[Nike Air]

why dress as a pirate when I know you have a full Hawaiian outfit at your disposal.............

[mark s]

6'2" and 13st 8lb. That makes me 'overweight' on those graphs.

bag of bones 

[chummer]

good effort Andy!

[SA Chris]

6'2" and 13st 8lb. That makes me 'overweight' on those graphs.

The same graph must make me "fatcunt" then.

[Fultonius]

...

[Jaspersharpe]

Ken Yager reports on supertopo that Alex Honnold has soloed The Phoenix in Yosemite.  Phoenix is "only" a single-pitch 5.13a (7c+) but the business is technical insecure thin jamming and it is a long way up in the air. 

Interview with AH here:

http://www.planetmountain.com/english/News/shownews1.lasso?l=2&keyid=38260

The first day I worked on the route there were TWO rainbows in the waterfall below us. It was amazing.

Whoah dude!! WHAT DID IT MEAN!?

[DaveC]

Whoah dude!! WHAT DID IT MEAN!?

??? ???

[nai]

??? ???

Has Ray Jardine been overdoing it a bit?

I envision an emergency anchor that will fire into a crack (or the rock itself) at the press of a button or a pull of a cord.

[Jaspersharpe]

I thought they'd been around for ages?

[Nemo]

In amongst the ceaseless tide of wiffle on the past few pages of this thread, I just noticed that Chris Savage has done Progress.     This is a flippin great effort – Progress is utterly nails.  Is this the first ascent of this by someone other than Mcclure since Sellars did it way back in the 90s?  This is a totally different league to stuff like Make It Funky, Unjustified etc etc.  At least a full grade and a half harder IMO.  It’s also worth pointing out that it got considerably harder around 2000 / 2001 with loads of holds coming off (mainly on the lower section which now has some really hard moves, but also some important holds higher up). 

Basically, if you leave aside Mcclure and Ondra, this is one of the more significant ascents in the UK in the last decade – and as usual people have absolutely no interest whatsoever. 

Obviously it’s slightly chicken and egg whether media coverage leads the scene or the scene leads the media.  And in an ideal world perhaps people shouldn’t need the attention of others in order to stay psyched for hard climbing.  But whether we like it or not, the reality is that Usain Bolt wouldn’t be running 100m in 9.6s if nobody else was interested in what he was doing.  So if you want to see standards in the UK improve, then yes – 8c is still newsworthy (if it isn’t then there has been VERY little news in the UK in the last decade).  And ascents of 8c+’s like Progress – which are very rare indeed in the UK are REALLY newsworthy.  Perhaps if ascents like this got the same amount of coverage as some of the vastly easier trad routes which people have multiple orgasms about, then a few people might actually gain the motivation required to progress towards 9as…   

[Ru]

Basically, if you leave aside Mcclure and Ondra, this is one of the more significant ascents in the UK in the last decade – and as usual people have absolutely no interest whatsoever. 

Pasqill did Kaabah recently and Evolution last year, and Smit did Kaabah a couple of years ago - they're all 8c+. Then there's Liquid Ambar and Sea of Tranquility being repeated - arguably 8c+ too.

[Nemo]

“Pasqill did Kaabah recently and Evolution last year, and Smit did Kaabah a couple of years ago - they're all 8c+. Then there's Liquid Ambar and Sea of Tranquility being repeated - arguably 8c+ too.” - Ru

I did say “one of the more significant” not “the most significant”.  Indeed I was thinking of exactly those ascents when I commented.  Having said that, rightly or wrongly, I suspect that Progress is one of the hardest of that bunch - especially since the holds were lost (depending on strengths and weaknesses obviously). 

[SA Chris]

Basically, if you leave aside Mcclure and Ondra, this is one of the more significant ascents in the UK in the last decade – and as usual people have absolutely no interest whatsoever. 

Why do assume people have absoultely no interest. Bit of a sweeping statement isn't it? This is the first I have heard of it, and I for one am very interested and think it's a great achievement from Chris. if you ever read this Chris, fucking good effort.

Maybe he needs to publicise his ascents a bit more if he wants people to take interest?

[Nemo]

Yeah, you’re right.  That was a bit over the top.  Especially on here where there clearly are interested people.

I wasn’t making a specific point about lack of interest in what Chris is doing.  I just think that, more widely, there’s a general lack of interest (at least with some people) of hard sport climbing in the UK.  As others have said, I think perhaps people have just got used to reading about the standards set by the likes of Ondra, Sharma, Mcclure etc…  Now someone redpointing an 8c+ in the UK doesn’t sound like a big deal any more – even though two in 10 days (by someone other than Mcclure and Ondra) – Chris on Progress and Ryan on Kabaah – has been pretty much unheard of in the UK since the mid 90s.

Another reason for the possible lack of interest (of some people) is that I’m not sure a lot of people know too much about these routes any more.  Which seems a shame.  Most people spent the past 15 years bouldering and trad climbing - I think a lot of younger climbers probably won’t have even heard of stuff like Progress.  In the early 90s, everyone knew THAT picture of Moon on Agincourt and pretty much everyone knew the sequence on Hubble even if they climbed HVS – the media coverage was more than just the uninspiring “Person X has climbed grade Y” that you often got with sport routes over the last decade.  A lot of these routes have stories and histories equally as entertaining as those which have made certain trad routes famous. 

To be fair, things have improved immeasurably in the past few years – Jack’s written some great, inspiring articles on the other channel on everything from sport climbing to the north face of the Eiger.  And whilst it’s certainly not the only factor, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that suddenly there’s a whole pile of people climbing 8c again…  I guess what I was trying to say is that I wouldn’t want to see that process go into reverse, because 8c is perceived by some as not being newsworthy… 

[Dexter]

I have to admit im in that boat, I was there when Pasquill did Kaabah and didnt even realise (punterish I know). Then again I get psyched to see people climbing hard as it makes me want to climb hard myself. Also seeing a fair number of 8c's is still significant and it makes it seem more attainable to me.
edit: also shoud there be a new thread for this? its a bit 

[JohnM]

I think the lack of general interest is that the majority of climbers in this country can't comprehend how hard these routes are and therefore cannot relate to them in anyway.  If the grade the average climber in this country climbs is HVS/E1 or whatever it is meant to be the average equivalent French grade is well under 7a and most people won't even use the french grade anyway.  Even very strong boulderers who don't sport climb will have little idea of what's involved in climbing top end sport routes.  Therefore, these grades will have little resonance with the majority of people whereas something like an E8 may have more meaning.  Davo and I were discussing the other day about another British climber cracking the 9a grade in Britain.  Dave reckoned it would definitely happen in the next few years whereas I said that whilst I agreed there were definitely candidates it could quite easily not happen.  I not so sure know and reckon that someone like Chris or Ryan could do it! 

[SA Chris]

Have we been here before?

[shark]

Split posts relating to Hazel Findlay's repeat of 'Once Upon A Time in the South West'

I think it deserves a separate news item 

Cheers Ethan for breaking the news.

[Adam Lincoln]

Jordan just repeated 'Traverse of the gods' at Longridge. Almost doing 'reverse of the gods' on the same night. Which even though its in effect the same holds, it climbs very differently.

[Johnny Brown]

From facebook, Charlie Woodburn also did 'Once Upon...' today, though I daresay his ascent will be somewhat overshadowed by 5'2" of Warrington's finest. It must tear Steve apart having to belay her while she spreads that 'fucking white mess' everywhere.

[c3po]

You beat me to it Lincoln

[Jim]

He's not Adam Dot Lincoln for nothing.
Some fine repeats going on

[wiain]

From facebook, Charlie Woodburn also did 'Once Upon...' today, though I daresay his ascent will be somewhat overshadowed by 5'2" of Warrington's finest. It must tear Steve apart having to belay her while she spreads that 'fucking white mess' everywhere.

He did it yesterday, finishing in the dark I think.

[abarro81]

Well done to all the beasts. Hazel's ascent is well impressive!

Is Reverse of the Gods the same difficulty as Trav of the Gods? What does there and back get? I'm on a mission to find the longest routes I can to try. Even if it means that they're not routes in the strictest sense of the word.

[T_B]

It must tear Steve apart having to belay her while she spreads that 'fucking white mess' everywhere.

Just spoke to him and he sounded v proud. She hadn't done it in a one'er on a TR, but apparently cruised it on the lead. Big runouts above the top pegs. Waddage.