UKBouldering.com
the shizzle => news => Topic started by: kc on July 13, 2013, 06:29:33 pm
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Well done Gary.
There are a few good ones in there somewhere.
http://www.sportsclimbs.co.uk/ (http://www.sportsclimbs.co.uk/)
See fuckbook link.
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obsessed?
good effort
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Amazing effort fro Gary! What a hero!
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Crazy stat!
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his belayer deserves a medal
or a couple of days off
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Never knew the Stranglers had recorded so many songs.
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I wonder how many stars?
Also, from his facebook page:
Basic Information
Gender: Male
Interested in: Men
Doh ::)
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his belayer deserves a medal
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Belayer? :-\
:P
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Fair play to Gary, I've climbed a lot of his routes locally and some of them are 3 star classics. It must be an awesome amount of time and effort he's put in over the years, respec'.
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Wow! Amazing stuff :-)
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his belayer deserves a medal
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Belayer? :-\
:P
Sorry, don't understand this. Are you saying you don't believe he has done all the routes he claims?
By the way this is an honest question and not a wind up. Personally I think that 4000 routes is an amazing effort.
Dave
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his belayer deserves a medal
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Belayer? :-\
:P
Sorry, don't understand this. Are you saying you don't believe he has done all the routes he claims?
By the way this is an honest question and not a wind up. Personally I think that 4000 routes is an amazing effort.
Dave
I read Petes comment on belayer - to refer to belayer being the singular not plural - implying that only one person had belayed him up all those routes - which would indeed be quite a task :)
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Fair enough - apologies.
My impression was that it was trying to question if he had a belayer for all of his ascents.
Dave
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...if he had a belayer for all of his ascents.
I've read in the comments of guides that some routes he's put up were first done as solos.
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his belayer deserves a medal
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Belayer? :-\
:P
Sorry, don't understand this. Are you saying you don't believe he has done all the routes he claims?
By the way this is an honest question and not a wind up. Personally I think that 4000 routes is an amazing effort.
Dave
He did famously claim two routes on the same day in different parts of the country. Speaking personally he also retro bolted a route of mine then renamed and claimed it.
4000 routes is in quantitative terms a big achievement - but just because he climbed them first doesn't mean they wouldn't have been climbed - well the better ones at least.
I have other issues about Gibson's contribution but there seems to have been a swing of opinion which means puts me and other "detractors with axes to grind" in the minority.
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He did famously claim two routes on the same day in different parts of the country. Speaking personally he also retro bolted a route of mine then renamed and claimed it.
4000 routes is in quantitative terms a big achievement - but just because he climbed them first doesn't mean they wouldn't have been climbed - well the better ones at least.
I have other issues about Gibson's contribution but there seems to have been a swing of opinion which means puts me and other "detractors with axes to grind" in the minority.
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I kind of remember something about that 2 routes on same day thing.
I am genuinely curious as to why he isn't held in higher regard by the climbing community in general, although to be fair he does seem to be on this thread.
Cheers Dave
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I think there is a reasonably clear distinction between Gary's routes that are obviously good (whether Lundy classics or just pretty decent routes wherever), and some of the more recent routes in Peak quarries that ascend something that approximates rock but has no other merit and ideally wouldn't have been climbed (and I've met people with concerns that Gary's bolting of choss is encouraging less experienced climbers onto dangerous terrain). Obviously there is a grey area inbetween but it seems appropriate to praise him for the former quality routes but not for the latter. Both a ceasless tide of crap new routes AND a futuristic eye for a line??
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I am genuinely curious as to why he isn't held in higher regard by the climbing community in general,
Cheers Dave
In summary:
New route greed
Dubious FA claims
Bad bolts
Bolts/situ gear at Pembroke and Lundy
Excessive gardening / chipping of routes
Chossy routes best left to nature
Other than that - great guy
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Is he including Always the Sun in that 4000 I wonder?
(Climbing could do with a bit of cycling-esque "truth and reconciliation" I reckon.
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If anyones got OTE 56 there's a good article on him by John Horscroft:
The late 70s and early 80s were a time of fierce competition and Gibson was soon ruffling feathers. People began to question the veracity of some of his claims and rumours were rife that he could not have done certain lines because they were later found to be two grades harder than those suggested by Gibson.
Keith Sharples, peak activist and occasional partner of Gibson's at the time has said that he would mysteriously complete a route just after every other witness had left the dale. He was becoming a victim of his own ambition and , addict like was prepared to go to almost any lengths to get his publicity fix. As the rumours became more widespread, Gibson found the sheer volume of routes he was producing meant he was under closer scrutiny than most......
While he stands by the vast majority of the routes he claimed, including other causes celebre such as Big Bug at Tremadog and Snapdragon in Cheedale, he is candid if vague about his cheating. "Its true i claimed routes that i hadn't done, that i weighted gear during first ascents and i claimed routes 'early'
Controversial but impressive guy.
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I think I remember reading that and a distant memory of that article plus various peoples' comments is what prompted me to ask earlier.
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Regardless of his faults his contribution to british climbing is huge and, to me, a net positive.
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Regardless of his faults his contribution to british climbing is huge and, to me, a net positive.
I agree
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Davo - you were right to think what you originally did. It's not exactly controversial to say that Gary hasn't climbed every route he's claimed to have. What isn't in doubt is that he's equipped more routes than anyone. I've actually seen it in action at Craig Arthur - saw him bolting a couple of lines there, he said he hadn't climbed them but on checking his website when I got home he'd already named, graded and dated them. C'est la vie, his contribution is massive and generally I've got lots of respect for much of what he's done even with the odd white lie.
Regardless of his faults his contribution to british climbing is huge and, to me, a net positive.
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the mainstream media should be jumping on the bandwagon and telling the world about a man who has new routed his way up the equivalent of Mount Everest... 6 times! Often scaling rocks that were previously thought of as unclimbable!
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Regardless of his faults his contribution to british climbing is huge and, to me, a net positive.
I agree
I agree too.
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Davo - you were right to think what you originally did. It's not exactly controversial to say that Gary hasn't climbed every route he's claimed to have. What isn't in doubt is that he's equipped more routes than anyone. I've actually seen it in action at Craig Arthur - saw him bolting a couple of lines there, he said he hadn't climbed them but on checking his website when I got home he'd already named, graded and dated them. C'est la vie, his contribution is massive and generally I've got lots of respect for much of what he's done even with the odd white lie.
Maybe we should adopt the French view about routes - namely that the equipper/opener of the route gets the naming rights rather than the person that did the actual first ascent?? (I believe that is the system but maybe I am misunderstanding it?)
I personally am grateful for all the developing and equipping that he has done and think he is to be congratulated for that but I don't like the idea of bolting a route, stating that you have climbed it and then naming it etc as the first ascentionist. This seems to me to be a touch disingenuous and isn't what climbing should be about. I have always liked the black and white aspect of climbing - i.e. if you get to the top in one go - you have climbed it. If you don't - you haven't climbed it.
Dave
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What concerns me more than the naming/claiming business is that recently bolts pulled out on one or two of his routes, and if only a fraction of a percentage of the bolts he's placed over the years on those 4000 routes are dodgy then someone out there is in for a nasty shock one day. Lets face it nobody is perfect, but when we're in a game where bolts are implicitly trusted ( and rightly or wrongly they are trusted without question 99.99% of the time) then someone is going to be let down bigtime.
Of course an interesting discussion might be if those 4000 routes had been spread between say 50 other first ascentionists then statistically would there be more or fewer bad bolts out there? Argument of experience versus possible complacency.
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To me Gary's done a great job putting up routes in the 6's where there were none. They may not be the best in many cases, but a lot of the time owt's better 'an nowt.
For a man who's put in thousands of bolts, it's impressive how few have been duds. And you can't put up 4000 routes without ruffling some feathers, missing out some prior ascents and making lots of other mistakes along the way. There's also no way anyone could manage to achieve this without having the odd personality problem.
I think if you haven't contributed even 5% as many new routes as he has, you're not really in a position to criticize.
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I'd guesstimate 50 people would bring in a hell of a lot more potential for error.
4000 routes, the large majority of them involving bolts, say an average of 6 bolts per route. Do the maths - it's very impressive there have been so few occurrences of Gary's bolting going wrong - 3 routes involving a total of 5 or 6 bolts that I've heard about. Experienced climbers have placed 1/50th that number and messed up.
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I don't really understand your post Sam, are you saying if you haven't put up/bolted 200 routes then you're not in a position to criticise someone for lying about first ascents or not in a position to criticise someone purely for the bolts theyve put in failing?