Trad gear needed on bolted routes

OK Can someone please explain to me the rational behind doing this... Your on a climb that has lets say 7-10 bolts on it.. but there happens to be a small crack 2/3 of the way up.. So they don't put a bolt there.. This leaves you with a sport climb that requires one piece of trad gear to make it safe.

What is the point? if there is already a full line of bolts on the climb why can't you just add one more to make it bolt protected. Does saying oh my climb is a trad climb because you need to place a red Camelot at the crux and only clip 9 bolts make you feel better?

This ethic makes no sense to me especially when there are other climbs at a cliff that take only draws.. It seems like someone is taking the if it can go on gear then it should not be bolted ethic waaaaaayyy to far. In my opinion it's just asking to hurt someone who sees 10 sport climbs and doesn't know that one of them needs a cam to keep him from dying..

I'm open to hearing the rational.. Please inform me

Michael, ethics vary by region. Hopefully you'll get some good insight in this sub-forum, but it might also be worth your while to post in the NY sub-forum, or simply ask locals.

FA prerogative, I guess.

While that sounds like an annoying way to establish a route, you have to meet the climb on its terms. Not every climb is for every person. You may not have the skills, courage, strength, conditions, or gear to do a route at one time or ever. Move on to the next route.

As far as hurting people, a competent climber should be able to see where there is a gap between protection points and judge for themselves whether to attempt the next run or to bail. Climbing involves judgment, that is part of the game and part of the fun. There is room for multiple approaches to climbing routes and that is what you are pushing up against. Embrace a little variety. Or, hell, contact the FA party or those who know more about the route and find out what the rationale was and if they'd be amenable to adding a bolt.

I mean I do get not over bolting.. and I for one think if it's went up on trad gear.. I'm not advocating making everything a safe no danger no adventure sport climb.. and I totally get that some "trad climbs" only have bolts.. some slabs with 40 foot run outs for example. but I just can't understand having 100's of bolts at a crag and leaving a crux section on one or two climbs require a cam.. It seems asinine to me.. I hope someone has a solid reason other than ego.

Colonel Mustard wrote:FA prerogative, I guess. While that sounds like an annoying way to establish a route, you have to meet the climb on its terms. Not every climb is for every person. You may not have the skills, courage, strength, conditions, or gear to do a route at one time or ever. Move on to the next route.

It just feels like adding a "fake" challenge to a climb to boost your ego..

Michael Spiesbach wrote: It just feels like adding a "fake" challenge to a climb to boost your ego..

Isn't it all a "fake" challenge? Why go up a cliff when you could go around?

Colonel Mustard wrote: Isn't it all a "fake" challenge? Why go up a cliff when you could go around?

touché sir...

Michael Spiesbach wrote:I hope someone has a solid reason other than ego.

There´s no "solid" reason to go rock climbing, why should any other aspect of our sport be different?

Again, I'm not saying that wouldn't be slightly annoying when you could just clip draws, but there are different reasons it may have been put up that way, or maybe it is just ego stroking. For good or bad, there is plenty of that in our sport.

Why waste a bolt when you could place your own perfectly fine gear?

I don't care much for mixed routes, either, and I love pure trad routes. But what I want doesn't matter, this is just the way it is. I try to bring a small rack to all areas that have mixed routes now. That even includes some lines at Avalon, first tier. It certainly includes anything in the Badger Mountain area, Wet Mountains, and Madakat.

It's meh for sure, but hey, you gotta adapt!

Now if I was developing a route and there was a two foot crack along an otherwise blank face with only face features, I'm bolting the shit out of that.

Now, all that said, the best mixed climb I have been on is "Climb of the Ancient Mariner" at Lumpy. Trad pitch 1 crack with awesome bolted slab pitch 2.

Michael Spiesbach wrote: It just feels like adding a "fake" challenge to a climb to boost your ego..

So mixed lines are egotistical now?

Not bolting next to a perfectly good crack/placement is fairly common, usually its a "trad" climb with a bolt or two but sometimes the opposite.

Bolts cost money.

Personally BITD those mixed routes helped me realize that I could do harder trad lines so I like and appreciate them.

Plus it keeps the sportos from greasing the rock up!

I agree it can seem contrived. Playing devils advocate I could see how it might be ease the transition for a sport climber looking to start leading trad. (eh, that sounds kind of contrived too.)

"Ego" . . . . . You are proposing that the first ascentionist should just make it easier for you and other like minded folks. Prioritizing your own convenience of experience over someone else's is a great example of your ego guiding your thinking! People climb for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes the planning (what pieces do i need for this pitch, etc), logistics (save this piece for the top, long runner on that one, etc), and non gymnastic factors provide the value of the climbing experience. Maybe a small section of trad gear/crack climbing is just the spark for a sport climber to gain an interest in trad climbing. As said above, move on to one of the other fully bolted routes if you are inclined, learn to tolerate other peoples preferences, be open to out of your comfort zone experiences and challenges, go learn to develop climbs and do it your way if its that important to you.

I agree I always have you in mind when putting up routes not the nature of the climb or rock etc

a good route looks almost exactly like what we practice in the gym that way we are prepared properly etc

Was just talking about this the other day. I think there's a fine line.. if it's a trad route with a few bolts where no gear is available - okay, I get that.. but I would tend to agree with you that if it's really a sport line with a few trad placements available then it does seem pointless to me. Especially somewhere with mostly bolted routes (in this case is it even ethics anymore?). That being said..try out Saratoga on Crane Mountain (5.8) it's super fun and it's the latter (mostly trad with a few bolts).

Edit: in the case of the route mentioned by s.price - I would agree there is no reason to bolt a perfectly good 30 foot crack. I think that's a little different though. The routes I picture when Mike mentions it are all bolts with 1 or 2 gear placements thrown in.

I'm not talking mixed ... I'm talking fully bolted area... one piece of gear.. at the crux on a fully bolted line... I think the only person who made a logical argument was that bolts cost money..

Placing a bolt next to a bomber crack is just plain lazy, I can not think of a single instance where this should be acceptable

s.price wrote:Why not establish the route in said fashion? I am currently developing a multi pitch cliff that is predominately bolted routes. The premiere route on the cliff is a mix of bolts and gear. Why? The first 60 feet is thin technical face. This is bolted and leads to 30 feet of finger crack which takes great gear. The next pitch is 30 feet of more techy bolted face leading to the crux OW pitch of 65 feet. The OW is not bolted and takes marginal gear making for a spicy lead. From the top of the OW the route finishes with 40 more feet of bolt protected face to the top. The 6 other routes found on this cliff are bolts from top to bottom as they are face climbs. I could easily bolt up the finger crack and OW but choose not to. Why? It would certainly make the OW easier and a bit safer and then you would only need draws for the whole route. That strikes me as dumbing the route down for the masses. I prefer to establish routes that force a leader to step up to the challenge. Either show up with the proper gear and mindset or don't.

See I think this is completely different from what iw as talking about.. Your supplementing a trad line with some bolts to make it not a death route..

If it's a sustained trad section I get it.. but to just say oh well you could get one piece in.. at one part of an otherwise completely bolted single pitch sport climb still seems silly to me

Matt Lisenby wrote:"Ego" . . . . . You are proposing that the first ascentionist should just make it easier for you and other like minded folks. Prioritizing your own convenience of experience over someone else's is a great example of your ego guiding your thinking! People climb for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes the planning (what pieces do i need for this pitch, etc), logistics (save this piece for the top, long runner on that one, etc), and non gymnastic factors provide the value of the climbing experience. Maybe a small section of trad gear/crack climbing is just the spark for a sport climber to gain an interest in trad climbing. As said above, move on to one of the other fully bolted routes if you are inclined, learn to tolerate other peoples preferences, be open to out of your comfort zone experiences and challenges, go learn to develop climbs and do it your way if its that important to you.

I almost exclusively climb trad and I generally feel climbs that don't need bolts should not have them.. It just seems silly to force a trad placement or x rated move in an area that is 99% bolts already.. I also bring gear with me when going to climb "sport in the northeast" because I know this is a common practice.. it just still seems silly

Barrett Pauer wrote:Placing a bolt next to a bomber crack is just plain lazy, I can not think of a single instance where this should be acceptable

Then never go to Rumney...