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General Climbing Discussion

Topic Date User

Should GriGris be alllowed in climbing gyms 10-Feb-2011 At 12:54:14 PM Richard Delaney

Message

On 10/02/2011 garbie wrote:
>What do you think, Richard?

Australia is a very interesting place to consider - discussions I've had in gyms in France and Canada went along the lines of:
RD: wow, only leading, where are the top-ropes?
Reply: top-ropes? what would we want those for?
RD: what about groups, and beginners?
Reply: What??? This place is for climbers.

The desk staff generally said: there's the bolted wall. You've got all you need, go for it.
BYO rope, belay device, harness, ...

The very difficult line for Australian gym operators/staff to tread is where do you start and stop with inspecting gear? Do you check the manufacturing date on all soft stuff? Do you check byo ropes from end to end? Then, as for skills, is it just assess them, give them a ticket and let em go - or continuous supervision - which varies in 'continuous' according to how many others are active in the gym.

So, what do I think?
Assess them as competent lead climbers/belayers (including gear selection) and then let them go with byo everything.

Richard