MP Guessing Game

In addition to ticking or rating a route, MP users have the option to vote on a number of stars. Which 5 routes have the most votes on MP? We're talking about the total number of votes. (This doesn't necessarily correlate with quality.) For example, Exum Ridge has 864 votes. Which 5 routes have the most? 

RULES: 

Anyone can easily find this information by browsing the website. To preserve the integrity of this totally pointless game, created almost exclusively to entertain me during a long and boring meeting, participants must post their replies strictly from memory. Do not browse the homepages for individual states or climbing areas, or your send will be invalidated. The winner will receive a ratty, purple sling that I found somewhere. (Winner pays S&H.)

My guesses (although I will not pay S&H for a ratty purple sling):

High Exposure

Southeast Buttress of Cathedral Peak

Royal Arches

Snake Dike

Corrugation Corner

Dark Shadows 

Jake Messner wrote:

My guesses (although I will not pay S&H for a ratty purple sling):

Fine. I’ll split s&h if you win. 

Epinephrine

Bastille Crack

Yellow Spur

Durrance

Snake Dike

• I would assume something easy to moderate to allow for more people to have tried their hand and want to add their voice to the pot (I'd lean towards the easier routes as they'll have the dual population of noobs having a go as well as experienced climbers using it to take new climbers out for their first outdoor experience) 
• A short approach would also increase the population of climbers. As well as ease of access and proximity to a high population center (which often will correspond to the popularity of the area as a whole)
• At first I think sport since it has a lower bar of economic and experiential entry but I'm unsure as easy trad will often draw quite a few people "because it's easy" so I'm going to stick with trad. 
• I think longer multipitch climbs will often have more of an impact on a climber in terms of the effort and views from the top which then leads to a higher likilyhood of that climber taking the time to then go in and make a vote on MP.

Sooooo (showing my west coast bias) 

1. Incredible Hand Crack 
2. Supercrack of the Desert
3. Royal Arches
4. After Six
5. Solar Slab
6. Whatever climb at the gunks that has the best ratio of "easy" to exposure. 

The real guessing game on MP is this: 

How good is this information? 

Guy Keesee wrote:

The real guessing game on MP is this: 

How good is this information? 

Is that your final answer? ;)

dayum .. uhhh .. gonna guess Bastille crack tbh. don't know enough shitty easy trad climbs to fill out the list. High E and a 5.8 at bruise bros. 

Good game

Bastille 

High E

Five gallon 

Nut cracker 

Dark shadows 

I’m sure there’s one at J tree that’s way up there but I haven’t climbed there so nothing comes to mind. :-(

Fail Falling wrote:

• I would assume something easy to moderate to allow for more people to have tried their hand and want to add their voice to the pot (I'd lean towards the easier routes as they'll have the dual population of noobs having a go as well as experienced climbers using it to take new climbers out for their first outdoor experience) 
• A short approach would also increase the population of climbers. As well as ease of access and proximity to a high population center (which often will correspond to the popularity of the area as a whole)
• At first I think sport since it has a lower bar of economic and experiential entry but I'm unsure as easy trad will often draw quite a few people "because it's easy" so I'm going to stick with trad. 
• I think longer multipitch climbs will often have more of an impact on a climber in terms of the effort and views from the top which then leads to a higher likilyhood of that climber taking the time to then go in and make a vote on MP.

Yeah - these criteria make a lot of sense.  I also think in the US most inspiring accessible easy routes are trad, since if they're inspiring, accessible and easy, someone would have done them before sport climbing became popular.  Based on that, I will say

1. S.E. Buttress of Cathedral Peak

2. High Exposure

3. Solar Slab

4. Bastille Crack

5. First flatiron east face

In no particular order: High E, Dark Shadows, Epinephrine, Bastile Crack, Rewritten

Others I wouldn't be surprised to see:

Birdland (by chance I saw how many ticks this had yesterday and remember being very surprised), 3rd flatiron, Supercrack, Snake Dike, Corrugation Corner, '[Redacted]'s Ceiling', CCK

Having never climbed in CA I'm sure there's some JTree or Yosemite classic I'm missing. 

Maybe there's a sport route? Something at Rumney or the Red? Underdog or To Defy the Laws of Tradition? 

A better question is which no star route has the most votes?

No one has all five yet. The game is afoot. 

In hindsight, I'd remove Durrance and replace with something at the RRG. A notoriously easy 12a, that aspiring hardpeople will want to send and current hardpeople will want to send & downgrade. Or maybe High Exposure.

The Proj was founded in Boulder and there will likely be a bias towards the area and Colorado in general.

Looking forward to the answers...

Here's the list:

1. Bastille Crack - 1,960

2. Southeast Buttress - 1,601

3. High Exposure - 1,526

4. Rewritten - 1,454

5. Stolen Chimney - 1,331

Like others, I had assumed that some 5.9 sport route at RRG or Shelf Road would take the lead. Not even close. One of the highest-voted sport routes that I could find was 5 Gallon Buckets with 1,216. It could be that moderate sport routes aren't inspiring enough to warrant a vote even if they see more actual ascents than something like Southeast Buttress. 

All the Red Rock routes mentioned sat around the 1200s, just below Stolen Chimney. I guess we shouldn't underestimate the Instagram effect. I haven't climbed Ancient Art, but I understand that it's forgettable mud climbing to a photogenic summit. 

I was also shocked to see two Eldo routes on the list. Isn't there a thread somewhere about the Colorado mountains being crowded?

Thanks for playing! 

Creed

Double cross has 1,467 votes

Sam Cieply wrote:

Double cross has 1,467 votes

Shit! You're right! What else did I miss? 

I don't think there's actually an easy way to look this up. Double Cross isn't even in California's expanded list of classics. But I did a lot of clicking and these are the ones with more than 1,200 votes that I found in order:

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105748490/the-bastille-crack
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105835705/southeast-buttress
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105798994/high-exposure
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105721615/double-cross
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105750106/rewritten
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105717310/stolen-chimney
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105732380/dark-shadows
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105733115/birdland
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105833505/the-nutcracker-suite-aka-nutcracker
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105732422/epinephrine
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105789060/5-gallon-buckets
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/105717367/incredible-hand-crack

Sam Cieply wrote:

Double cross has 1,467 votes

But how many fatalities, and does that impact whether or how we count those votes?

J W wrote:

1,467.

The deadliest route in America! (Next guessing game?)