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John Ely
Trad climber
DC
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Topic Author's Original Post - Nov 26, 2014 - 08:02am PT
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Who knows if anyone is interested in this question?
I think the historical areas at least in the lower 48 make a big upside down U from Joshua Tree to the Valley to Eldo to the Gunks to Seneca and on to stuff in the deeper South, as for instance certain meals in North Carolina. (Of course, lots of these published numbers have been repaired or adjusted.) To Illustrate the arch: e.g, 'Touch and Go', 'Central Pillar', 'Green Spur', 'MF' or 'Ants Line', 'Marshall's Madness' to pick some mid to low end 9s. (Gunks seems to have undergone the most corrections upwards.)
The most striking examples that come to mind are from Seneca. I think Triple S - even though it gets slimier and slimier - is still one of the hardest 5.8s in North America, and recall a time when the Cottonmouth, now a 10a or b I believe, has a guidebook rating of 8+. The 7 called Beesting used to be rated 5.4.
Examples from the past? Other geographical models?
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Greg Barnes
climber
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:48am PT
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One issue with Yosemite, Joshua Tree, Tuolumne, etc is that a lot of the less-than-classic "moderate" routes have seen so few ascents that the guidebooks just have one or two opinions on the routes. So if you get off the beaten path, it's not at all unusual to find very sandbagged routes just because the FA was having a good day and no one else bothered to give the author an opinion. Sometimes you find the reverse as well.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:52am PT
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The "least sandbagged" would emply no sandbag....meaning the most accurately rated area. Now where do you think that is?
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martygarrison
Trad climber
Washington DC
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:58am PT
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Most sandbagged - Granite Mountain
Least or most over rated - Joshua Tree
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doughnutnational
Gym climber
its nice here in the spring
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:03am PT
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For me locally (Fresno Area), both the Willow Creek Wall and Squarenail allowed me to onsite a few hard 5.11 's and one 5.12, something I couldn't do when I actually climbed alot. Thanks Mr Spencer.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:15am PT
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Mt. Woodson seemed to be a sandbag. Because everything is short I guess?
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:23am PT
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I'm with the OP. The obvious standout - the first and only place I thought of - is Seneca Rocks in West Virginia.
I still have the old yellow guidebook. Man ...
Too bad about Pete Absolom. Is Cal Swoager still around? That dude was STRONG.
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WBraun
climber
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:31am PT
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Yosemite Valley most sandbagged in North America.
There's "Valley Locals" with pitchforks, sh!tbags, potatoes to put up your tailpipe, and TKO's if you don't abide .....
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Gnome Ofthe Diabase
climber
Out Of Bed
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:33am PT
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question are ratings soft
question are ratings hard
question are you climbing
No question mark No guide book
go climbing with no guidebook ??
How would you find the rock ??
Is there any Out side clybing??
Close to the inside clybing??
How far from the parking lot??
that is now the measure that is the most important now.
How far from the car?.
that out of my system this has never gone away even though the route chose to fall down,
Loose Lips At JTree, depending on who said what. also one of the ski tracks, actually a lot at JTree.
South Dakota had. some crazy choppers....The Sandblaster...Vertigo..Hairy Pin...Yikes!!
(The Jester on Queen pin?? the last time that I did not check I messed up the names)
Run out slabs South vs West??
I come from The bank and MillBrook has the biggest baddest longest walktokill yourself routes East of the Lone Peak Cirq.
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stevep
Boulder climber
Salt Lake, UT
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:34am PT
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Index in Washington would be pretty high on the Most list of places I've visited.
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StahlBro
Trad climber
San Diego, CA
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:49am PT
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It is also important to look at the date of the FA. Early on a lot of people did not really know what 5.10 was, so 5.9 was thought to be pretty hard. This shifted some of the ratings downward.
The other thing is the type of climbing. The Gunks can be pretty demanding at many grades if you are used to climbing hard slabs or cracks on dummy domes. The first couple of times I climbed there I didn't have that much issue with the ratings, but you had to have some upper body endurance or you would get to the last moves thinking your guns had turned into tiny little T-Rex arms.
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Cragar
climber
MSLA - MT
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:04am PT
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Red Rocks always felt soft to me and StoneHill/Kookanusa seemed to have a little bit of a sandbag feel to me and I just figured the place had a Napoleon complex!!
Some of the older chossy routes in BLodgett can feel hard for their rating...plus, they are chossy!!
What about that Valley 10.c rating? I remember those grades feeling hard for their rating. I think it depends on when it was first done?
EDit: I will second the Index comment above...I always liked the sandbag feel of the place. It goes hand in hand with the place, kinda like the Coors in the hands of folks I met there with their respective micro-beer-bellies. Oh, and they were hiking the 5.11 splitters!
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martygarrison
Trad climber
Washington DC
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:08am PT
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Interesting on StoneHill/Kookanusa. I climbed there a lot and felt the ratings were spot on re Yosemite. Then I climbed some 12b called Widow Maker and damm it was hard. This is in the late 80's btw so it could have changed.
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Eric Beck
Sport climber
Bishop, California
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:11am PT
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Tahquitz, Joshua Tree are right on by definition.
Some observations tom other areas:
Devils Lake, Wisconsin stiff +2
Mt Lemmon, Arizona, stiff +2
Yosemite, Tuolumne, soft -.5
Clark Canyon, soft -1
Skaha, soft -.5
Owens River Gorge right on.
Alabama Hills soft -1
Kimbrough's theorem I think applies here: "The more obscure the climbing area, the stiffer the ratings." The idea is that in areas that develop in isolation people are thinking "This seems pretty hard, but for real climbers in Yosemite it would be trivial, so we'll call it 5.7".
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drljefe
climber
El Presidio San Augustin del Tucson
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:16am PT
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Arizona.
If you see a "+"....take note.
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Mike Bolte
Trad climber
Planet Earth
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:46am PT
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I agree with Eric and would add:
Squamish: soft -1
Eldo: stiff +0.5
Index: Stiff +1.5
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AP
Trad climber
Calgary
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:50am PT
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Everything is supposed compared to be Southern California 1970's gradings.
I think J Tree is quite variable, some 9's are harder than certain 10a'a
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Elcapinyoazz
Social climber
Joshua Tree
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Nov 26, 2014 - 10:57am PT
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My personal experience:
Accurate: Yos, Index, Josh, Idyllwild, Granite Mtn, Seneca, Vedauwoo, most of NC
Soft: Colorado (especially Rifle), Utah, Nevada, Squamish
Really, really soft: Jack's Canyon.
Hyped as sandbagged, but not: Gunks, New Hampshire granite.
Too slick to rate: Devils Lake, Carderock/Great Falls.
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CA.Timothy
climber
California
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Nov 26, 2014 - 11:11am PT
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In my opinion, a large amount of modern sport climbs in the eastern sierra are overrated.
Edit: Clarks, Dike etc are quite overrated. The gorge not so much imo
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Mike Friedrichs
Sport climber
City of Salt
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Nov 26, 2014 - 11:21am PT
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I've found, in general, that climbs are more difficult for a given rating in the east especially in the 5.9-5.11 range. Harder routes seem more consistent to me.
The softest ratings by far used to be Indian Creek. A lot of routes were down-rated by Bloom.
Interestingly I've found that as soon as a route is really polished, had holds break off, or became totally wired by the guidebook author it got down-rated. Never quite understood that.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Nov 26, 2014 - 12:10pm PT
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I'm with Eric in the application of Kimbrough's Theorum (or is it Kimbrough's Conjecture?), although several Squarenail ratings seem a little soft to me.
I learned ratings defined by standard climbs, but, ironically, some of those standards have had their ratings change over the years. For example, when I first started climbing, Moby Dick Center and Crack of Cawn were the definitions of a 5.9 climb in the Valley. No one does Crack of Dawn any more, seemingly, and the first pitch of Moby Dick Center has a 5.10a rating for its early move. Oh, well. . .
John
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Bad Climber
climber
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Nov 26, 2014 - 12:21pm PT
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I've climbed in lots of areas, but THE most sandbaggy is Granite Mountain in AZ. If the route is one of the older ones, it's good to assume about one number grade variance to other areas, i.e. 5.9 on the Mountain is 5.10 just about anywhere else. That sh*t's hard up there!
BAd
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TomKimbrough
Social climber
Salt Lake City
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Nov 26, 2014 - 01:26pm PT
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Kimbrough's theorem:
The relative difficulty of the rating is inversely proportional to the size of the area.
Perhaps true at one time. My son suggests that with more travel and communication between areas, it no longer applies.
TK
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
Nothing creative to say
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Nov 26, 2014 - 01:58pm PT
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Is there any corollary rule to the theorem?
If the difficulty of the rating is inversely proportional to the size of the area, but if the average difficulty is say 2 standard deviations to the right or left, then the theorem doesn't apply.
In other words, if we have a Jailhouse type sport crag where no grade is less than 5.11, then does the theorem still apply?
Hypothetically, what if the area is the size of Josh, but a ratings distribution like Jailhouse? Does it stilly apply?
Interesting idea!
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TomKimbrough
Social climber
Salt Lake City
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:06pm PT
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Well......
When the theorem was developed there were only a few 11s and no 12s......
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:11pm PT
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Arizona.
If you see a "+"....take note.
I second that motion.
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dagibbs
Trad climber
Ottawa, Ontario
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:31pm PT
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In general, stuff put up in the 70s and 80s and not re-graded tends to be stiffly graded/sandbagged by modern standards.
Stuff put up more recently, or stuff that has been re-graded tends to be normal to soft.
For instance, in JTree I was headed up a felt-solid-to-me 5.4 (Miramontes), got down, and some dude had a really old guide that had it listed at 5.1. Seemed reasonable at 5.4, would have felt massively sand-bagged at 5.1.
Of the places I've climbed in North America, I'd have to say El Potrero Chico felt the softest in its grading.
For stiff... some of the Gunks grades felt stiff. Some of the "old-school" stuff at my local crags also feel pretty stiff. (I don't expect over-hanging lay-back moves on a 5.4, for example. And there's a 5.9 that a solid 5.11 climber had to French-free to get up.)
Also agreed that some of the Alabama Hills grading seemed soft -- but not, I think, as soft as EPC.
Of course, my commentary applies to stuff graded in the easy-to-moderate range. I don't climb well enough to comment on relative grades from 5.11 on up.
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TomKimbrough
Social climber
Salt Lake City
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:56pm PT
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So....
Since it is the "Yosemite" Decimal System, actually developed at Tahquitz, by definition, ratings at Yosemite/Tahquitz must be exact.
Right......?
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Oregon
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:57pm PT
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Some additions to Eric's list.
Smith. Same as Owen's
Seneca.
Old routes- +1.5
new routes. +.5
Gunks .
Old routes +.5 or +1
Remember the Stannard grade tops out at 5.10 ( ask)
New routes seem Yosemite-ish, but the climbing is different.
Stone Mountain NC
Pretty much Tuolumne. The Rock is better. The runouts are longer. I bolt per pitch is common.
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Oregon
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:59pm PT
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Nov 26, 2014 - 02:56pm PT
So....
Since it is the "Yosemite" Decimal System, actually developed at Tahquitz, by definition, ratings at Yosemite/Tahquitz must be exact.
Right......?
Nah. They're soft. ;)
More important is they seem well calibrated. You can get big surprises other places.
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Oregon
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:01pm PT
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Eric...
Are you back on the rock?
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tradmanclimbs
Ice climber
Pomfert VT
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:08pm PT
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Seneca mostly sanbagged. bananna 5.6 would 10a pg many places. west pole is pretty funny for 7+ etc. etc. some places in the Daks simeler. Gunks 8+ mostly because Todd swain downgraded some of the 5.9's to 8+. We usually look at NH with a few exceptions as kinder friendlier grade than NY here in the NE.
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Darwin
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:10pm PT
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Whatever I'm on at the moment.
and what drljefe said:
Arizona.
If you see a "+"....take note. Sure worked for me, Tony and Gary. Especially 5.7+ . ieeeeeeee.
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AP
Trad climber
Calgary
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:35pm PT
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I can't believe no one has mentioned Cdn Rockies 5.9 A2
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:50pm PT
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You will never find easier clip ups than Custer state park. If you can't climb the grade there then you can't climb that grade anywhere.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Nov 26, 2014 - 03:52pm PT
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Oh and vedawoo has some super easy cracks for the grade also.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Nov 26, 2014 - 05:00pm PT
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Once all is said and done you can either do a climb or you can't regardless of the grade affixed to it. The human psych being what it is, people flock to soft rating areas. Seems that they feel better when failure comes with a larger number attached to it.
Kind of funny when you think about it.
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tradmanclimbs
Ice climber
Pomfert VT
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Nov 26, 2014 - 05:26pm PT
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Donini for the win! I hate getting spanked on easy climbs..... I do love Seneca though:)
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Eric Beck
Sport climber
Bishop, California
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Nov 26, 2014 - 06:18pm PT
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Hi Larry (Lorenzo). Was out at the boulders this afternoon, doing my core program of wimp routes together with the first few moves of some other of my favorites. Don"t want to get to high yet. Was in shorts, thought it might the last chance this fall.
Tom: ran into a kid out there, Nick Schley, who knew Paul. He met him at the Crested Butte - Aspen ski race.
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Nov 26, 2014 - 07:11pm PT
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For wide cracks, Vedauwoo is definitely sandbagged relative to Yosemite. I believe it is due to two completely different things--Bob Scarpelli (you big lug) and the flaring nature of Vedauwoo cracks.
I can think of 5 or 6 Vedauwoo 5.10a to 5.10bs that are harder than, say, Ahab (5.10b). In Yosemite, I would be embarrassed to struggle on anything (wide) under 5.11. At Vedauwoo, you never know.
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Nov 26, 2014 - 07:26pm PT
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Devils Lake- harder
Ciy of Rocks and Yosemite- easier
Devils Tower? NO need for numbers- if you can run the long distance you don't need no stinkin' sand bag
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:19pm PT
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Bahhhhhh! Never noticed much of a dif in grades from different places I've visited.
Everywhere has their test pieces & their gimmes.
Once you are used to the stone and style of movement it shouldn't vary much. Some places take longer than others to adapt to because you don't have the prerequisite experience with that style of climbing, but I don't think that's reason to call an entire area sandbagged.
Personally, I'm more interested in the areas with the nicest lines on the best rock these days.
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:29pm PT
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Nice thread. I thought about starting one like this as we toured the southwestish.
Owens River seemed pretty spot on, although China Doll seemed tough for a 8 and sporty to the first bolt.
Red Rocks seemed easy.
Only climbed at one spot in Moab, but it seemed fairly easy.
City of Rocks - Seems like the sport routes are a tad soft while the trad routes can be fairly stiff.
Tahoe is all over the place. Sugarloaf seems hard. The leap seems right on. The newer sport routes (at least on the south shore) seem om the softer side.
My first leads were at Luther Spires. Going from clipping bolts on Jane's Spy to a 5.7 trad route at the loaf was quite an awakening.
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AP
Trad climber
Calgary
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Nov 26, 2014 - 08:53pm PT
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How about sandbagging yourself?
a few years ago a local climber went back to a route he had put up in1975. Chris had rated it 5.7 at the time.
This time he thought it was 5.9and backed off due to poor pro.
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Kalimon
Social climber
Ridgway, CO
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Nov 26, 2014 - 09:46pm PT
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Ratings don't mean sh#t.
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Evel
Trad climber
Nedsterdam CO
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Nov 27, 2014 - 05:42am PT
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Like Pete, I, too thought of Seneca Rocks before I even clicked on the thread.
Anyone remember the cover of climbing with the title 'so you think you can climb 5.10?'
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Jon Clark
climber
philadelphia
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Nov 27, 2014 - 06:07am PT
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I'm curious how people define a sandbag. A mere letter grade, a full number, or simply a climb you got slapped around on that you expected to send?
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Larry
Trad climber
Bisbee
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Nov 27, 2014 - 06:39am PT
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Where do you "send" a route?
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Jon Clark
climber
philadelphia
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Nov 27, 2014 - 06:42am PT
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Not sure Larry, perhaps the same place you "take" a dump.
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MisterE
Gym climber
Bishop, CA
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Nov 27, 2014 - 07:08am PT
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Canadian Rockies 5.9 A2...Haha! Yup.
Agree with Granite Mountain, AZ
What about Looking Glass and Whitesides in North Carolina? My experiences are the are both hard for the grades AND frightening!
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bixquite
Social climber
humboldt nation
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Nov 27, 2014 - 08:55am PT
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index will make you check ya self
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