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Big multipitch and the Dolomites - tips for the punter (Read 15853 times)

iain

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I'm off to the Dolomites in 4 weeks for attempts on the Hasse Brandler among a few other things and there is a glaring hole of beta that I need help filling. The longest multipitch I've ever done was about 8 pitches and it took all day, and most of that time was wasted with belay/gear/rope faff.

I'd really appreciate advice/knowledge for what does and doesn't work efficiently, traps/pitfalls etc.

Ropes:
- Given the abs on descents I'm assuming that doubles are the way forward? 50's enough or is there any benefit from using 60's eg.running pitches together if poss.
- What's the best way to manage them at the belay. We've had suggestions of coiling into bags (Ikea of course) but I just picture more faff and a potential tangled mess. Another suggestion was overhand knots onto a crab every 10m or so, taking care with the coil length.

Belays, how to be efficient and swap over quickly:
- I'm assuming most Dolomites belays are bolted/pegged, especially on the popular routes. Do people climb with a permanent sling/crag for clipping in or attach ropes?
- Swapping gear, I've previously attached it to an easily accessed sling or something whilst belaying (with a reverso of course),

Leading: block or alternating, pros/cons
- Block has the advantage of a built in rest after every pitch rather than climbing 2 in a row, and possibly less swapping gear faff?
- Alternating easier for rope management?

Comms, assuming the voice doesn't carry well (like at Swanage this past weekend) how do people deal with that. My current method seems to be wait for too long and then struggle to get the rope out of the belay as it's pulled through.

Food/Water: This is basic stuff but I've never had to fuel myself for a potential 10+ hour climbing day.
- Clif/Nakd bar type things or is more variety better, or is a simple nut/fruit mix combined with something more solid occassionally better, (and certainly cheaper).
- 2/3 litres of water sufficient? This might be a more personal thing but I can see me ending the day slightly dehydrated with that amount.

Dolomites specific:
- Anything helpful to avoid route finding/descent mistakes? We're looking at the obvious targets such as Hasse Brandler, Comici, Cassin and something on the Tofana.
- Something on the Marmolada's been suggested as a nice-to-do, does it require crampons/axes to exit to the cable car?

Anything more beyond the above is gratefully appreciated.

Thank you  :)

Jerry Morefat

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A friend and I did the BH, comici and vinatzer/messner a couple off years ago. Some answers, based on our experience below.


Ropes:
- Given the abs on descents I'm assuming that doubles are the way forward? 50's enough or is there any benefit from using 60's eg.running pitches together if poss.
- What's the best way to manage them at the belay. We've had suggestions of coiling into bags (Ikea of course) but I just picture more faff and a potential tangled mess. Another suggestion was overhand knots onto a crab every 10m or so, taking care with the coil length.

We took 60m doubles although I think 50m would be fine. From memory all of the abbs on the cime grande are really short and a lot of the time we just used one rope. 60m obviously gives you more options.

We just looped coils over the front of our harnesses. Taking bags sounds like a right faff. Hanging belays are in the minority. Most of the time there will be ledges to stack ropes.
Belays, how to be efficient and swap over quickly:
- I'm assuming most Dolomites belays are bolted/pegged, especially on the popular routes. Do people climb with a permanent sling/crag for clipping in or attach ropes?
- Swapping gear, I've previously attached it to an easily accessed sling or something whilst belaying (with a reverso of course),
All the routes we did had bolted and/or pegged belays. Some of the pegs didn't look great though, so you might want to back them up here and there. We didn't bother with a sling, just clove hitched the rope directly into the anchor points.
Leading: block or alternating, pros/cons
- Block has the advantage of a built in rest after every pitch rather than climbing 2 in a row, and possibly less swapping gear faff?
- Alternating easier for rope management?
I've never quite understood the appeal of block leading as, in my mind, it complicates the rope management. We alternated leads and it seemed to work fine.
Comms, assuming the voice doesn't carry well (like at Swanage this past weekend) how do people deal with that. My current method seems to be wait for too long and then struggle to get the rope out of the belay as it's pulled through.
I don't recall this being a problem. In fact I remember being able to hear the conversation of people on the comic whilst on the BH. I guess if the wind is up you could have problems. In the past I've used a big pull and then dropped the rope, repeating this process 3 times, for the signal for safe and on belay. If you pull up enough rope and drop it, it's pretty hard to confuse it with just pulling up a bit of slack whilst climbing. However, if I'm being ultra cautious, I just do what you suggest and pay out the rope though the belay device until it comes tight. Better to be safe than sorry and all that.
Food/Water: This is basic stuff but I've never had to fuel myself for a potential 10+ hour climbing day.
- Clif/Nakd bar type things or is more variety better, or is a simple nut/fruit mix combined with something more solid occassionally better, (and certainly cheaper).
- 2/3 litres of water sufficient? This might be a more personal thing but I can see me ending the day slightly dehydrated with that amount.
Carrying that much stuff may slow you down. When we did the Comici we took 2 litres each, a couple of chocolate bars, some spare clothes and put it all in a rucksack which the second carried. We were really slow! Or more specifically, I was really slow. I wasn't prepared for how much of a pain climbing with a rucksack was. We then did the yellow edge a couple of days later with the same set up and bumped into a guide who literally laughed at the amount of stuff we were carrying. He suggested we need only take 1 litre of water each (clipped to your harness) and stuff chocolate and cereal bars in our shoes (also clipped to your harness) and dispense with the rucksack. So this is what we did on the BH and it worked really well. Going on the 0% chance of precipitation for that day we didn't even take waterproofs. We put our head torches on our helmets. I'm really paranoid about dehydrating and usually drink loads of water but 1 litre was fine on the cime grande. You're obviously on a north face, so there's no sun and, being in the mountains, it's quite cold.
Dolomites specific:
- Anything helpful to avoid route finding/descent mistakes? We're looking at the obvious targets such as Hasse Brandler, Comici, Cassin and something on the Tofana.
- Something on the Marmolada's been suggested as a nice-to-do, does it require crampons/axes to exit to the cable car?
Route finding on the BH is easy provided you go far enough left on the pitch which starts off to top of the obvious small pinnacle you climb at the start. A tip on the Comici is to take the right dihedral of the two on the second half of the climb. You'll know what I mean when you get there. The Alpine club Dolomites guidebook really bigs up the descent off the cime grande but a load of abseil stations have gone in since the publication of the guide book and the descent is actually really straightforward. There is even a point where someone has painted a massive arrow on the rock to send you down the correct gulley!

Route finding on the vinatzer/messner is really tricky. We were really lucky in that we had some friends climbing in front of us and just followed them. We took one axe between the two of us for the glacier but I don't think it is required. We took trainers and strap on spikes similar to these which were fine for traversing the glacier. We missed the cable car and slept in the cable car station. It was grim and I wouldn't recommend it. Better to walk down to the road and bivy there, even if it is dark, as it was when we topped out!

Hope this helps and have a great trip!

p.s. i think we may have climbed together at Raven Tor a couple of years ago if you're the Iain I think you are. Feel free to give me a ring you want any more info. Duncan.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2015, 11:24:52 am by Jerry Morefat »

iain

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We just looped coils over the front of our harnesses. Taking bags sounds like a right faff. Hanging belays are in the minority. Most of the time there will be ledges to stack ropes.
That's what I thought/hoped.

If the abs are short are single's feasible? What do the euros use on routes like this?

I've never quite understood the appeal of block leading as, in my mind, it complicates the rope management. We alternated leads and it seemed to work fine.
From my point of view it's more thinking about having to do 2 crux pitches one after the other, and block leading has a built in rest rather than having rest time where no one is moving up. It does increase the faff factor though.

Carrying that much stuff may slow you down. When we did the Comici we took 2 litres each, a couple of chocolate bars, some spare clothes and put it all in a rucksack which the second carried. We were really slow! Or more specifically, I was really slow. I wasn't prepared for how much of a pain climbing with a rucksack was. We then did the yellow edge a couple of days later with the same set up and bumped into a guide who literally laughed at the amount of stuff we were carrying. He suggested we need only take 1 litre of water each (clipped to your harness) and stuff chocolate and cereal bars in our shoes (also clipped to your harness) and dispense with the rucksack. So this is what we did on the BH and it worked really well. Going on the 0% chance of precipitation for that day we didn't even take waterproofs. We put our head torches on our helmets. I'm really paranoid about dehydrating and usually drink loads of water but 1 litre was fine on the cime grande. You're obviously on a north face, so there's no sun and, being in the mountains, it's quite cold.
Good knowledge, cheers. We were thinking of small sacs, 15-20l, but being able to do without them would be a bonus.

Route finding on the BH is easy provided you go far enough left on the pitch which starts off to top of the obvious small pinnacle you climb at the start. A tip on the Comici is to take the right dihedral of the two on the second half of the climb. You'll know what I mean when you get there. The Alpine club Dolomites guidebook really bigs up the descent off the cime grande but a load of abseil stations have gone in since the publication of the guide book and the descent is actually really straightforward. There is even a point where someone has painted a massive arrow on the rock to send you down the correct gulley!

Route finding on the vinatzer/messner is really tricky. We were really lucky in that we had some friends climbing in front of us and just followed them. We took one axe between the two of us for the glacier but I don't think it is required. We took trainers and strap on spikes similar to these which were fine for traversing the glacier. We missed the cable car and slept in the cable car station. It was grim and I wouldn't recommend it. Better to walk down to the road and bivy there, even if it is dark, as it was when we topped out!

Hope this helps and have a great trip!
It does, thank you.

p.s. i think we may have climbed together at Raven Tor a couple of years ago if you're the Iain I think you are. Feel free to give me a ring you want any more info. Duncan.
We did, hello again  :wave:

Jerry Morefat

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If the abs are short are single's feasible? What do the euros use on routes like this?

I'm fairly sure the abbs on the Cima Piccola are feasible with a single as the guide I mentioned was climbing with one single. I think most of them on the cima grange are as well, but I really can't be sure. Personally I'd take two half ropes just in case there is a need to retreat. Trying to retreat from the routes on the cima grande with one rope would be problematic to say the least as most of the pitches are in excess of 30m. I can't really recall what the euros did. I've got a memory of one group climbing the BH with a single and using a tag line to haul up a sack. I guess if they needed to retreat they could tie their single to their tag line. This could be be another option?

From my point of view it's more thinking about having to do 2 crux pitches one after the other, and block leading has a built in rest rather than having rest time where no one is moving up. It does increase the faff factor though.

I see your point. Personally I like leading after seconding as you're nice and warmed up. I really struggled with the feeling in my fingers on the BH as it was cold and the bottom third is very crimpy. By the time I had led half a pitch I'd lost the feeling in my fingers. I'm sure it would have been even worse if I hadn't just warmed up by seconding a pitch. Perhaps I was just being a wuss though! Things improved for me on the middle crux pitches as it had warmed up by the time we got to them and also the holds are bigger on these pitches.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2015, 01:27:16 pm by Jerry Morefat »

Wood FT

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Iain, whilst on Pabbay this year my much more experieced parter showed me the coils-on-a-crab technique and I'm sold on it. She used slipknots but I just used overhands. Make the coil lenghts as long as you can provided they dont drop under a roof (60m was done in 3 knots doing it this way). Made the belay much neater and helped keep my cluster-fuckery to a minimum (I still dropped her wires in the sea)

Also - if you're both belaying on guide plates it's easy for the 2nd to arrive at the belay > lock the plate off > swap gear > 2nd gives you their belay plate and you put them on belay under your locked off plate > they take your plate and lead off on the next pitch. Really smooth.

duncan

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Iain

You'll be fine. Swanage is the perfect training for the Dolomites. It's not called Marmolada buttress for nothing. It's been a hot summer, so the H-B should be nice and dry.

An engineering professor has a very thorough and detailed guide to multipitch climbing tips and tricks here: http://www.multipitchclimbing.com
I imagine his ebook (with Andy Kirkpatrick) is similarly complete. A leash works well on multipitch sport routes, ie with two perfect bolt belays, and on multi abseil descents. If you have to set up a more trad. belay, equalising pieces, as you sometimes do on H-B, I wouldn't bother.

We carried one and a half litres of water each. This was plenty. Just take something tasty to eat, whatever you fancy, avoid the triathlete marketing bull. Graham Obree was powered by Marmalade sandwiches. Lightweight shoes, like the evolv canvas jobs, are nice for the walk in/out.

Double thin 50m ropes were good. A single rope would feel committing. Fine if you're a guide on the Yellow Edge, not so much on the N.Face of the Cima Grande. Block leading versus alternating leading have pros and cons. Best try them out, perhaps on one of the longer sport routes suggested below. To my mind there was one definite crux pitch to the H-B. The difficulties on the other three 6c+/7a pitche were short-lived and much less tiring.

The route finding on the descent from Cima Grande is not completely trivial, have a good description of this. We scrambled down nearly all of it, taking our time as a Korean party just above us pulled off a block, injured themselves, and we had to call out a rescue. We were glad to have micro head torches.

We warmed-up on Ottovollante.
This is 7a free, with a shorter, more technical crux. It's less sustained or intimidating, completely bolted, but 10 pitches of are still quite tiring.

Ore e Carbone nearby is also supposed to be very good but I've not done it. Both are north facing but lower altitude so you get an idea of the likely conditions on the Cima Grande.

Tre Cima webcam
http://www.umbriameteo.com/webcam/trecime/





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Disclaimer: I've not climbed in the Dolomites, but I've done some long routes in other areas.

Rope management:
If the pitches are farily straight and steep, haul the bag with water & food on the harder pitches. Even though I'm pretty heavy I usually get way more tired seconding with a bag with water & food for two than leading without a pack, especially on vertical/slightly overhanging stuff. Seriously. Haul the bag. I never used to do, now I do and it makes a big difference on steep terrain.

I usually climb with one 9.0-9.4 mm and one ≈8 mm rope, using both on complex pitches and climbing on the 9mm and hauling on the 8mm on straight-forward pitches. Stack the 8mm on a 60cm sling when hauling (hauling <5kg hand over hand with a leadrope is usually fine, but a microtraxion could be worth it if you got money burning in your pocket) and then tie-off the sling around the rope and hang it out of the way before bringing up the second on the 9mm.

On mostly straight forward routes, climbing on a single and brining a 60m 5.5mm kevlar rap/haul line is a good system. The rapline is a small bundle that pack very neatly, so for easier pitches you can just bring it in the pack. Then you can just belay on the GriGri as normal. I'd invest in this system (the rapline is expensive) if I'd climb more than 4-5 of these routes per year.

Strategies:
*Eat something at every belay on the hard part of the routes, regardless if you are hungry or not. Mainly carbs.

*When switching leads: rest 5-15 min before the crux pitch(es) if they are of a difficulty where you could conceivably fall for non-trivial reasons. Falling is a bigwaste of time. And after having pumped out on an onsight attempt you are likely to be very slow the rest of the pitch.

(Note: This is all based on my experience of onsight attempts of long routes, I've never redpointed a multi-pitch in my life, so I would not know any of the tricks needed.)
« Last Edit: August 11, 2015, 02:11:29 pm by jwi »

Jerry Morefat

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Iain
The route finding on the descent from Cima Grande is not completely trivial, have a good description of this. We scrambled down nearly all of it.

I'm certain we abbed the whole thing and I distinctly remember wondering what the fuss was all about regarding the descent. I thought the descent from the Cima Piccola was more involved. I recall abbing from a singe piton to get down a steep snow covered slope at the base which I wasn't too happy about.

iain

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Good stuff there guys.

Guy, thanks for the coil pointers, and nice tip for the belay.

Duncan, that website's a gold mine. Thanks for the route suggestions and the webcam, those mountains look alright don't they.

Jwi, Like you I'm not going to be doing enough to justify the rapline but I'll have to try out the thick/thin ropes and hauling. There's a fair number of sideways/diagonal pitches on the routes but could be enough straight to make it worthwhile.

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Iain,

Have done quite some routes in the Dolomites myself over the years. Start off with some shorter/straightforward stuff and work slowly towards the more demanding routes. Sounds like you need to gain some experience till no time is wasted by belay/gear/rope faff. Most people start off way to quick. Big dreams. Hasse/Bandler. Low grade, well within our technical capabilities, etc. Works out fine in the end for most, but remember, one fatal mistake is all it takes.
 
Allright, the tricks:
- Doubles, unless on steep, straightforward and solid rock. 50 will do in the Dolomites (short pitches, meandering routes). 60 is better on modern routes.
- No singles on traditional routes. Having your one and only rope chopped and going for the ride down sucks. Thought for half a sec I bought in when a hold broke on a runnout easy section on the Hasse/Brandler. Went for a nasty nearly 20 meters sideways fall. Both ropes seriously damaged (sheet gone, core partially though). Have had ropes chopped on other occasions as well... Double up. 
- Equalize the belay (the modern way). Tie overhand knots onto a sling (between the pro) every 8, 7, 6, 5 etc meter or so, making sure each succeeding coil is shorter then the previous. This way no coil gets tangled into a previous one and its easy to release whilst belaying.
- Most Dolomites belays are pegged. Some modern routes are bolted. Equalize the belay with a sling - also when swapping leads. Makes the belay more easily escapable. Don't think you'll run into a situation where you'll need to escape the belay? Wrong, some day you will.
- Swapping gear: whatever works for you and your partner. As long as it is quick and efficient.
- Leading in blocks: hardly ever climb this way. Works well on really long routes with lots of hard pitches one after the other where you cant afford (timewise) to rest before climbing the next pitch. Alternating is easier (no tangled ropes/swapping belays) and more fun.
- Block has the advantage of a built in rest after every pitch rather than climbing 2 in a row, and possibly less swapping gear faff?
- Get to know each other well so you can climb without auditive comms. Plenty tricks round for letting the belayer know you're on belay.
- Drink and eat every hour. Dehydration sucks. Sort of. Of steep, cool (northern exposure) and 'short' routes a small bottle on the harness will do. Southern exposure (Marmolada)? 2 liters pppd.
- Route finding/descent mistakes? Buy a decent guidebook. For all Marmolade routes: get the guidebook by Giordani from Versante Sud and make photocopies (colour) of the pictures showing where the route goes. You'll be happy you did so once on the upper, slabby part of the wall (hell for route-finding novices). For Hasse Brandler get the topo from Topoguide.de (they have an excellent topo's for Vinantzer/Messner and Tempi Moderni on Marmolade as well). Get additional info from the web.
- On Marmolada in summer crampons/axes are not required to exit to the cable car or walk down to the col. Drive up to the col on the north side and see how the slope's conditions are. I've done the decent in well snowed up condition in may (half an hour from summit->col) and in icy conditions late august (2 hour decent). Bring approach shoes with a decent heel. Iced up conditions (late autumn) are different!!! Axe and crampons a must.
- Beware of thunderstorms, and/or shitty Italian forecasts. Be sure to be the first on routes. Be polite and let faster climbers go past. Bring a helmet. Bring two copies of the topo en route so you can lose one of 'm. Bring more cams/nuts. It's safer climbing. I prefer small cams over nuts in the Dolomites. Take a shit before the climb - and cover it up. Thats about it.
- Regarding routes: First part of the Comici is awesome. Vinatzer Messner is great as well. Don Quichote is a good intro into the M South Face. Modern bolted climbs have better rock than the classics. If you can look beyond the aura of the classics I believe more fun is to be had on modern bolted routes. The modern Classic 'Gelbe Mauer' (Albert/Glowaczs) and its two neighbours (Hainz) are as steep and impressive as the routes on the North Face of Cima Grande. History makes for great stories, not great climbing...  :smart:  Make sure to climb the more overhanging routes on the Tre Cime North Faces on days with good conditions. The rock feels damp on humid days (like on seacliffs) and makes freeing a route tricky.
- Have fun!

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Lots of good advice so far.

We've just done the BH and the most tiring thing we both found was seconding with the pack, even aiding the shit out of it on second. My shoes are like lumps of lead (La Sportiva Ganda) but Andy had some Innov8's. We kept our shoes clipped to the harness, water, food and jackets in the pack. Habrich is on the money with his advice.  Andy brought this pack which worked well: http://www.alloutdoor.co.uk/bags-rucksacks/lowe-alpine/mountain/lowe-alpine-illusion-16l-backpack.htm

I think we had 3l of water, which was just about right, could maybe go less, definitely not more. I don't drink much, but Andy does. Probably 1.25, 1.75l split. Some cereal bars, nuts, a few gels. It's not a huge "effort" the route, so you don't need tonnes of food.

Don't block lead, don't haul, use half ropes. (IMO far too wandery to be able to climb without fuckloads of drag on a single rope) Just get out and do some mileage on the first week. My first trip to the dollies it took a full week (4 big routes) at pretty easy grades just to get up to "guidebook time".

BH descent - We had a thunderstorm on the descent and we thankfully overtaken by a couple who had been down before. It's probably not that bad but in the dark it'd be tricky.

Try and cut weight on jackets - I had this which was perfect http://www.outdoorresearch.com/en/mens/jackets/mens-helium-ii-jacket.html that and shoes, light shoes, get LIGHT SHOES!

My best tip - pretend pegs are bolts unless they are really bad and in that case save your quickdraws.

Our "perfect rack" for the BH would be:

1) Rack of totems, plus a gold camalot #2
2) 6 nuts (odd or even, your preference
3) 18 draws, at least 6 or more "slingdraws".

I've hear some people saying that up to the crux is about E5 in it's own right which is total bull. E3 tops and once you're warmed up it's not even all that strenuous. I can give you some pitch-by-pitch beta for the crux pitches if you like.

Comms are fairly easy most of the time, such a smooth wall you can barely miss each other. On the marmolda less so, but you're ding so many pitches you'll quickly get a feel for when each other are at the belay. Get slick at using autobelay, it lets you faff around clipping the gear to the sling and taking photos etc.

I have a permanent cow's tail clip in/abseil rope on my belay loop. Not much use in the dollies as it's often too short. Although, get in the habit of clipping straight into the belay after seconding to allow your belayer to swap you from auto belay to normal (even on the last pitch of the last route andy still asked me "do you want me to clip in?" YES OF COURSE YOU MUPPIT! )  :spank:

Don't listen to Habrich about shoes.  ;) Wear something you can climb hard in, I have no idea how North Americans can climb in those loafers called Mythos, ok, maybe 5.10 cracks where you can literally wedge all that soft floppy material into the crack but edges? No chance. You will be edging all day, so wear something good. I was in Scarpa Boostics and didn't even have sore feet at the end of the day. Andy was in 5.10 verdes. The only thing worse than sore feet is blowing the onsight of the route of your life because you're in loafers. [rant over]

HaeMeS is spot on about the Messner part of the Vinatzer/Messner. Once your tired (17 pitches in) it's tricky and even the versant sud topo isn't perfect. There's a lot of mystery questing up there! Great climbing though.

We did Don Quixote as I had done the Vinatzer Messner before and Andy wanted a route on the S.Face. He was seriously underwhelmed. I thought it was alright but can't remember much about it (other than leaving the hut 1 hr before everyone, not finding the start and being overtaken by guys who had one more hour of sleep than us)  :slap:  The V/M is better.#


Now, one final tip which I have yet to try but saw another guy do was to put a loop of soft elastic (girls hair elastic apparently) around your ankle and tie it to your pull on loops of your shoes. That way your less worried about popping your heels off and losing your shoes.  :clap2:

Enjoy  ;D




« Last Edit: August 11, 2015, 09:55:15 pm by Fultonius »

Fultonius

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P.S. if you like the BH then do ISO2000 - fun technical and bold bolted route. just left of the motorway Comici.

jwi

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On the subject of light shoes, Duncan mentions Evolv Cruzer. I agree. 430g for a pair (42);  throw away the insoles to get them down under 400g. AFAIK Evolv's shoe is the only light-weight shoe with climbing rubber on the market (5.10 is testing a model that hopefully be out soon. Evolv could take some competition in this bracket). As a comparison the guide tennie is 820 g for a pair, so the difference is about as much as a camalot 5 (with biner).

Fultonius

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On the subject of light shoes, Duncan mentions Evolv Cruzer. I agree. 430g for a pair (42);  throw away the insoles to get them down under 400g. AFAIK Evolv's shoe is the only light-weight shoe with climbing rubber on the market (5.10 is testing a model that hopefully be out soon. Evolv could take some competition in this bracket). As a comparison the guide tennie is 820 g for a pair, so the difference is about as much as a camalot 5 (with biner).

And Gandas in 45 are another 200 or so grammes...   

Sorry Habrich, it's not really about attention span, I just go into instant rant mode whenever I hear Mythos being ...  what was I talking about again?  :shrug:

Johnny Brown

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I cannot believe 5.10 discontinued the Daescent. About 50g heavier than the Cruzer and a proper shoe you can walk, run, or climb E5/ 7C. I remember switching back to them on about pitch 30 of Seventh rifle and immediately regretting not wearing them all day, bar the three crux pitches. Well worth a hunt around on ebay, there is still some new stock left too.

galpinos

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Duncan mentions Evolv Cruzer.

My tip would be don't leave them in a hot tent all day, the glue doesn't like it. Apart from that, all good though probably not a patch on the Daesents for climbing (struggle to edge in them).


iain

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Lately I have been in the habit of putting socks on while belaying.  Probably looks very eccentric ...
Only if you combine with the other IO's penchant for climbing in pants.

Sounds like you need to gain some experience till no time is wasted by belay/gear/rope faff. Most people start off way to quick. Big dreams. Hasse/Bandler.
Re:dreams guilty as charged but not inexperienced, just slow and an obvious weakness to address and practice before going out.

- Beware of thunderstorms, and/or shitty Italian forecasts.
Any forecasting site recommendations?

Good work Fultonius! I was checking Duncan's Fairly Long, Moderately Hard ... thread yesterday and you'd mentioned wanting to do it on there years ago.

jwi

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I cannot believe 5.10 discontinued the Daescent.

A really tiny market, and a truly lightweight shoe will not last that long, so lots of prissy customers.

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Lately I have been in the habit of putting socks on while belaying.  Probably looks very eccentric ...
Only if you combine with the other IO's penchant for climbing in pants.

Sounds like you need to gain some experience till no time is wasted by belay/gear/rope faff. Most people start off way to quick. Big dreams. Hasse/Bandler.
Re:dreams guilty as charged but not inexperienced, just slow and an obvious weakness to address and practice before going out.

- Beware of thunderstorms, and/or shitty Italian forecasts.
Any forecasting site recommendations?

Good work Fultonius! I was checking Duncan's Fairly Long, Moderately Hard ... thread yesterday and you'd mentioned wanting to do it on there years ago.

Cheers. If you have a good forecast I don't think you need to be superfast on the BH. We were behind 2 other guys and our hand overs were swift but not Nose-In-3hours fast. We used http://www.dolomitimeteo.it/en/ not perfect (we got rained on twice when no showers were forecast and sun when rain was) but it seemed the best of the bunch!)

Whereas on the Vinatzer Messner Marmolada you have to be fast fast fast.

iain

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Cheers. If you have a good forecast I don't think you need to be superfast on the BH. We were behind 2 other guys and our hand overs were swift but not Nose-In-3hours fast. We used http://www.dolomitimeteo.it/en/ not perfect (we got rained on twice when no showers were forecast and sun when rain was) but it seemed the best of the bunch!)

Whereas on the Vinatzer Messner Marmolada you have to be fast fast fast.
Noted, thanks  :)


Edit: Oh and re shoe advice thanks everyone, actually thought ahead about that and settled on the Scarpa Vapours.

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The purpose designed wall packs like the Petzl Bug generally seem over-featured to me - too many straps and widgets. I have a ten litre £10 Decathlon minimal day pack that I think is near perfect.

They even do a purpose designed light'n'fast rock route sack. Looks well designed, costs next to nothing and is less than half the weight of the Pod one I currently use. Order placed.

For shoes I use Inov-8 F-Lite 195s. Very light. Not intended as approach shoes, but I've done some reasonably long & hairy alpine descents in them without dying, hiked all day in the rain in them on a mixture of scree and wet limestone, and find them perfectly ok for the job.

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A friend and I did the Vinatzer-Messner a few weeks ago. We took half ropes, a set of nuts 1-4 cams and a load of draws (lots of sling draws as Fultonius suggests). Again, like Fultonius said, just clip the pegs and go unless they look especially poor. I think in the 15/16 pitches I led, I placed about 3 or 4 bits of gear other than the odd belay when we got lost...

On all the longer routes we did, we carried a small pack each which we found worked better than the second carrying a single larger pack.

We did a combination of block leading and swinging leads, just changed when it was convenient, one person ended up with most of the gear or the belay made it more convenient to change.

The Vinatzer part wasn't quite as quick as we thought, as there are quite a few chimneys which slowed things down. The Messner part involved getting quite lost on the first half and just questing upwards before doing some scary stuff to get back on route.

You don't need crampons to get to the cable car and there is a small room in the top station that you can sleep in if (when?) you miss the last lift.

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Also, we used a combination of yr.no and meteoblue for weather. Somewhere in between them usually seemed to be about correct.

Plus, Tempi Moderni on the Marmolada looked to be pure quality. Mega psyched to get on it next year.

Tommy

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Five Ten had a replacement planned for the Daescent called the "Cat Burglar" which looked totally amazing. Predictably it was never brought into production as burglary turned out to be a niche market ;-)




iain

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Muench, Oli thank you.

Tommy  ::)  :)

 

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