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Franco's ground up ascent of The Young at Callaly (Read 28205 times)

Will Hunt

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The young ground up would be very impressive. You can jump from the crux but the top bit at 9-10 m is still pretty tricky.

Franco did The Young ground-up today (well, yesterday since I'm posting after midnight).

gme

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Nice one Franco. Great bit of climbing that.

SA Chris

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Good going that youth.

mark20

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The young ground up would be very impressive. You can jump from the crux but the top bit at 9-10 m is still pretty tricky.

Franco did The Young ground-up today (well, yesterday since I'm posting after midnight).
Write up on his blog -
https://francocookson.wordpress.com/

monkoffunk

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Ha, Franco always leaves room for some debate or other!

For those who like to criticise surely it’s not really criticism to say he did an easier link up and didn’t actually climb the route at all? Fair enough though, clearly it’s good enough for him!

mr chaz

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\

36chambers

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#trollface

SA Chris

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Strange justification.

ferret

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\
I think he used it to do the top without being boxed from the hard start,did most of the moves but then fell off. Armed with some for-knowledge of the moves and having confidence that you can fall from high and walk away he climbed the full line. Very impressive and an improvement in style though maybe not quite the same as doing the line ground up starting up the actual route everytime. True ground up still up for grabs for me.

36chambers

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\

if one were to traverse into the jug on WSS and then top it out do they get the full tick?? Asking for a friend.

dunnyg

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I was thinking of doing the top of Jason's roof, just get a leg up for the first half...

mark20

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\
I think he used it to do the top without being boxed from the hard start,did most of the moves but then fell off. Armed with some for-knowledge of the moves and having confidence that you can fall from high and walk away he climbed the full line. Very impressive and an improvement in style though maybe not quite the same as doing the line ground up starting up the actual route everytime. True ground up still up for grabs for me.
I thought that at first, but at the end it's clear - "...even if the time I got up it happened to be the time I skipped the start"

I assume the comparison to WSS is the nature of the climbing at the start, technical and on the feet (ie would be shit and horrible if eroded/sandy), rather than the route being over at half height.

andy popp

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\
I think he used it to do the top without being boxed from the hard start,did most of the moves but then fell off. Armed with some for-knowledge of the moves and having confidence that you can fall from high and walk away he climbed the full line.

I don't think that's what he did. This quote from the blog seems pretty unequivocal:

"There’s obvious room for those that like to criticise to say that I didn’t climb the whole thing, as I missed out the boulder start. I can see their point totally. For me the big challenge was unpicking the top without having inspected the line and I’m really pleased I was able to do that, even if the time I got up it happened to be the time I skipped the start."

Edit: What Mark said, he and I must have been posting at the same time.

Will Hunt

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I've heard it described as 7B into 7B into 7B but can't remember who said it and to what extent it was a throwaway comment.

dunnyg

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Whatever he did climb looks pretty wild either way.

SA Chris

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Right, so he missed out the bottom of the route which he likens to West Side Story... and opted for the VS crack instead?  :-\

if one were to traverse into the jug on WSS and then top it out do they get the full tick?? Asking for a friend.

Only if they have (nearly?) done the bottom part first.

Will Hunt

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This is great. 2 cap doffs in the 36 hours after I first posted. Within 1.5 hours of the first sighting of controversy there are 12 posts!

FWIW, when I posted I didn't know the full details, but I still would have posted had I known. It's a compromise and there's still a prize out there to be had, but I agree with dunny - it sounds like a wild few moments on the rock.

36chambers

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This is great. 2 cap doffs in the 36 hours after I first posted. Within 1.5 hours of the first sighting of controversy there are 12 posts!

I almost replied to your original post to ponder whether a highball 7C+ was a "significant repeat", so it was very nearly 3 replies pre-controversy ;D

Franco

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Christ! I thought I had out-manoeuvred the UKB sloops with my pre-emptive admissions.

To make it clear: I have done the bottom boulder problem many times (20?), the middle boulder problem about 15, and the top one once. They're all quite hard for me, but easyish if you know how to do them, or you're good at bouldering. Will's 7b,7b,7b isn't miles off. The middle one is probably the hardest (and by far the coolest), the bottom one could be anywhere from font 7a- 7b+, the top one could be low font 7s, but is hard to figure out and scary - potentially on a rope it wouldn't be that bad.

Physically, obviously, doing the initial boulder problem adds something. You get that skin-roughing, the odd cold finger and the mental aspect of feeling like you've already done some hard climbing, but I have no doubt that anyone who could do the individual bits could do the whole thing. I wasn't pumped at the top even when I'd done the first two boulder problems, just scared. It was basically a toss up between probably having more sessions on it and damaging it more, or just getting it done. As good as the start is, it gets really boring just climbing it over and over again.

I think all the people at the crag agreed that the place is great, the wall one of the best in the country, the moves the best in the county, but the line slightly wack. I struggle to think of a comparison, but it's remarkable how similar in grade all three sections are and how easy it is to slink off at each point. If it wasn't escapble, it would be truly one of the best anywhere. I didn't want to kind of come out and criticise the route, because it is really beautiful, amazing and worth doing, but I think people repeating it in the future will see what I mean - it feels quite artificial.

I think a boulderer's mindset gives a different view of things like this to a Trad climbers and allows for things to be slightly more squeezed, but for me I've unpicked all of the sequences of The Young and am dead happy with it. I've put time into being as accurate and honest about what I did as possible, so really am not looking for controversy. Like I said in my blog, I can see why you might say it's not the full tick etc, but let's keep it nice!


monkoffunk

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Christ! I thought I had out-manoeuvred the UKB sloops with my pre-emptive admissions.

To make it clear: I have done the bottom boulder problem many times (20?), the middle boulder problem about 15, and the top one once. They're all quite hard for me, but easyish if you know how to do them, or you're good at bouldering. Will's 7b,7b,7b isn't miles off. The middle one is probably the hardest (and by far the coolest), the bottom one could be anywhere from font 7a- 7b+, the top one could be low font 7s, but is hard to figure out and scary - potentially on a rope it wouldn't be that bad.

Physically, obviously, doing the initial boulder problem adds something. You get that skin-roughing, the odd cold finger and the mental aspect of feeling like you've already done some hard climbing, but I have no doubt that anyone who could do the individual bits could do the whole thing. I wasn't pumped at the top even when I'd done the first two boulder problems, just scared. It was basically a toss up between probably having more sessions on it and damaging it more, or just getting it done. As good as the start is, it gets really boring just climbing it over and over again.

I think all the people at the crag agreed that the place is great, the wall one of the best in the country, the moves the best in the county, but the line slightly wack. I struggle to think of a comparison, but it's remarkable how similar in grade all three sections are and how easy it is to slink off at each point. If it wasn't escapble, it would be truly one of the best anywhere. I didn't want to kind of come out and criticise the route, because it is really beautiful, amazing and worth doing, but I think people repeating it in the future will see what I mean - it feels quite artificial.

I think a boulderer's mindset gives a different view of things like this to a Trad climbers and allows for things to be slightly more squeezed, but for me I've unpicked all of the sequences of The Young and am dead happy with it. I've put time into being as accurate and honest about what I did as possible, so really am not looking for controversy. Like I said in my blog, I can see why you might say it's not the full tick etc, but let's keep it nice!

I think most of the posts were just trying to clarify exactly what had been done.

I don’t think there is any criticism, as I said before, and you’ve been totally honest about how you climbed a bit of rock in the way you wanted.

So it’s all good.

However it is simply a technicality that this isn’t a ground up ascent of that route and it’s not a significant repeat, because it isn’t a repeat. Clearly not without significance though and especially in the significance to you!

andy popp

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I've put time into being as accurate and honest about what I did as possible, so really am not looking for controversy

Fair play to you Franco, you're very clear about what you did (and why) here and in the blog. I'm sure no controversy was intended. Unfortunately you were unwittingly pipped to the post by Will with news that, no doubt unintentionally, proved to be a bit misleading. I'm glad you got so much out of it, that's what matters.

gme

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Franco- Well done for doing that top section ground up from the jug. Its a long way up there and the fall you took makes me wince thinking about it. If you have fallen from the last move i suspect you wouldn't have walked away.

However you have not done the young only two thirds of it as did the other ascents who traversed off left. I am pretty sure that top 7A section would feel harder after doing the 1st two 7B+ sections rather than a VS and a 7B+ section. I totally understand your reasons for doing it as you have but you have not done the route.

For you to say the line is wack seems unbelievable and the same could be said of a vast majority of routes in the country never mind the county. Anyone who walked up to the wall and looked at what you did would say its illogical and the route obviously goes straight up the wall.

I am not in anyway having a go at you and am seriously impressed in your efforts to do it ground up but to suggest that a trad climbers eye makes your way more logical is just not correct. If it was all about finding the easiest way to the top the sport/hobby would have died a death decades ago.

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Q: What’s the difference between a trad climber who boulders and a boulderer who trad climbs?

A: About 3 e grades

Johnny Brown

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PS, although I don't know this venue I've got a lot of sympathy for Franco's pragmatism. It's not unusual for FAers and their cheerleaders to overlook major quality issues if the line ends up looking like the solution to the cool bit of rock. Longer term, ground-up repeats have a habit of finding what's logical. I put this down to a more authentic approach vs rehearsal, but I'm sure y'all will have no truck with that.

gme

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JB - Have a look at the pictures on UKC. I dont have the technical ability to share them on here.

What he does is totally off line and to say that the wall isnt a logical line is just bollocks. It even follows a coloured streak of slightly different sandstone.

He climbs a crack that is meters away from the climbing and that avoids half of the hard climbing. At no point do you have to avoid the crack but at one point (possibly 2) you can traverse off to it. Hes statement that the crack is 3 inches from his foot at the jug is miss leading as well as it suggests that you are trying to avoid using it.

I am not having a go at Franco as its impressive doing the top wall ground up, however it is only 7A and maybe not even newsworthy on its own. Doing two 6/7 move 7b+s to get there then doing the 7A bit is a totally different proposition. The fact that you have to go up and down it jumping off numerous times is the whole point, its how we did things in the county for years before high balling was invented, i must have bailed off his eminence and Poseidon a dozen times before i did them.

The article is also incorrect in saying Dan did a right hand variation. The original way Andy did it stepped right at the top back onto the jug then went up just as Dan and Franco have done, its described such in the guide.  Going straight up from after the pockets would be much harder than anything on the rest of the route.

I think this is one of the best routes/highballs in the UK and Franco has missed out on perhaps the best highball ever done so far. Something its obvious he was capable of but for some reason hes chosen to sully it.

I would also like to know when it was "glued" as it wasn't a few years ago when i tried it, or i didn't think it was.

 

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