Join A Punter In His Wide Climbing Journey (Or Don't, Whatever)

Well other than the puke in the thread, how’s the wide climbing going? Puke yet yourself? Nothing compliments a mastosistic pursuit more than one’s own vomit 

Jabroni McChufferson wrote:

Well other than the puke in the thread, how’s the wide climbing going? Puke yet yourself? Nothing compliments a mastosistic pursuit more than one’s own vomit 

Been taking advantage of this weird weather window to do a bunch of development as the area I'm developing is likely to get snowed in for a good while in a few weeks. I promise that my stoke for the wide is high and I will be returning to CRG for flailage (and quite possibly some vomiting) very soon! 

But lol no I have not vomited in my very brief wide climbing career thus far, but I'm sure it's gonna come sooner or later!

Puke means it's working 

I am also not a good wide climbing and am in serious need of some sort of offwidth bootcamp as I often find myself climbing stuff with offwidth sections. When I did the North Chimney of Castleton in the fall of '23 I was mad because I onsighted everything except for a roughly 3 ft section where I had to pull on a #6. That's happened on a lot of routes. I generally feel good in chimneys, but as soon as it involves stacks and arm bars I start flailing. 

So far my best wide achievement has been climbing Blackjack in the Black Canyon, either onsighting or following clean on all the pitches, which involves 2 pitches of sustained wide climbing. But the actual OW bits had enough foot chips and crimps that made them pretty cheatable for someone like me. 

So recently I resolved to attack a couple local OW cracks - one of which  I had laybacked past the OW crux when I sent it - and just toprope them and force myself to do the OW moves with no cheating. Now I feel like I have stacked hands relatively sorted out - until you have to change to hand-fists and beyond. Still need to make myself work on those.

Aaron K wrote:

I am also not a good wide climbing and am in serious need of some sort of offwidth bootcamp as I often find myself climbing stuff with offwidth sections. When I did the North Chimney of Castleton in the fall of '23 I was mad because I onsighted everything except for a roughly 3 ft section where I had to pull on a #6. That's happened on a lot of routes. I generally feel good in chimneys, but as soon as it involves stacks and arm bars I start flailing. 

So far my best wide achievement has been climbing Blackjack in the Black Canyon, either onsighting or following clean on all the pitches, which involves 2 pitches of sustained wide climbing. But the actual OW bits had enough foot chips and crimps that made them pretty cheatable for someone like me. 

So recently I resolved to attack a couple local OW cracks - one of which I had laybacked past the OW crux when I sent it - and just toprope them and force myself to do the OW moves with no cheating. Now I feel like I have stacked hands relatively sorted out - until you have to change to hand-fists and beyond. Still need to make myself work on those.

Arm bars and chicken wings. 

FEET. 

push up

Reset

Push up

Reset

FEET!!!

Did I mention FEET?

Currently at CRG enjoying the good weather before the rains come. Flailing on Struggler per the recommendation up thread. Question to the wide wizards regarding #4s size OW: WTF is the footwork when you can't get your leg in the crack? If I'm doing butterfly jams with my hands how do I keep myself into the wall if I can't get my leg in there to lock me off and hold me upright? 

Images for reference of me struggling on Struggler

Inside Leg (Left in the photo): Calf lock. To do a calf lock raise your leg as high as you can, having your foot be around waist height. Slide it in up to your knee and rotate your hips away from the long wall that makes up the corner. This should be able to hold you in without your hands.

Outside Leg (Right leg in the photo): Depending on your hip flexibility you can do a number of things. Sometimes a heel toe is all your hips will let you do, this would be done outside the crack as it is obviously to small to get your entire foot into it, it can also only be done in corner cracks. Some folks can "frog foot", that means heel pointed into the crack. The last option which I quite like for corner cracks and find the least strenuous is doing a heel toe by smearing the on the inside of the crack with my toes and the outside middle of my foot touching the edge of the corner.

Cory N wrote:

Inside Leg (Left in the photo): Calf lock. To do a calf lock raise your leg as high as you can, having your foot be around waist height. Slide it in up to your knee and rotate your hips away from the long wall that makes up the corner. This should be able to hold you in without your hands.

Thanks for the reply, Cory! What do I do when the crack is too narrow for me to be able to slide my leg in? I can't even get my calf in this crack unfortunately. Unless I'm misunderstanding your instructions?

What size shoes are ya wearin'? I was in a #4s crack last weekend in sz42 shoes and could get a wide (rattly?) foot jam. My crack was the same orientation as your photo. It helped to have my center of mass shifted slightly to the right. Of course the foot wanted to slip and skitter down but with some diligence it would stick long enough to move off of. Then I was able to do a sort of right hand gaston before getting another jam. You can also sort of press your left elbow against the left wall and left palm against right edge crack while doing the gastonthing with right hand, so you're oriented in a way that makes the transition back to butterfly quick. (I'm not an OW wizard tho by any means so feel free to disregard)

Trevor Kerber wrote:

What size shoes are ya wearin'? I was in a #4s crack last weekend in sz42 shoes and could get a wide (rattly?) foot jam. My crack was the same orientation as your photo. It helped to have my center of mass shifted slightly to the right. Of course the foot wanted to slip and skitter down but with some diligence it would stick long enough to move off of. Then I was able to do a sort of right hand gaston before getting another jam. You can also sort of press your left elbow against the left wall and left palm against right edge crack while doing the gastonthing with right hand, so you're oriented in a way that makes the transition back to butterfly quick. (I'm not an OW wizard tho by any means so feel free to disregard)

Size 44. About to try out advice. Thanks!

Hit post limit, here's the update: 

The Trevor/Aaron beta works! Feels absolutely awful and I can't imagine doing it on lead yet, but it does work! 

Doing the butterfly jam I release the butterfly, raise my right hand and lean to the right using the right hand as a sort of side pull, then I raise my left hand and gaston into the wall hard while leaning to the right, then I bring my right hand up to my left hand and resume the butterfly jam. 

Takeaways: 

• MP is awesome, thanks guys
• The beta works 
• I have a loooooong ways to go before I'm getting on lead 
• It turns out #5s cracks are way more secure-- #4s OW kinda blows

What worked well enough for me if the crack was still narrow enough for rattly foot jams (ie not wide enough for a knee) and I was in butterfly jams, was to basically lean into the left hand ( in a corner with the same orientation as your photo). Then scoot the left hand up using a right hand gaston, then re-engage the butterfly. 

Basically what Trevor described in the second half of his post. You can also get some left elbow action in.

I think day 3 was a success and I learned a looooot more about wide climbing than my previous two days. It's still really challenging but I managed to link 3-4 moves on both the #5s section (harder for me with the hands but overall easier because I can get my leg in the crack to lock me in) and the #4s section (far easier butterfly jams but absolutely hate the side pull/gaston BS to stay in the crack). 

Quite a long ways to go but I think it was pretty significantly educational and I feel like I'm kinda sorta starting to understand wide climbing. Thanks for the beta, y'all! You're the best and I appreciate y'all. 

Heel toe! 

One general piece of advice that's really helped me out with OW: when practical, aim for deep hands and shallow feet. Going shallow on the feet feels less secure, but it moves the center of gravity into the wall, as does deep hands. 

If your hands are proportional to your feet, you might be able to cop some rattly fists in the #4 size-- particularly with such a variegated crack. I find a sideways, thumb-out/up fist is generally most secure. In the route photographed, I'd be feeling for fists with my left (often deep and straight in) while gastoning with right. If you can get one good solid fist and clench it, you might be surprised how far you can work your feet off of it. Crack gloves with thumbs make this less painful, but when learning a new technique, you might try taping up instead, as this gives better sensitivity. For whatever reason, hand jamming was counterintuitive to me, even in perfect #2s. I credit one barehanded day with teaching me proper technique. It was well worth all the skin I lost.

Finally, I'll put a plug in for Kent Pease's Crack Climber's Technique Manual. The guy thinks like an engineer, and you might find his explanations relatable. It was definitely easier for me to learn from this book than someone on the ground streaming beta. Cheers.

Hi Ricky, there is an alternative, old school way to climb narrow OW (too narrow for knees or even calf). Forget the hand stacking, that stuff is most useful on overhanging and/or straight in cracks. Arm bars and chicken wings. Body very sideways to wall, with hips facing slightly outward. Inside foot "toe heel", sort of, that is toe pointing down, contact in vicinity of of top of little toe and inside of heel, heel high, whole foot as high as you can place it. Outside foot just below, toe heeling, toe down,  contact points approximately side of big toe and outside of heel. Yes, this is a bit contortionist. Now arm bar. Push up with feet WITH BOTH FEET STAYING WHERE YOU SET THEM. There's a tendency to release the outside foot and keep pushing up to full extension on the inside leg. DON'T DO IT........ Reset your arms higher (probable chicken wing inside arm, whatever you can find for the outside arm to best help), reset feet higher, move inside arm to arm bar,  push up, repeat. 

So that's an alternative way to use your feet. This has worked on every narrow OW I have  ever done,  except one 5.11 pitch that was very overhanging,  and I used Leavittation.

BTW, I tried out the TRS thing yesterday. I need some tuning. 

Eric, I'll try out the chicken wing, arm bar beta next time. 

Problem: there are multiple routes I want to lead that require a #7. 

Solution:

Shout-out to the climber in Utah that bought this at a local shop and shipped it to me! Appreciate you, brother! 

Unfortunately life and weather are conspiring against me to keep me from climbing. In a very unusual for me circumstance, I need to work a lot this month. At least much of it is rope access instruction instead of the dull, brain dead work I usually do, so that's nice. I may not be able to get out much for a few weeks but I will be hitting the wide with a vengeance very soon! And I'll be putting that #7 in rock very soon as well!