Ridiculous Climbing Gym Policies...Let's Hear Them

Sloppy Second wrote: No climbing shoes in the bathroom.

I kinda like this policy. 

TaylorP wrote:

My gym doesn't even let you down-climb a lead route, whether you un-clip or not.

What if you need to downclimb to a rest?  Or if you get too high above your bolt and are in danger of a ground fall?

Ted Pinson wrote:

What if you need to downclimb to a rest?  Or if you get too high above your bolt and are in danger of a ground fall?

Those situations can be remedied with a soft catch.

FWIW, my current gym sells and encourages Ohm usage.

The rope length policy doesn't surprise me. Just because the walls are 12 meters high doesn't mean you're only going to use max 24 meters. Routes can wander and overhang. A little extra rope on the ground is really cheap insurance against people dropping each other.  My gym has 60-foot walls and pretty significant overhangs. They require  a 50m. 

lynn ties in with a double bowline..kinda looks like an eight knot...who's gonna tell her knot to..knot me

Sloppy Second wrote:

Those situations can be remedied with a soft catch.

So if I’m about to fall and deck, I should ask my belayer to let some extra slack out during the fall?

No dogs, but for some reason cats are cool.

No showing your goofy work friends how to belay. 

Skye Swoboda-Colberg wrote: How's this for some BS:

ATC is required for Top roping but not allowed for Lead belay.
Grigri is required for Lead belay but not allowed for Top Roping.

Back when Dan was the head of that gym, I sent him a long email about how poorly served the gym was by such asinine rules.

But since i’m not a student anymore, I think it was lost on him. The bouldering gym is ok. It’s run by folks I worked with at the old Half Acre, so at least they know what is good in a gym. Even so, i’m leaving laradise, so it’s moot.

kevin deweese wrote:

I and all my partners do as part of our warmups. 

No wonder Power Company is always so f-ing crowded

Sloppy Second wrote: No climbing shoes in the bathroom.

So is your kink putting your hands on dirty bathroom floors... 

#nottryingtokinkshame

NorCalNomad wrote:

So is your kink putting your hands on dirty bathroom floors... 

#nottryingtokinkshame

Rule 34: If it exists, there is porn of it. No exceptions.
Rule 35: If there is no porn of it, porn will be made of it.
Rule 36: No matter what it is, it is somebody's fetish.

But hey, at least it's better than a dirty sanchez.

NorCalNomad wrote:

So is your kink putting your hands on dirty bathroom floors... 

#nottryingtokinkshame

I'm just lazy and don't want to untie my shoes, but whatever...

Sloppy Second wrote:

I'm just lazy and don't want to untie my shoes, but whatever...

You wear laced shoes in the gym?! #gumby

Tradiban wrote:

You wear laced shoes in the gym?! #gumby

Get with it dude, everybody is wearing TC Pros in the gym these days.

#FreeSoloOscar

Sloppy Second wrote:

Get with it dude, everybody is wearing TC Pros in the gym these days.

#FreeSoloOscar

This shit kills me. Peeps spending $190 on shoes they toe drag.

Doesn't the rock warriors way or the Anderson's book specify you shouldn't have "training shoes" because it reinforces sloppy footwork that results from bad shoes? 

"nats off"   -worst ever.  

vertical endeavors in the twin cities has wonderful natural walls and abundance of cracks but they go out of their way to intentionally set with "nats off"

Wilson On The Drums wrote: "nats off"   -worst ever.  

vertical endeavors in the twin cities has wonderful natural walls and abundance of cracks but they go out of their way to intentionally set with "nats off"

Is that still common? At VE Glendale Heights (Chicago suburbs), the policy since last summer has been for the setters to allow the use of nats and aretes whenever possible. We still have the option to mark nats as "off" but we're supposed to avoid it if possible when setting. Since that policy went into effect, about the only time you see nats marked "off" is for harder routes set on walls with "easy" nats. (It's tough to set a 5.11 on an anchor with a 5.9 crack.)

All of our volumes are also now painted black, and volumes are to be considered part of the wall. (i.e. all volumes are "on" for all routes.)

Edit to add: You know you can also just climb whatever you want, right? One of my favorite exercises to practice jams, finger-locks, etc. is to pick a crack, and climb it "natural hands, rainbow feet". My hands are only allowed to use nats, but feet can go wherever. (Except for the very bottom of our hand crack, my crack technique isn't good enough yet to climb any of our cracks completely nats-only.) As the routes around the crack get re-set, it changes the climb enough to keep things interesting.

No bowline tie-in seems to be a common policy in a lot of gyms, and it does bug me a lot. But you can often get away with it anyway, because the staff isn't everywhere/can't see everything. if you don't give them the reason to scrutinize you too closely... And some versions of double-bowline do look almost like a figure 8 from a distance, especially if you finish with the double-fisherman above the bowline.

One gym in NYC required that you took a lead belay test on an ATC. But you could belay with anything you want afterwards, and they never checked to see if you could actually use the device you actually chose properly.

There is one gym that very strongly suggests that when you fall while bouldering you tuck and roll. And another gym in the same city that forbids you from tuck-and-rolling.

I like the rule of atc only for the lead belay test, then whatever device you want after is fine. Seems like a solid way to judge ability.