[Will Hunt]

b) in my experience benchmarks are usually pretty flipping hard for their given grade!

Go on...
 

[Bradders]

b) in my experience benchmarks are usually pretty flipping hard for their given grade!

Go on...
 

Is this not a pretty well known thing?

[remus]

b) in my experience benchmarks are usually pretty flipping hard for their given grade!

Go on...
 

Is this not a pretty well known thing?

Benchmarks are meant to be something that represents the grade, no? So by definition surely they should sit in the middle of the grade.

[Bradders]

Well yes, but my point is they often don't. Three that spring to mind are Lager Lager Lager, Ben's Groove Sit and Zoo York. All variously referred to as benchmarks in guidebooks etc. but all rather difficult for their given grades.

[Will Hunt]

If it's hard for the grade it's not benchmark. Those problems you mention are seen as tough for the grade I think, so it's probably wrong to describe them as benchmarks (though maybe Lager is just very knacky and conditions dependent).

[andy moles]

I think there's some confusion with the term benchmark, while I agree it should mean something that is middle of the grade, I have seen it used quite a bit for things that are at the hard end of the grade. Or I'm mistaken, and it's just that willies are being waved.

[remus]

Grade inflation is another option. Things that were once benchmarks could drift upwards until they become relatively hard for the grade.

[User deactivated.]

Seems a pretty useless term to me. Are there any problems at all where everyone agrees on the grade?

For Zoo York I've seen opinions ranging from 7C+ to hard 8A+.

I dont think ive seen a single problem on ukc that's undisputed at the grade with sufficient grade votes (lets say more than 10).

[teestub]

I think there's some confusion with the term benchmark, while I agree it should mean something that is middle of the grade, I have seen it used quite a bit for things that are at the hard end of the grade. Or I'm mistaken, and it's just that willies are being waved.

I’ve always taken it to mean this, as in essentially the benchmark for the top of the grade, and anything harder would be a grade higher.

Whoever thinks ZY is 7C+ has smoked too much crack.

[Bradders]

If it's hard for the grade it's not benchmark. Those problems you mention are seen as tough for the grade I think, so it's probably wrong to describe them as benchmarks (though maybe Lager is just very knacky and conditions dependent).

Maybe I've set too much store by the YMC grit guides, but to quote from them so as to show I'm not going completely mad:

Zoo York Font 8a
The magnificent jutting arete....Perhaps the benchmark for Font 8a

Ben's Groove Font 7b
The classic problem of the wall.....The sitter is benchmark Font 7c+

Lager Lager Lager Font 7c
A total classic and benchmark Font 7c

[tim palmer]

I agree that if any of those problems were in any other country they would be at least one grade higher so guess they are bench marks as if you can climb them you can climb that grade anywhere

[moose]

Is there an effect due to "benchmarks" being problems that are among the first of the grade in an area?  There can be conservatism when establishing a new grade - it awaits a problem that is a substantial, appreciable by all, step-up from what went before. Later, the range of the grade is established - where it begins and ends - but those early "benchmarks" remain hard as their difficulty was what forced the recognition that a new grade was possible and substantially harder than what went before. [TLDR - see Scottish HVS]

[jwi]

Isn't a benchmark just a problem or route on which most climbers agree upon the grade? So something pretty stiff for the grade without being undergraded that is not excessively morpho, condition dependent or overly dependent on a weird trick? Otherwise, what would be the point?

[mrjonathanr]

I have always understood benchmark as an accurate example of the grade. Hence the name.

[El Mocho]

I agree that if any of those problems were in any other country they would be at least one grade higher so guess they are bench marks as if you can climb them you can climb that grade anywhere

We (aka a bunch of the folk in or around our house in Leeds in '98-2002) repeated them all around 2000, in the case of Lager and BG sitter prob within a few months of the FA. At the time we thought they were benchmark for the grade with the exception of Zoo, which I think got 7C+ at the time, and was considered hard for that!

This was the time when I started bouldering a lot more, before going to uni I hadn't climbed 8A, and we were all operating around these grades at the time. As they were some of the really great problems from that era and seen as benchmark to us I used them fairly consistently to compare other problems and grades. I'm not saying they are or are not benchmark (I've not done any of them for 20 years now), but to us at the time they were. It could be we were wrong/I remember incorrectly, it could be they were benchmark to us but were actually hard in reality or it could show a shift in grades over the last 20 years.

It's worth noting that JB consistently doesn't climb 8A except for 2 soft ones in the Peak he fluked up and he did Lager and Ben's but not Zoo so that's proof.

[Johnny Brown]

I don't remember having any kind of a handle on font grades at that time.

Isn't a benchmark just a problem or route on which most climbers agree upon the grade? So something pretty stiff for the grade without being undergraded that is not excessively morpho, condition dependent or overly dependent on a weird trick?

That's pretty much my interpretation (I've removed the bits that describe gritstone climbing).

A problem where you can safely claim the grade without being at risk of subsequent downgrading. Which is likely to put it above mid-grade.

It's worth noting that JB consistently doesn't climb 8A except for 2² soft ones in the Peak he fluked up

I fond the more time I spend at the crag the luckier I get.

[Bonjoy]

I take benchmark to pretty much mean undisputed at the grade (give or take the odd outlier opinion). Which is likely to mostly discount things near the top or bottom of a grade.
In practice though there have been various slippages over time, which have operated in both directions depending on where you are and what style of climbing is involved. Which I think accounts to an extent for why some benchmarks have migrated from being solid mid-grade fodder, to bulwarks against slippage at the edge of their grades.

[Duma]

I like the idea of bulwark problems/routes.

[jwi]

Many routes also gets harder with time. I went back to my old stomping grounds this summer and the warm-up route had lost two key holds. It was always very hard for 7a+ but now it was ridiculous. The locals (who climb the route at least once every session assured me that the difficulty had not changed....)

Also no one could convince me that the difficulty of the start of Femme Blanche/Femme Noire in Céüse is the same as the first time I did it. I am a lot stronger now and last summer I couldn't get up it.

[Wellsy]

In my limited experience, benchmarks have often been really weird. Golden Arete was suggested to me to be benchmark 6B+ but I thought it was harder than Steep Traverse which is benchmark 6C and Mermaid is supposedly benchmark 7A but I did it way quicker than a couple of lime 7As that are suggested to be soft.

These days I live and die by the guidebook grade, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but at least you get a degree of consistency.

[Will Hunt]

I take benchmark to pretty much mean undisputed at the grade (give or take the odd outlier opinion). Which is likely to mostly discount things near the top or bottom of a grade.

This is my take also.

I dont think ive seen a single problem on ukc that's undisputed at the grade with sufficient grade votes (lets say more than 10).

Got one. Layby Arete. Benchmark 7B+.
https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/slipstones-549/lay-by_arete-39361

[SA Chris]

can you only vote on grade if you've done it?

Looks like 87 people have logged it, but only 10 gave an opinion on grade? Is that the norm, never really looked at UKC stats before.

[andy moles]

No, all you need to vote on the grade is an account. Witness Burden of Dreams https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/lappnor-17691/burden_of_dreams-435486.

You also can't change your vote.

Apparently they're working on a system upgrade (no pun intended).

[joel182]

can you only vote on grade if you've done it?

Looks like 87 people have logged it, but only 10 gave an opinion on grade? Is that the norm, never really looked at UKC stats before.

Totally guessing, but that's probably a pretty typical ratio.

Crescent Arete has about 1800 logs and 170 votes on difficulty.

[Bradders]

No, all you need to vote on the grade is an account. Witness Burden of Dreams https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/lappnor-17691/burden_of_dreams-435486.

You also can't change your vote.

Apparently they're working on a system upgrade (no pun intended).

Dear me, that is a bit of a shambles isn't it.