Hang Dogging and Downgrading

Downgrading is a pass time of the wannabes. The real hard men( e.g. ondra, sharma, etc.) may downgrade something once in a while but it comes from experience not ego. Nuff said

GabeO wrote: Um - and that helps improve the route grades on MP how? Of course what I'm asking for is relatively unimportant. So is everything we talk about here. A better question would be whether it would make things better or worse, and whether it's worth the trouble to implement the changes. GO

Yes, no.

In my experience, you would be fixing a problem that doesn't even exist. User motivations aside, the grades usually wind up fairly spot on. To guess the user competence to grade routes based on the self-reported style of ascent gets very murky. Should the hard man/lady who absolutely cruises 5.10 be allowed to rate it?

I find mountainproject grades to be as or more accurate than most guidebooks. The letter grades (the real area of contention) and controversy make better campfire conversation anyway. Who doesn't like going to the grades and seeing your favorite 5.10d rated 11b and shaking your fist at the dick bag who stamped 5.9 on it?

The inaccurate grades I see usually stem from time honored sand bags, a route with few ascents, or a bad fa grade that gets propagated for whatever reason. Given enough time in the wash, it all seems to even out.

If it still matters, you can climb and then down rate my friend's route called Tick On My Dick. And why do you hate democracy so much anyway ;).

Another note... My local crag is smith rock and without a doubt the grading there can feel a little goofy. Many people say the grades there are stiff while I personally think they're soft (except for the lower gorge...).

Most notable are the starts to many of the routes that are rated under 5.10. Smith has a lot of bouldery starts that are easily 5.10 but lead into 5.8 climbing. The result? The climb gets rated 5.8. I personally like that style of climbing and grading because a full day of one move wonder 5.10s would suck for me. Plus, I like that I need to get to know the areas character to better understand the grades. 5.10 knobs or basalt cracks will destroy me while 5.11 trad on tuff or steep sloper sport climbing makes me feel like a kid again.

It's all just way to subjective for me to care much but I do enjoy the confusion and beat down that comes to my ego every time I do start to think it matters.

rging wrote: Hang dogging an R rate route? I can only assume you retro bolted it while hang dogging. Two wrongs, sir, do not make a right.

You can hang dog on TR? Yes no?
But yes as soon as I saw the thread I was out there retro bolting the crap outta this bugger. Probably chiseled a couple holds as well. So three wrongs or is it four?
Oh yeah also grid bolted the whole sector on rappel and squeeze jobbed the fu€£ outta that old Woodward/Hensel sandbaggery! :)
Still haven't sent the original project clean, still gonna call it 10.a!

Fred Bonnard wrote:and continuing with the unimportant things... Why not take the average, remove 2 outliers on both side, in most case that would results in a good consensus, my 2 cents.

I agree, and think this would be the best and cleanest solution. Furthermore, I think the people in charge should just do it and not tell anyone. Then the fools and the clueless who want to mess with the grades can keep doing their thing and believing that they're fucking with the rest of us, while they're really just playing with themselves.

And the rest of us can get better consensus grades.

GO

so we basically need your consent to be part of the consensus? isn't the point of a consensus to arrive at some sort of a conclusion based on a pool of information?

if you look at 2 folks who probably get more shit about downgrading than anybody on this site (myself and tony bubb), you'll see that between the two of us we have over 50 years of climbing all over the place, all styles of climbing.

i think there are several things that really screw up the 'consensus' ratings.

1) is people postulating grades without any breadth of experience. a perfect example is the number of comments on routes that say something like "this route is 5.11 if you can't crack climb". umm no, it is still 5.9, you just don't know how to crack climb.

2) "consensus" being made up by a small group of climbers without the experience to grade routes. a great example being the rico era routes at shelf. he climbed with a handful of folks who's climbing experience consisted of 6 months in the gym. of course everything felt like 5.11 to them. when somebody would downgrade one of his routes, he would defend it by saying that the "consensus" was .....

3) areas where there are a small number of people putting up routes, and the people aren't consistently climbing at other areas to keep their grading calibrated.

4) people forgetting that grading is a spectrum. just because climb A is 12a and climb B is harder than climb A, climb B isn't necessarily 12b.

I only ever give a grade for a climb on MP when it differs from the current consensus. It's not worth my time to go agree with the consensus grades of everything else. And since I never upgrade a route's rating, the result is that I'm only ever downgrading. I wouldn't be surprised if it's the same for most people downgrading routes.

Downgrading certainly doesn't make me feel any better, I'm just being honest with myself. Trust me, I'd much rather NOT have to downgrade. I'm still looking for a 12a onsight even though according to guidebooks (or MP) I've already had a few. They just haven't felt as difficult as other well-traveled climbs of the grade in the same areas (and ones that suit my climbing style, too).

I don't think hangdogging a route makes you any less capable of giving it a reasonable rating, but I do think you have to at least get the redpoint before you do, especially on endurance-limited routes. I'm sure we've all fallen off of "easy" terrain near the anchors due to pump...

I think this whole thread is a bit silly, yet I am for some reason still drawn to give an opinion. Oh well, here goes.

Some people upthread have suggested that you aren't qualified to offer a grade opinion if you have not sent the route, or have hangdogged on the route, etc. This, I think, if not necessarily true, and often the reverse if true. Oftentimes, if I onsight a route, I am not too sure about the grade. If it felt hard, maybe I just botched a sequence or missed something. On limit-onsights, I seem to barely remember the route afterwards...it all disappears into a blur. Conversely, on a route that is 2 number grades below your limit, you probably can't tell the difference between letters. A 5.14+ climber can't reliably tell the difference between 12a and 12b, but a 5.12 climber usually can.

When working a route ("hangdogging", as the old crusties call it), you really get to know the ins and outs of a route. You learn the most efficient sequence, you think about the route a lot, you compare the difficulty to similar routes in the area...any you gain a pretty good ability to describe the routes graded difficulty, even if you haven't quite sent the thing yet.

I'll put it this way: Lets say two people try a route. One person climbs several number grades higher than the route's grade, so they warm up by onsighting the route. For the other climber, the route is just at their limit. They put in 6 tries over a weekend, and come quite close to sending, but never quite make it through the exit crux. Who is likely to have a better understanding of how to grade the route? I would say the second climber, even though they didn't sent it.

Of course, to flail on a route once, not even do all the moves, and then downgrade it to make yourself look big, is quite silly and should not be considered a legitimate opinion. This is kind of a dickbag move (unless it is in jest), but it doesn't seem to common a scenario.

Nic the brit wrote:Downgrading is a pass time of the wannabes. The real hard men( e.g. ondra, sharma, etc.) may downgrade something once in a while but it comes from experience not ego. Nuff said

I definitely would never consider a sport climber a "hardman". Research the stonemasters and please respect your elders.

Nic the brit wrote:Downgrading is a pass time of the wannabes. The real hard men( e.g. ondra, sharma, etc.) may downgrade something once in a while but it comes from experience not ego. Nuff said

how do you know that they aren't downgrading based on ego, and how do you know that other folks aren't downgrading based on experience?

JCM wrote:I think this whole thread is a bit silly, yet I am for some reason still drawn to give an opinion. Oh well, here goes. Some people upthread have suggested that you aren't qualified to offer a grade opinion if you have not sent the route, or have hangdogged on the route, etc. This, I think, if not necessarily true, and often the reverse if true. Oftentimes, if I onsight a route, I am not too sure about the grade. If it felt hard, maybe I just botched a sequence or missed something. On limit-onsights, I seem to barely remember the route afterwards...it all disappears into a blur. Conversely, on a route that is 2 number grades below your limit, you probably can't tell the difference between letters. A 5.14+ climber can't reliably tell the difference between 12a and 12b, but a 5.12 climber usually can. When working a route ("hangdogging", as the old crusties call it), you really get to know the ins and outs of a route. You learn the most efficient sequence, you think about the route a lot, you compare the difficulty to similar routes in the area...any you gain a pretty good ability to describe the routes graded difficulty, even if you haven't quite sent the thing yet. I'll put it this way: Lets say two people try a route. One person climbs several number grades higher than the route's grade, so they warm up by onsighting the route. For the other climber, the route is just at their limit. They put in 6 tries over a weekend, and come quite close to sending, but never quite make it through the exit crux. Who is likely to have a better understanding of how to grade the route? I would say the second climber, even though they didn't sent it. Of course, to flail on a route once, not even do all the moves, and then downgrade it to make yourself look big, is quite silly and should not be considered a legitimate opinion. This is kind of a dickbag move (unless it is in jest), but it doesn't seem to common a scenario.

+1

Locker wrote:You can either do it, or you can't. Worrying so much about the fucking numbers is in my opinion a big waste of time. JUST my opinion!

If you would do a better job resoling we would all be climbing 5.14s and not having this conversation.

kind of related, but slightly drifting.... i remember when MP (actually climbingboulder.com) first started there was a big controversy about whether people should be allowed to submit routes if they had not sent them. some folks even went so far as to say people shouldn't submit routes that they didn't onsight. i have always thought that a person who has come close and failed a few times usually has the best grasp of the route and can give the best description.

i don't agree with dogging a route and downgrading it, but i also don't necessarily think people who haven't sent a route are completely incapable of grading it.

Davarious wrote: I definitely would never consider a sport climber a "hardman". Research the stonemasters and please respect your elders.

CLASSIC!!

JCM wrote:I think this whole thread is a bit silly, yet I am for some reason still drawn to give an opinion. Oh well, here goes. Some people upthread have suggested that you aren't qualified to offer a grade opinion if you have not sent the route, or have hangdogged on the route, etc. This, I think, if not necessarily true, and often the reverse if true. Oftentimes, if I onsight a route, I am not too sure about the grade. If it felt hard, maybe I just botched a sequence or missed something. On limit-onsights, I seem to barely remember the route afterwards...it all disappears into a blur. Conversely, on a route that is 2 number grades below your limit, you probably can't tell the difference between letters. A 5.14+ climber can't reliably tell the difference between 12a and 12b, but a 5.12 climber usually can. When working a route ("hangdogging", as the old crusties call it), you really get to know the ins and outs of a route. You learn the most efficient sequence, you think about the route a lot, you compare the difficulty to similar routes in the area...any you gain a pretty good ability to describe the routes graded difficulty, even if you haven't quite sent the thing yet. I'll put it this way: Lets say two people try a route. One person climbs several number grades higher than the route's grade, so they warm up by onsighting the route. For the other climber, the route is just at their limit. They put in 6 tries over a weekend, and come quite close to sending, but never quite make it through the exit crux. Who is likely to have a better understanding of how to grade the route? I would say the second climber, even though they didn't sent it. Of course, to flail on a route once, not even do all the moves, and then downgrade it to make yourself look big, is quite silly and should not be considered a legitimate opinion. This is kind of a dickbag move (unless it is in jest), but it doesn't seem to common a scenario.

Despite my previous posts, I agree with pretty much everything you said here. I guess my point was that if we compare two climbers of similar abilities attempting the same route - one sends, and one hangs on every bolt... it's probably the one who climbed through the entirety of the route to its finish that truly felt the difficulty of the route in its complete form. Your points are all valid though, and yes, this thread is ridiculous.

To further go against the general opinion of this thread, I will offer the suggestion that, in certain circumstances and with e certain attitude, a climber who has not yet sent a route can offer a reasonable and informed suggestion that the route is soft--or even to suggest a downgrade--without being a tool.

Specifics: Let's say you try a route at or near your redpoint limit (grade-wise). You are a seasoned and well-rounded sport climber / redpointer, and you have a good understanding of what you can do, an how long it usually takes you to send a route of a certain grade. The route in question is of a grade that usually takes you 10-15 attempts to send. You are at the crag for a weekend trip, and get around to trying the route on Sunday morning. You make quick progress, find the climbing not too bad, and put in 3 goes that day. You very nearly send on your 3rd go, but unfortunately fall off at the very top when you get over-excited (with having made it that far) and botch a sequence. PUNT. You don't get another chance on the route, since the crag is far from home and you need to drive home that night, but you're still psyched because you've never made such fast progression a route of this grade. One the drive home you consider 3 possibilities: A. The hangboard training is working, B. The route just happens to suit you perfectly is some weird morpho way, or C. The grade may be soft/wrong. You suspect that Option C is the most correct one this time. In this circumstance, it would be totally acceptable for you to suggest a lower grade (so long as you aren't a dick about it), even without having sent the route. Your opinion isn't really any different, having punted off the top, than it would be if you had another day to finish off the route.

I think a lot of the people on this thread who decry "hangdogging and downgrading" don't really understand the idea of working a route. I think that they picture someone flailing on a route once on TR, and then spraying about how easy it is. I suggest that you can certainly have an understanding about the grade without sending, and to voice that opinion is fine too (again, just don't be obnoxious about it).

Nevertheless, I must admit that routes sometimes do surprise you. Moves that you thought were trivial while working a route can turn out to be sticking points that shut down redpoints. Conversely, sections that you though would be really hard on the go when first working the route can sometimes dumb down after some practice, and turn out to be NBD. So, you're opinion can never be fully. 100% solidified until you've finished the thing off...but that doesn't mean you can't be 99% sure about your grade-opinion without having sent it.

You guys should climb at JTree. Some of those 5.9 face climbs are .10c now.

Jeff Ludwig wrote:You guys should climb at JTree. Some of those 5.9 face climbs are .10c now.

But that's only because the grainy pebble holds fell off. *choss*

#thechossfactor #undercoverchosses #truegrit

Bryan Hall wrote:Maybe if the downgrading bothers you this much it's just a sign you're too concerned with the grades and what everyone else thinks. Then again, it's rock climbing, it's just a big fun meaningless game so I guess we can care as much or little about all the details as we want!

I love this "Holier than Thou" attitude. It's all just big fun you say? I'm willing to bet 99.9% of the people on this site only tell themselves this so one day we'll actually believe the shit we're shoveling. If this was all just about big fun and a meaningless game I wouldn't have lied to my wife, skipped out of work, and blew off nearly all my friends at some point because I found another belay bitch that is willing goto my project I can't stop thinking about because I missed the redpoint over the weekend. After all the hard work and obessing over it when I finally send to have some jackleg downgrade all over MP.com after they went bolt to bolt on my project, dude you can meet me in the playground at 3pm and we'll settle this dispute once and for all :)