Flatus 

Wow, to think I was climbing DL 11b in '72 when my old Red Guidebook called it 10b !! Still one of the best thin face routes at the Lake !!

dave ,the rating in yer old "red" guide book is F10b. the "F" scale and the 5.11 scale are two completely different systems. having led flatus at least 20 times when i used to live in the midwest and having spent the last23 yrs. living and climbing in eldo ,i can assure you that you were climbing 5.11a way back when. also most dl climbers were quite good on a top-rope. when did pete c. tr bagatelle?1967?

in the old red guide book i beleive Bagatelle was given F10c. most folks would agree that bagatelle is alot harder than flatus then just one "letter" grade.

There was some "Tripple Direct" variation of this thing that was harder. Maybe 5.12a? I don't recall exact details, but I remember that it was super fun and super hard. Can someone post those?

F10b maybe, but 5.10b? Well, if you want to get someone hurt, just keep it up. I have that old guide too, but I know it isn't YDS.
Flatus is not even close enough to that grade to be worth discussing why anyone would call it that.

Flatus Triple Direct is one really nice 5.12a. Start by avoiding the traditional start to Flatus (you know- the funky rightward traverse at the start to be climbed before climbing directly up the bolt line) and climbing up into the meat of Flatus from directly below. Next climb the meat of Flatus route past the bolts. Just above the second bolt do not move left but climb straight up into the overhang and crack above. This is the part that is the best.... one has all ready negotiated all the pumpy devious climbing of the regular Flatus route (and direct start) and now one has to keep it together and keep enough power available to pull through the roof sequence. After that there is still hard and varied climbing to be had all the way to the top (staying out of upper Michael's Project route and to the left). This is a damn good route and I think I explained it here pretty good with out giving it away move by move..... I think this would be a hard route to flash because the moves are not obvious. Alot of fun is to be had here figuring out the sequences of this route in order to be able to have the strength to pull all the way to the top in one push... I guess the same could be said of most harder routes at Devil's Lake but this route just seems like an extra nice gem to me...

Dave Bohn,

I have to back Steve up here. I have absolutely no doubt that Flatus is F10b in your old guidebook, but the F system is no longer in use at Devil's Lake. Today we use the more popular Yosemite Decimal System, under which I assure you Flatus is at least 5.11b. I say at least, because if you are unfamiliar with exactly where Flatus goes you could easily find yourself on Flatus Direct, or Flatus 3D which are both significantly harder.

Rating this route as 5.10b here is quite possibly the worst form of sandbagging.

Cheers,
James

A couple decent rps can also be used, along with the #2 friend (.75 camalot), to back up the bolts. In fact one may just want to skip the bolts as these things are sketchy.

Some off set cams work well by the second bolt as well if one is inclined to lead the route.

Dave Groth