Knife Edge of the Shield Sandia Mountains - Sustained Class 4+

Hi everyone! I'm looking for a last minute partner to climb this weekend with me either 4/11 or 4/12. I have experience having climbed sustained class 4 Capitol Peak and Cabezon Peak. I also have some outdoor sports climbing experience, although hiking and mountaineering are really more of my thing. If interested, please lmk and perhaps we can connect on a short 15 min phone call to get to know each other. For more info on this climb, I would encourage you to look at the posts on either Summit Post or on here.

https://www.summitpost.org/knife-edge-of-the-shield/166412

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/106242069/knife-edge-ridge

I'm in CO so no help for a partner, but this is probably one of the best scramble-trail runs I've ever done if you're comfy at the grade, I would do it once a week if I lived in the area! I would say 4th class is a bit of a sandbag past the W especially with some funky routefinding, you might want to be comfy scrambling up to 5.4-5.6 if you want it to feel casual with the phat exposure. Capitol is significantly easier. 

If it's in your skillset, the jump is pretty exhilarating. Have fun!

There's supposed to be a sneak ledge at the W that keeps it sustained 4th. The exposure is supposed to be legendary though! I'm moving to Phoenix in May and this was one of the last things on my NM bucket list before I go.

There is a sneak at the first part W, but that isn't really the class 5 portion. The class 5 section continues above the W for 75' or so after the second notch. It's easy (5.2ish), but don't let people sandbag it into not being class 5. For comparison, I would say that the exposure is similar but crux moves are a notch harder than the Blanca-Little bear traverse or the headwall of Creston Needle on the Crestone traverse in Colorado. 

Fully agreed with Caleb above, and you can get into some harder than 5.2 stuff if you get off the crest as well. It's probably 5.2 if you really seek out the easiest way and could be a bit harder if you just romp up.

It's definitely not 4th by CO standards (maybe by CA standards).

Thanks for the beta! Any other useful beta either of y'all can provide me? 

Above the second notch, there is an option to go right that feels less exposed but results in harder (5.7ish) climbing. The left line is more exposed but easier. Good rule of thumb is to remember the "this should be 5.2-5.4" rule and be prepared to routefind/downclimb if you get into harder stuff. It's a pretty straightforward route overall though.