[Adam Lincoln]

To be fair, the new line is the line of the wall. ID skirts off to edge of crag for a decent rest before coming back in for top hard moves.

The new route is an arbitrary, less obvious variation to ID (with which it shares ground). It's got an indifferent new start, shares the middle, and then a different finish.

Who to believe?  What Grimer said, entertaining thread anyway.

The history of minor ferns in the Pavey Ark East wall gully??

Now that I would be psyched for.

Ask Ben what he thinks of ID compared to Lexion. Though he probably wouldnt remember as he was a little pre occupied to look right 🤣.

Also i saw it fully chalked and clean which makes a difference.

[Ged]

I think people deliberately confuse pokey routes with very dangerous routes. There's a world of difference between an 8b with a bit of a slammy fall and a death 8b, especially if the climbing is really insecure. There really isn't much of the latter anywhere.

Not sure people are deliberately confusing anything, and I’m not convinced there’s that much of a clear divide to be honest. A long slammy fall can go disastrously wrong. And a supposed ‘death’ route could have a lucky outcome. And there’s plenty of grey in between. I’ve done bolted ‘sport’ routes which are far more dangerous than a lot of hard(ish) trad. That’s not uncommon outside of the UK.

IIRC Dave Mac fell onto that RP on Rhapsody and almost broke it - which would have turned it from a long but safe fall into possible death. How can you grade precisely for something like that? Why even bother, if it takes so much effort and thought to try and pin it down - especially when history has shown so often that the next person will have a different experience on it? I guess the answer is simple - look at the comments on UKC and it’s mainly just fascination with the ‘E11’ badge.

I mean Trad climbing is all about the subjective and perceptions. If you discount how a route 'feels' then obviously the E grade will make no sense. I think there is an argument for abandoning the E grade and I totally agree about the obsession with it. It's weird. On balance though, it does inform in a way that 8b r/x does not - as you've just perfectly demonstrated. Routes like Parthian Shot change with perceptions. Perceptions change with events, rock damage and the stories people tell. The main take away from that story is to not trust hollow flakes entirely.

Most people putting up routes with big E grades are geeks who aren't taking massive risks. If you're climbing 8c+s at Kilnsey all the time, I can see why someone getting loads of kudos for doing a bold 8b is annoying. At the extreme bold end though, it's a totally different game. Soloing a proper sketch 8a+ is still cutting edge in the bold Trad game. If you hate the whole game then fair enough, but maybe live and let live a little? It would be like me saying everything anyone does in Parisella's Cave is pointless and only training for the real thing - untrue and just makes me look like a bit of a plum.

 As for Europe, I've been on apparent E10s there, where the climbing isn't outrageous and there are bomber size 2 nuts everywhere you want them. I've long thought that the semi-pokey 8b style Trad routes are going to end up getting downgraded as standards increase, as standards on death routes just don't increase at the same rate. But then maybe I would say that, as I'm weak and mostly climb death routes?

E10 according to who? A local sport wad who's never used the e grade system before? Not too surprising.

[cheque]

When was the last time someone did a new route above E7 without also giving it a French or bouldering grade and adding detailed speculation about how much falling off it would hurt as well? It certainly wasn’t this time.

Possibly within the last fortnight. But can't say for sure because Caff doesn't actually report what E grade The Pumphouse Party in Battleship Zawn is, let alone what French grade it might be or what the protection is like.

He shouted out all his coaches and gave rope diameter and belay device details though right?

[Will Hunt]

When was the last time someone did a new route above E7 without also giving it a French or bouldering grade and adding detailed speculation about how much falling off it would hurt as well? It certainly wasn’t this time.

Possibly within the last fortnight. But can't say for sure because Caff doesn't actually report what E grade The Pumphouse Party in Battleship Zawn is, let alone what French grade it might be or what the protection is like.

He shouted out all his coaches and gave rope diameter and belay device details though right?

Yep yep. He's always sure to mention his support for the short-haul helicopter flight industry too.

[Tony]

To be fair, the new line is the line of the wall. ID skirts off to edge of crag for a decent rest before coming back in for top hard moves.

The new route is an arbitrary, less obvious variation to ID (with which it shares ground). It's got an indifferent new start, shares the middle, and then a different finish.

I think we're just giving opinions based on different perspectives/criteria. Both of which are perfectly defensible.

My comment was in the context that ID pre-dates Niel's route and has a substantial (though relatively easy) section common to both.

The earlier route takes in more "major features" of that wall (because they make it easier / provide gear). But in doing so it is less straight up.

I'd agree that, if you give a lot of weight to the straightness of a route as a measure of significance then the new route is more significant.

However, the ID traverse left (to the edge of that bit of wall; hardly the edge of the crag!) is along an obvious feature. It then goes right and up to enter another feature in the form of the finishing groove.

Also i saw it fully chalked and clean which makes a difference.

I absolutely agree that this makes a huge difference to how, essentially, two arbitrary lines (sharing some common ground) up a fairly uniformly featured wall look.

I imagine the climbing on Lexicon is at least as good as that on ID. Neither route has a particularly strong natural line.

[Johnny Brown]

I get the feeling that being the kind of person who trains hard enough to be climbing well into the f9s perhaps self selects you as someone who doesn't just take massive risks.

You could equally argue that people only do dangerous routes because they want recognition but don't have the talent or application to get good enough to compete on difficulty.

Both are pretty specious imo.

[abarro81]

I get the feeling that being the kind of person who trains hard enough to be climbing well into the f9s perhaps self selects you as someone who doesn't just take massive risks.

You could equally argue that people only do dangerous routes because they want recognition but don't have the talent or application to get good enough to compete on difficulty.

Both are pretty specious imo.

I don't know, from personal experience the latter basically describes the first 5 years of my climbing whilst the former describes the next 10 years!

There's definitely something to it that those in the performance tunnel won't want to step outside it for too long for fear of losing GAINZ, and those who don't step into the tunnel will only be climbing >9a if they're pretty damn talented... so the pool is more limited than it might appear, and it's limited to people who have the potential to do an awful lot of badass stuff so the route would probably have to be very good to buy the risk being worth it (after all, they can just go climb all the hardest MPs in Europe which is both hard AND likely to be pretty mentally intense)

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Yep, interesting thread, and good mix of views. Nothing too extreme.

These words from Galpinos were great to read, and not especially surprising.

I enjoyed the write up, as an aging dad it filled me with inspiration that gains can still be made, but I can see that some found it lacking soul. However, having been to see Gresh speak once*, he was so enthusiastic, so open and so obviously obsessed with climbing the joy he got from climbing pretty much shone out of him and it's a shame that doesn't come through in the write up.

*Kenton Cool was on the same bill and that was dullest talk I have ever heard. Interestingly, my non-climbing wife felt the same. I though she'd like the mountaineering and find the minutiae of rock climbing dull but she said she found Gresh so engaging she really cared for what he was saying.

Neil's an interesting mix of massive inherent enthusiasm, together with an obsessive (self-doubt driven?) emphasis on outcome/performance.

As with Pearson's ascent of Walk of Life, the most important thing is that folk are getting out there and doing the business. It's a shame that ascents get derided often more than critiqued, but I think we've hit a much better balance here.

I'll go with a lot of the comments about the "advertorial" appearance of the write-up, but I'm not sure that isn't misleading. For me, there's a great deal of reading between the lines, wrt the sense of how committed to the project Neil had to be to get it done.
For me, that's the nub of it.

Other take aways for me were things like filling your face on days when you've avoided work. I'm going to employ some positive reinforcement and visualisation to make that happen.

On that point, the comments about visualisation are a bit off the mark, and again reflect Neil's emphasis on "getting over the line".
With sport, the reinforcement/visualisation isn't about "not losing", it's about letting the outcome take care of itself - all that you can do, is get in it's way. Most of us know that feeling from the way we commit to a hard headpoint/solo.
To that end, I think Neil places too much emphasis on his performance - in terms of searching for the missing golden bullet. I think there's a bit of post-hoc-ness in his analysis. 

From that perspective, I think the write up reflects the complexities and tensions that get expressed in the creative act.

[cowboyhat]

Great thread, when I saw it ran to four pages I did wonder how a grade debate would have sustained such interest.

I could barely skim read that UKC 'article'. Dry as old sticks. As the author of some overly long self indulgent climbing blogs myself no doubt some schadenfreude will impact me down the line.


I know i'm an old man etc and that language evolves but I'm really struggling with 'bloc' 'send'  E11 'for' Neil, (he wasn't given it) and all the other fucking nonsense in the climbing lexicon these days.

[Bradders]

I know i'm an old man etc and that language evolves but I'm really struggling with 'bloc' 'send'  E11 'for' Neil, (he wasn't given it) and all the other fucking nonsense in the climbing lexicon these days.

Ha yeah same. Mind you the list of nonsense things in climbing could be its own four page thread!

[Danny]

Looks like Steve McClure took huge whip off the top of this yesterday   

[teestub]

Looks like Steve McClure took huge whip off the top of this yesterday 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT6kxA5jUdV/?utm_medium=copy_link

Sounds like it’s safe then 😄

[SA Chris]

Should've tied his laces.

[Duncan campbell]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT6wjIRoVYy/?utm_medium=copy_link

Dave Macleod is on it!!

Downgrade imminent??

  

[36chambers]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT6kxA5jUdV/?utm_medium=copy_link

Sounds like it’s safe then 😄

"THE MOST OUTRAGEOUS THING I’VE EVER WITNESSED in climbing….  NUMBER 3 WILL SHOCK YOU" 

[Will Hunt]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT6wjIRoVYy/?utm_medium=copy_link

Dave Macleod is on it!!

Downgrade imminent??

  

I really hope Dave slags it. Don't let us down, Dave.

[Fiend]

Fine time for cuntsagram to go back to it's sporadic log-in-required-even-to-view bullshit 

[abarro81]

While Gresh's style on insta or the ukc write-up may leave some cold, as pointed out above, if you chat to him about his projects or climbing in general, it's clear that he's psyched off his tits for them/it. It's not necessarily my forte, but I have no more objection to it than the (to me) pseudo-intellectual waffle and condescending attitude of those at the other end of spectrum (e.g. Dan). So I don't hope DM slags it, I hope he enjoys it and everyone's happy. Apart from ukb. 

[Fiend]

Are we doing a UKB betting pool as to how the inevitable DMac subtly-implied downgrade is going to pan out??

I'm going to go along the lines of:

"Can't really estimate grades at this level as haven't climbed harder than E9 for years, well off my peak due to fatherhood and pandemic"

 +

"Probably not quite as hard as Rhapsody, which took 48 days at my local crag that I was living next door too and intimately familiar with, whilst Lexicon took 3 sessions at a crag I've never visited before.... Still can't guess the grade tho..."

[Danny]

The general vibe I'm getting off this thread is that Lexicon is not that good/overgraded/over-hyped.

Maybe some of those things are true, maybe they aren't. But I always thought ID looked cool. Plenty of top end tradders seem to agree. Lexicon must be about the same quality. Let's just say the sport grade is about right: it's a precarious and pumpy 8b with a potential 80 fall, and it's on a decent bit of mountain rock. You don't have to be a fawning sycophant to give that the "good effort" nod. Worth a bit of celebrating, even. 

[Tony]

While Gresh's style on insta or the ukc write-up may leave some cold, as pointed out above, if you chat to him about his projects or climbing in general, it's clear that he's psyched off his tits for them/it.

I get this but I can't help being a little cynical as to Neil's grading. See my previous comment.

... I'd have fewer qualms with [Neil's grading] if Neil didn't have a history of it: see Nike's comments (which have been echoed by others) and, e.g., https://www.frcc.co.uk/routes/fearless/

[ali k]

Off topic, but Barrows I had a dream last night that you decked off a route trying to clip the 3rd or 4th bolt after skipping the first few. It was a nasty fall onto a steep rocky landing and I think you might have died. Can you confirm?

[Johnny Brown]

I have no more objection to it than the (to me) pseudo-intellectual waffle and condescending attitude of those at the other end of spectrum (e.g. Dan)

Cheetham or Varian?

[Danny]

Having said all that, I would put money on Dave Mac downclimbing 75% of it at 8c, cruising it, and then downgrading it.

[Danny]

I have no more objection to it than the (to me) pseudo-intellectual waffle and condescending attitude of those at the other end of spectrum (e.g. Dan)

Cheetham or Varian?

I had the same thought. Really enjoyed Dan V's blogging style. If VP could turn that into a banterous coffee table book about UK bouldering I'd buy it.