I personally like that this person is willing to challenge himself, develop new lines, and push the ethical envelop forward.

Not to sound mean but your friend is as dumb as they come, unless they climb that hard how in the world is he going to knows that a true 14? Unless you can climb that hard and have climbed other 14's to know what they are like how can u call it a 14? do me a favor next time you out with you friend just do the entire climbing world a favor and push him off the top of some tall face with out any belay.

If you are drilling ground up without aid, you only get to drill when you find a no-hands stance. This results in runouts, and generally letting the route dictate where you can place the bolts instead of logic about where clips will be easy.

If you are drilling ground up, with aid, you have as much control as rab bolting, unless you arbitrarily limit yourself to hooking or something lame like that. In the latter case, you'll end up with a complete mess (like the Bachar-Yerian).

Couldn't let this slip by, Fracture. The Bachar-Yerian is a mess??? (Not a bold, visionary, ground breaking climb...?)

I think there is something to be said for putting a route up according to what the rock dictates. You don't?

No, historically speaking, the standards of our sport were pushed by innovative and extremely bold people who took risks to push those standards - little or no "breaking of rules" was involved.

Ray Jardine pushed the ethical envelop when he decided to work the Phoenix into oblivion. He put up the first 13. He was criticized for dogging the route more than for pitoning it to death.

Separate Reality in the valley was lead on preplaced gear. The gear was placed while walking across the top of the crack, and the slings hung on the bottom. Sounds a lot like pink pointing to me. The route is still done this way often.


With your standards of needing to be within reach, no new standarts would be reached. Lynn Hill worked on the Nose for over a year before getting the redpoint. You could argue that the route wasn't in her range and didn’t belong there. Is she pushing the ethics envelop in the wrong direction too.

Wofgang was criticized in “Rock Punk,” I know, I was living in Bavaria at the time, for bolting a route that "would never go free." I guess he showed them.

Instead of criticizing this guy for wanted to bolt something hard by his standards, give him some advice on how to do the job well. Whether the route is 14 or not is irrelevant anyways.

Sport routes

Wolfgang Gullich bolted a Action Direct (14+) now, before he, or anyone else in the world was ever able to climb the grade. He had vision, he failed, he designed a training regiment, and he came back several months later to do the first accent. He than rated the route 14b before any route had ever been rated 14a. When criticized for it, he held his ground.

Wolfgang Gullich bolted a Action Direct (14+) now, before he, or anyone else in the world was ever able to climb the grade. He had vision, he failed, he designed a training regiment, and he came back several months later to do the first accent. He than rated the route 14b before any route had ever been rated 14a. When criticized for it, he held his ground.

If your mate thinks that hees up to the task and willing to learn and put up a quaility route, then Id say let him go for it.

even good climbers screw up bolt jobs.. i dont know if it's been mentioned but Dave graham did a poor ass job on Bill clinton project at Rumney.. though it has been done properly now

still say u should toss TR anchors and see what it's like... or leave it

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No, I don't. I call it contrived. But that's not what the Bachar-Yerian is, anyway: it was drilled on aid (from hooks). The runouts are completely deliberate, not "dictated by the rock". Supposedly (I don't remember where I heard this) on the FA, Bachar would climb, ask Yerian if he was scared, and if yes, go a little further before placing a hook to drill a bolt.

Ground breaking? The Bachar-Yerian is only 5.11c/d. The only "difficulty" is due to the intentionally bad bolting job. As Guangzhou mentions: Action Directe was truely ground breaking. Akira will probably eventually be seen as ground breaking. The FFA of the Nose was ground breaking. The early rap-bolted lines done at Smith were certainly ground breaking.

I don't think the BY compares with these other developments.

Nowhere have anyone claimed that ground up routes were not bold. Whether or not a line is bold is irrelevant to the question on this post.

On a different note, I have never climbed the Bachar line, I hope to get there one day.

Having not done the route, I can't say how often a hook placement was available to Bachar - but I guarantee that the runouts were not entirely deliberate. - i.e. on a steep slab he climbed upward into the unknown hoping for a hook placement before the fall potential became too enormous...

I've not heard the story you related above... sounds like rumor/myth to me, though.

As far as the grade goes... Well, it has spit off 5.13/14 cats like Kurt Albert - I was referring to it as groundbreaking in terms of mind control and style, not numerical difficulty.

I'm not disputing the historic nature of some of those other routes you mentioned... but I think it is interesting that all of the routes you name were done in a "modern" top-down style. I'm certainly not against sport climbing or "working" trad routes on a top-rope... but don't you think there is room in climbing for ground-up boldness (which I think the Bachar-Yerian is an excellent example of)? (I only ask because your list seems to indicate that you only place importance on difficulty)

To me, climbing up into difficult, unknown terrain with uncertain protection is quite admirable.