RRC Archives

I'll play. Thanks for the template, krampus.

Onsite:
12b sport
11c trad

Redpoint:
13a sport (only one)
12a trad (only one)

spraylordess!!

j/k nice work on Tuskan...

It is not about falling--at least it is not with me and many others that I know. I whip on both trad and sport. If the gear is good in good rock, the protection is good. Many don't feel this way. I was talking to a buddy at Rocktoberfest who does not fall on trad. His dominant line of argument was that our sandstone spontaneous explodes when you weight gear. The major question in my head was, well then why are you climbing on trad at all in the Red;? you are free-soloing. People draw some pretty odd conclusions from who knows where. To his credit, he says my exploits are changing his mind and he is more interested in pushing his grade.

One major difference between redpointing trad versus sport is timing. In sport the problem distills down Joe-Friday-style to 'just the moves mam.' Consider how many goes in a day one can commit to a typical sport line versus a typical trad line. Placing and organizing the gear takes more time on the trad line than the sport line. You are more in charge of your own ass end in trad; that little problem takes more time to puzzle over in the absence of Joe Bolter's connect-the-dots-game.

At the end of the day, I find redpointing trad to be more enjoyable. When I am away from climbing it is the trad that is in my head.

I also love to sport climb. Others on this forum indicated that they use the sport grade to keep their trad grade honest. Pushing the trad to meet the sport grade is a very enjoyable overall project. I think people who climb at the same grade in both styles are not pushing the sport grade that much . . . but every conclusion / stereotype has a few outliers (outliars? ).

LK Day wrote:There are always outliers. While certainly not trad, an argument could be made that if you can't afford to fall it's not exactly a "sport" route either.

dustonian wrote:spraylordess!!

j/k nice work on Tuskan...

Dammit, Dustin, if you'd just logged on and sprayed my list for me like I paid you to, I wouldn't have to resort to such spraylordessery. And thanks.

dustonian wrote:Go check out Bloodline, Joely... and I've heard Cascading Wind & Vascular Massacre are really good too.

I intend to and can't wait. Searching through the guide it looks like muir valley has a few good ones too, but it may be a while before I can go there again (too many poochies).

Oh yeah... dreamthiever and dog warts I mean wars. they look awesome. I'm also perenially SIKED on pink feat...

art, to be succinct...do you think most people 'say" they enjoy trad more because, um, they just suck so bad at sport climbing (or have plateaued) and there is no place to hide? we climb 5.12 sport but we see 9 year olds warming up on our projects so we decide to go hide in the woods and plug gear instead of admitting we are being left behind.

I mean, my gawd, how many times do we get to hear: trad is full body, trad is the puzzle, trad is all senses, trad is always sandbagged, trad is blah, blah...blah....the majority of low end trad climbers also suck at sport climbing I would assume. ie...you won't see some brah plugging gear on 5.13 only to get wanked on 5.10 clip ups...

i think what really happens is that people start to plateau with their sport climbing and start to search for something to spice up their outdoor recreation time....gear plugging fits the bill for a season or two until they realize that they do very little climbing per outing. can you name a single person who climbs harder on gear than on bolts? yes, we have gehring but I am assuming he climbs 5.14 sport as well.

my point: people don't want to put in the gym time to see small gains in skill sets so they pretend they found the holy grail and start trad climbing at very low levels. then they get to see big gains again for a season.

You've been climbing in the Red too long. It is a strange little microcosm here... almost everywhere most else people just climb routes of both styles and don't make a big deal about distinguishing the two. It's all rock climbing. There just happens to be a higher percentage of good sport climbs relative to good trad climbs here.... that said, there are many excellent, must-do trad climbs in the Red. Just doing one or the other is very self-limiting and mundane IMO... and making a big fuss about it is so last century. It is awesome to live near an area that has so many great routes established in both styles.

pigsteak wrote:people don't want to put in the gym time to see small gains in skill sets so they pretend they found the holy grail and start trad climbing at very low levels. then they get to see big gains again for a season.

this sounds likely. you get the to relieve the excitement of the initial learning curve again.

for me the allure of trad is 1) more climbing and 2) i can climb everything without waiting for the bolt squad to lay it all out for me. win-win. the major stopper for me is financial; it's kinda pricey, no?

maybe after my parents die i can afford to be a bolder climber, but until then i think it's okay to simulate the head games on hard sport routes.

dustonian wrote:You've been climbing in the Red too long. It is a strange little microcosm here... almost everywhere most else people just climb routes of both styles and don't make a big deal about distinguishing the two. It's all rock climbing. There just happens to be a higher percentage of good sport climbs relative to good trad climbs here.... that said, there are many excellent, must-do trad climbs in the Red. Just doing one or the other is very self-limiting and mundane IMO... and making a big fuss about it is so last century. It is awesome to live near an area that has so many great routes established in both styles.

Yea... Dustin is right. When I was in NC you just did it all, and didn't think to much about it. By the way I climbed trad and sport at the same grade then. (5.12ish) Now that I climb mostly at the red... the only time you will see me using trad gear is to bolt crappy routes. Little known fact, cams were invented to help rappel bolt sport routes. Not sure if you all knew that.