I went here once when I started climbing and did a few classic 9s. Looking to go back and try some hard 10s, easy 11s. Would love to try Vampire and Valhalla.

Anyone have a list of progressively harder routes to work up to these?

For Valhalla: Sundance, Sundike, Toproping Winter Solstice or Arcy Farcy after climbing Hernia.

Try this:

http://www.mountainproject.com/scripts/Search.php?searchType>>>>>

It's a combined list of trad routes from 5.10a-5.10d at both Tahquitz and Suicide Rocks.

Super Pooper 10a,El Camino Real 10a,On The Road 10c, and the list goes on, but if you do Super Pooper you can get a pretty good look at most of the routes on the West Face Bulge.ie The Vampire,The Flakes,etc.Another cool route in that area is The Step 10a. And on Suicide the for mentioned Sundance 10b. will give you a look at Valhalla and is a must do in its own right.Feel free to E-mail me for any additional Beta.

Have fun, Cheers

Last weekend I sent El Camino, Human Fright and Sundance. On one of the route pages someone suggested Sundance is good training for Valhalla, but is that really the case? I mean, that's a jump from 10b to 11a. Any Suicide vets want to weigh in?

Michael,

There is a bit of a gap a Suicide for the type of climbing to prepare you for Valhalla for one. Things like Winter Solstice and AF tend to be just thin edging and friction problems. Where as Valhalla is a bit Steeper. Sundance is good but most people avoid its true last pitch these days. Leading pitches like it will prepare you more than you think even at its lesser grade. Hesitation is another to get you use to the unique rock on the Sunshine face.

Develop some power bouldering and try leading as many of the 5.10’s as you can find. Over at Tahquitz you could do Fred as a transition 5.11, if I remember right its well protected. Obscured by Clouds (first pitch) on Suicide has a cranking like crux and its slight runouts would be comparable to some on the third pitch of Valhalla if you stick to the original line. Leading AF would be of more value to preparation than Top Roping. Wouldn’t recommend WS unless you were comfortable at that grade.

I have a Short TR on Valhalla here if you’re interested.

http://stonemastergear.com/index.php?option=com_content&task>>>>>

Good luck on your quest you will do it.

Mike

Thanks for the suggestions Mike (and the cool TR).
Is the true last pitch of Sundance that barely there 5.10 crack? That's the way I went (probably cause I'm an idiot). I found it kind of funky and runout. For some reason I always hate gunning for the anchors too far above a blue alien.

Yep that’s the way to do it on Sundance, Right on! Hey look at it this way at least you can get a cam in. BITD there was a (shitty) Pin left there every so often but fiddling with shallow nut placements was more the norm. Sounds like you’re leading pretty strong. The next 10a pitch you do well feel that much better. Hair lip is a good one if you hadn’t done it (balancey). Javelin has a little pull up high without a runout. Do those before Obscured on second thought.

I remember talking to Larry Reynolds (FA Valhalla) after doing something exciting when I was about 15. He told me if I wanted to do something really exciting go do Harms Way! So I went and did it, guess it was meant to be a sandbag. Anyway it was pretty exciting. You got to take these recommendations with a grain of salt. Usually you can look and see what you’re getting into and being able to down climb what you can climb is the best I can ever say.

Have fun

Hey, Michael

Thanks for the E-mail

Nice work on Sundance theres no looking back now !!!

Maybe Graham can give up the beta on 10K gold I think its next !!

Cheers