[Andy Harris]

Last night I made the 1st ascent of Ruth Jenkins old project left of Caviar.

I’ve called it Barracuda and it rates at a very bouldery French 8b.

It’s essentially a 6 move boulder problem (7c+ or maybe a bit harder) into a French 7a+. Very fingery with a particularly hard move into and off a mono stack!

Surprisingly good climbing on dirty holds if you like that sort of thing.

[dave]

nice work. does this end up on or near plectrum maxilla direct then or what (i've never really been able to suss where that goes by looking)?

[account_inactive]

Effort Andy

[Jaspersharpe]

Excellent effort and good name. 

[Bonjoy]

 It takes the fairly obvious diagonal line going L-R into the top of Caviar. Vintage Harris, a truely horrendous set of grips! Rubicon is the new black.

[Andy B]

Excellent.

a mono stack!

How do you stack one finger?

[dave]

Badly.

[dobbin]

This is a bloody good effort. It looks to be miles from that mono to the next hold.

As they say in Scoootland - 'There's naaaay grips'.

[Slide]

Good effort Andy

Rubicon is indeed the new black.  I knew i should have installed the turnstile and started charging.

[Andy F]

Great effort Andy, but I've got to say a 7C+/8A into F7a+ sounds harder than 8b    (well by Yorkshire maths anyway...)

[north_country_boy]

sounds about right to me Andy F, if you consider Pump up is Font 7c+/F8a+

[dobbin]

yes, but that is 7c+ into f5+.

Does anyone else think PUTP to the 2nd bolt is probably 7c+/8a?

[Darren S]

nice one andy 

[north_country_boy]

yeah thats exactly my thinking dobbin - like doing pump up the power (Font7c+) into F7a+ (rather than 5+) would be 8b in my opinion......

[Doylo]

nice andy, sound a fair bit trickier than zeke, same grade? Long live the Con.

[Andy Harris]

Tricky one this. It's definately a notch harder than the true bouldery peak 8a+ routes (egPUTP, Culloden, Inch Test, Dialectics). The hard bit is even shorter but the moves are harder and a very specific strength that will not suit the masses. For me it was harder than stuff like Zeke, Revelations but that doesn't mean a grade above, just more intense. I guess as always repeats will confirm or not.

[Shy Ted]

bon effort

[Ru]

Tricky one this. It's definately a notch harder than the true bouldery peak 8a+ routes (egPUTP, Culloden, Inch Test, Dialectics). I guess as always repeats will confirm or not.

I repeated this yesterday. It's harder than PUTP, Culloden, Love of Money, Dialectics, Revelations and similar in difficulty to 3 Spheres and Jehovahkill. I thought it was font 8a at the start. 8b+?

[Doylo]

Effort Ru, font 8a is too hard for 8b surely! Give it 8b+!

[nodder]

Doylo the upgrader

[Doylo]

Doylo the upgrader

Yes i believe in accurate grading David!
Jordan repeated your 8as at Moel Y gest at weekend, was impressed.

[nodder]

Of course.  When you stop pissing about with your string you should get up there.  Grumble used that crimp though knew I should have tried harder to break it.
 

[Andy Harris]

Nice to see my bit of peak nastiness getting some attention. I'd wondered all along if was more 8b+ than 8b and had been chatting to Ru whilst he's been trying it. I guess I was going well at the time and plumped for 8b but it's hard to grade these essentially boulder problem routes.  We've both now settled on 8b+ or Font 8a. Hopefully it will get some more attention now. The perfect antithesis to Mecca.

[nickreyner]

Well Done , Thought you were getting close when we left on Sunday

[Andy Harris]

Sad news but I finally got back on Barracuda to see if the pocket had got bigger (after a conversation with Ted & Ryan) & I'm afraid to say it has. The pocket has crumbled 3 or 4mm meaning you can get your big 2 fingers side by side vs the original mono stack. Unfortuantely this has made is significantly easier. Originally I thought 8b+ or Font 8a but now it's no more than 8a+ or Font 7c. Incredible what such a small difference can make. Still bouldery and fingery but at a different level.

The bonus for boulderers is it's a lot more friendly to boulder out to the Jug as it's much more static.

[Kingy]

Just seen this and would like to back up Andy on this. The pocket had indeed got bigger when I tried it in October/november last year before the floods came in. With my sausage fingers, I stuggled to fit them both fully in the pocket so there was still an element of 'stack' for me. I personally found the move desparate but once you start believing that you will hang that horrible tooth which you jump for then it becomes doable.

It may be a little stiff for font 7c as a boulder problem for those with fat fingers taking into account the starting set up moves as well which are no picnic. Therefore I would perhaps err on the side of 8a+/8b in comparison to the likes of Caviar or Beluga.

[Kingy]

Got back on this yesterday and the moves moving past the 2nd bolt beyond the good LH hold at the end of the boulder problem have altered during to rockfall (there is a large area of fresh, fragile, unweathered rock). The boulder problem up to there is unchanged. It now seems very hard beyond the 2nd and the rock left behind is very crumbly and brittle sadly. Rubble was raining down on my belayer at one point while I checked out different possibilities.

Some stabilisation may be possible to bring the route back to a doable state. A reascent is needed - hopefully this won't go the way of other Rubicon 'classics' like Tribes or Eugenics and become horribly unbalanced or impossible.

[haydn jones]

Luckily you caught the football sized bit instead of dropping it on my head though! 

[Wood FT]

Got back on this yesterday and the moves moving past the 2nd bolt beyond the good LH hold at the end of the boulder problem have altered during to rockfall (there is a large area of fresh, fragile, unweathered rock). The boulder problem up to there is unchanged. It now seems very hard beyond the 2nd and the rock left behind is very crumbly and brittle sadly. Rubble was raining down on my belayer at one point while I checked out different possibilities.

Some stabilisation may be possible to bring the route back to a doable state. A reascent is needed - hopefully this won't go the way of other Rubicon 'classics' like Tribes or Eugenics and become horribly unbalanced or impossible.

Good to see your training for the Dru is going well Ted!