|
polarwid
Feb 2, 2004, 4:43 AM
Post #1 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Nov 22, 2001
Posts: 3608
|
Nice article MIKE,
Seems like my heroes of yesterday have all gone away, and there is no one to replace them, 'cept maybe in the ALPINE arena. Keep up the good work, looking forward to more musings from you!
|
|
|
|
|
polarwid
Feb 2, 2004, 4:44 AM
Post #2 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Nov 22, 2001
Posts: 3608
|
polarwid moved this thread from General to Feedback.
|
|
|
|
|
rockfax
Feb 3, 2004, 12:16 AM
Post #3 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Oct 26, 2001
Posts: 652
|
> Unfortunately, she chose not to wear green nail polish, or date a British climbing writer, so no one noticed.
Is that all it takes to get noticed?
Good article Mike.
Mick
|
|
|
|
|
krestkid
Feb 3, 2004, 12:25 AM
Post #4 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: May 1, 2003
Posts: 147
|
Great article! I read it at the right time, after finding myself not very motivated to climb because of lack of noticeable improvement. I know it will come!! Thanks and great job!
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 3, 2004, 12:41 AM
Post #5 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: > Unfortunately, she chose not to wear green nail polish, or date a British climbing writer, so no one noticed. Is that all it takes to get noticed? Good article Mike. Mick
It's either the nail polish or make sure you hang out in Yosemite. Apparently the only good climbing is there according to the magazines these days. :D
I prefer the stout-beer drinking pebble wrestlers myself :wink:
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 3, 2004, 12:42 AM
Post #6 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: Great article! I read it at the right time, after finding myself not very motivated to climb because of lack of noticeable improvement. I know it will come!! Thanks and great job!
You too have Elvis within :wink:
|
|
|
|
|
philbox
Moderator
Feb 3, 2004, 1:15 AM
Post #7 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 27, 2002
Posts: 13105
|
Yeah, I agree, awesome article Mr. Reardon. Will this be a taste of what we can expect from you in the future. Will this be a syndicated column. Will we see more of your writing. I do hope this won`t be the last we see of you. I hope I can look forward to a series.
|
|
|
|
|
maculated
Feb 3, 2004, 2:46 AM
Post #8 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Dec 23, 2001
Posts: 6179
|
Voting didn't work so here's my comment:
Elvis is in Joan Rivers and she's tryin' to get out!!
Excellent article, my man.
|
|
|
|
|
miker
Feb 3, 2004, 4:20 PM
Post #9 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Oct 1, 2001
Posts: 170
|
Excellently done.
Now, let us ponder the climber as superstar. I am not one for much hero worship, I like to read about the Sharma and the Jardine and all, but I just assume they are guys with that extra drive and or genetic potential to climb really hard. Do climbers, who are generally individualistic people, not bowdown as easily to the hero worship? I mean some of the gym rat sport types or bouldery dudes who fall into the stereotypical beta spewing category are the ones who seem to get into the who climbed hardest...But we know there are folks out there now who climb all sorts of stuff that no one else can. Is the problem just that so few can climb at the 5.15 level and the level of focus and commitment required, along with the skill obviously, means that you see very few repeats in that area? Or do the climbs at that level actually magnify the difference in climbing styles of the high end folks where a specific climb caters to the climbers strength, be it grip, core body, or convoluted figure four with a dyno type moves?
just pondering the ponderous
miker
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 3, 2004, 4:29 PM
Post #10 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: Voting didn't work so here's my comment: Elvis is in Joan Rivers and she's tryin' to get out!! Excellent article, my man.
Who built the pyramids?
Who built Stonehenge? :D
|
|
|
|
|
rrrADAM
Feb 3, 2004, 4:29 PM
Post #11 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Dec 19, 1999
Posts: 17553
|
Hey Mike, I know you've seen the Elvis in me, but it's just my legs shaking when you are spotting me. :lol:
Great Article brutha. :wink:
|
|
|
|
|
artm
Feb 3, 2004, 4:33 PM
Post #12 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 22, 2001
Posts: 17990
|
Elvis LIVES!
Hail to the King Baby!
|
|
|
|
|
indigo_nite
Feb 4, 2004, 1:40 AM
Post #13 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Mar 3, 2002
Posts: 365
|
liked this piece b/c it was interesting and not too long. at the crags and at home, I'm amazed by how many great "anonymous" climbers there are... a good piece of writing, with edge.
|
|
|
|
|
climbsomething
Feb 4, 2004, 1:59 AM
Post #14 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: May 30, 2002
Posts: 8588
|
In reply to: > Unfortunately, she chose not to wear green nail polish, or date a British climbing writer, so no one noticed. |
|
|
|
|
curt
Feb 4, 2004, 3:44 AM
Post #15 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Aug 27, 2002
Posts: 18275
|
In reply to: I prefer the stout-beer drinking pebble wrestlers myself :wink:
Hence I chime in. Nice article Mike. :lol:
Curt
|
|
|
|
|
fiend
Feb 4, 2004, 4:07 AM
Post #16 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: May 25, 2001
Posts: 3669
|
In reply to: Climbing V13 is definitely something only a few are capable of. Then again, Jim Holloway did it thirty years ago on Trice, while John Gill and others in his crew likely also climbed as hard, and all without the comfort of twenty-six crashpads with matching color-coordinated spotters.
Bull. John Gill and crew pulling as hard as today's climbers? When will people get over this archaic idea that the Golden Age ended with the sending of 5.9 and if it wasn't done in the same style as 30 years ago then it's no good?
I don't understand the point of this article. What exactly was it trying to say? You begin with tales of hardmen pulling ahead of their time but were they ever superstars or did they make their ascents in relative obscurity?
I also didn't understand the Elvis analogy. Are you saying that we need more people pimping themselves and their accomplishments out? Are you saying that everyone should inlfate their egos to overblown and spray to get their just rewards?
Some people (lisa rands) have their own websites and push their accomplishments to the media so that they can continue to get sponsored. Believe it or not, some climbers enjoy obscurity... oddly enough, I find these hardmen to be the ones I most admire and enjoy meeting or talking to. I found the whole article seemd more to say that we should go for the glory and fame rather than the accomplishment and joy.
I thought climbing was the reward?
In reply to: Where are our Michael Jordan? Babe Ruth? Our Elvis?
Dead or retired... like the eras of their accomplishments.
|
|
|
|
|
rrrADAM
Feb 4, 2004, 2:05 PM
Post #17 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Dec 19, 1999
Posts: 17553
|
Mark, check the quote you posted, and remember when you and I did the Thimbal in SD... We were TRing it, and still couldn't do it.
When John did it, there was a gaurd rail that would have broken his back if he'd fallen, he didn't have the luxuary of stacked crash pads and spotters, nore did he even have the same sticky shoes we have today.
I will agree that the tecnical limits have gotten higher, but the size of one's balls (commitment factor) have shrunk a great deal in relation to the way it used to be when these "trendsetters" were in their primes. Even the trends they have set have been watered down now.
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 4, 2004, 3:30 PM
Post #18 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: In reply to: > Unfortunately, she chose not to wear green nail polish, or date a British climbing writer, so no one noticed. Well, if all I hafta do is wear technicolor nail polish, I'm signing myself up for Goddess-Strong Climbing Babe. I dunno about those climbing writers, though. They're kinda jackholes. heh.
A climber without a girlfriend - homeless. Stay away from the writers as well.... :D
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 4, 2004, 3:37 PM
Post #19 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: John Gill and crew pulling as hard as today's climbers? When will people get over this archaic idea that the Golden Age ended with the sending of 5.9 and if it wasn't done in the same style as 30 years ago then it's no good? I don't understand the point of this article. In reply to: Where are our Michael Jordan? Babe Ruth? Our Elvis? Dead or retired... like the eras of their accomplishments.
We got proof of Gill and crew being Elvis. Pimping about merely being equals thirty years after the fact is ridiculous at best. Anyone can follow, I wanna read about who's in the lead.
As for your understanding the article, either you understand or you don't. Kind of like climbing. :wink:
The era of their accomplishments? They may be dead or retired, but at least they did something with the space they occupied. Not many others today doing that.
Oh yeah, and they did it for the love of the sport, not for sponsorship money.
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 4, 2004, 3:38 PM
Post #20 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: In reply to: I prefer the stout-beer drinking pebble wrestlers myself :wink: Hence I chime in. Nice article Mike. :lol: Curt
Strictly for you, the king of pebble wrestlers, or is that whiskey drinkers?
|
|
|
|
|
fiend
Feb 4, 2004, 5:07 PM
Post #21 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: May 25, 2001
Posts: 3669
|
I still think you're looking at the past through rose coloured glasses.
You think Jason Kehl does what he does for the sponsors? What about Sharma? Graham? These people are simply trying to do what they have to in order to make climbing the focus of their lives. The are the top of the game right now and they deserve every meager reward they get for it.
John Gill and company set some badass problems, but what does the thimble rate at these days? V8 at the highest? We're seeing ascents of problems a full seven Vgrades higher than that!
There's a mentality, a certain natural progression of ability that builds over time. Today we're seeing different body types and different attitudes out there on the rock, does that mean that John Gill did better because he was one of the first?
What about Oscar Eckenstein? Was he a superstar beacause he bouldered in the 1890s?
Even if it were possible to go back in time and give the oldschoolers the tools we have today (Stealth Rubber and Crashpads) I still don't think they would be pulling in the same realm as today's leaders.
Maybe today's "Elvises" are just a little more subtle in their accomplishments. It's easy to say that John Gill was a leader when you think of how wide open the field was then. It's much harder to stand out from the crowd and go your own way when the popularity of the sport has increased a thousand fold since the heroes you refer to made their mark.
Perhaps you're waiting to see who invents the next form of climbing? What about those who took climbing inside and on plastic?
Years from now people will be writing articles about gym owners with the vision to go against the grain and stand out from their peers by boiling climbing down to it's purest gymnastic form.
Sure, gyms are thrashed today as a barely recognizable form of climbing, but isn't bouldering still dealing with that stigma?
Nels Rosaasen, Tori Allen, these are your new heroes. Doesn't it take something special to go against popular opinion and admit that you don't like climbing on rock?
|
|
|
|
|
philbox
Moderator
Feb 4, 2004, 9:02 PM
Post #22 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 27, 2002
Posts: 13105
|
Hey fiend, you sound like you have enough material for another article. Go for it dude. Everyone is free to submit an article. Here`s a title for you, Plastic, the ultimate in climbing. Live the dream, go to your local gym and realise what you have been missing.
|
|
|
|
|
mreardon
Feb 5, 2004, 12:35 AM
Post #23 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Jun 17, 2002
Posts: 1337
|
In reply to: The are the top of the game right now and they deserve every meager reward they get for it. John Gill and company set some badass problems, but what does the thimble rate at these days? V8 at the highest? We're seeing ascents of problems a full seven Vgrades higher than that!
Today's folks deserve credit for climbing hard. But they don't deserve the accolades of every single burp they do being mentioned. Babe Ruth hit more home runs than the average team. Superstar. Michael Jordan's stats beats most players alive and dead. Superstar. Sharma is known for his bouldering, but hasn't pushed the standards, instead choosing to follow others and do repeats. He did Realization (which was established as a link up of another project set by someone else), but hasn't done any of Caldwell's testpieces. Lisa Rands hasn't kept up with the boys, and there are a lot of other women pulling the same grade as she is. Yet every time I open a magazine, it's Sharma and Rands. Why? Sharma pulls something no one else can dream of doing, then it's deserved to treat him the way the media do. Lisa wants to catch the boys and pull V15, the same holds true. Right now, they're stronger than most, but not the strongest by a long shot.
As for Gill and company? Do your homework before you make comments like the one above. It's not rose-colored. Calloway (sp.) set a V13 thirty years ago. A far cry from seven grades. That's a superstar because that grade was unheard of then and took a generation or two to repeat. A 5.9 grade VII established in 1906. Superstar. It took 50 years for others to equal that grade.
The media need to be more responsible. What's next, an issue about X-Rated climbs with no pictures of anyone on an actual X rated climb? :wink:
Find your Elvis, climb hard, enjoy life, and everyone will respect you. Spray ad nauseum because you need a new pair of shoes, then expect people to call "bull".
|
|
|
|
|
curt
Feb 5, 2004, 1:32 AM
Post #24 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: Aug 27, 2002
Posts: 18275
|
In reply to: John Gill and company set some badass problems, but what does the thimble rate at these days? V8 at the highest? We're seeing ascents of problems a full seven Vgrades higher than that!
The thimble probably goes at 5.12a or V4 these days. However, Gill did put up at least one V10 problem in the 70s. It has only been repeated by Jim Holloway, in spite of the fact that a number of competent boulderers have tried it.
Also, as Mike Reardon alluded, Jim Holloway established three boulder problems in the 1970s that have never been repeated. Who can say how hard these things are, by today's standards? And, its not like nobody has tried to repeat them. Two of them are in Boulder Colorado and the third is at Horsetooth in Ft. Collins Colorado. Slapshot may indeed still be the hardest move ever done on rock, by anybody--anywhere.
Curt
|
|
|
|
|
fiend
Feb 5, 2004, 1:48 AM
Post #25 of 46
(4711 views)
Shortcut
Registered: May 25, 2001
Posts: 3669
|
In reply to: Today's folks deserve credit for climbing hard. But they don't deserve the accolades of every single burp they do being mentioned.
True true, but the climbers keep buying the magazines so they can find out what colour nailpolish Rands is wearing. I think that's more of a societal change than anything else but I haven't been around long enough to know what the media was like back in The Day.
In reply to: Sharma is known for his bouldering, but hasn't pushed the standards, instead choosing to follow others and do repeats.
What about Necessary Evil? Wasn't that his line? (I'm probably shooting myself in the foot here because I think it may have been bolted by someone else).
Wow, I did some research and I'm supremely humbled by what I found. The 70s saw ascents of V10-13 (Trice is generally given as soft V13 or V12/13) by Holloway.
I can understand a lot of the points you make, but I still don't get the point of the article. Was it related to the media and its treatment of climbing? Or to the fact that no one is doing anything new?
I know the superstars are out there (Fred Rouhling, Dai Koyamada, Johnny Dawes, Mauro Calibani) but are you upset that the media isn't representing them?
I have to leave work now, so no more bitching from me :p
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1
