hands off brake strand belays with a gri gri

If the climber is dogging, and the grigri is locked, tie a bite knot before going hands free. Whats best if the climber is going bolt to bolt is if the climber fifis into a draw to unweight the rope (improves rope longevity and belayer genital circulation). In those situations, the belayer can go hands free with a grigri, give some slack, tie a backup and take a seat maybe in a different order. The climber is “indirect” but still on belay bc the system is closed with a backup knot and the belayer never takes the climber off. It is a safe practice for sport climbing, but not tying the stopper knot is complacent if somehow the grigri cam gets disengaged due to rock fall, belayer mistake or some other occurrence. 

If you're too stupid to figure out how to use a grigri safely, God help your partners.

I was once verbally attacked by someone who lived by the rules of Petzl, I told them to go way deep on themselves. We were not climbing together.

I also drive with one hand occasionally, I cross the road without using crosswalks sometimes and drink more than 3 beers a night once in a while. I guess you could say I just like living on the edge?

I've had a Gri Gri slip on me.  I had backup knots tied in the rope fortunately.  There is no excuse for not keeping your brake had on the rope or tying a quick overhand knot.  Just how lazy can you be?

We counted/estimated how many times we hang directly on the rope with a GriGri when bolting new routes and I came to roughly 96.000 times without failure, one of my buddies has done six times as many routes as me!

Jim Tittwrote:

We counted/estimated how many times we hang directly on the rope with a GriGri when bolting new routes and I came to roughly 96.000 times without failure, one of my buddies has done six times as many routes as me!

It only takes once in a million....to die!

I have def seen Gris slip off lock or not lock up at all. Slipping off lock because the cam gets pinched by climber movement. It's all "impossible" until you or your friend is laying dead on the ground bleeding out.

I've gone hands free on devices plenty of times.  I think most people are missing the point here.  The point isn't that the likelihood of something bad happening is low.  The point isn't the way the device "works".  I think the point is that tying an overhand on a bight under a GriGri that's loaded is easy.  Why would anyone not do that?  Do you know what your climber is going to do next?  Are you going to stare at them the entire time?  Think about this scenario:  The belayer is comfortable enough to let go of the brake strand with the climber resting on the rope, no?  Then what is to keep them from looking away from the climber- given that they're already comfortable enough to let go of the brake strand?  In my estimation: nothing. And if this is indeed the case, and human nature alludes to this being highly likely, why wouldn't one take an extra 5 seconds to just tie an overhand on a bight under the device?  Answer:  Laziness.  You have a fix for a situation that's relatively low risk, that takes almost no effort or time.  Why not use it- especially if we know that it's likely that A) the belayer is not looking at the climber at this point and B) that the climber could unload the rope, and then fall immediately after doing so.  Well, dear climbers, what is the reason for taking the brake hand off in the first place?  It's not an ATC.  There's no tension on the brake hand, so the answer is the same: laziness.  

While we're all arguing the pedantry of how risky it actually is, and what the specifics of belay device behavior are, we're missing the obvious:  There's no real reason to take one's hand off the brake strand of a loaded GriGri (I've eaten whole sandwiches with my brake hand on, also have untied and take off shoes or loosened them, rearranged gear, etc. etc. all without ever having to take the brake hand off).  And, in the event that I am *that* annoyed by having to hold onto the rope while doing tasks while the climber is resting on the rope, I always tie a hefty knot below the device so that I can be relieved of my duty properly, and with no risk- I've even been known to clip the loop created by the knot back to my belay loop with a locker.  OMG AN EXTRA FIVE SECONDS it took.

So keep on with the senseless pedantry on an issue that has such a painfully quick and easy fix, and let me know the next time you're dogging something and you look down and see your belayer with no backup knot and no brake hand on if you feel 100% cool with it.  If you do happen to notice that and you're cool with it, then great.  You have not a single thing to live for, don't really value your life, or you're ignorant yourself and don't know that even a small risk that's unnecessary is still a risk and if it's preventable, why not prevent it?  If this is the case, then you probably make a shitty climbing partner anyway and natural selection will eventually take you and your partner out- Murphy's Law says that you'll probably die first though.

If you notice that and you're not cool with it, think about how easy it would have been for the belayer to tie an overhand on a bight below the device so that the risk of something going awry in that scenario is essentially nil.  Then ask yourself why your belayer didn't do that. Either they didn't value your life enough for a five second, fraction of a calorie expenditure, or they didn't know that it's a good idea to do so. In either case, if this was me, I'd shitcan them as a partner permanently. I have too many people depending on me and my income to let some lazy asshole fuck things up for everyone. YMMV.  

I think it’s safe enough to do while I light darts. If you’re hangdogging, I’m smoking. Those are the rules. 

Tradibanwrote:

It only takes once in a million....to die!

I'm sure my life insurance guy mentioned something higher than that and the guy trying to sell me a burial plan said something about we all die......

Ted Ravenwrote:

I think it’s safe enough to do while I light darts. If you’re hangdogging, I’m smoking. Those are the rules. 

I bet I can guess which one you are...

https://youtu.be/q2kZwQbgmVY

Jake Joneswrote:

I've gone hands free on devices plenty of times.  I think most people are missing the point here.  The point isn't that the likelihood of something bad happening is low.  The point isn't the way the device "works".  I think the point is that tying an overhand on a bight under a GriGri that's loaded is easy.  Why would anyone not do that?  Do you know what your climber is going to do next?  Are you going to stare at them the entire time?  Think about this scenario:  The belayer is comfortable enough to let go of the brake strand with the climber resting on the rope, no?  Then what is to keep them from looking away from the climber- given that they're already comfortable enough to let go of the brake strand?  In my estimation: nothing. And if this is indeed the case, and human nature alludes to this being highly likely, why wouldn't one take an extra 5 seconds to just tie an overhand on a bight under the device?  Answer:  Laziness.  You have a fix for a situation that's relatively low risk, that takes almost no effort or time.  Why not use it- especially if we know that it's likely that A) the belayer is not looking at the climber at this point and B) that the climber could unload the rope, and then fall immediately after doing so.  Well, dear climbers, what is the reason for taking the brake hand off in the first place?  It's not an ATC.  There's no tension on the brake hand, so the answer is the same: laziness.  

While we're all arguing the pedantry of how risky it actually is, and what the specifics of belay device behavior are, we're missing the obvious:  There's no real reason to take one's hand off the brake strand of a loaded GriGri (I've eaten whole sandwiches with my brake hand on, also have untied and take off shoes or loosened them, rearranged gear, etc. etc. all without ever having to take the brake hand off).  And, in the event that I am *that* annoyed by having to hold onto the rope while doing tasks while the climber is resting on the rope, I always tie a hefty knot below the device so that I can be relieved of my duty properly, and with no risk- I've even been known to clip the loop created by the knot back to my belay loop with a locker.  OMG AN EXTRA FIVE SECONDS it took.

So keep on with the senseless pedantry on an issue that has such a painfully quick and easy fix, and let me know the next time you're dogging something and you look down and see your belayer with no backup knot and no brake hand on if you feel 100% cool with it.  If you do happen to notice that and you're cool with it, then great.  You have not a single thing to live for, don't really value your life, or you're ignorant yourself and don't know that even a small risk that's unnecessary is still a risk and if it's preventable, why not prevent it?  If this is the case, then you probably make a shitty climbing partner anyway and natural selection will eventually take you and your partner out- Murphy's Law says that you'll probably die first though.

If you notice that and you're not cool with it, think about how easy it would have been for the belayer to tie an overhand on a bight below the device so that the risk of something going awry in that scenario is essentially nil.  Then ask yourself why your belayer didn't do that. Either they didn't value your life enough for a five second, fraction of a calorie expenditure, or they didn't know that it's a good idea to do so. In either case, if this was me, I'd shitcan them as a partner permanently. I have too many people depending on me and my income to let some lazy asshole fuck things up for everyone. YMMV.  

WHOAH!

Jake Joneswrote:

You have not a single thing to live for, don't really value your life

Not sure about the rest of what you said but this is bang on!

abandon moderation wrote:

Using "it's easy so you should do it or you're lazy" is not a good argument.

• It's easy to tie a backup knot above your figure 8.
• It's easy to use cordelette and tie a master point on two bolts.
• It's easy to replace biners after you drop them on the ground (aka microfractures bro, is it worth your life).
• It's easy to climb with a 10mm rope instead of something "unsafe"
• It's easy to place an extra piece of pro

There's countless really easy things to do in climbing that may or may not reduce risk, that almost any reasonable climber agrees we don't have to do.

All this is true. But since it's someone else's life in your hands while you're belaying, at the very least it's worth taking the time to ask the climber who you're belaying if they are okay with a hands free belay.

Even if in this exact scenario it's "safe enough", I do question the idea of standardizing this practice (whether by intent or not) when there are so many assisted belay devices out there, and it really is a better practice to keep a hand (or knot) on the rope. 

I personally wouldn't feel the warm fuzzies if I looked down to see my belayer not holding on to the brake strand... nor would I feel good about seeing my belayer using the "squeeze the lemon" technique to dish out rope, also with no hand on the brake strand. But maybe I'm just too old school--that is, brought up to hold on to the brake strand even in death (I think there is an actual true story about this actually happening???).

I'm surprised this 15-minute video hasn't been mentioned or critiqued yet. This is Ben (I believe), from Lithuania (I think), on his Hard Is Easy channel. Topic: "Ep. 7 GriGri: What Happens If You Don't Hold The Rope?":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKe72j_mBlU

In a controlled situation, the brake strand on a cammed grigri doesn’t need to be held, if its engaged, it won’t disengage, it would be a crappy device if it did. This is rock climbing though, gear is dropped, you move around, rocks fall, birds shit, wasps sting, any of these things can cause the grigri cam to become disengaged. Don’t go hands free without backing it up! You don’t know if something can go wrong that is out of your control. 

Nick Budkawrote:

In a controlled situation, the brake strand on a cammed grigri doesn’t need to be held, if its engaged, it won’t disengage, 

no, but i've watched multiple ropes creep back through a closed cam. most notably, newer ropes 8.9 - 9mm with dry treatment. the worst i've seen is the PMI erratic. 

I get the impression that there are many more people willing to go hands-free belaying with an ATC in guide mode than going hands-free with a gri-gri. Does anyone have any speculation as to why this is? Both are against manufacturers spec and there are stories of failure modes in both cases.

For those of you who do handsfree on one, but not the other: Which one do you run handsfree and what's your reasoning?

Sounds like this might be a ”hot take” on this thread and my opinion has changed over the years.

If you are using a Grigri and you load the device I don’t think you NEED to keep your hand on the rope. The whole point of using them is that they cam on the rope and stay that way. I think this ok if your partner is dogging the route, and you want to take your hand of to do something. If you’re partner is in direct and you want take out a bunch of slack to eat a sandwich maybe tie a back-up. Same is true if you are rapping, you can take your hand off the break to swing around, put in a bolt and what not. If the climber is moving your hand should be on the rope.

There’s really only a few situations that the cam won’t engage even in a fall, it jams into the first quick draw or your thumb is on the break in a fall (in this case your hand is likely on the break and it will fail). People top rope solo with grigris all the time and I haven’t heard about someone dying because their hand wasn’t on the break. I have felt the rope slip in lead falls a little bit on really skinny ropes (9.2ish and under), but the cam still always engages - once it engages it’s engaged. 

At the end of the day you are responsible communicating what you are comfortable and safe with to your partners. What you think is safe might be different than what someone else thinks and is comfortable with. 

YMMV. Yer gonna die.

Ward Smithwrote:

I use a gri gri to clean and bolt routes.  I go hands off every time, and have been since the first gri gris came out.

The only time I’ve ever seen one not engage in a fall is when there is a ton of rope drag, and the fall in such cases is in slow motion.  

I do the same. I also use a grigri to rappel. I also use a grigri to lead belay. I'll have a backup knot somewhere (maybe just the end of the rope) but I've gone hands free many times when the device is locked up.

However I have used a grigri to bolt a route, I unweighted, tightened a bolt or something, went back to weight the grigri and it slipped for about 5 feet before it caught. So I've experienced that o shit slip.

If I'm belaying a partner I hold onto the brake strand or put a knot in it. If I had a partner not holding it I'd ask them to do the same. If they're a good partner they'll do what you ask to make you more comfortable.

Matt Robinsonwrote:

I bet I can guess which one you are...

https://youtu.be/q2kZwQbgmVY

I’m the sort of guy that has never had the screaming barfies, and I ever did have them, I’d never say so.