[spidermonkey09]

I don't see the harm in adding a 7a tech grade to hard routes.

But what useful information is being conveyed by doing so? That the route has a crux sequence around Font 7B or harder - so somewhere in an approximately ten grade range? It's not clear to me who is supposed to find that helpful.

I think its quite helpful to know if a crux is Font 7B or harder. Anything of Font 7A+ and below would equate to 6c which would be onsightable for many leader operating at the E7 and above level. English 7b would be warranted for exceptionally difficult cruxes. E.g. Smoked Salmon E8 7b at Bamford, The Angel's Share E8 7b (original grades). These are rare beasts admittedly but do crop up on gritstone in particular for very bouldery sequences.

Anyway, the UK tech grade is carrying on in UKC databases and Rockfax going forwards I understand so its not as if we are adding it to routes, its there to stay! By all means add in French and Font grades as well, the more the merrier!

I have absolutely no idea what a tech 7b grade is supposed to denote. How hard did they think smoked salmon was?! By Barrows method that would assume they thought the crux move was in the font 8B+ region?!

[SA Chris]

Was explaining the difference between 7A probs and 7a routes to some young guys who were struggling with the idea at the wall, can we change that too while we are at it?

They were struggling with the difference between a route and a boulder?

Yup. One said he could do 7a routes but not 7A graded boulders he was struggling with. Though the grading system was the same for both.

[Kingy]

I have absolutely no idea what a tech 7b grade is supposed to denote.

Nothing wrong with a bit of mystery!

[abarro81]

I have absolutely no idea what a tech 7b grade is supposed to denote. How hard did they think smoked salmon was?! By Barrows method that would assume they thought the crux move was in the font 8B+ region?!

Just to clarify, I wasn't suggesting an 8B move was "tech 7a", just that "tech 7a" could be anything from maybe one 7A move (=7A boulder) through to a dozen or so 7B moves in a row with hard transitions (= 8B?) and therefore isn't very useful, to say the least.

Anything of Font 7A+ and below would equate to 6c

Except you said WSS and Blind Date are 7a... neither of which have a 7B move on (or even close). It's almost as if the whole concept of the tech grade is a bit farcical since some use it to refer to the hardest move and others the hardest section (plus it's too wide to be useful).

But enough of this. Make Uselessly Wide Grades Great Again! Preferably in Latin - very British.

[Kingy]

[
Except you said WSS and Blind Date are 7a... neither of which have a 7B move on (or even close).

WSS is 7B+ to me at least. I find it desparate as do many people of average height. A lot of folk are calling it Font 7C. Its been E4 7a in the routes guidbook for many years.

Re Blind Date, an old Al Rouse route from the 80's originally done with a 'splits' stance off an old long- deparated boulder has been Font 7B+ ever since the Peak Bouldering 2005 guidebook and has been E4 7a in the routes guide for many years.

Again, for those of average height, I would say not many would dispute the 7B+ grade. FWIW, 21 votes on UKC for 7B+!

[yetix]

I think Alex is talking about single move difficulty rather than the whole grade and saying the tech grade doesn't reflect that no? I don't do trad but that's what I was taking from his reply?

[petejh]

So we have routes with short cruxes, and we have routes with sustained climbing.
And we have grading systems which deal well with short cruxes (font grade), and we have grading systems which deal well with sustained climbing (sport grade).

So why oh why do insist on a grading system (UK tech grade) that doesn't describe either style of climbing well? It's so British (and crap)!

[spidermonkey09]

[
Except you said WSS and Blind Date are 7a... neither of which have a 7B move on (or even close).

WSS is 7B+ to me at least. I find it desparate as do many people of average height. A lot of folk are calling it Font 7C. Its been E4 7a in the routes guidbook for many years.

Re Blind Date, an old Al Rouse route from the 80's originally done with a 'splits' stance off an old long- deparated boulder has been Font 7B+ ever since the Peak Bouldering 2005 guidebook and has been E4 7a in the routes guide for many years.

Again, for those of average height, I would say not many would dispute the 7B+ grade. FWIW, 21 votes on UKC for 7B+!

I don't think thats at issue; I agree WSS is 7B+, but that doesn't mean theres a single move on it thats font 7B, which is what a tech grade of 7a implies.

[Kingy]

I see what you're saying. I think we need to take 'single move' with a pinch of salt here. Blind Date is 5 hand moves in total to the end of the difficulties. I have no issue with calling that English 7a. I think its splitting hairs to say that we need to break it down further into the grade of each hand move. I take a pragmatic approach here to the 'single move' aspect. Basically, I would use the Font system in a similar way to the English tech for short problems of 5 moves or below .

Similarly with WSS, that would be about 5 hard hand moves alll adding up to 7a.

If we were talking about 10 moves then we're into the 'sustained nature of multiple moves e.g. Powerband. That would be a different kettle of fish....

[crimpinainteasy]

The correct answer is clearly E grade with French grade for sustained routes and E grade with font grade for bouldery ones.

This would have the neat side effect of stopping people mixing up 6a and 6A so bloody often.

This is the only rational answer.

[spidermonkey09]

I see what you're saying. I think we need to take 'single move' with a pinch of salt here. Blind Date is 5 hand moves in total to the end of the difficulties. I have no issue with calling that English 7a. I think its splitting hairs to say that we need to break it down further into the grade of each hand move. I take a pragmatic approach here to the 'single move' aspect. Basically, I would use the Font system in a similar way to the English tech for short problems of 5 moves or below .

Similarly with WSS, that would be about 5 hard hand moves alll adding up to 7a.

If we were talking about 10 moves then we're into the 'sustained nature of multiple moves e.g. Powerband. That would be a different kettle of fish....

I think this is the crux (lol) of it. I don't agree with using the tech grade for grading short hard sequences. as Pete has said that is literally what the font grade is good for. that is borne out by the fact that nobody knows WSS as e4 7a, they know it as font 7B+. It seems very retrograde in that context to continue using the tech grade where it starts to make no sense, ie from 6c upwards. Below that it works fine.

[Kingy]

I think this is the crux (lol) of it. I don't agree with using the tech grade for grading short hard sequences. as Pete has said that is literally what the font grade is good for. that is borne out by the fact that nobody knows WSS as e4 7a, they know it as font 7B+. It seems very retrograde in that context to continue using the tech grade where it starts to make no sense, ie from 6c upwards. Below that it works fine.

I can remember trying WSS in 2000 when it was B9 or 7a in the Al Williams Peak bouldering guide before I even knew what Font 7B+ meant. I certainly understood the difficulty of the problem from 7a. Its always been applied in a 'holistic' sense to short series of hand moves. I think its a mistake to try to apply it too literally. I don't see the need to slavishly insist on the tech grade being only 1 hand move. Font grades being for short sequences of moves doesn't mean English tech grades can't be too (to a certain limited extent).

I don't think we can say that the whole English tech grade was ever meant for one hand move! What about pitches at Gogarth, surely a few strung together was what was meant by 'the hardest move'? I am a pragmatist, not a purist 

The English tech grade may be old and wide but I don't accept that it makes no sense. Worked fine for me!

[Tom de Gay]

The hard bit of Bon Voyage is a traverse, so clearly a Fontainebleau traverse grade would be the best way to describe the difficulty.

[Fiend]

Was explaining the difference between 7A probs and 7a routes to some young guys who were struggling with the idea at the wall, can we change that too while we are at it?

Which was exactly my impeccable and undeniable logic (amongst other reasons) which V grades were objectively superior. I spent about 20 minutes trying to find a blogpost a wrote on it but couldn't. I did find one where the entire first paragraph was calling every possible variety of boulderer a cunt, so that's something.

[crimpinainteasy]

I think this is the crux (lol) of it. I don't agree with using the tech grade for grading short hard sequences. as Pete has said that is literally what the font grade is good for. that is borne out by the fact that nobody knows WSS as e4 7a, they know it as font 7B+. It seems very retrograde in that context to continue using the tech grade where it starts to make no sense, ie from 6c upwards. Below that it works fine.

I can remember trying WSS in 2000 when it was B9 or 7a in the Al Williams Peak bouldering guide before I even knew what Font 7B+ meant. I certainly understood the difficulty of the problem from 7a. Its always been applied in a 'holistic' sense to short series of hand moves. I think its a mistake to try to apply it too literally. I don't see the need to slavishly insist on the tech grade being only 1 hand move. Font grades being for short sequences of moves doesn't mean English tech grades can't be too (to a certain limited extent).

I don't think we can say that the whole English tech grade was ever meant for one hand move! What about pitches at Gogarth, surely a few strung together was what was meant by 'the hardest move'? I am a pragmatist, not a purist 

The English tech grade may be old and wide but I don't accept that it makes no sense. Worked fine for me!

I'm not a trad climber so maybe just my ignorance here but if English tech grades are based on the hardest sequence of moves and not the hardest single move then how come a 7C and 8B boulder can both get the same tech grade, since such a huge grade discrepcancy guarantees the crux sequence on the latter is much harder?

[Kingy]

how come a 7C and 8B boulder can both get the same tech grade, since such a huge grade discrepcancy guarantees the crux sequence on the latter is much harder?

I think cos hard single moves compound very quickly into harder sequences. So to compare a one move 7a  with a 5 move problem 7a.

Out of interest, what are the examples for 7C and 8B being the same technical grade? 

[i_a_coops]

Angel's share (considered 7C above pads?) and Hubble (can't remember if it's considered 8B or 8B+) are both tech 7b then? Jobs a good'un.

[Kingy]

Angel's share (considered 7C above pads?) and Hubble (can't remember if it's considered 8B or 8B+) are both tech 7b then? Jobs a good'un.

Angel's Share crux is now given English 7a so can't be compared with Hubble's crux which is 7b. Next! 

[i_a_coops]

On the flip side I actually like uk tech grades for slate/slate style slabs and vertical things as i think there's more variation in whether or not a hard move fits your body and/or your brain,  so distinguishing between a 7B and 7B+ slab for a hypothetical 'average' climber seems really unrealistic.

I worked out an infallible system for this:

6a = put a foot up, rockover
6b = as above but an intermediate foot move is required
6c = 3 foot moves for one hand move
7a = 4 foot moves per hand move

That gets all the historic tech grades right in twll mwr except for the top pitch of quarryman which doesn't clock in at 7a unless you're using font grades.

[Kingy]

Dan has shared with me his thoughts on the debate in the form of the following short piece:

Leibvoller Kamph (The Loving Struggle)

Karl Jaspers was a psychoanalyst and existential philosopher who thought a lot about the nature of being and knowing. He describes 3 main types of being in the world, the objective, the subjective and 'being itself. The first modes of being lend themselves to forms of empirical observation, where as 'being itself' lies beyond the boundaries of the empirical world but within the fullness of reality that Jaspers called 'The Encompassing' or 'Existence'. Jaspers believed these 3 modes of being existed in a painful union (marriage?) of needing each other to exist yet repelling each other at the same time.

The British (traditional) climbing grading system uses technical and adjectival grades in an attempt to describe the objective difficulty and encompassing nature of a route. The first ascentionist proposes a grade, which with time, and a growing number of repeat assents will settle to a position which allows would be climbers some indication of the challenge ahead. Take for example the route 'Elegy' on the lower tier of the Roaches, described by Ken Wilson as a real 'man-boy sorter' it's burly, technical, smeary and bold, weighing in at the lowly grade of E2 5c. You could say that the given grade is only a small almost insignificant part of the overall experience, you could also argue that the grade is a symbolic part of the 'encompassing' without which, understanding the full nature of the route would not be possible.

In an attempt to understand existence Jaspers describes how human beings bring concrete and practical understandings of the world (Dassein or everydayness) and the features of intellect and empirical understanding in the conscious mind (science?) together in a spirited attempt to gain a sense of coherence and universality in the world of being. He suggested that an object is not examined in isolation but through a tension between individual and group understanding and agreement which he refers to as the Leiboller Kamph or the 'Loving Struggle'.

In my understanding the grading of a British traditional rock climb is not a reductionistic process which attempts to speak purely to an empirical system, as if that were all reality offers. It is an individual and social effort, a communion of modes of being, the subjective, the objective and being itself, it is symbolic of what is not said or not able to be known in words, that being a greater encompassing knowledge, unreachable by science and empiricism and alluding to the 'implicate order' sought in the uneasy tension of the Loving Struggle.

[petejh]

That's some E9 bullshit.

[remus]

That's some E9 bullshit.

E9 6c or E9 7a?

[reeve]

with time, and a growing number of repeat assents will settle to a position which allows would be climbers some indication of the challenge ahead.

What happens if they disagree with the proposed grade?

[joel182]

Was explaining the difference between 7A probs and 7a routes to some young guys who were struggling with the idea at the wall, can we change that too while we are at it?

This has been solved really hasn't it? One is V6 and the other is 5.11d 7a.

[stone]

"Breaking a pitch into individual moves and rating the pitch by the hardest move is nonsense."

Jim Bridwell (The Innocent, The Ignorant And The Insecure. Ascent 1973)

It is time to thank the UK tech. grade for decades of loyal service and send it off to retirement. It works well for move-rest-move-rest climbing but the activity has changed and it is now obsolete. As a guide to physical difficulty, a French grade is clearly more informative for routes above about E3/ UK6a and is different but just as useful on easier ones.

In agreement with your general point, I think it can also be true for some well protected but very sustained easier routes too. Swanage has classic E4 5cs, E3 5bs etc that are super sustained, burly and with unlimited idiot-proof protection (can place as many rock8s etc as you can carry). They would get the same sport grade as many E4 6b, E3 6a routes.