Multipitch "Send" Terminology: Worth Caring About?

It's always interesting to me to flesh out the subtleties of climbing terms and the ideas behind climbing styles.

What do you guys think? Theoretically you and a partner are doing a multipitch, say 4 pitches, and lets also the say you're swapping leads.

If you as a team finish the route, you as a team "sent" it. But if one of you did the first two pitches and the other did the last two (or any other combination), in a modern climbing sense (ground up lead free climbing) you really only "sent" portions of the route.

I guess my question is, is redpointing a multipitch or sending it as a team "worth more"? Who's the bigger badass?

Oh and I'm fully aware this discussion/question is absolutely meaningless to the enjoyment and/or experience of climbing.

no

The only way to send a free climb multipitch is by free soloing it. Anything else is a A0 when you start hanging on an anchor to belay the second up.

When my partner leads the hard pitches and I lead the easier ones, I don't consider that I flashed the route or redpointed it, or whatever. Just like I don't take credit if I am belaying a friend who flashes a 5.13. Sure, he better thank me for my awesome belaying skill, but I did not climb the route.

That said, I don't discount the fact that as a team we did the route. I just don't put a name on the accomplishment.

ViperScale wrote:The only way to send a free climb multipitch is by free soloing it. Anything else is a A0 when you start hanging on an anchor to belay the second up.

what happens if the anchors are on a huge ledge and you actually never hang on the anchor, but just clip in for safety?

I have had a few beers and have time to think about things that really don't matter so I think ......

Jan Tarculas wrote: what happens if the anchors are on a huge ledge and you actually never hang on the anchor, but just clip in for safety?

If you never clip in and just stand on the ledge and belay your partner up than maybe I would give that to you but when you clip it you are mentally putting yourself in a safe spot where you don't have to worry about falling etc so that is aid.

as long as it's not drastically different in the pitches you led vs the ones your partner led than I'd say you both sent the route.

If you're leading 2 5.8 pitches and your partner leads 2 5.12 pitches, that's different than you leading 2 5.8 pitches and your partner leading 2 5.9 pitches. Just be honest if people ask who led which pitch, although, IMO it doesn't really matter. As long as you climbed it, got to the top, and had fun, who really gives a fuck?

As long as you didn't fall or hang in between belay stations, you're good. The rest is just pedantry. There's another thread right now about what qualifies as an FFA. That doesn't apply particularly in this case, but... if it was me, as long as I shared the leading with my partner, and I didn't take any falls or hang on anything (except a belay anchor) I'd call it a send. On the same note, If the route is 5 pitches, I lead the easiest and my partner leads the other 4 that are harder because I don't want to or I'm scared or whatever, I'm probably not gonna count that as a send, even if I don't hang or fall, and beers are on me. But that's just me.

Beth Rodden and Tommy Caldwell swapped leads on The Nose in 2005, and the headlines still said "Caldwell-Rodden Free the Nose" .

In some cases stopping at a belay actually reduces the grade of the climb. Moonlight Buttress is one example. P4 and 5 if I recall right are .12b and .12d respectively. However, if you combine P4 and P5 with a 70m you get .13a supposedly. I think that's how the climb was done originally.

ViperScale wrote: If you never clip in and just stand on the ledge and belay your partner up than maybe I would give that to you but when you clip it you are mentally putting yourself in a safe spot where you don't have to worry about falling etc so that is aid.

Wait what? Isn't that what putting protection at a good stance or clipping a bolt at a good stance is, clipping your rope into a piece or bolt and knowing you are in a safe spot and won't fall? So you're telling me every route I have sent because I found good no hands rest/shake off spot, with a piece/bolt clipped in next to me was all aiding? I have to go back to my profile and change all my ticks then

Jan Tarculas wrote: Wait what? Isn't that what putting protection at a good stance or clipping a bolt at a good stance is, clipping your rope into a piece or bolt and knowing you are in a safe spot and won't fall? So you're telling me every route I have sent because I found good no hands rest/shake off spot, with a piece/bolt clipped in next to me was all aiding? I have to go back to my profile and change all my ticks then

Sarcasm much?

20 kN wrote:In some cases stopping at a belay actually reduces the grade of the climb. Moonlight Buttress is one example. P4 and 5 if I recall right are .12b and .12d respectively. However, if you combine P4 and P5 with a 70m you get .13a supposedly. I think that's how the climb was done originally.

Not really the yosemite system is suppose to grade only off the hardest single move so it should not change the grade. It could change the grade for some of the other systems that take into account how sustained the route is.

I just put next to my 76 ticks for the route - Led pitches X, Y , and Z - Z not clean - or something like that

ViperScale wrote: Not really the yosemite system is suppose to grade only off the hardest single move so it should not change the grade.

This is how it always worked.....until the past 5+ years, perhaps more. More and more on the hard routes it seems that the 5.N grade isn't because of a single 5.N move but because there are 25 5.N-1 moves in a row.

In fact when Henry Barber established the first 5.11 he even said it wasn't because a single move was 5.11 but that there was a stretch of continuously difficult 5.10d moves. (Recall that at the time there was still consternation about extending YDS to the mathematically incorrect 5.10. Making it open-ended into 5.11 and beyond was pretty controversial.)

ViperScale - you don't know what you are talking about. The rest of us pretty much agree Tommy and Kevin freed the Dawn Wall.

Wally wrote:ViperScale - you don't know what you are talking about. The rest of us pretty much agree Tommy and Kevin freed the Dawn Wall.

... read all the post please before you post. I even said I was being sarcastic.

ViperScale wrote:I even said I was being sarcastic.

Alas sarcasm doesn't come through well in the written word unless you work really hard at it. Seems a number of people, myself included, didn't pick up on the sarcasm until you told us about it.

Marc801 wrote: This is how it always worked.....until the past 5+ years, perhaps more.

More like the past 40 years. Even way BITD Bridwell called out the "grade by the hardest move" idea as BS.

"Send" as a concept gets pretty slippery when you drag it up a multipitch climb.

If my partner and I swapped leads and each lead was onsighted, flashed or redpointed by one of us, and then followed with no hangs, I would say we sent the route. I wouldn't say I sent the route. This style is a team game.

If my partner onsighted, flashed or redpointed every pitch, I would say he or she sent the route regardless of whether I hung while following. And if I followed every pitch clean, no send for me. It's still a team game, but the glory clearly belongs to my partner.