Teaching Trad belay technique in the gym

Additions for the "place cams in a block of stupid" portion of the wall:

A bat in the fist jam
A lizard in the hand jam
Bunch of wasps in a finger crack
Crazy glue some crystals in the crack for RPs which will surely rip

Follower must come up to the leader with all gear placed still hanging off the rope in no order, scared out of their mind because there is a bear circling packs at the base of the wall. You will be timed on your transition.

Pick any color, for this explanation I will use pink. Set 2 routes which cross each other, both are pink. One is a 5.10a but the hanger are triple length apart after you get half way up. The other one next to it is a 5.12a with the normal spacing of gym hangers.

someone blowing smoke, both pot and cigarettes in your face, annoying babies crying, dogs barking, and youngster's spraying, your buddy offering you beers between goes should be sufficient experience.

or you could always just go climb outside.

matt snyder wrote:someone blowing smoke, both pot and cigarettes in your face, annoying babies crying, dogs barking, and youngster's spraying, your buddy offering you beers between goes should be sufficient experience.

this already sounds like a few indoor gyms...

Getting all serious of a moment. As someone who has taught people the essence of rope work for many a year, it pisses me off that gyms don't have the bits needed to teach the basics. For example a variety of commonly found lower offs, fake cracks etc. This could all be at ground level and in the climbing area, so no routes would be lost. Some accidents might be avoided.

In the UK our national climbing association has stated to install some of this, but I really can't see why the gyms don't, particularly in the UK where rain often sends instructors and clients indoors - and hence it would pay for itself within months.

As I've mentioned before, gyms wouldn't go for this. They are not to train for climbing. They are to earn money. Fabrics producing money from the now days conjuncture and craze.

Au contraire. In the US they may be for profit businesses but not everywhere. in Germany, for example, the German Alpine Club (DAV) owns and runs gyms all over the country and offer courses on climbing, safety etc as well as areas built specifically for practicing anchoring, multipitch etc.

My gym has 3 mini walls that are ~8 feet high with multiple bolts and holds so you can practicing reaching the belay station, securing yourself, then building an anchor and bringing someone up. There's a belay ledge built on one wall for people to practice multpitch as well as areas in our outdoor section to do so as well.

The same in Russia. We have non-commercial gyms as well. There are no problems at all with learning if you have access to such an organization. Problem is when you want to learn but all you have is a bunch of commercial gyms providing courses like "Advanced toproping. Breaking mental crux".

BTW, how about wild nature interactions test? I would guess several levels:

0. Non-annoying creatures and focus management. Fishes, etc.

1. Annoying creatures and anger management. Pooping birds, flies, etc.

2. Non-directly impacting creatures and forethoughtful behaviour. Squirrels and chipmunks filching snacks, etc.

2 and 1/2. Unexpected and provoked attacks and vocal suppression. Snakes on ledges, bats in cracks, etc.

3. Aggressive creatures and thinking out-of-the-box (ref. an example below).

Two mountaineers are shivering in terror on a tree's branch. An angry hungry huge black bear is approaching and starting to climb up the tree. One is taking off his mountain boots and lacing up his running shoes. Another:
- Do you really think to run faster than a bear?
- I do really think to run faster than you!

Pavel, black bears are pansies. The key is to aggressively stomp in the woods and then knock a tree over with your hands. The bear will run away. True story from Squamish.

Years ago Casey and I took his rack to Mesa Rim, and placed cams in the fake cracks but clipped the bolts as we went instead. Went over well.

To make it seem like Arizona Climbing.......

cactus pricks and other sharp needle like things stuck in your rope.

Haha my rope still has cactus spines in it from climbing in Texas...

Trolling for another John Long response? It might just work...

You never know what you may get on these here MP forums, Frank

Pavel Burov wrote:Commercial gym wouldn't even try it. Because virtually nobody will attend at "advanced belay" course. It is way more effective to run "how to climb 5.11 with no need to change anything in consuming life style" classes, just give 'em rock solid name like "Advanced TR" or "Crux solving 101".

Not true, when I was teaching there were definitely people who were interested in upping their belay game/ outdoor specific skills. Hell I've seen a lot of "classes" for lead belaying at other gyms that were the same length as our into to climbing one night classes, and you'd definitely want a follow up.

Pavel Burov wrote:As I've mentioned before, gyms wouldn't go for this. They are not to train for climbing. They are to earn money. Fabrics producing money from the now days conjuncture and craze.

Again you don't know what you're talking about. Every level of our gym from desk staff to owners wanted to teach trad/ outdoor skills but there was no way we could do it with our insurance. We even use to have a sport/ bolted anchors class that we had to stop due to insurance :(

Fantastic crew of my local North Cal gym even started advanced belay class. Nobody came.

All gyms I've seen in U.S. are like in between Scylla and Charbdys - fantastic enthusiastic crew and mostly indifferent gym members are interested in climb-clmb-climb and not interested in learn-train.

P.S. I didn't react on your personal attacks by the obvious reason.

WTF is this turning into. Serious ideas about indoor trad belaying simulations ONLY

Belaying lead jumps?