Alpine draw vs runner over the shoulder

With the recent discussion about re-racking alpine draws I wondered how many people actually prefer alpine draws vs runners over the shoulder. It appears that it is more efficient and lighter weight to carry over the shoulder with a single biner attached. When extending placements it reduces the faffing of extending the alpine draw and reduces the weight of extra carabiners for each draw. Is this preferred or is this simply another trend that is not being used anymore?  Seems like it would speed things up and lighten the rack. Thoughts?

Personally my only concern about draws over the shoulder is getting them hung up in case of a fall. I never thought about this until the accident on the Obelisk 15 years ago and used to carry them over the shoulder all the time. Now I rack slings as alpine draws on my harness or an over the shoulder gear sling. I know there is still a minimal risk with a gear sling, but it has a lower profile than many slings. Plus alpine draws are cleaner and easy overall.

http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Account-of-Obelisk-Accident/t10484n.html

edit: I agree with Marc below. One of the reasons I read accident reports is that if one climbs enough, you will experience rarities. I will put slings over my shoulder now and then when cleaning and think about what happened to Ishun.

One of the factors in that accident was the knobby terrain of that route and the Obelisk. At most other locations a fall would not result in anything hanging up.

BITD, that was The Way… 1-inch nylon slings tied with a water knot over the shoulder. These days, I usually just keep the alpine draws on my harness but will sometimes put one or more over the shoulder if I’m anticipating their use in some critical place. Just one old guy’s method…

EDIT: Just read the accident report above. So tragic and awful. 

Terry Ewrote:

Personally my only concern about draws over the shoulder is getting them hung up in case of a fall. I never thought about this until the accident on the Obelisk 15 years ago and used to carry them over the shoulder all the time. Now I rack slings as alpine draws on my harness or an over the shoulder gear sling. I know there is still a minimal risk with a gear sling, but it has a lower profile than many slings. Plus alpine draws are cleaner and easy overall.

http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Account-of-Obelisk-Accident/t10484n.html

Thanks for the link to the article. What a horrible accident. Definitely something to consider. 

I have a short torso, so if I rack them over my shoulder the carabiners frequently get hooked on my gear loops and try to strangle me mid climb. 

Both.  A few alpine draws clipped on the harness for when you're in an awkward stance and can't take a sling over your head without possibly losing balance or a hold, and then slings with single carabiners over the shoulder for easy clips.

Brent Moorewrote:

Thanks for the link to the article. What a horrible accident. Definitely something to consider. 

How many similar accidents have there been over the past 15 years? And the 15 before that?

The point being that in rock climbing we cannot mitigate against every single possibility.

Brent Moorewrote:

With the recent discussion about re-racking alpine draws I wondered how many people actually prefer alpine draws vs runners over the shoulder. It appears that it is more efficient and lighter weight to carry over the shoulder with a single biner attached. When extending placements it reduces the faffing of extending the alpine draw and reduces the weight of extra carabiners for each draw. Is this preferred or is this simply another trend that is not being used anymore?  Seems like it would speed things up and lighten the rack. Thoughts?

I've never personally cared for over the shoulder. Tried it plenty, but just don't like it. I also tend to climb with a pack often enough that it has me racking a certain way even if I don't have pack on. I tend to rack everything on the harness.

I don't feel like slings over the shoulder reduces much faffing because for every cam where you've saved a biner, you place a nut where you need to find a second biner (and if you're pumped and trying to work fast this sucks). I also have had the experience of it being more faff to get them off my shoulder when you are in a chimney/offwidth or simply can't switch hands easily and the sling needs to come off the arm that you're holding on with. 

It's ultimately just going to be preference and what you prefer. 

If you alpine draw it and extend the sling, encourage your 2nd to not reassemble the draws while following. Rather, Have them justy drape it over the head, clean the piece and let it hang. Then the 2nd can stick either arm through depending on what side they want it. When they get to belay, THEN rerack the extended draws. Huge time and energy saver.

I mostly rack alpine draws, having started off my "career" as over the shoulder. Now I'd only rack over the shoulder if there is a compelling reason to do so (extra slings for belay shenanigans, leave behind rap slings, etc.).

And when I use an alpine draw, I only extend if absolutely necessary. I have to help my younger partners relearn the time sink that fucking around with slings can become, made worse if one of you insists on placing a bunch of nuts too.  

Focus on efficiency, and let the route and pro needs dictate your strategy.

Cherokee has ended this thread with wisdom.

The only bit I can add is to rack your alpines on your alpines. I usually have 3 alpines clipped into one alpine's top biner and then clipped to my harness. Saves space and keeps things organized. Very, very rarely if I look ahead in the route and see some sort of area where having a runner over the shoulder could be useful, I'll throw one over the shoulder from a stance. Two or more at a time is guaranteed faffing.

Cherokee Nuneswrote:

If you alpine draw it and extend the sling, encourage your 2nd to not reassemble the draws while following. Rather, Have them justy drape it over the head, clean the piece and let it hang. Then the 2nd can stick either arm through depending on what side they want it. When they get to belay, THEN rerack the extended draws. Huge time and energy saver.

I mostly rack alpine draws, having started off my "career" as over the shoulder. Now I'd only rack over the shoulder if there is a compelling reason to do so (extra slings for belay shenanigans, leave behind rap slings, etc.).

And when I use an alpine draw, I only extend if absolutely necessary. I have to help my younger partners relearn the time sink that fucking around with slings can become, made worse if one of you insists on placing a bunch of nuts too.  

Depending on how you do it, it’s just as fast to rerack alpines while following. If it’s hard, do it while you’re shaking out/resting.  If it’s easy, climb into a reasonable amount of slack as you’re approaching the gear placement so you do it while your belayer catches up.  I’ve never found reracking slings at the belay to be a time saver.

And not placing nuts to save time seems like a bad idea to me, at least on a general level. I’ve done routes where we intentionally didn’t bring nuts because we knew we didn’t need them, but otherwise, if you’re trying to save time, it’s probably because you’re also trying to climb a big route, which probably also means you’re trying to save weight.  Nuts are the most space and weight efficient pro available and, if you’re smart about it, can be placed so they come out with minimal effort for the follower.

Categorically discouraging nuts and encouraging followers to make a mess while following instead of arriving at the anchor with a clean, well organized rack seems like a gumby move imo.

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

Remember when using a gear sling was all the rage as well? yeah, don't see that much anymore either. I would suggest for similar reasons. Strapping things to your chest makes more sense the lower the grade one is freeclimbing.

Fwiw, every 5.13 crack I’ve done in the past decade except one (it was steep) has been with a gear sling. They’re a bad idea if it’s steep because you lose access to the gear when it all falls behind you, but otherwise they’re actually super nice because you don’t have to think about which side of your harness to rack the gear on.  You just grab the top piece on the sling and put it in at the tick mark.

Cherokee Nuneswrote:

If you alpine draw it and extend the sling, encourage your 2nd to not reassemble the draws while following. Rather, Have them justy drape it over the head, clean the piece and let it hang. Then the 2nd can stick either arm through depending on what side they want it. When they get to belay, THEN rerack the extended draws. Huge time and energy saver.

I mostly rack alpine draws, having started off my "career" as over the shoulder. Now I'd only rack over the shoulder if there is a compelling reason to do so (extra slings for belay shenanigans, leave behind rap slings, etc.).

And when I use an alpine draw, I only extend if absolutely necessary. I have to help my younger partners relearn the time sink that fucking around with slings can become, made worse if one of you insists on placing a bunch of nuts too.  

Focus on efficiency, and let the route and pro needs dictate your strategy.

Same.  Also worth mentioning is that if you're in the "over the shoulder because you only need one carabiner" camp, then you can also rack on your harness like that.  Just twist the runner a few times and clip the opposite end back into the carabiner.  Personally I hate having to wade through draws to find the ones with only one biner attached vs. two for placing cams vs placing passive pro.  

At the end of the day, I do exactly what is posted above.  I rack according to the objective, realizing that there's no perfect subscription and that there are many different methods and variations to choose from.  People in binary mode (this way OR that way) when it comes to climbing, gear, building anchors, etc. do so because they want easy and quick subscriptions.  The easiest and quickest way to get to the best solution is to be well-educated on all the options and employ the one that best fits the circumstances and scenario you're in at the moment.

Eric Craig wrote:

Seeking out an easier/simpler way can be exceptionally smart. And very wise. And even safer.

That’s not at all what he was saying though.

Learning the tools and then simplifying to what’s needed on a particular route is smart.

Getting dogmatic and only knowing/trying one way is limiting and not very smart. 

Eric Craig wrote:

I don't disagree with this at all. I understood Jake Jones comment to be a blanket kind of statement, based on how it's written. 

While I often make contrary posts, it is rare that they are meant to be personal. A broad base of knowledge, and the experience to back it up, is most desirable. I would rarely want someone to just take my word for it. (There  is such a thing as extraordinary circumstances). Especially when I was a guide. My goal was for people to gain understanding,  including understanding of methods that I didn't favor. That most definitely includes the benefits,  more so even,  than why I might not favor it. 

Again,  extraordinary circumstances not withstanding, I have never been much of a my way or the highway kind of guy. 

That makes more sense. Thanks for clarifying. 

I place a lot of tricams and nuts, both of which I tend to rack in sets.  Ballnuts also get racked together if I think I'll want them.  For all of those, alpines which don't get extended unless necessary just make more sense, and most of my cam placements don't need anything more than the extendable sling(mix of DMM and WC).

Eric Craig wrote:

I don't disagree with this at all. I understood Jake Jones comment to be a blanket kind of statement, based on how it's written. 

While I often make contrary posts, it is rare that they are meant to be personal. A broad base of knowledge, and the experience to back it up, is most desirable. I would rarely want someone to just take my word for it. (There  is such a thing as extraordinary circumstances). Especially when I was a guide. My goal was for people to gain understanding,  including understanding of methods that I didn't favor. That most definitely includes the benefits,  more so even,  than why I might not favor it. 

Again,  extraordinary circumstances not withstanding, I have never been much of a my way or the highway kind of guy. 

I hear you man.  No offense taken.  I have about 15 years of experience on gear-protected routes up to 11c and bolted routes to 12a.  I don't climb that hard anymore, but I've done a good amount of multipitch on a variety of terrain and have not once ever needed gear slung across my shoulder/chest.  But then again, I avoid chimneys, so there's that.  With regard to "defeating the purpose", the "purpose" I was referring to was the comment upthread about people slinging across their shoulder/chest because one can put a single carabiner on those slings- the inferred meaning being that one would need two carabiners to rack to the harness instead of a runner/gear sling.  

I also have never been a dogmatic person when it comes to methods.  Actually, that was the entire point of my post.  If one gets locked into that mode of thinking, then it's likely that efficient and beneficial alternative methods will be missed.  This may or may not be detrimental to the overall goal, or to progression.

With 6mm dyneema slings and single Nano 22 biners, I can toss four over my shoulder and not even notice them. 

Plus one of Jordan Day's dyneema rabbit runners over the shoulders with the loops clipped with a single biner, if the terrain calls for it.

This frees up space on the gear loops and provides insurance against my chronic underestimation of how many slings are needed on a pitch.

Terry Ewrote:

Personally my only concern about draws over the shoulder is getting them hung up in case of a fall. I never thought about this until the accident on the Obelisk 15 years ago and used to carry them over the shoulder all the time. Now I rack slings as alpine draws on my harness or an over the shoulder gear sling. I know there is still a minimal risk with a gear sling, but it has a lower profile than many slings. Plus alpine draws are cleaner and easy overall.

http://www.supertopo.com/tr/Account-of-Obelisk-Accident/t10484n.html

edit: I agree with Marc below. One of the reasons I read accident reports is that if one climbs enough, you will experience rarities. I will put slings over my shoulder now and then when cleaning and think about what happened to Ishun.

One of the factors in that accident was the knobby terrain of that route and the Obelisk. At most other locations a fall would not result in anything hanging up.

Bone chilling account. I pray none of us ever have to deal with anything like that. And I certainly won't be slinging over my shoulder on lead anymore after reading that. Horrible.

It is efficient though to rack onto a shoulder sling when cleaning gear on follow if you're short fixing and you wanna tag up the gear fast, or when meeting at the anchor if the follower isn't leading the next pitch.

A friend's partner had an accident (minor consequences) involving over-the-shoulder slings catching on stuff during a fall about 8 years ago.  That makes at least 2 (probably more unreported ones out there).

I'm still hesitant to give up shoulder slings - it would usually mean bringing fewer slings (too much stuff on the harness annoys me), and not enough slings could cause a different type of accident. A connected world is great for finding out what *could* happen, not necessarily for weighing the relative probabilities of things.

One solution I've experimented with is clipping extra stuff to the straps of the backpack (and moving it from there to the harness as supplies on the harness run low).  But I'm not sure if backpacks are actually less prone to this type of accident than shoulder slings, or if there is just less data on backpacks because people haven't been wearing them en masse for as long.

Couple of tied ones sans biners for rap anchors or extra extension. Just used that with some nuts  last week. 10 nuts for $75. 50 cents a foot for web or cord. Cheap retreat. Will keep in mind the hazard tho.

 Double length runners clipped over shoulder can be removed from under pack  or other gear like a rabbit.