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Great video about Dani Andrada's life and bolting.


benjenga

4-Jul-2012
6:53:48 AM

http://vimeo.com/m/36642899

Olbert

4-Jul-2012
9:16:29 AM

Good video!

Interesting when he was talking about routes and saying stuff about 'pure' lines and then adding the caveat that some lines are 'almost pure'. This goes against the strident anti-chipping ethic prevalent amongst climbers - it seems a wonder he says that on an international video and nobody (?) has commented.

Also when I was in Spain (and France) there was shit everywhere - and I mean that literally: shit and everywhere. I remember parking on the side of the road at Monsteratt, to camp for the night, and when I wandered off for some alone time I was confronted but a bunch of little white flowers (and not the good kind of flowers). Seemed like anywhere there was an out of the way corner at a popular crag there would be unburried shit everywhere.


nmonteith

4-Jul-2012
9:46:43 AM

On 4/07/2012 Olbert wrote:
>Good video!
>
>Interesting when he was talking about routes and saying stuff about 'pure'
>lines and then adding the caveat that some lines are 'almost pure'. This
>goes against the strident anti-chipping ethic prevalent amongst climbers
>- it seems a wonder he says that on an international video and nobody
>(?) has commented.

There isn't a worldwide strident anti-chipping ethic. Most European crags have some history of chipping - some heavily. And in the USA, especially in the 1990s chipping was very popular. And in Australia there are quite a few famous routes that are chipped. Limestone especially is commonly manipulated by comfortizing and drilling pockets deeper. You probably have never realized how much work has gone into the routes you climbed! In the Bluies we trundle and glue rather than chip.

>Also when I was in Spain (and France) there was shit everywhere - and
>I mean that literally: shit and everywhere. I remember parking
>on the side of the road at Monsteratt, to camp for the night, and when
>I wandered off for some alone time I was confronted but a bunch of little
>white flowers (and not the good kind of flowers). Seemed like anywhere
>there was an out of the way corner at a popular crag there would be unburried
>shit everywhere.

Europeans don't understand the burying aspect of crapping in the woods. I had a few conversations with a couple of Germans in Thailand earlier this year who were mystified by why i carried a small plastic shovel. When I explained why - they said they just thought toilet paper dissolved away! They had never heard of digging a hole first.

Cats have better toilet manners than Europeans.

White Trash

4-Jul-2012
10:00:06 AM

On 4/07/2012 nmonteith wrote:
>On 4/07/2012 Olbert wrote:
>>Also when I was in Spain (and France) there was shit everywhere - and
>>I mean that literally: shit and everywhere. I remember
>parking
>>on the side of the road at Monsteratt, to camp for the night, and when
>>I wandered off for some alone time I was confronted but a bunch of little
>>white flowers (and not the good kind of flowers). Seemed like anywhere
>>there was an out of the way corner at a popular crag there would be unburried
>>shit everywhere.
>
>Europeans don't understand the burying aspect of crapping in the woods.
>I had a few conversations with a couple of Germans in Thailand earlier
>this year who were mystified by why i carried a small plastic shovel. When
>I explained why - they said they just thought toilet paper dissolved away!
>They had never heard of digging a hole first.
>
>Cats have better toilet manners than Europeans.
Some of my best friends are euros.
Although what you talk about is the situation, that wouldnt be a racist comment would it?


nmonteith

4-Jul-2012
10:14:10 AM

On 4/07/2012 Olbert wrote:
>Good video!
>Interesting when he was talking about routes and saying stuff about 'pure'
>lines and then adding the caveat that some lines are 'almost pure'. This
>goes against the strident anti-chipping ethic prevalent amongst climbers
>- it seems a wonder he says that on an international video and nobody
>(?) has commented.

Oh, and when you are in Yosemite later this year free climbing up a heavily piton scarred 'classic' route you will probably think twice about that statement! There are whole pitches that involve finger locking and placing cams in the large slots created by pitons. And don't think these are 'accidentally' created from the aid climbing days. Climbers deliberately hammered pitons in and out to create holds big enough for fingers. Steve Schnider admitted exactly that to me when talking about free climbing Lurking Fear.

Serenity Crack - Yosemite.


nmonteith

4-Jul-2012
10:15:09 AM

On 4/07/2012 White Trash wrote:
>Although what you talk about is the situation, that wouldnt be a racist
>comment would it?

Europe is a culture not a race.

Olbert

4-Jul-2012
11:17:21 AM

On 4/07/2012 nmonteith wrote:
>On 4/07/2012 Olbert wrote:
>>Good video!
>>
>>Interesting when he was talking about routes and saying stuff about 'pure'
>>lines and then adding the caveat that some lines are 'almost pure'.
>This
>>goes against the strident anti-chipping ethic prevalent amongst climbers
>>- it seems a wonder he says that on an international video and nobody
>>(?) has commented.
>
>There isn't a worldwide strident anti-chipping ethic. Most European crags
>have some history of chipping - some heavily. And in the USA, especially
>in the 1990s chipping was very popular. And in Australia there are quite
>a few famous routes that are chipped. Limestone especially is commonly
>manipulated by comfortizing and drilling pockets deeper. You probably have
>never realized how much work has gone into the routes you climbed! In the
>Bluies we trundle and glue rather than chip.

I'm aware of the various sorts of chipping that goes on and went on in Australia and the world to make routes and I'm not part of the strident anti-chipping league, I just thought there was a somewhat of a consensus among non-route-developing climbers (especially new climbers) that chipping was bad. I figured route-developers chipped a little here and a little there when necessary but mainly kept it under the radar and didn't talk about it.

I know here that if you talk to the right people that you can get a real history of routes but if you were a visiting climber and just read the guidebook you wouldn't really know which routes are chipped/glued unless it was blindingly obvious. Certainly when I talk to experienced climbing friends they tell me that they were once naive and vehemently anti-chipping but now they have come to realise it is somewhat a necessity.

Note: I have included 'trundle and glue' into the broad notion of 'chipping'. I understand the necessity of this at various crags due to rock quality and I seek to make no comment on the ethics on this practice.


rodw

4-Jul-2012
11:22:47 AM

Trundling and gluing are nothing like chipping....trundling you are removing rock that would fall anyway.....gluing is you reinforcing rock that was there naturally...Chipping you are creating a hold that would never have been there is you hadn't come along...and can't really see how you can justify it at all.....if it cant be done without the chip , it cant be done ..end of story...how could it ever be a necessity?


IdratherbeclimbingM9

4-Jul-2012
11:25:03 AM

On 4/07/2012 nmonteith wrote:
>Oh, and when you are in Yosemite later this year free climbing up a heavily
>piton scarred 'classic' route you will probably think twice about that
>statement! There are whole pitches that involve finger locking and placing
>cams in the large slots created by pitons. And don't think these are 'accidentally'
>created from the aid climbing days. Climbers deliberately hammered pitons
>in and out to create holds big enough for fingers. Steve Schnider admitted
>exactly that to me when talking about free climbing Lurking Fear.

My understanding of piton scarring history is that it originally was indeed an accidental side product of that nature of climbing, and Serenity crack was the classic example that Yvon Chouinard used to promote his newfangled hexcentric philosophy!

The photo you posted appears to me to be even more beaten out since the days when Yvon referred to it.

I suspect strongly that the evolution to clean climbing that route took time to catch on, and that the beaten out pin scars were not done as 'chipping to enhance the freeing of it', but rather the fact that most who still used pitons tended only to carry the smaller sizes and looked for new placements in the original crack that would take them. This demonstrated by the fact that so many of the placements are so close together.

Once the small sizes would no longer hold firm then larger sizes were used (right up to the bongs), and with that size progression the beat-outs continued.

The deliberate enhancing of holds by misused pitoning is a sad indictment of certain individuals, and continues to 'stain' the legitimate use of that form of protection when on the rare occasion it is still justified.

An interesting side-note is that during the transition phase from aiding routes to freeing them, it was recognised that if a piton needed to be placed, that changing it's manner of removal to predominantly hitting it upwards, would leave a usable nut placement in its wake, instead of a ruined placement due non thoughtful removal of same; however once again, I doubt those who did/do it considered it 'chipping' in the sense of deliberately creating finger/hand/foot holds...

Karl Bromelow

4-Jul-2012
12:44:32 PM

On 4/07/2012 nmonteith wrote:
>Europe is a culture not a race.

Europe is a continent not a culture nor a race. I'm European and I don't leave crap and bog roll lying around for people to step in though I did nearly step in such two days ago in the middle of the path going down to the beach for a surf. Soiled speedos were also discarded just next to the turd and paper but over the fence. I'm guessing that there's a good chance the cable was laid by an Australian but I'd hate to jump to the conclusion that it was culturally acceptable to crap in a public place and leave it exposed in Australia. That would be a sweeping generalisation wouldn't it?

Cheers, Karl

One Day Hero

4-Jul-2012
1:06:19 PM

On 4/07/2012 rodw wrote:
>Trundling and gluing are nothing like chipping....
>.....if it cant be done without the chip , it cant be
>done ..end of story...how could it ever be a necessity?

Nice one Rod ;)


Benjenga

4-Jul-2012
1:30:52 PM

So what class do you place the act of gluing a new piece of rock onto a blank section or rock (neatly) and calling it a hold??
Classic example is on chimp chowder at bowens.


nmonteith

4-Jul-2012
1:33:41 PM

Or knocking off holds to make it harder? Or gluing up breaks to make it harder? Comforting holds with an angle grinder?


rodw

4-Jul-2012
1:42:00 PM

On 4/07/2012 Benjenga wrote:
>So what class do you place the act of gluing a new piece of rock onto a
>blank section or rock (neatly) and calling it a hold??
>Classic example is on chimp chowder at bowens.

In the same vein as chipping IMHO...your changing the route and bringing it down to your level...I've bolted heaps of routes that I ended up not being able to do (admittedly in my case that pretty easy to do)...if that happens just open it up and walk away..do not change it to suit your skill set.

One Day Hero

4-Jul-2012
2:08:50 PM

Rod, you need to work on the trolling a bit, mate........too obvious!

I read a cool diss of the Hell Cave at American Fork. One of the developers wrote that the whole wall was covered in detachable edges, so they were pretty much route setting like in a gym (designing the sequence by reinforcing, then trundling the rest).

I can't think of anyone who would be interested in a 40m enduro 21 with a single move, ugly V10 crux at half height. There's a time and a place for chipping, but just like bolting it gets overused by hackers who have terrible taste.

Olbert

4-Jul-2012
2:09:38 PM

On 4/07/2012 Karl Bromelow wrote:
>On 4/07/2012 nmonteith wrote:
>>Europe is a culture not a race.
>
>Europe is a continent not a culture nor a race. I'm European and I don't
>leave crap and bog roll lying around for people to step in though I did
>nearly step in such two days ago in the middle of the path going down to
>the beach for a surf. Soiled speedos were also discarded just next to the
>turd and paper but over the fence. I'm guessing that there's a good chance
>the cable was laid by an Australian but I'd hate to jump to the conclusion
>that it was culturally acceptable to crap in a public place and leave it
>exposed in Australia. That would be a sweeping generalisation wouldn't
>it?
>
>Cheers, Karl

I have lived in Australia my whole life and sampled many of the places (non-climbing and climbing) Australia has to offer. I do not recall every finding anything that remotely resembled what I found at numerous crags (less known ones as well!) in France and Spain. That's not to say that it doesn't happen in Australia (I remember reading a Rock article about Centennial Glenn mentioning all the shit they cleaned up) but in my experience it's a lot more prevalent in Europe.

I'm not sure if culture plays a part in this problem but I feel there is some element of general culture common across Europe. Having never spoken to any Europeans about this I wouldn't know but I would find it plausible that it could play a role.


nmonteith

4-Jul-2012
2:18:58 PM

I always found trying to 'bush camp' in Europe a disgusting experience - as whenever I snuck off into the woods to set up a sneaky hidden tent off the road - I had to spend 10 minutes with a stick clearing the shit and toilet paper to make space for the tent. My mate was in a cushy single bed campervan and I was in the shit - literally!

One Day Hero

4-Jul-2012
2:20:26 PM

The Italians are fuching disgusting, the French aren't much better! Pretty much everywhere you can stop a car next to a major road will be totally covered in shit.

All it needs though is an education campaign and lots more public toilets, right? Australia is probably world champion at having cleanish public loo's in all towns and at regular intervals along highways. You can hardly blame people for shitting in the woods when the only alternative is to shit in their pants. However, why they don't bury it is a bit of a mystery, and a public education/shaming campaign is sorely needed.


rodw

4-Jul-2012
2:22:02 PM

On 4/07/2012 One Day Hero wrote:

>I can't think of anyone who would be interested in a 40m enduro 21 with
>a single move, ugly V10 crux at half height. There's a time and a place
>for chipping, but just like bolting it gets overused by hackers who have
>terrible taste.

I disagree with ya ODH, not every route need to be a 5 star classic and routes shouldn't adjusted to try and achieve that.....sticking a flake on here and there is okay but doing up the whole routes length seem excessive.

I've been to fork and the rock I saw seemed more solid than that..maybe they were after a crimpfest on rock that just dosn't supply that type of climbing?

One Day Hero

4-Jul-2012
2:36:39 PM

On 4/07/2012 rodw wrote:
>
>I disagree with ya ODH, not every route needs to be a 5 star classic.....

Well Rod, good to see that you're doing your bit to maintain the average.

There are 50 messages in this topic.