Stolen Hangboard @ Waimea

Eli wrote:

What mostly separates the crags and the ethics of them is the ladder and the lack of warm-up routes. For those that don't know or haven't been but have still voiced their opinions: There is a wooden ladder to a ledge where 5-7 classic routes start, even though you can climb an 11+ corner to the same ledge. 

I appreciate those that hope I get my board back, I hope I get it back too.

Are you talking about the original start to Techno?  When did it become .11+?  Something changed?  Was about .11a years ago.  Insecure, friction dependent, techy.

Hope you get your board back too.

Wait, are you talking about Technosurfing? Since when is it 11-?  In my 1997 Rumney guide it is listed as 12a. I remember that it felt somewhat solid at that grade back in '98. 

Pfft, techno is like a 10d at best.

(lol)

Anyways.... things left at the base of a cliff should be presumed "lost property" and not "crag booty." Booty is the shit you leave on the climb because you're too soft to finish, not the shit you left at the base because you're a dumbass. So whoevers got Eli's board needs to own up. I think the discussion of whether its ok to leave a hangboard there over the winter season is a different one, although I don't see the big deal if it was tucked out of the way and just available for someone to hang up if they wanted to use it. Probably shouldn't be left attached to the rock all year though.

Grade inflation :-)

You guys ruined Rumney more than a decade ago. A good example of how an area can be over loved. Yea, fuck it, put up a hangboard, why not?!?!

Eli, I hope you get the hangboard back. With that said, I understand you had nothing but the best intentions, but it's not appropriate to hang a hangboard all winter and I'm not surprised that someone took it down and packed it out. The climbing management plan allows gear to be stored or cached for up to 14 days - any longer and it's considered abandoned.

Totally uncool to leave your hangboard, draws, crash pad at the crag. Someone did a good thing cleaning that  junk up.

Tradiban wrote:

You guys ruined Rumney more than a decade ago. A good example of how an area can be over loved. Yea, fuck it, put up a hangboard, why not?!?!

Yawn. Grow a pair and use your real name if you want to sit at the grownups' table.

the schmuck wrote:

Wait, are you talking about Technosurfing? Since when is it 11-?  In my 1997 Rumney guide it is listed as 12a. I remember that it felt somewhat solid at that grade back in '98. 

I was referring to the inside corner start of Techno leading up to the ledge.  The ladder bypasses this thin and techy start.

Eli, I have a Metolius hang board you can have. I'm not using it.  

Hmmmm...

First off, I don't think the satirical examples are super useful. No one is going to bring a stationnary bike to the crag, you can just hike up & down and get the warmup, and no one warms up doing bench press before sending a hard project. Even if some weirdo were to do that, I'm pretty sure consensus will be strong that it doesn't belong there. Throwing that around feels like bad faith on that topic, imo, and an effort to make the other side look foolish and skip over the debate, which I think could be valuable if it actually happens. So let's try to have it and not derail it too too much....

Now, that being said, there are limit cases as to what is or not an acceptable additional to a crag such as Waimea. We do need to draw a line somehere, and I think the hangboard is probably in the grey zone.

A couple points:

1. The crag matters. People don't bolt hand cracks at Yosemite (or say Red River Gorge, which has tons of trad too), yet they do (would) in Ten Sleep. I wouldn't be offended if someone who bolted a hand crack @ Yosemite had their "route" chopped, or even the Red even though it generally is regarded as a mostly sport climbing destination by a lot of folks. I would think it unacceptable if someone chopped a bolted crack at Ten Sleep. The guidebook unapologetically proclaims "bolt the planet". Different crags have different ethos - if you're not able or not willing to accept that fact, then you may want to meditate a bit on your tendancies to be a moral imperialist regarding climbing ethos, and why that would be bad for climbing in general if everyone who had an opinion were starting to do the same and act on it (e.g. bolt anything, chop everything, etc.)
2. Popular climbing areas are disturbed by climbers. Having 50+ people around at the bottom of a cliff at week-end with bags big enough for most people to spend 2 weeks in a resort at Puerto Vallarta is disturbing an area (plus, even though most are careful, they may leave trash etc.). Bolts are a disturbance, so are fixed draws, ladders, fixed ropes and artificial trails. The point about disturbances is that some are justifiable and acceptable, while others are not. Clearly the presence of people is deemed an acceptable disturbance - otherwise no one would be climbing or enjoying nature much, and that disturbance is acceptable most places (though some places may put limits in the form of quotas, say Roadside crag @ Red River or some national parks). Bolts are an acceptable disturbances in some places, while not in others - see again point #1.
3. Everyone can have an informed opinion on the topic. I think looking back at how climbing developped, there's been contribution from far & wide on a variety of issues. Having lots of people pitch in with their views & background on it is valuable I believe, so I don't see why this should be a Rumney-users only issue. However, see point #1 & #2: if you've never been to Rumney, have not taken care to read about the details of Waimea and/or fail to let those facts influence your opinion, then you're really just being a moral imperialist repeating a stance in the dark. I don't think we should discard inputs just because they're not Rumney locals,  but then I think we also should feel free to skip on one-liners from some dude tradding away at Devil's Tower who's never seen the eastern shore of the Mississipi nor clipped into something he didn't place himself in a crack...

=========================

I don't think Rumney is ruined or trashed. It may be to hardcore trad climber, but then see #1. Choices have been made and you guys apparently lost the battle for the soul of that crag whenever it happened. There are good trad lines in Rumney and they're not bolted, but if you wanted a trad-only destination then look somewhere else. Rumney seems to be primarly a sport-climbing destination and choices made in its development are coherent with that vision. Please just dealt with it.

So @Tradiban (and a few other similar comments), it may be ruined in your eyes, but then beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. Go to the Gunks and have fun, or Cathedral ledge or somewhere that is more inline with your views. I don't think sport climbers should spit on locations that adopt a minimalist stances on bolting as being outdated/retrograde/out-of-touch, so please trad climbers refrain some spitting on those who enjoy different things than you do about climbing in general. We can do way harder moves than you can, but then you have bigger balls than us to run it on thin gear. So it's not a dick measuring contest, just have different styles of dicks. There are a lot of crags out there, which have made different development choices (see #1 again). Enjoy those inline with your preferences, and fight to keep them this way, but please don't spit on other's choices.

Now, I think there's a decent amount of hypocrisie with regards to sport climbing "disturbances". Let's leave aside the bolting topic (e.g. let's assume bolting routes is fine and no one has a problem with it). There's still fixed draws. There's still fixed ropes & ladders & the stick clips. Yes, fixed draws are cool because otherwise it's pretty fn difficult to project something like, say, Predator. Not difficult as in "this route is hard", but as in "it sucks so much to just get on it and clean it that I'm gonna find another project even though that line would be sick to climb". So we accept fixed draws, and the ladder & the fixed ropes for similar reasons - it makes it somewhat possible to work on those routes which we may not really get to project without to "helpers". But then if someone was to put up fixed draws on, say, Center Piece, I don't think that would fly because it's just a 10d. We may be forgetting that some people's project are another's warmup and that our warm-ups where once our projects. A stronger climber could snub the fixed draws on Predator. That line of argument has been brought up in this thread, and there is some value to it.

That being said, it may take a dedicated climber say a year to get to be point where they can work that steep 10d without fixed draws and it being too much of a hassle. The same cannot be said for 13b - some fairly dedicated climbers may never project 13b, or at least not with the ease necessary to do it in a base setup (e.g. without helpers & improvements) as inhospitable as Predator's. I think it's fair to adopt, let's say, a humanist point of view in this case, which is the greater good for the greater number. I think it's less of an annoyance for someone to climb hard for a year to be able to project that 10d without fixed draws, so it's not worth the global disturbance of putting fixed draws on it. The same isn't true at 13 & + for most people. However, we do have to admit we're making that choice and why we are making it.

The key point for me is this: would there be another practical way for most people to realistically achieve the same result without adding this disturbance to the crag?

Thinks that, at Waimea, don't make the cut:

• The expresso/vending machine
• The bench press & stationnary bike or treadmill or other farcical examples peole may come up with

Things that, at other crags, don't make the cut:

• Bolts
• Bolts for anchors where natural anchors are possible
• Sign post for trails
• (you get the idea)

Then for the hangboard... I personnally see an added value to it, which is that there isn't that much in terms of good warmups there and critically, the hangboard allows you to warmup finger thendons which helps prevent injuries. I'd personnally be happy if it stayed there and Eli I think a lot of people here unfairly trashed your idea......

However, as pointed out above, there is an existing document that clearly states what is or not acceptabled in terms of permanent gear at the crag after nov.30 - and the hangboard clearly falls into the non-acceptable during that period. I think Eli you should seek an exemption for your hangboard. If you don't get it, then unfortunately that is off the table... You probably should have researched things more before making that addition - the line had apparently been drawn before...

Yeah, and just to add to the "humanist point of view" about what to disturb and what not to disturb... Let's say Predator wasn't located in Rumney, but instead in the middle of the Gunks. I don't think it even should be bolted, and even if it had been, I don't think there should be fixed draws on it. Because the humanist stance on that would be that there would likely be rather few climbers enjoying the fixed draws/bolts on the Gunk's Predator, but it would be a huge annoyance to the Gunks climbing community. I really think that if it were at the Gunk, that line shouldn't even get bolted in the first place.

From a sport climbing's perspective, we would be loosing out on a great sport climb. But that's irrelevent - that's not why the Gunks have been developped in the first place. The goal shouldn't be to bolt every potential great sport line on the planet, nor should it be to keep every piece of cliff pristine. The goal should be to develop different crags with their own characters & ethos, with a wide variety of ethos being pushed. What those are should be based partly on the crag's "natural" character (say, blank standstone with few protectable cracks are probably good for sport-oriented philosophy, while perfect granite cracks should probably focus on trad, etc.), and also of course on whoever happens to develop the place and what direction they want to push it towards...

Rich Brereton wrote:

Yawn. Grow a pair and use your real name if you want to sit at the grownups' table.

Ah, the ol' "You can't have an opinion because you don't use your real name on the internet" argument. Cute. I will brush that aside with this: My name is Jack Meoff and I'm from Canada. Happy now?

With that behind us, many exceptions to a "clean" crag have been made at Rumney and those exceptions have been attempted to be justified by various reasoning. That's all fine and well by me, it's up to the locals to decide what goes and what stays but it is my opinion that a hangboard fully falls within your local standard and that, in my opinion, has "ruined" the area for my liking. 

Rumney is a victim of it's own popularity and I don't believe there would have been a way to stop it from becoming an outdoor gym besides limiting human access.

Foremost, this is all my opinion, which you need to separate from a personal attack, because it's not a personal attack. Alot of people on this board could benefit from understanding that distinction.

Good luck with your slippery slope!

Franck Vee wrote:

Franck Vee wrote:

Then for the hangboard... I personnally [sic] see an added value to it, which is that there isn't that much in terms of good warmups there and critically, the hangboard allows you to warmup finger thendons [sic] which helps prevent injuries. I'd personnally [sic] be happy if it stayed there and Eli I think a lot of people here unfairly trashed your idea......

Why is warming up on the ladder rungs not adequate? 

Marc801 C wrote:

You realize that the Gunks were "developed" about 50 years before the term "sport climbing" was invented, yes?

So what's the point? Of course things are influenced by their historical context, and that's partly why the Gunks are as they are today. Yet sport has been around for 50 years, yet the Gunks is still not geared toward sport climbing. It could change, I don't think it will, since it's a good place for trad. Nor do I think it should. I don't how or why the fact that the Gunks were developped before sport climbing invalidates the points that different crags have different ethos and those should be respected, even if you don't share them?

PS: I'm not sure you really, really need to put [sic] when you're quoting from a forum that shows the quoted italicized text directly and the name of the user who spelled it in bold? I mean the practice probably had merit when people wrote everything by hand, and perhaps if you're writing an essay... might be a bit redundant here though... ;)

As for the ladder rung: well yes and no. Rungs aren't necessarily that good to do crimps. You could use a tree's branch as well I guess. I think the hangboard is better, whether that makes it worthwhile to have up there, I'll put you in the no camp....

Franck Vee wrote:PS: I'm not sure you really, really need to put [sic] when you're quoting from a forum that shows the quoted italicized text directly and the name of the user who spelled it in bold? I mean the practice probably had merit when people wrote everything by hand, and perhaps if you're writing an essay... might be a bit redundant here though... ;)

Actually, you do, as beat into my by my graduate advisor.

Franck Vee wrote:

So what's the point? Of course things are influenced by their historical context, and that's partly why the Gunks are as they are today. Yet sport has been around for 50 years, yet the Gunks is still not geared toward sport climbing.

The way it was written, it could be interpreted that the staunch trad ethic of the Gunks was a response to sport climbing. Having encountered massive misunderstanding or downright incorrect assumptions and beliefs about the Gunks over the years on various forums I'm kind of sensitized to it. I get what you're saying. BTW, in the US, sport climbing is only about 35 years old.

 It could change, I don't think it will, since it's a good place for trad. 

And the 1986 ban on new fixed protection from that point forward has something to do with it as well.

As for the ladder rung: well yes and no. Rungs aren't necessarily that good to do crimps. You could use a tree's branch as well I guess. I think the hangboard is better, whether that makes it worthwhile to have up there, I'll put you in the no camp....

Not climbing at those grades doesn't really allow commentary on the need for warm-up (which is a whole other discussion). Having never been to Rumney, I don't really have a yes or no opinion on the hangboard.  Generally I'm pretty lenient in my attitude towards mostly/totally sport areas. I'd be very outraged by bolting Serenity Crack; Wings of Desire at Skaha otoh, doesn't bother me at all.

Dana Bartlett wrote:

I think using [sic] indicates that the preceding word was incorrectly spelled. 

Well - you could find more authoritative sources, but from this: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/74428/how-do-i-properly-use-sic-for-a-phrase-or-do-i-use-it-at-all

(There's also a related topic link within this).

Broadly speaking, the point of [sic] is to say "look I know there's a mistake in that passage, but it's a direct quote from someone who fucked it up and now I'm stuck to quoting with the mistake in it because if I don't, it's not really a direct quote anymore and some jerk reader may later pedantically say I'm liberally editing my sources to make them say whatever the hell I would want them to say to support my point. So I'm going to directly quote it with the mistake in it, but then I'm going to throw in a mention that I'm smarter than him and I spotted the mistake."

My point is that forum quotations, which makes it uber-obvious you're directly quoting someone and who that person is and therefore that any error in that quote is theirs not yours, makes the use of sic redundant.

It's not like 98% of writers/readers on the forum cared all that much about error-free messages. I care that it's readable easily and overall good [english,french etc.]. But typos etc.... meh.

Marc801 C wrote:

The way it was written, it could be interpreted that the staunch trad ethic of the Gunks was a response to sport climbing. Having encountered massive misunderstanding or downright incorrect assumptions and beliefs about the Gunks over the years on various forums I'm kind of sensitized to it. I get what you're saying. BTW, in the US, sport climbing is only about 35 years old.

And the 1986 ban on new fixed protection from that point forward has something to do with it as well.

Not climbing at those grades doesn't really allow commentary on the need for warm-up (which is a whole other discussion). Having never been to Rumney, I don't really have a yes or no opinion on the hangboard.  Generally I'm pretty lenient in my attitude towards mostly/totally sport areas. I'd be very outraged by bolting Serenity Crack; Wings of Desire at Skaha otoh, doesn't bother me at all.

Oh just checked and true - roughly 35 years. I had just assumed that it originated in the US (Smith Rocks) and that this was about 50 years ago. Sport climbing just feels like a very US-y thing to do.

Didn't know about the ban.... however those things can change. Ownerships, agreements etc... are shaped by the forces of the day. Of course there's tremendous inertia related to those, but if let's say every trad climber had dropped their racks and got to sport climbing when it got around, perhaps the pressures would have been strong enough for the ban to be lifted/relaxed/culture changed. Or if sport climbers weren't for the most part cheap dirtbags and if there was more to money to make with running sport climbing areas, then again perhaps things would change.

For warm-up well... For me, I'm not climbing that hard (12s roughly), but I do see the importance of good warmups to avoid injuries (after a couple said injuries). I think that getting at around 11/11+, crimpy routes, or overhangs with crimpy hard moves, can really be dangerous. Heck, maybe even before that (say a beginner climber pushing theirs limits at some 10+). Running laps on the trail or riding a bike to the gym are good cardio warm-up, but they don't warm up specific muscles and even less so tendons. The only way to properly warm up tendons for a climb at your limit seems to be to use them on progressively harder crimps/holds. The next best thing, for Waimea, would be to warmup at other easier crags then move there. But the point of the OP was that winter sessions tends to be shorter...