World’s Hardest 5.8? I need your input!

Let’s be honest, I’m just gonna say it upfront…you can never trust a 5.8. Besides 5.8 climbs being commonly on weaker rock and often having more consequences with falls, some 5.8 climbs can be downright, objectively hard!

In fact, I’ve been to some places lately in which locals are claiming to have “the world’s hardest 5.8” at their crag.

After a lot of 5.8 climbing and some pondering, I decided to embark on a quest. I’m searching for literally the hardest single pitch of 5.8 climbing in the world.

My journey starts here: I need your opinion. If you have any leads on where to find a really hard 5.8, post it here!

For the pitch to qualify:

• This climb must be rated 5.8 or equivalent (e.
• 5.8 is the climb’s ORIGINAL RATING (it’s okay if it’s been upgraded over the years or by consensus)
• It can be located anywhere in the world
• Trad or sport
• It can be part of a multipitch climb, but the difficulty of the pitch will only take into account the single pitch itself (without respect to the climbing required to reach it).

Can’t wait to see where this goes. Hopefully I’ll learn a lot about our sport’s history and have a good time in the process.

PS

the hardest 5.8 I’ve climbed is Pleasant Surprise in Kootenai Canyon near Missoula Montana. I’ve climbed hard 5.8s all over the world and it takes the cake, but I know there must be something harder.

Son of the Easy O at the Gunks is solid for the grade.

5.8+ mountainproject.com/route/1…

There is a "5.8" chimney at the top of this route that the last guidebook called 5.8++/10b. Gets a 5.9 on the MP page. https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105806033/west-face 

This one is pretty hard for cragging... I flailed on it as an early 5.10 onsight leader and went back a couple years ago and still thought it was pretty stout for a few moves https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105793864/classic-crack 

This is the only 5.8 I've climbed on the E coast but if the awkward and powerful boulder problems spread throughout the route are any indication I think there have got to be some hard ones out there. https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105884815/moby-grape 

This one was once rated 5.7 because "moves in the first 15 ft don't count". In the older two volume Cascade Select guide there is a photo of Ed Cooper soloing it in leather boots that look like clown shoes with bunched up socks sticking out the top. Just in case you thought standards were rising. https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105852476/angel 

There is a 5.9 wide crack pitch that goes through a roof at the top of a crag I like. Only 5.9 I ever had to project. 

Basically we're all soft and climbing 5.12 but struggling on 5.7-9 just means you're a gym rat gumby who lacks testosterone or skill or something like that... just in case your ego was starting to get in the way of having fun.  

Modern Times at the Gunks. There really is no argument. 

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105758578/the-umph-slot

Brys Jung wrote:

Will also accept worlds hardest 5.9

First pitch of the green adjective is pretty bad, I have seen at least two posts about how hard it is 

Triple S at Seneca deserves an honorable mention. 

fossil wrote:

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105758578/the-umph-slot

Second mention of this one - The Umph Slot - seems like a solid contender as the MP consensus seems to be 5.10+ for its true difficulty

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105900752/titties-and-beer-aka-worlds-hardest-58

I mean, ya can't argue with this one. It's in the name.

How times change. In the late 1950s when 5.9 was the top of the scale, Chouinard told me that often 5.9s were a sequence of 5.8 moves. 5.8 seemed hard back then.

John Gill wrote:

How times change. In the late 1950s when 5.9 was the top of the scale, Chouinard told me that often 5.9s were a sequence of 5.8 moves. 5.8 seemed hard back then.

Still does for some of us!!!!

Depends on the style of the climb.  A 5.8 crimpy climb would be easy for me.  A 5.8 crack climb, not so much.

Persistence at Devils Tower is damn hard, if memory serves I think it’s 5.8

The Umph slot and By Gulley are both 9’s I believe. Disqualification.

That piece of shit sport route on the right of the Rope de Dope crag at Smith was probably 5.8 before every greasy groper in the western US touched it.

Vedauwoo doesn’t really make the list because it’s got notorious 5.9’s and 11a. Pretty casual for the 8’s actually 

I can think of a handful of contenders around Leavenworth, WA -- problem is, within the past forty years, so many have been upgraded.  For example:  at Peshastin Pinnacles - Butter Brickle chimney, rated 5.8 when I moved here in 1980, now rated 5.9+.  On Castle Rock, same story -- Damnation -- rated 5.8 first time I climbed it, current guidebook says 5.9+.  On Castle Rock, one that has NOT been upgraded,  the classic Canary (5.8+) -- the exit move to complete the first pitch has humbled many a "5.10 leader".  The issue for most of these routes is the mindset in which they were climbed.  In those days, 5.9 was defined as "the limit of human ability".  No honest climber would claim to climb at "the limit of human ability", so even the hardest climb he/she could do must, by that way of thinking, be no harder than 5.8.  So you get Don Jensen (a mathematician by training) rating Sun Ribbon Arete in the Sierra 5.8 -- last published rating I saw was 5.10C!  The "worlds hardest 5.8" is most likely one that was established before 1970 and has not had enough traffic for the climbing community to have reached consensus on what a "modern" rating might be.

-Haireball

This was it (the guidebook grade was 5.8 when I climbed it in the late 80s). Now people in the comments are calling it 11a. Go figure. 

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105742160/chicago-overhang

I'm far from a wunderkind crack climber, but Diedre's P3 had me huffing, puffing, and punting far more than most 10b's,

Excalibur at lower washbowl. In the daks. 

The Grand Giraffe was done in 1960 and it was rated 5.8 at least until the late 70s or early 80s.  It always seemed a bit hard for the grade, but I don't remember any talk of upgrading it back then.  I just always thought that I must be missing a hold or something. I think sometime around 1980 people started calling it 5.9-,  now its rated 9+ in Leven's 2020 guide and 10a here on Mountain Project.

Umph slot is easily a number grade harder than grand giraffe, modern times, or any of the other routes listsd above that i have done. I would say it is the hardest 8 i have ever been on. I cant think of anything similar in difficulty.

Ro Shampo #IYKYK