When you have a roster of partners, what do you do?

Let’s say you have 5 trusted partners. You want to climb a route with one of them this weekend. Do you text them in order, wait for response, then proceed if unsuccessful? Or do you text all at once?

I’ve always fretted about this. What if someone in the roster takes a long time to respond, taking the iterative method. What if everyone responds around the same time, taking the shotgun approach? 

-Is this for a multipitch route where you don’t want to deal with a party of >2? Do these partners of yours not know each other, or don’t like each other? Is there a discrepancy in abilities, so going with partner 1 means doing 5.9, and going with partner 2 means climbing 5.12?

If everyone knows each other, and climbs together some of the time, why not group chat? Just message the group, “hey, I want to climb this multipitch route X this weekend, do any of you feel like it?” The first person who responds  “yes, let’s do it” is your partner for the day. And everyone else would understand why they aren’t, and would make other plans? Or would maybe band together and convince you to change plans and go to single-pitch crag that has 3 routes that are in everyone’s list?

I usually start with a curious text Wednesday, respectable pleading to those who haven't blocked me yet Thursday, then by Friday 11pm I'm offering them 40$/hr to belay me. As expected, Saturday morning I resort to being a Mountain Projtitute and posting for a one day stand. Sunday, I watch lead rope solo setup videos all day and cry

Lena, that’s great advice with the group chat.

I go for the one at a time approach to avoid awkward situations but it often leads to not finding a partner. I may try the group chat next time. 

First i brag about my success in making friends to everyone on mountain project.

Then i like to plan out way in advance, so i ask different friends when they have free weekends, and what goals and objectives they might have and start to pencil them in for future weekends.

Then when inevitably life happens plans fall thru and weather forecasts go bad, i spam text everyone and the first to reply back wins, and if the weekend objective turns out to be single pitch type events, then i just invite all the others that reply as well.

Idk kinda depends on who they are, their level relative to mine, their objectives vs mine, assumption of risk, etc. 

This is all in the context of ice/alpine climbing. I definitely have a preferred partner but several others who I climb with. Having same/similar goals is always the most important to me. 

I also try to give several days lead time just in case someone takes a while to get back to me 

I struggle with the weekly text roulette, it's exhausting. I have a bunch of contacts who don't belong on a group chat, some of whom I know well and others who I've only climbed with once or twice. The group chat is great when it works, though.

Generally I'll text my preferred partners on Mon/Tues and then move down the list by Weds night if no reply. I don't worry too much about people responding late - if I text someone Monday and they reply Thursday, nobody is surprised that I may have found a partner already. I avoid texting multiples at once unless it's Thursday night/Friday and I'm desperate.

My partners know I generally prefer a party of 2 day regardless of single pitching or multi. So I ask one at a time, but if they don’t reply within about 12 hours I move onto the next partner. First come first serve. I would reply with, “I didn’t hear from you so I found another partner. Next time!”  Once I moved onto asking a bunch of people at once (still for one person) I will clarify that I asked more than one person and that it is first come first serve. If all else fails I come to the internet begging for belays.  I have 3 little kids, a job, and a marriage, so most of my partners know my one day a week is precious to me and don’t seem to judge my methods. 

Adam blocwrote:

I usually start with a curious text Wednesday, respectable pleading to those who haven't blocked me yet Thursday, then by Friday 11pm I'm offering them 40$/hr to belay me. As expected, Saturday morning I resort to being a Mountain Projtitute and posting for a one day stand. Sunday, I watch lead rope solo setup videos all day and cry

Lol this is pretty great 

Lena chitawrote:

-Is this for a multipitch route where you don’t want to deal with a party of >2? Do these partners of yours not know each other, or don’t like each other? Is there a discrepancy in abilities, so going with partner 1 means doing 5.9, and going with partner 2 means climbing 5.12?

If everyone knows each other, and climbs together some of the time, why not group chat? Just message the group, “hey, I want to climb this multipitch route X this weekend, do any of you feel like it?” The first person who responds  “yes, let’s do it” is your partner for the day. And everyone else would understand why they aren’t, and would make other plans? Or would maybe band together and convince you to change plans and go to single-pitch crag that has 3 routes that are in everyone’s list?

Yes, as others said, great advice. I was asking in the context of multi pitch, similar abilities