[Fiend]

Can we have more people discussing the merits of the E grade system and then asking to not discuss the merits of the E grade system, please 

[Johnny Brown]

 

And just for the record, I think WSS is a great example for discussing the merits of E grades, which is why I keep using it, even if everyone deletes the E-grade with pads nowadays.

I don't get the fixation that E4 should be broadly the same overall whatever. They're not just E4, that's half the grade. E4 7a is clearly way harder than E4 5c for most E4 climbers*. The fact that uk grades can do so much more than others is a feature not a bug.

*but not all, because frequently I am him, as my belayers on pumpy routes will attest.

[andy moles]

joked that they were E5 4a or whatever, but really all that's doing is shoehorning a different kind of experience into a grading system that isn't great for it...

I think there are other ways of grading that do a better job.

Why not suggest and explain them then?

Well in the case of WSS, a bouldering grade, obviously. And possibly, in place of the supplementary information that E4 provided, a separate bouldering grade for the top.

I'd have thought that the vaguer grades of XS or HXS for sustained chop 4a or 4c would be more appropriate to that kind of experience, accounting for the fact there are probably headstrong climbers who couldn't normally lead more than E1 who could do them, and people normally capable of on-sighting E6s who couldn't. Obviously you can't account fully for climbers having different relative strengths, but that particular example seems to push that to extreme?

[abarro81]

doesn't really tell you if the hard climbing is high up or not, whereas E4 7a clearly implies it can't be.

I guess what E4 7a doesn't tell you, is whether there's an E4 but up high after a 7a boulder (your interpretation of how grades should work) or a VS up high after a 7a boulder (with the E grade being earned by the difficulty of the crux move, which I guess would feel committing without pads even on WSS; which would be closer to my or some others' understanding of how these grades should work, even though we'd all give it E6 at least anyway if forced to use trad grades). I guess when I used to go out soloing, if there was an E1 6a micro route I knew the 6a was low but would have no clue if the top was going to feel like VS or E1.. but maybe I just never understood how e grades get applied to micro routes. Seems like I'm far from being alone.

The more I think about it the more it does kind of make sense, but it will never be intuitive because it doesn't fit with how the E grade is used on most routes, where it represents a broad measure of overall difficulty taking lots into account (difficulty, obviousness, tenuousness, danger etc.). So if your trad experience was on more conventional routes it would not occur that that's how the grade was being used. It didn't to me until this conversation!

[andy moles]

I don't get the fixation that E4 should be broadly the same overall whatever. They're not just E4, that's half the grade.

I get what you're saying with this, but people seem to find E grades confusing enough even with the assumption that the 'E' part represents the approximate overall difficulty, without making it even more complicated...

[abarro81]

E grade represents the overall difficulty, except when it doesn't, at which point it may not may not encompass the difficulty of the hard bit to some extent (but not a full extent, I'm still not clear on this) depending on whether the FA grew up in Pembroke or Sheffield. Clear?

[Johnny Brown]

I'd have thought that the vaguer grades of XS or HXS for sustained chop 4a or 4c would be more appropriate

I tend to think of XS/ HXS as being more suited to loose ledge shuffling, more like extreme versions of your 'E5 4a' approach suited to headstrong punters. And as I said above I'm very unsure of where the grade boundary lies.

Whereas our E4 4c pitch had more in common with Gogarth E5 5b like Death Trap - i.e. it's vertical, sustained proper climbing but you've very limited faith in either the holds or the protection. A proper trad E6 leader would have been fine, if perhaps slightly traumatised as I was. A headstrong E1 leader would either backed off or died.

or a VS up high after a 7a boulder (

(Edit: you've added more context) Clearly this would never have been given an E grade at all, because to anyone doing the start it would be trivial. As it is, it isn't trivial, and people back off it even with pads, so it got E4.  E1 6a would suggest that the 6a is fall-offable but I would expect harder climbing at height than 'VS', but if it was dangerous 5b or 5c it would get more than E1 overall, so you can expect 5a ish I think. The grades are 'overall', they just cover a lot more variety than other systems.

I get what you're saying with this, but

I'm not proposing any changes I'm just explaining how it already works, and always has done. The proof is in the guidebooks.

[andy moles]

Whereas our E4 4c pitch had more in common with Gogarth E5 5b like Death Trap - i.e. it's vertical, sustained proper climbing but you've very limited faith in either the holds or the protection. A proper trad E6 leader would have been fine, if perhaps slightly traumatised as I was. A headstrong E1 leader would either backed off or died.

I'll take your word on this, I'm just finding the pitch in question quite hard to imagine!

I'm not proposing any changes I'm just explaining how it already works, and always has done. The proof is in the guidebooks.

In some guidebooks, from a specific era, for particular areas! i.e. the period between the development of E grades and the proliferation of bouldering pads, on sedimentary outcrops in northern England...

[Johnny Brown]

That doesn't include the sea cliffs, where there is just as much weirdness at the opposite end?

It's the same everywhere I've been in the Uk, but I did learn early on there was a variety of styles, and not to throw a hissy fit and claim the grades were 'broken' if I an E4 didn't suit me. Well I might have had some fits but I didn't claim the grades were broken.

I have tended to seek out uncoventional routes though, so was exposed to the breath and scope before my head got all swol from climbing big numbers.

[abarro81]

Someone should have stuck that in a guide or something. I think I would have found it useful to know back when I climbed on grit quite a lot... Now you say it it does make some sense, but if you started climbing somewhere without many micro routes it's not obvious. I'm also not entirely sure that's how it's used round the country? I don't recall micro routes in Avon feeling like they used that system, but maybe I'm misremembering.

I think you're projecting or imagining when it comes to people throwing a fit about these grades. I recall people just treating them like a joke, because that's how they seem if you're used to normal grading

[andy moles]

I have tended to seek out uncoventional routes though

You probably are in a relatively small Venn overlap of specialties there, ankle-breaker grit soloing and seaside death choss.

[Somebody's Fool]

They’re both five minutes from his house.

[andy moles]

They’re both five minutes from his house.

Is his house bifurcated by a rupture in the fabric of space? 

[northern yob]

2nd home wanker….. in north wales too, I can feel another great debate coming on. 😂

[SA Chris]

A plague in both his houses clearly.

[remus]

Someone should have stuck that in a guide or something. I think I would have found it useful to know back when I climbed on grit quite a lot... Now you say it it does make some sense, but if you started climbing somewhere without many micro routes it's not obvious. I'm also not entirely sure that's how it's used round the country? I don't recall micro routes in Avon feeling like they used that system, but maybe I'm misremembering.

Handily most guides do include a few paragraphs on grades:

The system of grading for routes in this volume is the traditional British style, a combination of adjectival and technical grades, and assumes the leader has a normal rack, including standard camming devices, nuts, slings, quickdraws etc. The adjectival grade is the first part of the grade, and attempts to give an overall sense of the difficulty of a climb. This will be influenced by many aspects.

Being a massive dweeb I've gone and checked a few other guides and they all include very similar wording (Rockfax eastern grit, CC South Devon, CC Dartmoor, The Sheffield-Stanage area 1970 reprint, Peak Limestone South 1987, Moorland Gritstone Chew Valley 1988, Derwent Valley 1981).

You could be forgiven for thinking the adjectival grade is widely understood to "give an overall sense of the difficulty of a climb".

[SA Chris]

"attempt to" - which it does with reasonable success for 95%of the routes in the country. Yet everyone seems to be focus on the two tiny flat end of the bell curve. You know, the bell ends

[Nemo]

"The most useful/ popular modern grade would, I suppose be 7C(!)"

Agreed

"So do we agree 'standard' E4 is around 5c/6a? So we are fine with going down to the 4c/5a grade in extreme cases - bold, sustained, loose, poor protection."

Again, agreed.
Not done any E4 4c's but done plenty of things that aren't too far off.  For those who haven't seen such things, then since we're talking hypotheticals, imagine kicking steps in an 80 degree slope of "rock" resembling the shifting sands on a sand dune with no gear and a pit of tigers underneath you and you'll get the idea.  There's plenty of stuff in the UK that's not that far off that hilariously.  Routes certainly doesn't need to have much in the way of technical rock climbing to feel like they are overall E4 or E6 or much harder.

"But if we go up the same amount - to 6c/7a - it's somehow unacceptable? Why?"

Because for the E grade to actually have any use, it needs to be the overall grade of the route.  Which includes physical difficulty.  That works fine for the examples above when there's hardly any physical difficulty but huge amounts of other skills required and danger.  But if it's the overall grade of a route, then something that's Fr 9c can't ever be E4. Or something that's Fr8a for that matter.  Completely safe Fr8a cracks are overall considered overall to be E7.  For E7 to mean anything, then completely safe Fr8a shorter routes also need to be E7.  Giving them E4 completely undermines the foundation of what E grades are meant to represent.

"Your E6 or 7 is a bizarre attempt to translate into some overall sport grade."

No, it really isn't.  It's an attempt to make E grades actually mean something and be used consistently.  And the only thing that makes sense for it to mean is the overall grade of the route.  Which includes the difficulty and the danger and everything else.  You're trying to eliminate or significantly reduce the importance of the physical difficulty bit on a particular subset of routes which undermines E grades entirely.  Just because that's how it's been historically doesn't make it a good idea. It's why there's still endless ridiculous debates about this subject, a little like the one we're currently having.

"everyone seems to be focus on the two tiny flat end of the bell curve"

This same shit comes up time and time again for hard routes in the news, which is why people care.  Might be 2% of overall volume of routes, but it's the 2% that's often in the news and hence the routes people often talk about.

"Is this a generational thing?"

You might have a couple of years on me, but not much more I don't think.

"I really can’t get my head round why lots of people have such a problem with it or are against them"

Not got anything against them at all.  Precisely the opposite - I'm trying to defend them as I think that if used properly they are the best way to grade trad routes.
I'm just pointing out that they need to be used consistently to avoid all the criticism that gets thrown at them. 

"The only issue I can see here is people who think of themselves as 'E4 climbers' might get their ego pricked"

No. The main issue as far as I'm concerned is that at the top end, hard trad grades in the news have become a joke, as noone can agree on what they are supposed to be representing.
Which makes the UK the laughing stock of the world when people can't agree whether something is E8 or E11 - ie: whether it should be world standard news, or something for a few people to go "nice one" to their mate in the pub.

"E grade represents the overall difficulty, except when it doesn't, at which point it may not may not encompass the difficulty of the hard bit to some extent (but not a full extent, I'm still not clear on this) depending on whether the FA grew up in Pembroke or Sheffield. Clear?"

     Indeed.


The Egraders were right in terms of their aims - ie: E grades could and should be a lot more consistent.  They just stratospherically messed up the implementation.
What they should have done was posted something about how E grades should and could be used consistently.
And then put their heads together and spent some time writing a proper graded list for all routes ever given E9 or harder.  That's the only way of actually sorting out hard trad grades and making them consistent, not some silly gimmick on a website.  And if they'd even started that on a piece of paper, they'd have realised that their translations were a million miles away from reality and would involve regrading the vast majority of routes in the UK. 

[northern yob]

The reason why Egrades don’t work at the top end is because they are rarely applied objectively/properly, those at the top end have to contend with their ego’s, public opinion, sponsors etc etc  this is the case with all grades not just E grades! Sport climbs and boulders aren’t immune to downgrades/upgrades and people certainly don’t agree on them all. E grades give lots of info…. Sometimes I agree sometimes I don’t! Sport grades give less info… sometimes I agree sometimes I don’t. It’s all the same whatever the system.

[Nemo]

With sport routes and boulders, typically significant downgrades only happen when people find better beta.
The vast majority of people (at least those who travel to at least some extent) climbing at that level tend to roughly agree about grades when they've used the same beta (with obvious exceptions for height dependent stuff etc).

With UK trad routes people can climb exactly the same sequence and yet come up with a completely different grade as they are using a completely different grading system.  That's not sensible.  Sure sponsors, public opinion, beta and all the rest of it are always going to play a part, but sorting out what the numbers are actually meant to represent is a pre requisite to even bothering trying to assign something a number.