Rock Climbing Made Easy, the real document

[Katheryne Howe]

What's a 5.7? What do the numbers mean? What is a Red Point? How is that
different from an onsight? Here are the answers to those questions and
more: Rock Climbing Made Easy, by Kate Howe and Tom Wight for your viewing
pleasure!

Write to ka...@literaryfunk.com with any questions, comments, additions or
disagreements to this document.

First: there are three types of climbing

Free Soloing
Free Climbing
Aid Climbing

Free Climbing has several parts to it. They are:
Belay
Top Rope Belay
Lead Belay
Top Rope
Lead
Traditional (Trad)
Multi Pitch
Cleaning
Sport

Aid climbing has several parts to it also. They are:
Belay
Lead
Cleaning
Clean Aid
Multi Pitch
Big Walls

And then at the end of it all, I will tell you about:

Rating Systems
Falls
Terminology

Good Luck! Hang in there!!

Free Soloing
is climbing up a rock with no ropes or protection of any kind (i.e. crazy,
we don't do this.) If you fall, you have nothing to stop you but the
ground below.

Free Climbing
has two categories: Trad (or traditional) and Sport, and two Types, Top
Rope and Lead. It is called Free because you don't use anything other than
your hands and feet to pull yourself up the rock. Sport and Trad indicate
the type of Protection used. (See: Sport; Trad)

Aid Climbing
is Trad climbing with a twist, it will be explained a little later.

Any time that you are climbing (unless you are free-soloing, which is rare)
you are protected by a rope. You always have two people, a climber, and a
belayer.

The Belayer's job:
is to handle the safety end of the rope. They take up slack as the climber
creates it, feed out slack as the climber needs it, and make a brake so the
rope goes taught and catches the climber if they fall or just need a rest.
The mechanics of belaying are too complicated to go into in this segment,
because there are many types of devices that are used, (Pic. of Belay
devices) but they all serve one purpose: to protect the climber. One point
worth pointing out is that the Lead Belay (see: Lead Climbing) is different
than the Top Rope Belay (see: Top-Roping). It is more dynamic and requires
additional training.

Ropes:
When you are Free Climbing, you will be either Top Roping or Lead climbing,
(also known as Leading) depending on your skill level, and desire.

Top Roping:
Usually there is an easy way to the top of a climb (you walk up the
backside.) An experienced climber builds an Anchor using Traditional
Protection (see: Trad Climbing), slings, and other gear to make a solid,
safe anchor point. (See Fig: for example of an Anchor)

Then he threads the rope through the anchor so both ends are dangling at
the foot of the climb. The Climber ties in to his harness at one end of
the rope using a Figure Eight Follow Through Knot, and the belayer hooks up
the belay system to his harness on the other end. (See Fig:)

As the climber climbs up, slack is created, and the belayer removes the
slack through his belay device. If a climber falls on a Top Rope, he will
only fall a few inches (providing the belayer is doing a good job.) (See
Fig:)

This way, inexperienced climbers can experience climbing with a minimum of
danger, so long as the person building the anchor is experienced, and the
belayer is properly trained. (Pic. of Mom climbing)

Lead Climbing:
Is a more advanced type of climbing. We will discuss the types of
Protection (Pro) in a moment. For now, when you are Leading, the rope is
at the bottom of the climb, and the climber and belayer are also at the
bottom. (this is for a One-Pitch Climb. Multi Pitch will also be discussed
later. What's a Pitch? We'll get there!)

The Climber (or Leader) ties into the end of the rope. The Belayer hooks
up the belay system about ten feet down the rope from the climber (See Fig:
)

The climber starts off and as he goes, the belayer feeds out slack.
Weather he is climbing Trad or Sport (see below); the climber will
periodically clip the rope into some sort of protection along the climb, so
that if he falls, he will only fall to his last piece. (See Fig)

Trad Climbing:
In Trad climbing, you climb either up a crack in the rock, or you climb up
the face of the rock next to a crack. As you climb, you put pieces of gear
(also called pro or protection) in the crack. You then clip a carabiner to
the gear, and then your rope through the carabiner. That way, if you fall,
you only fall to your last piece of gear. Hopefully, your skills at
placing gear are good, and the piece will sustain a pretty good whipper (or
fall, from a few inches to more than thirty feet, depending on how far it
is between pieces of gear you put in). (See fig: trad gear)

Sport Climbing:
In Sport Climbing, you climb "face" which means you don't need a crack.
Sport climbs are a newer sensation in Climbing. It is a more gymnastic
type of climbing, and usually are shorter, more powerful climbs than the
majority of Trad climbs.

In Sport climbing, someone goes to a piece of rock, looks at it and wonders
if they can do it. They bolt the rock using a hammer drill and some heavy
duty bolts. (See fig) You can bolt a climb either on Lead (you climb up
from the bottom and bolt it as you go) or Rappel (you fund an easier way to
the top, set an anchor and bolt from the top down as you Rap down, much
more widely done for it's ease and safety.)

So, when you are going to climb a sport route, you set up the belay the
same, the climber ties into the end of the rope, the belayer sets up the
belay about ten feet away from him. The climber takes off up the climb,
and as he gets to a bolt, he first clips a quickdraw into the bolt, and
then the rope into the draw. (See fig: draw, Pic.: Tom Clipping)

At the top of the climb, there are Anchors of some type, most often Chains,
or open or closed Cold Shuts, which the person who bolted the climb put up
there. Once you reach the top, you are lowered off by your belayer.

How the heck do you get your gear back? If you are Trad Climbing, you just
left a lot of expensive stuff stuck in a crack in the rock, if you are
sport climbing, there are all these nice quickdraws hanging off the bolts
of the climb! Well, you do that by Cleaning the gear. First, let's talk
about Pitches, then we will go into Cleaning.

Pitches:
A Pitch is the distance between belay stances (on a single pitch climb, the
top belay is the anchors, and you are just simply lowered off by your
belayer, so the pitch has to be less than half a rope length, or you need
more than one rope to get back to the ground, its more involved when you
are more than a half-rope length off the ground. That's when you get into
multi-pitch stuff). Most ropes are either 60 meters or 50 meters.

Most Sport climbs are one pitch, and most are very short. (40 feet or so).

Many Trad climbs (but NOT all!) and most Aid climbs are Multi Pitch. When
you do a Multi Pitch climb, it begins the way all Lead Climbs do. The
Leader ties in to the rope, the belayer hooks up a few feet behind him, and
TIES INTO THE OTHER END OF THE ROPE, so both climbers are tied to the rope,
one at either end. (See fig)

The leader begins to climb, and the belayer feeds out slack and takes up
slack, as the Leader requires. When the Leader gets to the top of the
pitch, he builds a Belay Anchor and attaches himself to it. The belayer at
the bottom takes his belay device off the rope and gets ready to climb.
The leader, who is now at the top of the First Pitch of the climb, becomes
the Belayer. He pulls up all the rope he can through his Belay device
until he can't pull anymore. At that point, he has reached the climber.
The climber begins to climb up, and the belayer belays from up top. As the
climber reaches gear that the leader has placed in the rock, the climber
cleans it, or removes it from the rock and hangs it on his harness. The
climber is cleaning the route, and is climbing on a Top Rope. When the
cleaner gets to the top of the first pitch, there will be two people up
there, and nothing left in the rock below them. This continues until the
top of the rock is reached (2-6 pitches, usually), and then both climbers
walk down the easy way off the backside. (Sometimes there are permanent
Rap Stations along the routes, and the climbers will Rap or Rappel down.)

Cleaning
A single pitch or sport route is a little different. One person will lead
the route. To get the gear that he places in the rock or on the bolts
back, he must reach the anchors. If another person wants to climb the
route on Top Rope, the belayer will simply lower the climber to the ground,
and the person who climbs up next will clean the draws or gear off the
route as they go. When they reach the anchors, they clip themselves
directly into the anchors so they are no longer using the rope for
protection. They remove any gear from the permanent anchors that was put
there by the leader, untie their rope, thread it through the anchors
directly, and tie back in. Then they unclip themselves from the anchors
and are back on the rope, back on Belay. The Belayer then lowers the
climber to the ground.

If no one is climbing after the first person that climbed, then he will
clean the route on the way down.

Why not just put the rope through the anchors themselves in the first
place? It depends. Sometimes there are carabiners on the anchors and you
can do just that. When you are climbing a route, you want to clip in
quickly and safely. It just depends on who's leading and what type of
anchors have been placed. (See fig: tom at the top of metabolism man)

Aid Climbing
Aid climbing is a whole other world, with it's own rating system and
everything. There are two types of Aid Climbing, Clean Aid, and Aid.

In Clean Aid, you only use gear that doesn't mark the rock, traditional
Trad gear plus some special aid gear, like hooks. It is hammerless which
means you don't hammer pitons into the rock, drill any holes, or use
copperheads (mashies). (See fig: aid pro)

In traditional Aid, you use a full rack of Trad gear plus you have to
hammer pieces of metal into the rock (pitons, knife blades, lost arrows,
mashies are all things that get banged into the rock for protection. The
Second (the person who climbs second, the cleaner has to remove all of
these things using a device called a "Funkness" which is just a hammer with
a hole in it that they use to yank the stuff out with.)

In Aid climbing, you place gear in the rock, and then you pull on it,
helping or aiding yourself up. Many Aid routes are too hard to climb free,
which is why they are Aid routes. Many old aid routes are now sent free.
(Free Climbed). (See Fig: marc climbing, aiders)

Many Aid routes are what are known as Big Walls.

A Big Wall is a rock that is usually so long that it takes more than one
day to climb, so the climbers must bivy (sleep overnight) on the face of
the rock. El Capitan and Halfdome are classic examples of Big Walls. A
route on El Capitain called "The Nose" is one of the most popular routes,
and it takes a solid aid climber about 3 days at almost 30 pitches!

With free climbing technique improving, and indoor climbing gyms making the
climbing season year round, more and more hard aid routes are going free.
Last year, Lynn Hill, arguably one of the greatest climbers ever (not to
mention women climbers) climbed The Nose free, in a single day.

Insert pic: big wall

Rating Systems
vary all over the world. The system that is most wildly used in the United
States for Free Climbing (any type) is called the Yosemite Decimal Scale.
The number 5, meaning fifth class (steep, needs protection) precede all
climbs. All classes below that are climbable without protection.

If you look in a guidebook, and it says "third class scramble" that means
it's a moderately technical movement over steep terrain, without much
danger of falling. Fourth is more difficult movement with danger involved
(you could get hurt if you fell), and second is just steep hiking.

So, in Free climbing, the rating, or difficulty scale looks like this:

Beginning Intermediate Advanced Expert
5.4 5.8 5.10a 5.13a
5.5 5.9 5.10b 5.13b
5.6 5.10c 5.13c
5.7 5.10d 5.13d
5.11a 5.14a
5.11b 5.14b
5.11c 5.14c
5.11d 5.14d
5.12a
5.12b
5.12c
5.12d

When this system was first developed in the 1960's, they thought that 5.10
would be the hardest climb that could be done. Pretty soon, they were
finding that one 5.10 was much harder than another was, and so rather than
re-rate all the climbs that had been established so far, they simply began
to add letters to differentiate the difficulties.

In order to see just how hard each rating is, you just have to jump on
something and see how it feels to you. I can say that as the numbers
increase, the amount of difficulty between them increases almost
exponentially. Thus the difference in difficulty between 5.7 and 5.8 is
minuscule compared to the difference between 5.10 and 5.11.

Aid routes are rated with a simple scale: A1-A5.

A1 - bomber placements: every single piece of gear you put in could hold a
full strength fall.

A2 - bomber placements separated by body weight (marginal) placements (they
will hold your weight if you step up on them, but they will rip or pull out
if you fall hard on them.), increasing the potential for a longer fall.

A3 - string of marginal placements only, the Belay being the only bomber
anchor. If you fall on this, you could zipper (pull out everything like a
zipper opening) all your pieces and fall to the belay, which should stop
you.

A4 - long strings of marginal placements with danger of bodily injury if
you fall (i.e.: there is a ledge you could hit, etc.)

A5 - just like A4, only you could die if you fall, and the belays are
marginal.

Falling
okay. Falling can actually be a good thing, if it is done safely. Fall
safely? YES! If you are afraid of falling, a great place to learn how to
do it right, that is how to fall correctly and how to catch a fall safely
as a belayer, is in the gym, which is a much more controlled environment.
Usually, the lead terrain in a gym is steep, so when you fall, you fall in
to space and just swing there, sweaty but safe. A good motto when you know
your fall is clean is "Fall Trying". This simply means spend the energy
that you are spending hanging on tight and having a conversation with your
belayer about taking (pulling the rope tight so you don't fall as far)
reaching for the next hold, and fall the extra foot.

It is hard to learn to fall, it is against every self-preservation instinct
that you have, but it is an essential skill to have in order to be a safe
climber.

Safety
One thing that really chaps my hide is climbers without proper training who
go outside, build shoddy anchors, and take their friends climbing.
Climbing is a dangerous sport. If you make a mistake, you could die. With
proper training and a little practice, the risk factors are SUBSTANTIALLY
decreased. I can't say it's totally safe, you never know when you are
outside what can happen. But if you and your belayer pay close attention
and have respect for the sport, you should be okay. Unfortunately, the
longer people climb, the more they tend to blow off things like safety
checks and buddy systems, which are things that save lives.

Terminology

Aid Climbing by placing gear and then pulling on it, aiding yourself by
standing in Aiders which are hanging off the gear you just placed.
Includes hammering in Pitons, Mashies, and other gear.
Aiders A piece of Gear you use in Aiding, ladders made out of webbing which
you clip to your gear and step up in.
Alien A piece of Traditional Protection, a spring-loaded camming device
used in both Aid and Trad Free climbing. Made by Colorado Custom Hardware.

Anchor A system of redundant points of protection designed to hold a
belayer and catch a falling climber. Generally Bomb Proof.
Belay (the) as in "we reached the Belay", a place along a route that is
suitable to belay from.
Belay (to) as in "I will belay him." To act upon a rope in a manner by
which you can catch a falling climber with a minimum of effort and danger
to both climber and belayer.
Belay Anchor An anchor built for the purpose of stabilizing the belayer as
well as catching the climber. Used for a variety of reasons: The climber
is heavier than the belayer and will pull the belayer up off the ground if
the climber falls; the force of the falling climber will physically move
the belayer into an unsatisfactory position, or the climbers are both at
least one pitch off the ground.
Big Wall A huge endeavor. A climb which is multi-pitch, and in which the
climber or climbers must bivy over night on the wall.
Bivy to sleep over night from "Bivouac"
Bivouac see Bivy
Body weight a placement that is strong enough to hold your weight if you
stand on it, but not strong enough to catch any sort of fall.
Bolt a piece of hardware screwed straight into the rock. Found in sport
climbing areas and gym.
Bolting The act of putting up bolts and setting a route outside. Consists
not only of putting up the bolts, but of cleaning the climb, pulling out
any loose rock, plants or other dangers, making sure the route is safe.
Biner see Carabiner
Grip see Hold
Hold something you grab, handhold or foot hold, called "Grips" by the
British.
Bomber Either Huge, or perfect. If a bomb went off your placement wouldn't
slip. Can also refer to a hold, i.e. a bomber jug (a huge, awesome and
lovely hand hold)
Bomb Proof see Bomber
Cam (to) as in "To cam: he cammed his hand in there" the act of applying
pressure to something, and in the application of that pressure, the item
gets bigger.
Walk when your gear moves around after you place it.
Camming Device (Spring Loaded) A piece of traditional or aid protection.
A metal device made of three or four "legs" which can be triggered open or
closed. See Aliens, Friends, TCU, SLCD.
Carabiner An aluminum snap link, which can hold approximately 4500 pounds
when, used correctly. A climber's dearest love, an Aid climber's lover.
Chains An anchor, usually two chains at least four links long right next to
each other. Found at the top of Sport climbs, and at Rap Stations.
Clean Aid Hammerless Aid climbing. Does not mark the rock in any way.
Cold Shuts Anchors which have an opening at the top.
Copperhead A piece of trad or aid pro, you hold it up to the crack and mash
it in there with your fingers and pound it into place with your hammer.
When you stand on it, you pray it holds.
Features Natural holds on the rock
Crack Climb To use your hands and feet as camming devices and climb up a
crack using no face features.
Crack a fissure in the rock.
Crag a climbing area
Crimp a way to grip a hold, a very small ledge on which you bend your
fingers and push hard, can be painful!
Draw see Quickdraw
Face to climb up the face of the rock, not needing any crack climbing.
Face climbs are either bolted, or protected by a crack running along side
them
Lactic Acid a byproduct of exercise: its build up prohibits muscular
performance, and it BURNS!
Flame Out when you can feel the lactic acid rushing into your muscles, but
you can't let go because you are almost there, but it feels like your
forearms are catching on fire, you are so pumped.
Flash When you walk up to a climb, get a little beta from someone or watch
someone climb it, then climb the route from Top to Bottom without falling
or sitting on the rope at all.
Crusty Old Trad Guy You don't necessarily have to be old to be a Crusty Old
Trad Guy, just last July I met a 23 year old named Philip who was maybe the
Crustiest Oldest Traddest Guy I've ever met. Wears knee socks under his
climbing shoes, prefers slung hexes to SLCD's, wears a floppy fishing hat,
loves scary, awkward, hard run out multi-pitch that he can make safe. Cool
guy.
Spraying Beta Bad manners. Someone who stands at the base of a climb and
yammers advice to everyone that will listen whether they've been on the
climb or not, and whether you want the advice or not.
Beta Information, hints on how to do the climb
Flash Pump When you don't warm up sufficiently and you get on something
that is hard for you too soon. You get a pump that is VERY hard to get rid
of.
Free Climb To climb using your hands and feet on the rock to move. Can be
Trad, Sport or Solo.
Free Solo Climbing with no rope, no gear, no one around.
Friend A type of Spring Loaded Camming Device
Gaston A way to grip a hold for better leverage. Turn your hand thumbs
down with your palm away from you and grip the hold that way.
Gear All the crap you have to schlep along to make it safe to climb.
Harness Worn by everyone but the free soloist, this is the seat of webbing
that catches you when you fall.
Hammerless No need to pound Pitons, or any other type of gear into the
wall. Can be climbed clean.
Heel Hook A climbing move. Wrap your heel around a hold to stabilize your
body.
Hex see Hexcentric
Stopper a lump of metal that is slung with webbing or wire, which you place
into a crack for protection.
Chock slang for Stopper
Poser someone who is climbing for the oohs and ahhs of his adoring crowd
rather than for his personal edification.
Chalk slather all over your hands, absorbs moisture, gives you something to
do while you are shaking out your pump, helps you hang on, looks good in
pictures if you can be casual while you do it. (see poser)
Hexcentric an odd shaped chock, usable in several orientations.
Mono only one finger can fit in this pocket, the best way to blow a tendon
if you haven't trained on them.
Pockets ouch, these are holds that take practice and cause tendon damage.
They go from three finger pockets to monos.
Jugs Not what you think. Awesome positive holds, easy to hang onto, you
can fit your whole hand in these babies.
Knife Blade A thin Piton.
Lead Belay A dynamic Belay in which the belayer gives out slack as well as
takes it in.
Leading Securing the rope as you climb.
Lost Arrow Another kind of Piton.
Mashie see copperhead
Multi-Pitch More than one Pitch
Nut see Stopper
Off Belay a command, as in "You are off belay!"
On Belay a command, said before you leave the ground as part of the buddy
check.
Onsight You walk up to a climb, never seen anyone on it before, never
climbed it before, don't have any beta, and you climb it from the bottom to
the top with out falling. You are now a stud.
Open Hand A way to grip a hold, using as little energy as possible.
Overhanging More than vertical
Pinch A type of hold, not incut, you pinch it to grab on to it.
Pink Point Like a Red Point only the draws are already hanging there for
you. (A really technicality, nobody cares.)
Pitch the distance between belay stances (on a single pitch climb, the top
belay is the anchors, and you are just simply lowered off by your belayer,
so the pitch has to be less than half a rope length, or you need more than
one rope to get back to the ground, its more involved when you are more
than a half-rope length off the ground. That's when you get into
multi-pitch stuff).
Pitons A piece of metal with a sharp point on one end and a hole in the
other that you pound into a crack for protection while Trad or Aid
climbing.
Pro see Protection
Protection gear that you put on a climb to arrest your fall, hold the
belayer down, and keep stuff from falling to the bottom.
Pump as in "whew! I'm Pumped!!" when your forearms fill up with lactic
acid and you just can't grip anymore.
Sling a piece of webbing which can hold up to 4500 pounds when used
properly.
Quickdraw Sport climber's love. Two carabiners on a short sling.
Rap see Rappel
Abeseille see Rappel
Rappel to lower yourself down your rope using a friction device.
Red Point You have been on a route before and fallen on it or not finished
it. The Red Point is the time that you finally climb the route from bottom
to top without falling.
Rip to pull gear out of the rock
Rock! what you yell whenever anything falls off a climb. If you hear this,
don't look up!
Route a designated, or plotted way of getting to the top of a climb.
Send as in "c'mon! send it! go, go!" to climb it without falling.
Shuts anchors with an automatically closing gate
Slab low angle rock
Slack a command, as in give me some!
Cammalot SLCD made by Black Diamond.
SLCD Spring Loaded Camming Device, see "Camming Device"
Sloper a type of hold, very hard to hold on to, no incut edges, your hands
tend to slowly slide off these holds.
Sport rather than Trad, this type of climbing is dynamic, gymnastic, short
and powerful. These climbs are bolted.
Take a command, means "make the rope tight, I am gonna fall!" or "Okay,
I'm done, make the rope tight!"
TCU Tiny Spring Loaded Camming Device, see "Camming Device", made by
Metolious
Tension see "Take"
Top Rope a rope that is anchored at the top already, less fall potential
TR see Top Rope
Trad see Traditional
Traditional In Trad climbing, you climb either up a crack in the rock, or
you climb up the face of the rock next to a crack. As you climb, you put
pieces of gear (also called pro or protection) in the crack,. You then
clip a carabiner to the gear, and then your rope through the carabiner.
That way, if you fall, you only fall to your last piece of gear.
Hopefully, your skills at placing gear are good, and the piece will sustain
a pretty good whipper (or fall, from a few inches to more than thirty feet,
depending on how far it is between pieces of gear you put in).
Up Rope a command, means please take up any slack in the line.
Whipper a big huge fall.
Zipper to pull all the gear out of a pitch like a zipper ripping open.