[boulderingbacon]

freezing for me and well ventilated is how i like it. i have never been cold climbing indoors but then again its about minus 5 in my workshop at the moment so i just dont feel the cold like some people because im used to it.

[Bonjoy]

I'm with Moose. Can't stand over cold conditions at the wall. Life's too short to spend more than an hour warming up at a wall. I'm happy to have body/muscle optimum conditions rather than hold/rubber optimum, even if that makes some slopers less useable. Cool but not baltic AND ventilation is preferable.

[Stubbs]

What Bonjoy said: if you're climbing indoors for training it's only the relative difficulty of what you're trying that matters, unless you are bothered about the arbitrary grades the trails of plastic you are following have been assigned.

[duncan]

As bonjoy and Stubbs.  I'd rather climbing walls were not cold.  I try to do a fair amount of endurance work / AeroCap / ARC stuff and if I wanted numb fingers I'd go to a crag. 

In any case, I started climbing before 1989 when "conditions" were invented.  Before then no-one climbed on the grit over winter because it was thought to be "green" and, well, bloody freezing and damp.  Cold is over-rated.     

The real problem with modern (London) climbing walls is that they are great training for 7a at Kalymnos, aka swinging around on blobs and generally having a laugh, but extremely poor preparation for UK trad. and sport routes, anything crimpy and vertical. 

[rodma]

As bonjoy and Stubbs.  I'd rather climbing walls were not cold. 

 

Plus 1

[i.munro]

I'm with Moose. Can't stand over cold conditions at the wall. Life's too short to spend more than an hour warming up at a wall. I'm happy to have body/muscle optimum conditions rather than hold/rubber optimum, even if that makes some slopers less useable. Cool but not baltic AND ventilation is preferable.

Hold on guys I'm getting confused here. You're saying " Cool but not baltic AND ventilation is preferable." but that you agree with Moose who seems to want room temps i.e. staff in t-shirts.

In the nature of things for 3-4 months the temps outside are between 0 & 10 deg.
Now shirt-sleeves is generally defined as around 21 deg c.
Given decent ventilation warming all that air by 10 deg is going to be expensive & I don't think people want to pay that .

So I reckon our choices (in winter)  are  something like

!) Good ventilation & outside temp plus a few degrees. ( say 3 - 13)
2) No ventilation & room temps (say 18-21)
3) No ventilation & somewhere in the middle (say 13-16)

[Bonjoy]

I was agreeing with the general thrust of Moose's comment as opposed to all the ice lovers before him, but you're right room temp (if it's anything like the office i'm in now) is too warm. It wants to be warm enough so that your toes don't go white in your shoes and you can warm up quickly, but not so warm that you start sweating all over the place, I'd guess at between 5 and 12 degrees being good. However this means in an ideal world walls acting to raise temps on some days including keeping windows closed if needed. Although you might be right that most of the time the indoor temp in an unheated building with a few windows open in this country is not very low, those few cold periods do tend to coincide with high wall use.

[i.munro]

 I'd guess at between 5 and 12 degrees being good. However this means in an ideal world walls acting to raise temps on some days including keeping windows closed if needed.

You're right. Perhaps this is the question I should have been asking all along. (although I think I've established that people do care even if they don't agree)

At what sort of (inside) temp do you think the management should be closing windows/vents?

[slackline]

When >= 80% of users wish them to be.

[i.munro]

When >= 80% of users wish them to be.

Not 51% ?

[slackline]

Got to have a clear majority.

[Duma]

I don't think they should be closing vents. Whilst really baltic conditions aren't my first choice, I'd rather that than poor ventilation. In general I'm very rarely cold once warmed up (you lot just aren't working hard enough  ), and more layers during the warm up works okay at limiting the discomfort (though a bit of aero to raise the heart rate before a session makes the most difference).

[i.munro]

Got to have a clear majority.

     
It'd be a brave manager who ignored  half his customers.
How about 50% but any knob turning  up in shorts in Feb then moaning just gets politely directed  to the shop :-)

[slackline]

Got to have a clear majority.

     
It'd be a brave manager who ignored  half his customers.
How about 50% but any knob turning  up in shorts in Feb then moaning just gets politely directed  to the shop :-)

You might want to think about the logic you're trying to invoke there (20% != ¹/₂ and the 'minority' of 49% you proposed isn't a million miles off ignoring half your customers!).  You're not a First-Past-The-Post proponent are you?


It'll always be a case of pleasing some of the people some of the time but not all the people all of the time. 

[tomtom]

Got to have a clear majority.

     
It'd be a brave manager who ignored  half his customers.
How about 50% but any knob turning  up in shorts in Feb then moaning just gets politely directed  to the shop :-)

I know a wall manager who seems to ignore 80% of his customers

[seankenny]

The real problem with modern (London) climbing walls is that they are great training for 7a at Kalymnos, aka swinging around on blobs and generally having a laugh, but extremely poor preparation for UK trad. and sport routes, anything crimpy and vertical.

 

[Stubbs]

There's some fucking horrible looking vert crimpy >7a climbs at the Castle on the areas next to the campus board and on the top floor.  I would go near them with a barge pole, but if you think you need to climb vert crimpy stuff inside to be good at it outside have at it!

[SA Chris]

Never mind you might soon get a chance to visit Ratho, which is as well ventilated and cool as you like. Only place I have ever seen people leading with duvet jackets on.

[Snoops]

I go indoors to avoid cold.  I want to climb at normal room temperature.  Have a good three or so hours of continual cranking and go home to feed my aching muscles with cake - without having to dive into a downie between every go.  Maybe I've got oddly dry skin (I only sweat to a problematic degree in direct sunlight in summer) but I find that dirty, infrequently changed holds impact my performance far more than a few degrees Centigrade.  Any tiny differential in friction is more than compensated for by increased dynamism and limberness.  Basically, if the staff are wearing downies they should install some more heating!

 

[TobyD]

walls should be warm enough to warm up easily and minimise the risk of injury, and just about stick a jumper on between routes / problems to stay warm. sliding around on every hold with greasy sweat so you trash your skin is too warm.
Duvet jacket temps are colder than ideal; the wall i climbed at this time last year in Kualar Lumpur was distinctly warmer than ideal - being a greenhouse on top of a giant shopping mall, i suppose it would be. For anyone interested: http://www.planetfear.com/articles/Climbing_in_and_Around_Kuala_Lumpur_1116.html   Toasty!

My current local the Quay usually seems to be about right, by chance or design i don't know! The foundry is usually pretty ok too?

[miso soup]

I've been to that place in KL, it's a lot more pleasant later in the day when the sun gets lower.  I liked how you could look around from the top of a route and see real mountains behind you.

The Arch has been managing to maintain good temps over the winter, a few times I've had my jumper on for the whole session but I've never had to get my jacket out the locker.