the shizzle > chuffing

History of UK grades?

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lukeyboy:
I have to say, I disagree.

I share your view that it's important our climbing history and culture is recorded and preserved, but for me the tech grade is not an interesting or important part of that. It's the route names, the characters, the lines and the stories that make up the history, not an alphanumeric reference number which will likely be meaningless to most climbers in a few decades time.

Whether you call Indian Face E9 6c or E9 Fr7b or whatever, all the interesting and important stuff still remains - tales of the first ascent, the boldness of the line, epics had on it, the bolt saga etc.

Just my two pence.

spidermonkey09:
 I also think the phrase "erasure of climbing history" is absolutely not what is happening. It's an overly emotive term. It's the development of climbing history and the incorporation of new perspectives.

As I said in the other thread I consider the tech grade all but obsolete and won't mourn its phasing out. I agree with lukeyboy, it's not a meaningful thing for me personally in a historical sense.

Kingy:
I understand the UK tech grade is not going anywhere on UKC so no phasing out/ erasing (or whatever we choose to call it.)

As an aside, seems like a good opportunity to share this nugget of climbing history on the Indian Face. E9 6c is in the streets every night!

https://www.planetmountain.com/en/news/climbing/e9-6c-the-video-of-john-redhead-and-johnny-dawes.html

Fiend:
"E9 6c speaks of collecting, speaks of commodities, speaks of CVs, and business, it speaks of climbers being paid to do a job"

That first part, along with "speaks of ego, speaks of attention-seeking", should be on the preface of every grade section of every guidebook.

duncan:
I love climbing history but, generally speaking, I don't see numbers per se as hugely historically important except perhaps in first-of-the-grade discussions. Ironically, these are invariably framed in contemporary grades rather than the ones given at the time of their first ascent.

The history of Cenotaph Corner is it's status as a 'last great problem', how it was named long before being climbed, Menlove Edwards top-roping it in the 1930s, Peter Harding's attempt after the war, Joe Brown's getting to the niche on his first try but dropping his peg hammer on his belayer's head and all that. That it used to be XS (no tech. grade) and is now E1 5b does not detract from that history. Grading it E1 6a+ in the future won't detract from its history either!

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