A PSA on belay gloves and brake hands

T Roper wrote: yeah, I'll take a bad belay with a grigri over a bad belay with an ATC any fucking day. call me a reckless if you will...

Munter hitch all the way. Seriously.

As for the original post sounds like there was to much slack betwen the belay debice and the non breaking hand. Also try not to grab the climbers side of the rope to hard, nothing will happend if you are hlding the breaking side firmly and there's no slack betwen the belay debice and the non breaking hand, but it isn't a good or safe habit.

Climb safe, F.

JRZane wrote: Care to elaborate? I've had a reflex to defend my belayer from the criticisms, but I can handle my part! Aside from climbing up to a better stance and not clipping so high, and not (repeatedly) blowing the clip, any other suggestions for what I could have done to protect myself better?

You blew a low overhead clip 4(!) times. That's excessive and dangerous. One weird trick Obama doesn't want you to know about is that quickdraws are almost always better holds than natural ones.

T Roper wrote:Deja vu brah, climbing is fucking dangerous , pick your partner's with brain cells

Pick your partner's what? Oh, did you mean that to be plural and not possessive?

I love when pages and pages go on about things that should be common sense. OMG my friend got rope burn and it's a huge mystery! What should I do if my partner blows the clip at second bolt? My friend had cams that pulled! Better give a PSA!!

How many pages can we get?

Daniel Winder wrote: You blew a low overhead clip 4(!) times. That's excessive and dangerous. One weird trick Obama doesn't want you to know about is that quickdraws are almost always better holds than natural ones.

I did....embarrassingly so. Just for clarification, "blowing the clip" did not include dropping the rope, just 3-4 wrist turns where the rope didn't cross the gate. I think it had a lot to do with trying to clip a left facing clip that was to the left of my left hand with my right hand (crossover left). I remember trying to snap it in thinking why the F isn't this thing going in....and as soon as that panic hit, my arms were already trembling and a bit of sweaty palms did the rest.

rgold wrote: I think it was John Byrnes who recommend using only two fingers of the guide hand. Anybody do that?

Above the device I typically grip the rope between my thumb and forefinger. No need for a full hand.

JRZane wrote: I did....embarrassingly so. Just for clarification, "blowing the clip" did not include dropping the rope, just 3-4 wrist turns where the rope didn't cross the gate. I think it had a lot to do with trying to clip a left facing clip that was to the left of my left hand with my right hand (crossover left). I remember trying to snap it in thinking why the F isn't this thing going in....and as soon as that panic hit, my arms were already trembling and a bit of sweaty palms did the rest.

So then where's the part where you grabbed the draw, got your feet up, made the clip, and then called for a take? If you were too pumped to do that and your belayer managed to keep you off the ground anyway, I'd say the safety system worked.

Is grabbing a draw embarrassing? I never realized that before, but if you're super sneaky you may be able to get away with it before anyone notices.

^^ Be careful. Every time you grab a draw, God kills a puppy.

Maybe I'm weird, but I've NEVER death-gripped the climber's side of the rope, and I don't find it particularly hard to get my left hand under my right (breaking) hand. To be honest, I don't get the impulse, but it must have been a habit I developed early in climbing. Caught tons of falls on both Grigris and ATCs, including a 40'er or so, never gotten anything close to rope burn.

Daniel Winder wrote:One weird trick Obama doesn't want you to know about is that quickdraws are almost always better holds than natural ones.

Please DO NOT grab draws.
rockandice.com/lates-news/i…

Faraday wrote: Please DO NOT grab draws. rockandice.com/lates-news/i…

That article transitions from "Don’t grab draws" to "Here are a few tips for grabbing quickdraws" in a mere five lines.

Faraday wrote: Please DO NOT grab draws. rockandice.com/lates-news/i…

Definitely a possibility. The dude in the story tried to grab the draw as he fell past, for sure not what I'm advocating. The blurb then goes on to give tips on how to grab draws.

To each their own I suppose.

ebmudder wrote: The OP's question was not "how did it happen" but what should the belayer have done differently...I think the takeaway for the belayer is not hold on to the leader's side of the rope...there's no situation where this wouldn't be the case.

What about when you're being yanked either up or forward towards the cliff? Holding the climber's strand can help stabilize the belayer, potentially preventing an impact that could cause the belayer to let go of the brake hand. It only takes 1 hand on the brake to catch virtually all low FF falls, which means the second hand can be used to stabilize the belayer being yanked and/or brace for an impact that may cause the belayer to let go of the brake strand.

In other words, in at least 90% of all falls the 2nd hand may be more valuable not in brake position. IMO the belayer did the best one could ask for, given the shitty situation the climber was in. The take-away from this is that blowing a clip is very dangerous the climber is relatively close to the ground and/or a ledge or other feature.

What draws are you using? High end rope side draws making clipping a lot easier and faster, and Spirits are the best draw I've used if you can drop the coin.

IMO clipping fast is an important skill to say safe, and blowing a clip once should be an anomaly, but after blowing it a second time you should have re evaluated your situation and managed the risk better by down climbing,

Were you panicking when you couldn't make that clip? Anyone I've watched blow a clip that many times hasn't been collected while they've attempted this skill. If that's the case use climbing as a way to develop composure under pressure. If you're curious about this there's a lot of literature out there that talks about maintaining performance and decision making under stress.

This is something that many people might have never considered, that to perform under stress we need to have developed methodical approaches to maintain performance. Ask yourself how do I perform when I'm stressed and how do I 'keep my cool' I think this is key and the root of both your and your belayers errors

What could you do differently?
-talk to him about proper belay techniques and watch him lead belay (assuming you know what you're looking for)
- not blow clips: consider better draws and practice a lot
- take potential ground fall situations more seriously. If you can't make a clip safely consider down climbing / falling with no arm loads of slack
- consider using assisted brake devices exclusively for belaying

I would speculate that the number of rope burns received while belaying is INVERSELY proportional to the number of falls ever caught by the belayer.