[Nike Air]

Repeated this yesterday, first go no falls after top rope inspection.
It climbs well,  the gear is bomber and should be a future classic if it somehow stops seeping .
I first had a look a few weeks back just after repeating toms HXS on ilam rock earlier in the day. (That's a toughie)
Reckon about 7c/+ or e7 ish, hard to tell  as it was pretty soaked, wet holds galore and soaking gear placements and horrid Connies in general.....  The slab was about font 7a. The top gear is good and the piece just below the last placement's is a stonking gold super light. The rest in the niche is very good. Full recovery possible and easy to down climb to from placing the upper bits of kit.
The finishing moves were done with very wet hands and  probably font 6c?


Anyhow it was a cool route.

[Fiend]

Fucking balls. I was going to call the "Jordan First Repeat And Downgrade" as soon as I watched the video. I should have put money on it!

Also could have predicted no arguments with the quality 

Nice one man.

[36chambers]

Good work on the swift repeat Jordan and thanks for the informative write up.

[Nike Air]

Cheers
There does seem a trend to give stuff a high grade but without having repeated what's already around or taking into account leeway within a grade spectrum.
Guess big number = more money/fame. Who'd blame them.

Good effort to all doing new routes BTW. I should pull my finger out.

[cheque]

just after repeating toms HXS on ilam rock earlier in the day. (That's a toughie)

What grade do you reckon?

[T_B]

Guess big number = more money/fame. Who'd blame them.

Hey Jordan, I've never met you but that kind of throwaway cynical statement is what increasingly puts me off the British climbing scene. I spoke to Joe before he did it and he genuinely thought it was 8a+ climbing and didn't trust the gear. He's young and clearly a bit inexperienced. Cut the guy some slack FFS. Anyway, good effort on your repeat.

[Johnny Brown]

He did kick the gear out. Maybe that was the E9 bit?

[Duma]

Guess big number = more money/fame. Who'd blame them.

Hey Jordan, I've never met you but that kind of throwaway cynical statement is what increasingly puts me off the British climbing scene. I spoke to Joe before he did it and he genuinely thought it was 8a+ climbing and didn't trust the gear. He's young and clearly a bit inexperienced. Cut the guy some slack FFS. Anyway, good effort on your repeat.

What T_B said - did you bother to read any of the thread before slagging the guy off?

[petejh]

To be fair I think Jordan's comment could be aimed at nearly all climbing media rather than at the route's first ascensionist - social media, the mags, UKC, the BMC website etc. etc. etc. The climbing media operates almost entirely by regurgitating - often with with added hype and a nice staged photo - whatever a climber tells it. Without any attempt to query. Vested interests galore. No objectivity. News stories get published almost entirely on the back of hype.

Jordan has given an honest appraisal of the route's difficultly which is exactly what should happen. Isn't it?

Now go and repeat my E7 at Forwyn Jordan, it'll be dry and good for an OS attempt!

[36chambers]

Guess big number = more money/fame. Who'd blame them.

Hey Jordan, I've never met you but that kind of throwaway cynical statement is what increasingly puts me off the British climbing scene. I spoke to Joe before he did it and he genuinely thought it was 8a+ climbing and didn't trust the gear. He's young and clearly a bit inexperienced. Cut the guy some slack FFS. Anyway, good effort on your repeat.

What T_B said - did you bother to read any of the thread before slagging the guy off?

In Nike Air's defence, this Joe chap does have a track record of misrepresenting his achievements online to get more followers/fame

[ferret]

Calm down its the internet, anything can be taken out of context.

He's definitely aware that he hasn't climbed a multitude of limestone E8/E9's to work from but given the objective difficulty and serious nature of the climbing (with that last piece of gear falling out - you're looking at a groundfall from 20m up, and it is definitely not and easy move) he felt that the grade was justified

For example you could quite easily read that as "he admits that he has no idea what hes talking about but gave it a massive grade anyway"*
*in no way does this reflect my opinion of what actually happened

pretty easy to grade wrongly though. limestone gear never looks as good when your not used to it, and few people can grade slabs well unless they climb them a lot. (slabs are always desperate)

[Nike Air]

Ah I just somehow lost my long reply....

Anyways
I had done a load of reading up on it thanks. I'm just wondering what the comparison routes were for the grading of it.
Locally?
Eye of tiger, felt 8a on the flash/ground up
Final round, felt 8b, e9
Arch rival 7c+
Boot boys 8a+

It's not a science always, it's mostly a feeling.
 I shouldn't have expressed my in such bad taste but I can sense when grades are inflated by individuals. I've been there where I've wanted it to be harder cause I've got some emotional attachment to a route.
I applaud these inspiring new routes, just want some context to the grading.

[Nike Air]

Duma. Why the prompt punter point. I'm highlighting something that can be talked about no?

[dave]

To be fair to Jordan, he did question the wisdom of giving something a high grade without first having done a load of stuff up to and including that standard, which is fair comment. You can grade something as honestly as you like but if you're giving something X grade having not done a load of other Xs or thereabouts then you take that risk, as you're not speaking from a position of great personal experience.

[Will Hunt]

This is all getting

It's not the fact that somebody got the grade of an FA wrong - which has been going on for ages. Grading FAs is extremely difficult. In my lowly and small experience of it I have generally got it right, but in some cases I have forced myself to knock up to two grades off how hard I actually thought it was to compensate for the "FA factor".

It's not got anything to do with the new route. Because what any controversy here is about is that some people don't like what Joe represents i.e. a climber who is not operating at the top level of the sport, who has attracted some sponsorship because of an enthusiastic social media presence. There's a different thread for that. I do hope that if people want to discuss it, that they remember that there is a young lad on the receiving end of it, who is likely to come across this thread, who might already be feeling chastened that one of the top 5 climbers in the country has downgraded his opus.

To be fair to Jordan, he did question the wisdom of giving something a high grade without first having done a load of stuff up to and including that standard, which is fair comment. You can grade something as honestly as you like but if you're giving something X grade having not done a load of other Xs or thereabouts then you take that risk, as you're not speaking from a position of great personal experience.

This is a fair point, but in the situation described above the climber is sometimes vindicated. AndyF hasn't called Franco out on any of this new route grades in a while!

[petejh]

Guess big number = more money/fame. Who'd blame them.

Hey Jordan, I've never met you but that kind of throwaway cynical statement is what increasingly puts me off the British climbing scene. I spoke to Joe before he did it and he genuinely thought it was 8a+ climbing and didn't trust the gear. He's young and clearly a bit inexperienced. Cut the guy some slack FFS. Anyway, good effort on your repeat.

What T_B said - did you bother to read any of the thread before slagging the guy off?

In Nike Air's defence, this Joe chap does have a track record of misrepresenting his achievements online to get more followers/fame

I dunno, a new E7 gets done and there's quite a bit of hype - because the climber thought it was harder (as often happens).   

There's a valid point here at how the climbing scene recognises what's worthy/significant. What's significant sometimes isn't what's actually reported as such - as most people know but could be mistaken for forgetting if they read the self-reportage from various climbers over the years, regurgitated verbatim in the media. This trend is continuing with the rise of social media and 'sponsored content'.
None of that is a personal dig at JH. It's cool doing new routes and that should be applauded. But all the fuss in the climbing media is unjustified when they aren't actually significant routes. A bit of breathing space/time lag between an FA's breathless reportage on their own activities and the main online/print news sources actually reporting would help objectivty. Rather than the rush to report asap in a chase for clicks.

Funnily I was just chasing up my emails this morning and clicked on the latest BMC newsletter. There's an interview with the first ascensionist. You can decide for yourself how much the FA pushes himself online via blogging, instagram, facebook and films; whether that's to pursue sponsorship or whatever else.

The first in our mini-series profiling the young guns rocking the scene right now. 22-year-old Joe Heeley offers some beta for Eyes Wide Shut, the new E9 he's put up at Dovedale, some advice on how to get into new-routing, and talks about the mental side of climbing, how he trains, the role of social media at the top of the sport, and why the future of climbing could be indoors.

A modern youth, fluent with all social media channels, as well as blogging, photography, and filming, he's already been snapped up for sponsorship by a host of brands. I'm sure there'll be plenty more headlines about him in the future; in the meantime you can watch Joe train, get jealous about his climbing and find out what he had for breakfast on his website, Facebook page, Twitter or Instagram feed.

[AlistairB]

Bloody hell, leave off Jordan a bit yeah? Didn't see you all rushing in to defend Pearson when Dave Mac ripped the Walk of Life grade to shreds with no tact whatsoever.

People get things wrong, fine. From my armchair I thought that was an incredibly bold grade to stick on something when you've no hard limestone trad experience and don't route climb but I would've been perfectly happy for Joe's grade to be validated. I know he said about not being sure etc. but that didn't mean he had to give it E9. Tom said he wasn't sure about Final Round so he gave it HXS, other people in the past have given a grade range or no grade at all.

Joe made his video, gave it E9, sent it to UKC etc., he actively chose to make it a big deal and opted in to the attention and scrutiny that comes with that. I'm perfectly sure he can cope with Jordan giving an honest appraisal of the difficulty. Life goes on and I'm sure he's got plenty of other things to climb.

Ridiculous that Jordan is getting shit from some people on here. Congrats on the repeats, particularly Final Round, that looks one hell of a stern proposition.

[Johnny Brown]

I don't think people realise just how good Jordan is.

[ferret]

Bloody hell, leave off Jordan a bit yeah? Didn't see you all rushing in to defend Pearson when Dave Mac ripped the Walk of Life grade to shreds with no tact whatsoever.

People get things wrong, fine. From my armchair I thought that was an incredibly bold grade to stick on something when you've no hard limestone trad experience and don't route climb but I would've been perfectly happy for Joe's grade to be validated. I know he said about not being sure etc. but that didn't mean he had to give it E9. Tom said he wasn't sure about Final Round so he gave it HXS, other people in the past have given a grade range or no grade at all.

Joe made his video, gave it E9, sent it to UKC etc., he actively chose to make it a big deal and opted in to the attention and scrutiny that comes with that. I'm perfectly sure he can cope with Jordan giving an honest appraisal of the difficulty. Life goes on and I'm sure he's got plenty of other things to climb.

Ridiculous that Jordan is getting shit from some people on here. Congrats on the repeats, particularly Final Round, that looks one hell of a stern proposition.

Pretty difficult to disagree with that

[Will Hunt]

Joe made his video, gave it E9, sent it to UKC etc., he actively chose to make it a big deal and opted in to the attention and scrutiny that comes with that. I'm perfectly sure he can cope with Jordan giving an honest appraisal of the difficulty. Life goes on and I'm sure he's got plenty of other things to climb.

There's two separate issues there though. Nobody is going to criticise Jordan for giving an honest appraisal of the grade, and I'm sure Joe will cope with that just fine. There's then the inferences being made about Joe's character, and his motives in applying the grade that he did, which is a completely separate discussion, and one that, if it is to take place at all, should be carried out with some sensitivity. I only say this because I know from private conversations that there are one or two climbers out there who find Joe's social media presence distasteful and would find some schadenfreude in seeing him publically humbled. I hope the climbing community can have a bit more decorum than that as it's a bit ghoulish.

I think that makes sense? Ya dig?

[Duma]

Duma. Why the prompt punter point. I'm highlighting something that can be talked about no?

Of course. But you chose to highlight it by implying that Joe had deliberately overgraded this route for fame/money - the first page of this thread along with the vid shows pretty clearly his thought process and it seems sound. Don't get me wrong, it's a good thing the grade's been corrected, but I'd rather it went down than it was undergraded and someone went for it and hurt themselves. Don't like the idea that people shouldn't be giving stuff grades if they've not climbed lot's of other stuff at that grade in the area - just be honest about the style and your experience - which he was!

I have never met Joe btw, and have no experience of his social media presence.

[Nike Air]

I guess the prefix of " do you think ..." would have been more peaceful introduction to my brain fart. 

 

[DAVETHOMAS90]

What T_B said
+1

Sorry Jordan. Well done with the repeat. Good to see a great new route getting the attention it deserves.

I felt the same way about James Pearson's efforts on The Walk of Life. Such a great effort to go out there and get it done.

When you've put up a new route that you honestly think is great, it's easy to get wrapped up in your own hyperbole, enthusiasm and celebration.

If there's speculation over "competitive grading", of course there can be just as much hidden motive in down grading a route. We're often not even aware of our own motives anyhow.

Joe could have written this one up in the Pembroke new routes book, and avoided any controversy 

[Andy F]

[/quote]

This is a fair point, but in the situation described above the climber is sometimes vindicated. AndyF hasn't called Franco out on any of this new route grades in a while!
[/quote]

Only because I didn't know he'd done any. He got one right. Woo fucking hoo, I still think some of the older grades he gave are completely bollocks and you know why.

Any way, well done on the repeat Jordan and the honest opinion of the grade.

[petejh]

I don't think people realise just how good Jordan is.

That's probably true. And it's partly because because Jordan and the other genuinely talented wads like him are dots in an ocean of keen as mustard climbing 'athletes' and 'ambassadors' who seem to want to go out of their way to self-publicise everything in order to seek recognition and the sponsor's eye. 


E7s/8s have been FA'd in their hundreds for over 30 years, more recently by all sorts of relatively ordinary climbers. In a meritocratic scene that ascent wouldn't merit a fanfare or recognition beyond your mates and a few locals. Unfortunately (I think) we have a climbing scene that rewards being a massive self-publicist above being a brilliant climber. It isn't schadenfreude to point this out.
Jordan should be applauded for offering an opinion that helps to keep people honest; and not diplomatically declining to suggest a grade thus giving the appearance of being the guy doing 'bold E9 in the wet'.