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billygoat
climber
3hrs to El Cap Meadow, 1.25hrs Pinns, 42min Castle
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Tom Evans--
Thank you for your edit. I couldn't agree more. "Lot's of new bolts" is a very subjective statement, and we should consider what is being attempted. That said, a 120 foot fall can be quite safe in a few circumstances. In others, I don't think anybody in their right mind would have a problem with an extra bolt or two (or three). Time will tell. So let's try to keep the rumors to a minimum and see what happens.
By the way. If anybody needs to make some money, I know where you can get about 3,000 feet of rope to sell on Ebay.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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In 25+ years of living in Yosemite, I've never heard of one person climbing Arturus (I'm sure it's been done but it's rare)
The Topo is certainly a lie as it' shows straight forward straight up A1 crack systems and it ain't so. Certainly such a route on Half Dome would get done more if there weren't a lot of devils in the details. Note that A1 (which is certainly a lie on this route) can also be c3+ or worse.
Mescalito doesn't get done much in the winter but it's super popular aid trade route in season. We'll have to find out the real story before passing judgement.
Peace
karl
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nick d
Trad climber
nm
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"Unfortunately I had no way to properly remove the bolts", so I clipped em all instead.
Yeah, spray on blowhard. I personally did not agree with Todd Skinner's climbing ethics, but he was a standard setting guy. Dudes like him are bound to rub some people the wrong way.
If your only claim to fame is spraying about yourself non-stop on the internet (and I think it is) you might consider stopping your constant slagging on Todd.
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA
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One thing I don't understand about this discussion is all the secrecy of who the climber attempting to free the route actually is. C'mon. The guy is not a deep undercover agent for the CIA. He's climbing a route on El Capitan in plain sight of everybody. Heck, Werner or Karl could just hike over to the Big Stone and ask him when he comes down.
Bruce
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elcap-pics
climber
Crestline CA
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Well there are only a few people on the planet who could attempt something like this... the Hubers are not here... so ... who could he be? Seems obvious to me...
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James
climber
A tent in the redwoods
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I wonder who it could possibly be!?
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WBraun
climber
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Me too, hee hee
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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According to the article, it was precisely b/c he thought the aid was easy there that he didn't feel adding the bolts would bring down the aid experience.
I call big stinky bullshit on that.
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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I'm thinking that instead of everyone being really quiet about whose fixed lines are where, perhaps it should be widely known? After many months of taking aid to eliminate aid, tales of the line-fixer's "free" ascent will be on many publication covers...why keep mum about the process?
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James
climber
A tent in the redwoods
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drum roll please....It's Tommy Caldwell!
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caughtinside
Social climber
Davis, CA
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Well, to be fair, the Arcturus article mentioned that the crack took marginal pins, and that the choice was made to bolt because of the unsustainable nature of nailing.
I think it is easy to be critical of the action, but to honestly evaluate it you have to look at everything. These guys talked to Robbins, they considered nailing the crack, and ultimately they placed a few bolts (can't remember how many.)
It'd be interesting to get Robbin's take on that article and the route...
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Concur with Melissa.
Karl has a point that A1 may be a sandbag rating, and could be C3+. And certainly some of the placements may be difficult, which simply means that you should run it out above the good or easily-made placements, and not add bolts.
"In others, I don't think anybody in their right mind would have a problem with an extra bolt or two (or three). Time will tell."
If you have been climbing an A3 head seam, and suddenly there is a big honkin' 3/8" bolt added to the route, you have substantially altered the route. And the nature of climbing dictates that the most likely place a person would want to place a bolt would be in such a location, where the aid climbing pro is marginal.
Hopefully Tommy won't do this. He told me that while he used Todd Skinner's bolts on Dihedral Wall, he did not place any. And speaking of Dihedral:
" 'Unfortunately I had no way to properly remove the bolts', so I clipped em all instead."
I think knott.
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WBraun
climber
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But!!!!!! Looky here,
You placed a OMG a Pition ......
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James
climber
A tent in the redwoods
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The thing that really sucks is that Sean Leary freed a lot of those pitches on gear before Skinner placed the bolts.
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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"Protecting this was an ethical dilema for me. Glean gear was out of the question, but it would have taken marginal pins. In general, I think fixing pins should be avoided b/c they damage the climbing features and wear out quickly. Robbins once said that if you're going to drill a hole, fill it w/ something good. I would extend that to, if you're going to fix gear, you should fix something good. I also weighed the value of the aid climbing here. The pitch was straightforward A1, so it wasn't a classic or crux pitch."
Sorry, but it doesn't work both ways. The pins can't both be marginal and A1. It can't be both very obscure A1 and something that is going to wear out quickly. And straightforward A1 is no less valuable, IMO, than a really hard pitch.
I don't see why pins would need to be truly fixed beyond their ascent. "Filling it w/ something good" applies to the sh#t you leave for others, IMO.
Was the rest of the route (including practice and recon) pinless?
Edit: Mike, if you're reading this, will you post your topo and comment on whether or not pins were fair game elsewhere? If the dihedral in the pic in R&I w/ 3 new bolts in the frame is the "non-classic" pitch in question, the classic climbing must be out this world.
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caughtinside
Social climber
Davis, CA
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I don't know if the rest of the route was pinless.
But now it has to be, right? It's been freed and the style raised, so no more nailing. ;)
Anyway, maybe Mike Anderson will see this thread and comment, he posts here sometimes I think. He certainly seems up front and honest about the methods and rationale on the route.
I really don't know enough (anything) about nailing so I can't comment on the logical flaws Melissa sees in his quote on the A1.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Concur with Melissa's obvious and observable logic flaws in the Rock & Ice article. If those pictures of the retrobolts are the ones they dared to publish in the magazine, what else did they do that they didn't show us?
You can tie a pink ribbon around bullsh#t, but it still smells like bullsh#t.
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caughtinside
Social climber
Davis, CA
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hmm, smells more like an awesome free climbing achievement to me. By guys with jobs no less, not some guy who climbs for a living.
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Matt
Trad climber
primordial soup
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i recognize it's a slippery slope, but-
if someone aids a line, and then for whatever reason nobody ever does it, but it offers high quality free climbing potential that is significantly more appealing than the aid line ever was, and if the FA is on board w/ the FFA wrt equiping the route for free climbing, then you have to at least consider those facts (not that the answers will always be determined by them).
one thing is for certain, the fact is that the people who are actually up there free climbing the route are the people who make the 'final' decisions on such matters.
and of course, if in reading hotflashes or whatever you find that you disagree or are offended, you can just go up and chop all of mike andersen's (or likewise tommy caldwell's) bolts, isn't that how it's done?
...or you can sit here on the internet and pretend that you might someday shuttle multiple loads up there and aid yer way up the rig (best-a luck w/ that), but if you were never gonna go do it before those bolts went in, then i doubt you are ever gonna go chop anything now, so outside of this thread, BFD.
(trade routes on EC and semi-obscure lines away from the road may not be treated equally in such matters, time will tell).
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