overheard at the crag: post it

L Kapwrote:

No, that is not at all what I'm saying, and there has been no tap dancing.  

This is exactly what I'm talking about when I say that many climbers don't understand the mechanics of what is actually keeping you safe in a belay.

"Your own body properly braced in some circumstances" is only for very narrow and specialized applications. It is not applicable at all on a typical first pitch scenario belaying a leader from the ground. You cannot use your body as the sole anchor when you are belaying a climber who is ABOVE you (do you understand that they will simply fall on or next to you and splat?), unless the only function you're providing is to prevent them from falling past you down a slope or off a ledge, and even then trying to use your body as the anchor is rarely advisable because they will more than likely pull you off with them as they fall. In fact, sometimes it's advisable not to load up your belay device at all until after the leader has clipped something, if there is no option to anchor the belayer and there's a risk the leader could pull you off.

Using only your own body properly braced as the anchor - e.g. you're sitting in a pothole on a dome with your legs braced against the potential fall force -- has some utility in belaying a follower up to you after you lead the pitch, or belaying a partner through a traverse, typically in gentle slabby or 4th class terrain. It is not something you'd ever do in the vast majority of lead belay scenarios because your body would not provide utility as a functional anchor. 

and the tap dancing continues.  first rule when you have dug yourself down into a hole is to just stop digging...  you really don't understand any of this at all do you?  do you seriously not have your body properly braced during typical ground level belaying - isn't it applicable in every situation of belaying?  i sure as shit am braced/positioned to react to getting thrown forward, sideways, wherever.  how is your body not the anchor when you are ground level belaying?  if your body wasn't there, what would hold the belay device down?  your lack of understanding in all of this is pretty scary.  

Mark E Dixonwrote:

@slim- a gym employee said it so it must be best practice. And if a gym employee tells you to jump off a cliff, then I guess there’s no disagreeing

not just once...  the one common denominator is that is has been a twenty-something dweeb mansplaining it to a woman who climbs 2 number grades harder than he does, and has been doing so for about as long as he has been alive.  so awkard....

slimwrote:

and the tap dancing continues.  first rule when you have dug yourself down into a hole is to just stop digging...  you really don't understand any of this at all do you?  do you seriously not have your body properly braced during typical ground level belaying - isn't it applicable in every situation of belaying?  i sure as shit am braced/positioned to react to getting thrown forward, sideways, wherever.  how is your body not the anchor when you are ground level belaying?  if your body wasn't there, what would hold the belay device down?  your lack of understanding in all of this is pretty scary.  

Slim you currently have 3 threads going about this non-issue. Please, respectfully, fuck off.

must be one of the twenty something dweebs - sorry to touch a nerve!

This is why we can't have nice things.

Yeah I deleted my comment because I don't feel like reading through everything to see if I completely agree with the person I was defending. It's all making me realize i don't want strangers belaying me ever again. 

Can we stop waving our dicks at eachother for 5 mins this thread is supposed to be for lulz.

Not overheard but as much as overseen. I have witnessed 2 different parties over the last month have 1+ hour hangdogging sessions without going in direct on an ATC. While having a grigri on either their harness or in their pack, because it feels "easier".

slimwrote:

and the tap dancing continues.  first rule when you have dug yourself down into a hole is to just stop digging...  you really don't understand any of this at all do you?  do you seriously not have your body properly braced during typical ground level belaying - isn't it applicable in every situation of belaying?  i sure as shit am braced/positioned to react to getting thrown forward, sideways, wherever.  how is your body not the anchor when you are ground level belaying?  if your body wasn't there, what would hold the belay device down?  your lack of understanding in all of this is pretty scary.  

Yeah, you're trolling. You've been climbing long enough to understand that your body, no matter how it is braced, does exactly no good in a typical first pitch lead belay scenario before the first piece is clipped. Such a shame Baby Yoda decided to lock his thread since you could continue there to your heart's content, but let's return this thread to its intended purpose. 

*new climbers at Cathedral Ledge, one is up top rigging a second toprope anchor (taking over 20 minutes at this point), climber on ground: "what's taking so long?, You want me to rappel up there?" Thats when my head turned, to see him put his ATC, no backup, on both ends of the existing toprope, and yank his way up the 80ft pitch, taking in slack with every tiny yank. Somehow he did not give up

I unlocked my thread since it appeared people weren’t finished. Admittedly, I locked it to be a troll. Belay discussions can be continued on any of those other threads.

overheard at the crag, was a guide loudly spouting all of his thoughts about safe climbing with a very “my way or the highway” attitude to some poor soul who unfortunately paid for this. Most memorable was something along the lines of “That guys is dumb for rappelling off one rap ring.” It was linked to two bolts.

Later that same day, I was showing my partner my TR solo setup. Someone from the party next to us whispers “if he falls with a toothed device, he’ll rip his rope to shreds.” My partner looks up at me with pure terror. I calmly say “he’s talking about something else.”

Yoda Jedi Knightwrote:

I unlocked my thread since it appeared people weren’t finished. Admittedly, I locked it to be a troll. Belay discussions can be continued on any of those other threads.

overheard at the crag, was a guide loudly spouting all of his thoughts about safe climbing with a very “my way or the highway” attitude to some poor soul who unfortunately paid for this. Most memorable was something along the lines of “That guys is dumb for rappelling off one rap ring.” It was linked to two bolts.

Later that same day, I was showing my partner my TR solo setup. Someone from the party next to us whispers “if he falls with a toothed device, he’ll rip his rope to shreds.” My partner looks up at me with pure terror. I calmly say “he’s talking about something else.”

A few years ago, I saw a girl struggling to hang a 2nd bolt on one of the popular beginner routes. She tried a few times, and was getting close, but was just a couple inches short of reaching the bolt, and wasn’t willing to go higher.

Her belayer had an idea: he could hang the 2nd bolt with a stick clip, then she wouldn’t have to lock off quite as much! Great idea, but he was attempting to do this while the girl was hanging on the rope at the first bolt… basically, he was trying to do this one-handed, while still holding her weight/belaying.

As soon as I realized what they were doing, I told her to go in-direct. They didn’t know what it meant, so I explained. She clipped one side of the draw to her belay loop, the other side to the first draw. Her belayer had just started trying to stick clip the 2nd bolt with both hands, when two guys walking by yelled to the girl:”metal-on-metal!!!! You can’t do that!” And walked on.

The girl and her belayer both looked at me with complete panic!

My response was exactly the same as yours. “He’s talking about something else.”

Tal Mwrote:

• A guy doing the approach back to the car, in sunglasses, at night, with his phone as a flashlight in one hand. He was wearing prescription sunglasses and forgot to bring his normal glasses. That guy is me, on probably at least 15 separate occasions at this point. 

Ha!! Same here. 

Tal Mwrote:

• Climber at Wall of the 90s whose power scream was their own name (apparently this front range climber has also been seen at G1. If you're on here, hit me up - I have a lot of friends who want to climb with you).

Edit: oops, quoted the wrong one before. Still kinda worked.

It was a misty morning on the elusive slopes of Mount Rubidoux. I carried a single boulder pad and walked fast over broken glass and discarded Happy Meals in search of crisp dime-edges. I crossed paths with a typical middle-aged couple, out for a pleasant morning stroll. “Oh look Jim! You outta get one of those” the lady says, referring to my pad. Jim grunts and nods agreeably. Just after we cross paths the woman turns to Jim and whispers, as if sharing a juicy secret, “they use those to do Zumba up there”. I’ve heard many a strange crash-pad theories down at the Doux but this was probably the funniest.

This isn't climbing related, but overheard at the crag. My group was climbing next to a group of college kids, talking about college kid things...very loudly.

"Yeah, so she got paid $10,000 to pee on this guy's face and then the next day came into class and he was her professor".

Had to take a moment to process that one.

abandon moderation wrote:

Whatever boulderers told them they were going to do Zumba are probably still laughing. A friend of mine used to tell people it was a "mobile fornication station" when they asked about the pad. Sometimes he'd let them in on the joke after a moment, sometimes not...

That reminds me... Years ago, a friend of mine was taking pictures for a new bouldering guidebook. He was carrying a backpack with camera equipment, tripods, flashes, etc. heavy equipment, all in all, but relatively small pack. We started the day with my boyfriend and myself each carrying a pad. We ran into some friends, and they were short on pads for a highball, so when we left, one of the pads stayed with them, to be returned to us later. My boyfriend would have probably carried our one remaining pad (large Organic), but a strap broke that day, so we tied it together, shortening it significantly, and I was the only person small enough to be able to carry the pad with the short strap.

The bottom line, we walk out of the woods to the picnic area, where we parked the car. The two guys are walking with small backpacks. I'm carrying the crash pad that does look quite comically large on me. The crash pad has knocked leaves and twigs into my hair as we were doing some bushwhacking. I look about as good as you'd expect, after a sweaty summer day of climbing.

There is an elderly couple enjoying the picnic. The lady takes one look at the trio of us, and sidles up to me when I leave the guys to use the bathroom, before getting in the car. "You poor thing, Are you ok?" she whispers to me. "The guys are having fun, and YOU ARE CARRYING THE BED?"

Andrea Wilhelmwrote:

This isn't climbing related, but overheard at the crag. My group was climbing next to a group of college kids, talking about college kid things...very loudly.

"Yeah, so she got paid $10,000 to pee on this guy's face and then the next day came into class and he was her professor".

Had to take a moment to process that one.

What's the difference between a chickpea and a garbanzo bean?

That professor never paid $10,000 to have a garbanzo bean on his face.

Not the crag, but the gym: Kid talking up placing second in a recent bouldering comp, can climb pretty hard, in his defense. Minutes later a couple of us are talking about some of the outdoor routes we’ve been projecting and I overhear the same kid say “I wouldn’t know what grades they’re talking about, I’ve never climbed outside”. Honestly just sad when you live an hour from one of the greatest climbing destinations of the Midwest (horseshoe canyon). 

Eli Boldmanwrote:

Not the crag, but the gym: Kid talking up placing second in a recent bouldering comp, can climb pretty hard, in his defense. Minutes later a couple of us are talking about some of the outdoor routes we’ve been projecting and I overhear the same kid say “I wouldn’t know what grades they’re talking about, I’ve never climbed outside”. Honestly just sad when you live an hour from one of the greatest climbing destinations of the Midwest (horseshoe canyon). 

Different strokes for different folks

Crimpin Ain't Easy wrote:

Damn dude, how much money does the average professor make to be dropping $10,000 for some pee to the face?

My exact thought! Jfc.