Let's list the hardest 5.7's around

Ellen the Felonwrote:

Anyone agree with matthes crest? Before doing it, I thought i had gotten to the point where i could mostly cruise any 5.7.. then i fell about 5x following the crux. I fell because the moves were hard, not because of any flukes like a foot slip. 

I felt like the crux of Matthes was route finding on the downclimb. I ended up in some choss gully and fell when I ripped out a large "tooth" of rock. 

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/stats/105808198/original-north-face-route

I remember thinking the last pitch to this popular Sedona summit was pretty hard for 5.7, and was grateful for all the wide cracks I'd led to that point. MP graders seems to concur. It's also probably the first wide crack for a lot of people, since it's accessible and popular, which might explain all the 7plus and 8s here. 

mathtutortimwrote:

I was a little sketched out on Conn Diagonal recently 

Definitely a full value 5.7. Come to think of it, I can't recall a Herb and Jan route that isn't for the grade!

Tent Peg, a Royal Robbins route, is another 5.7 that requires your attention even if the climbing is "only" 5.7.

Lotta balls at Red Rock, now that most of the balls are gone. I recall giving the guy ahead of us some shit about how slow he was going and I will take this opportunity to tell him it took me just as long!

lotta balls was an 8 in my guidebook? 

Nick Goldsmithwrote:

lotta balls was an 8 in my guidebook? 

Now I feel so much better!

Austin Martinwrote:

I also found Prune to be quite a bit harder than “5.7”

Amen.  And Soler too.  And uh, just about everything else there haha.  But no one goes to Seneca thinking they're going to walk up something easily- or at least they don't do that after their first time- unless it's really low grade like Gunsight to South or Old Man's or something like that.  I've even heard people say those are sandbagged at their grades, so I guess it's all subjective anyway.

Before sticky rubber ,a lot of 5,7s & 5,8s were more challenging . Try the Nutcracker mantle with ordinary rubber and rate it.

A friend ran into John Bachar, who was selling Fire's out of his trunk & was amazed at the difference 

Creed Archibaldwrote:

Handjacker at Vedauwoo leveled my pride. 

Handjacker, hands down the hardest 5.7.

highaltitudeflatulentexpulsionwrote:

Another Vedauwoo suggestion. We’ve talked about OW but what about slab?

Cold fingers, 5.7 and one of many peoples first climbs. It’s a helluva thing though. Actually gets harder once you learn how to climb.

I thought that Cold Fingers was defensible as 5.7 slab, maybe even soft for it, its just that granite slab climbing, like off-width climbing, is a specialized skill that most people don't want to specialize in. Doesn't help any that there aren't that many slabs worth doing at Vedauwoo, so getting a lot of practice in is difficult.

But I do find that style of climbing incredibly tedious, and I've definitely pulled on one of the bolts on that rig when I shouldn't have needed to.

I thought the only actual 5.7 at seneca was Green wall. the rest of them all have at least one 5.10 move on them ;)   the  most dangerous  sandbag there  I thought was banana 5.6 /10b   its one of the  ways to get to the gunsite notch from the west side so it gets traffic but the gear sucks and its not even close to 5.6 so they get lots of busted ankles there.  another honest 5.7 is gunsite direct 5.4 ;)  heck the 5.3 version is 5.7 ;) 

Not to mention that Banana looks like it could fall down at any moment.  Happy to see someone else who thought that it is a laughable sandbag at 5.6.

Gerald’s mention of sticky rubber made me recall… North of Phoenix there was a place called the Carefree East Wall, or Carefree Boulder Pile, where many a tyro savored their first climbing experiences, me included. I say “was” even though that hunk of granite “is“ still there because it is now on the private property of a resort/hotel/golf course and you can only climb on it with a resort-authorized guide. Anyway, on this wall there is a short 5.7 face/slab route toward the left side that was called “Red Ball Jets”. As the story goes (10% truth?), Bill Sewry (or maybe it was Larry Treiber?) did the first ascent in those old tennis shoes of the same name. I’d guess that same route would now be listed at 5.9 at some sport crags today, even WITH our new fancy-sticky shoes.

That mantle move at the top of banana had me swearing I’d quit climbing. Especially since I’m not sure any of the gear would have held past the halfway point on that climb. 

Alan Rubinwrote:

Yes, grades at Granite Mountain are stiff, but it has also been a very long time for me, so can't remember route specifics.

When I did Durrance (on the Tower, I presume) it was rated 5.6 and seemed right for the grade--though I was a Devil's Lake climber, so had a distorted comprehension of grades.

West Pole is HARD. Quite likely the hardest of that grade that I've done.

HA! I thought the DL sandbag would appropriately prepare me, guess i spent too much time on the spicy face climbs

*Edit - hadn't realized there were 5 pages!

The Classic, or it's Crack Lover's Variation, or even Coke Bottle on Granite Mountain. But all the 5.6's to the left will smoke many gym climbers. And the 5.8's to the right will smoke a lot of hard sport climbers.

Daniel Joder wrote:

Anyone ever climb at Granite Mountain near Prescott. Arizona? It’s been decades, but I remember feeling like the grades were pretty stiff there. There is a 5.7 called The Classic or some such thing that I remember doing but I can’t recall my feelings about the grade on that specific route. Am I just an old man yelling at a cloud? Is my memory off?

It's possible you climbed everything BUT the Classic, as that is the most classic line and route. Includes GM 5.9 (Karl's Korner, for example). But the Classic proper smoked every student I belayed up it. Only a few student would lead it by the end of the semester.

All I know is that I'm much better off having learned to lead there and in J-Tree and Yosemite. Routes like Dolphin were basic. As a 5.6-5.8 leader my options were almost always offwidths and chimneys. With hexes and stoppers. It's kind of funny to me to see all the photos on the Dolphin page with $150 cams.   

Jake Joneswrote:

Amen.  And Soler too.  And uh, just about everything else there haha.  But no one goes to Seneca thinking they're going to walk up something easily- or at least they don't do that after their first time- unless it's really low grade like Gunsight to south or Old Man's or something like that.  I've even heard people say those are sandbagged at their grades, so I guess it's all subjective anyway.

Seems like everything everywhere is sandbagged. Makes me roll my eyes a bit cause it’s like you never know what you’re climbing or grades you can hit until you climb all around the country in a tight range of grades to compare climbing grade at on site to another. I’m sure a 5.7 in jtree isn’t going to feel exactly the same level of dofficulty as a 5.7 in Seneca or the gunks or eldo canyon. But who knows, why is west pole at Seneca a 5.7 when seemingly everyone that’s climbed it seems to agree. Is this really a 5.7 or should it be a 5.8/5.9? To climbers native out west would this be a solid 5.7 or maybe an even more sandbagged 5.7 than what Midwest or east coast natives could rate it…5.9.

I found something interesting in the gunks to be quite tricky for 5.7. Way harder than cck (onsited that at night with only the light from my belayers headlamp, it was cool). Felt that I was pulling a couple 5.9 moves but maybe im just short. 

The third pitch of The Yawn in Tuolomne. I got to the pitch after leading the first two and expected a break, but nope. It felt as hard as the others, perhaps even harder for me. 

Good Tang. Lower Small Wall, Red River Gorge.

Legend has it that if you put your ear to the crack and listen real closely at the second roof, you can hear the weeping of decades of 5.7 leaders.