hours of hiking. (now if someone is going to quibble with my word choice, it should be the fact that I called those accomplishments "incidental"!)
In reply to: I assume he used gear he placed himself and whatever was fixed on the route. Of course. No pink-pointing or pre-placing. On the one pitch that I saw him redpoint, he did of course leave the draws in place on the first two bolts when he pulled the rope.
In reply to: This has got to be the best free climb of the Big Stone yet, with the exception of Lynn Hill's, which cannot be bettered. Agreed. More impressive even than Yuji's ascent of the Salathe given that El Nino is a fair bit harder. That said, the free ascents of Zodiac and Lurking Fear are pretty damn amazing too, no matter how much time was spent working them and no matter how many tick marks there were. Dman, I'd be happy if I could just get that greasy slab on pitch five of Free Blast! (came close this spring, but got a little off route and couldn't reverse my moves and took the big dive from right next to the last bolt).
In reply to: How did he do the "Man Powered Rappel?" I don't know. I *assume* (warning: unsubstantiated opinion follows) that he just rapped it. I always thought the man-powered rappel thing was sort of beside the point (look at the photos, the "man" is anchored into the belay two feet away and it doesn't change that this is aid to the climber no less than a shoulder stand in the old days). As far as I know the only variation he made from the Hubers was that he climbed "Shipoopi Left", a two-pitch variation that Steve Schneider made near the top, because Schneider is pretty sure that a hold has broken off since the Huber ascent and that pitch is now 14a. The variation is 13c, but much longer, so it adds in an 11c pitch before the 13c if I'm not mistaken. Tom
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iamthewallress
Oct 20, 2003, 10:22 PM
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Hey, Tom...That's awesome that Yuji did so well on that route. I wanted to mention a few things though...There was some tape, etc. from free attempts when some friends of mine did NA wall. Tick mark free is just too much to ask for on a free line on El Cap these days. Also, Brian Cork diserves his due for putting up the new varation too...Not fair that only the old timer should get the credit.
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sandbag
Oct 20, 2003, 11:33 PM
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I know ill get flamed for this one but: How is it an onsight if the guy raps off and then juggs back to where he left off? Its an amazing feat none the less, far greater then anything ill ever do... there my two semantical cents CHACHINGGG!!!! :shock:
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akornylak
Oct 21, 2003, 12:05 AM
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About the terminology, "onsight" as I understand has always referred to a style, not an accomplishment. That is the style of trying a route with no beta or pre-inspection, first time. "flash" is the term that refers to the accomplishment of doing something with no falls or dogging. The latter term has come to imply a first-try, but thats not necessarily the case. In the past, to complete a route with no falls with no beta was an "onsight flash". If you fell, it was just an onsight attempt. You could walk a route having not been on it for years, and it would be a "flash". Nowadays though, the term is just "redpoint", (a European import), and "flash" is reserved only for first-trys. So I think Yuji attempted the route onsight, but did not accomplish the onsight flash. Well, its alright Yuji, you'll get it next time.
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hasbeen
Oct 21, 2003, 12:05 AM
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I'm pretty sure Holding and another young Brit did this a few years back, right after the FAA. As I recall, they each only fell once and swung leads up the thing. I believe it was their first big wall on their first trip to the Valley, and they did it in only two or three days. I don't think they hyped it up too much and thought it was 13b tops. This must count right up there as well. After all, Leo has claimed himself to be "the best traditional climber in the world," and even though he may have been drunk, it's pretty hard to argue with him. In fact, when he made this statement someone nearby challenged him with, "ever done Master's Edge?" Holding's response, "first on-sight ascent."
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