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Develop gear placing confidence 19-Jul-2010 At 11:56:38 AM hargs

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You don't need to go the full-on aid thing to practice placing gear. I asked a similar question a while back, and Mikl and others suggesting finding a crack that accepts gear, rigging a top rope as you would normally, and placing gear and standing up on it. That supertopo video is a good introduction to placing, weighting, and testing gear. Remember it's less about progression -- i.e., stepping high in your aiders -- and more about making good placements with the gear you have and the rock that's in front of you.

***

I went to my local rocks to test my new aiders and practice placing gear. I've placed plenty of gear -- ah, back in the eighties -- but after reading that other thread I realised I never fell on much of it. Certainly no big falls. I figured I knew what I was doing, but the truth is my gear could suck and I wouldn't know. So I took Mikl's advice: rigged a toprope, and started aiding my way up.

The first piece is right in front of me, a #6 hex, sideways, in a perfectly tapered crack. I clip the aider, tug on it, weight it, then step up, wedging my back against the chimney wall. So far so good. The next placement is higher up, a thin seam, and I rattle through my wires looking for a match. The #2's too big. A #1 BD stopper is the smallest piece I've got. I slot it in, tug on it, and it pops straight out. I try slotting it in higher up, wiggling it in, tugging on it, and it comes straight out again. I try lower in the seam and this time it catches. I tug on it and it stays put. I clip it, and ease some weight onto it, watching to see if it sinks in nicely or comes out again. About now I remember Chris McNamara's SuperTopo video: when you're testing gear, look down. So I tuck my chin in, ease more weight on, and the piece flies out, thwacking my helmet.

'Hmm.'

I look about for alternatives. There's a pocket on the wall in front of me, 2 fingers wide and a good couple of knuckes deep. It's not high up, but it's all I've got. I poke a #6 stopper in, pull down and it sticks -- it's solid with weight on but it moves around when the weight comes off -- so I push the stopper to the back, slide a #2 offset over the top, then pull the big stopper straight out, wedging the smaller nut against the roof of the pocket. The whole arrangement locks tight, so I clip the left aider, test it, ease some weight on, then all my weight on and jump up and down on it. Bomber. Step up, unclip the right aider from the lower piece, clip it to the stoppers, haul my right foot high and step up again, shuffling my back up the other chimney wall. Now I've got a good view of the seam but the gear sling is jammed behind my back. I'm wedged against the wall, so locating the biner with the small wires is awkward. I fiddle the #1 out, then watch helplessly as it floats to the ground. The next few pieces go in solidly and I make quick progress up to a stance in a little cave.

"Hello," a voice calls from above, "is someone on this rope?"

"Yes," I call back.

"Are you going down or coming up?"

I've worked myself into an awkward position under a bulge. I've got both aiders clipped to a piece and arranged so I can stand as high as possible, hanging on with one hand and reaching up with the other. It's strenuous, and the holds that aren't heinously slopey are just out of reach. I'm not feeling all that chatty.

"Ah, up."

Just about out of strength, I notice my belay loop is about the same height as everything else, so I wrestle another biner on, clip it, and slump into my harness. I've just created a monster cluster: biners crossed up, a gate jammed open, adjusting buckles impossible to reach underneath a mess of metal. My feet are too high, and I can't get at the straps to lower them into a more comfortable position.

"You must be some kind of novice to be climbing up here?"

What? "Um, no." Wait, can he see the snarf I just made? I scan the top of the cliff but don't see anyone.

"You shouldn't be down there if you don't know what you're doing. You need a tree protector around this tree. If you don't know what a tree protector is you should ask someone who knows about rockclimbing."

I could have used tape for anchoring to the tree but I was rushing out of the house and didn't bring any. And besides, the rope is a back-up, a precaution: I'm not hanging on it, or the tree. "The rope's not weighted," I call back, jiggling it to prove the point.

"Well if you don't have a tree protector, you can take your trousers off like we used to."

"What?"

"Take you trousers off and rap them around the tree. That's what we did. You know someone here cuts ropes that don't have tree protectors."

I bet I know who that is. I look around doing some quick maths. I'm 8 or 9 metres off the deck and I don't fancy soloing out on funky gear. The next piece is a weird slot out in the rounded lip of the cave, worn by years of pulling ropes though soft rock. It takes a #3 Friend but the move is out in space, suspended entirely on that one cam. I tie a prussik on and test the rope like a piece of gear: it's still solid, so I commit to the friend and move out around the roof.

By the time I climb over the top, my new mate has vanished, but he left me a calling card: a small pile of rubbish -- drink bottles and chocolate bar wrappers collected from the top of the cliff -- neatly stacked on my rope mat.