American Beauty 

Any beta please? Me and my buddy tried this thing yesterday, and could not figure it out at 12c??

It is tricky. I suggest bringing your drill and making your own holds. That way more folks can figure it out, and the more people that do it, the better it is.

Good one. Sad to say, most would listen.

Wow...you guys sure are witty. I love to get dogged by people I don't even know!!Thanks Nate! Thanks Rich! True, it is at the sport park, but if you guys are too blind to see a beautiful line (whether it be 'overbolted/overrated' or not) then I'll have to see what lines you guys are doing. I know the sport park gets a lot of bad press, but I for one think that rock is rock. Period. It's not my favorite place to climb (maybe climbed there 3 times), but the sport park does hold some awesome lines. It's too bad so many people are missing what climbing is about..fun. Personal fun, no matter how gained. So, if I climb at the sport park I am now labeled a chump or something. I'm surprised my car didn't get egged the last time I was there. If this is what climbing is coming too....inflated egos, dogging people you don't know on forums, constant debates on ratings and chipping.... I think I'll pick up bowling.

You're right, climbing is about fun. However, when one group of people's idea of fun is at odds with an unstated (and understated) community ethic -- and the history of a particular climbing area -- it's hard, at least for me, to overlook the proliferation of an "ethics-free" attitude and still have fun. No, I don't have to go to Sport Park (and I don't) but the danger of this sort of approach to fun quietly infiltrating the climbing scene, getting grandfathered in, and then being seen as an example of what rock climbing is supposedly all about to anyone new to the sport is alarming, to say the least. Slamming people is wrong, however, and I regret doing so in an article on the Sport Park, but it's too late now.

Attack issues, not people, right? I'm still learning ...

The sport park has a reputation of having lots of chipped routes and what would that do?................attract climbers that tend to chip. I am not pointing any fingers at anyone. I am not saying that YOU chip. There are a lot of clean, honest people out there but the ones that are chipping are giving climbers that climb @ the sport park like yourself a bad name. No harm meant in that comment. To me, overbolting depletes routes of their natural beauty, especially cracks.

Thanks for the idea Chris! I can't believe I never thought of egging cars in the sport park. Off to King Soopers...

Hey...I agree. And, Nate, I hope I was not rude to you specifically. If so, apologies. I agree wholeheartedly with what Matt is saying, but I felt the need to reply to comments I (whether directly or not) received. I was simply asking about some beta, and got bashed(stereotyped) in doing so. I climb at places like the industrial wall/secret crags, and shelf road (older climbs), where overbolting etc. are not issues. I do not support areas like the sport park, but areas like shelf where there are not such debates as this area is not 'known' for overbolting. I just stated that rockclimbing is fun, no matter where I am doing it. I wouldn't know the first thing about chipping. My comment was meant to address the petty issue of an average climber (me) asking a simple beta question which happened to be at a very controversial area, and getting stereotyped as a chump, or chipper or whatev. That was silly. Have fun!

No need to apologize Chris. These guys (Rich, Matt, Nate, Andrew) are the same guys who jumped you while trick or treating (in second grade) and stole your candy. They think they are funny. . .

12c Sport Park....11d in the real world?

Matt, I agree with you that its important to slam the issue and not the people. But I don't think you should apologize for expressing your view on the Sport Park and other areas like it. In fact I think you'll find that a high number of climbers agree with you. Lets face it...the Sport Park is seen as sort of a joke by many people in the climbing world. Hey I could care less if people want to go climb there...but the people who developed it should have been prepared for the fall-out that this sort of developement on public land would bring.

Its too bad that they were not a little more responsible...I think with some care and forethought the Sport Park could have been another fine little crag in Boulder Canyon.Instead it was turned into an over-bolted joke of a climbing area where you can go to pad your already inflated climbing ego....sort of like we used to do in the climbing gym scene...now we can go outside and get the same effect! Hey I'm not slamming the people who enjoy climbing there...

Chris said it best...the Sport Park is in fact "overbolted/overrated."

Question to Matt and anyone else who has any beta. Has there been any fall-out from the Land Management on this issue???

Hey Matt, just to set the record straight, I don't chip and I don't agree with chipping. What I also don't like is your over-stated views on chipping in Boulder Canyon. There has been no chipping in Boulder Canyon for years. About 99.9 per-cent of climbers who climb in Boulder Canyon do not chip. Not all climbers who climb in Boulder Canyon are Front-Range-Poser and most climbers (those-same 99.9 per-cent) do climb responibilty. I would be safe in saying that more chipping has been done in the last for years by ice-climbers on mixed-routes. Why hasn't that issue been addressed by you or the "mag" you work for? Talk to you soon, Bob D.

Stephan, I agree with you and Matt's right to express his views and agree with you and him on a number of points. Yes, The Sport Park is held in low-esteem by most Boulder climbers and for good reason! The chipped route's sucks! What I don't understand with Matt's views: How did the Sport Park make one of the worst crags in the nation when Rifle (with a number of chipped and glued routes) make one of the best? Kind of hard to figure? Bob

Bob, I must admit that I completely agree with your view of Rifle. I have climbed there quite a bit and think its completely over-rated. And the way some of the routes were manufactured is quite ridiculous! I suppose people got all psyched on Rifle because it was a limestone crag right here in Colorado!

But I have climbed there and enjoyed some of the better routes. I would be bummed if someone slammed me as a climber just because I climbed at Rifle where some of the routes are manufactured. In the same way its not fair to slam people who climb at the Sport Park. But I think its fair to question the way the area has been developed just as its fair to question other areas such as Rifle.

Hey everyone, I appreciate the forum here and am really psyched when we can all have a discussion about topics that mean a lot to us without resorting to childish name-calling.

Take care.

Bob -- Just to set the record straight, I never implied anything about you, your ethics, or your routes in Boulder Canyon, and to make it appear, by inference, that I have done so is unfair, unrealistic, and avoids the issue at hand.

Kent -- I'm not a bully, nor have I ever been. I don't like violence, and was exposed to a lot of it growing up ... To cast aspersions like that requires, one would think, a bit more research and forethought. Who, in Boulder, is known for bullying and making threats? It sure isn't me.

To elevate this debate beyond the realm of opinion and into the realm of the personal attack (what the hell do I have to do with dry tooling, exactly?) -- in a public forum -- again avoids the issue at hand. I'm one climber who's expressed his opinions about chipping, and will continue to do so. Call me what you will -- I've come clean about mistakes I've made, such as enhancing three holds on a route in New Mexico 13 years ago. If we can agree on a baseline level that chipping is a negative direction in the sport, then perhaps we can find ways to constructively address the issue without devolving into slams, flames, and fruitless quibbling.

I know I'm interested in trying.

Sorry Matt, Andrew, Rich, Nate, etc. I apologize for going off, and I'll try to clarify myself better in the future.

The route American Beauty is difficult, beautiful and (I think) natural. Chris asked for beta and instead got grief from people who hadn't done the route. Not all routes are chipped, overrated, etc. at the sport park, and climbers are not guilty just for having fun there. I don't support chipping and I hope that chipping is discontinued, as Bob D. thinks has happened.

Matt, I consider you a friend and a good person who has a great passion for climbing. I never said you questions my ethics! I was just stating my personal stand on chipping. On the issue of chipping let's call a spade a spade. Whether you dry-tool or not, is that a form of chipping that needs to be address by the climbing community? Take care and hope you are doing well in "Bonedale". I am stuck in Dallas,TX for three weeks.

Thanks Bob, I consider you a friend and respect your opinion as well. Sorry about being so defensive. I have "Mixed Emotions" about the whole dry-tooling craze as well, but I really don't think I've done enough of it to know what to think. It's obvious, especially on older routes, that crampons and tools leave the rock picked and scuffed, and where this has overlapped with rock climbing routes (such as Vampire Rock in 1998/99 when people were ice farming) that it creates a conflict of interest. Sure, many of the M-double-digit lines are in rotten limestone caves that are too chossy even for sport climbing, but an out-of-sight, out-of-mind mentality only sidesteps the question.

No, these impacts haven't been addressed in the climbing media, but you raise a good point. It would be interesting to hear what someone who's active in this realm of the sport thinks.

Geez, it's so good to know Matt and Bob are pals.

Pretty silly that the chipping/overbolted discussion is going on for this particular route which is neither chipped, nor overbolted.

Since Chris asked for beta, here's mine: Very technical. At the 2nd to last bolt, right hand in the pod, left hand in the highest good fingerlock in the crack out left. Stem left as high as possible and right hand/foot match in the pod. Bring right hand up to slopey layaway near the seam (the best part has a tiny thumb catch). Bring left hand up higher to a thin flaring part of the left crack, then bump left foot up higher. At this point you are pretty stretched out. Crank off the right layaway and pull your weight over your right foot and grab a thin crimp above your head with your left. Move with the right to the good part of the seam and clip the last bolt.

For my length this felt like mid-12, but if you can't reach from the left crack this would be WAY harder, involving moving directly up from the pod to the seam with no feet. Very height dependent, and one of those routes that it doesn't make sense to give a letter grade.

Surprisingly fun route with fairly consistent climbing after the first 20 or so feet. I agree with the write up for the grade; it goes more at 12b, but perhaps that is due to a long reach. Anyway, fun climb!

This is an excellent route. How ironic that a lengthy discussion on chipping should occur in relation to this route, which is not chipped. If this climb were located on a less controversial crag it would be highly regarded and quite popular.