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Crag & Route Beta

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Topic Date User

Iskra Crag update 10-Aug-2017 At 1:14:03 AM Dave J

Message

contd...

On 9/08/2017 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>>>A 6m aid route doesn't have many points of aid in it, does it?
>>
>Ah, this raises an interesting twist to the theme, and also a grey area
>where I am happy to compromise on my stated position outlined above.
>
>I will give two examples that have different outcomes.
>1. Sometimes aid was practiced on scrappy out of the way places (before
>the genre of 'bouldering' existed), and so the routes were of no 'real'
>significance to the first ascentionists...
>In this case I doubt the first ascentionists would object to a renaming
>under the title of a new 'bouldering ascent'.

This is why I'm biting... this (pius the alternative is borng paperwork). I think as aid routes they dont have a lot of worth. I completely get why you might want to force your way up seventh pillar or ozymandias by whatever means necessary. But a little wall like that cant have been a big deal even at the time. For me I think it is also possible to steal from the future and this is a good case in point. Like chipping or just bolting/red tagging/claim staking something you never had a chance of actually free climbing (with all due respect to the original aiders nobody in the world was climbing well enough to free these back then).

>2. I thought long and hard before submitting for publishing in a guidebook

>The second was that (believe it or not) there exists a small but devoted
>group of people who actually still enjoy aid climbing and this particular
>line filled a grade niche that has bugger-all examples to aspire to for
>those adherents...In this case, I'd be well miffed if it was renamed after a bouldering
>ascent, even though I acknowledge that this style of ascent is possible
>in the future...

I kind of get this...but not really. I acknowledge it exists but its not a driving force for me.
If Im iinspired to climb something it is about getting myself better to a point that I am able to do it. Ive never considered aiding any more than reconaisance(and Ive done a bit in the name of that) I dont personally get any more satistfaction from the act of getting myself from the bottom of a line to the top by pulling on all the gear or getting from top to bottom its all a means to an ends. again this is just me. A product of austrailan climbing post henry barber.
>
>In days of yore I practiced aid in scrappy locations, but none of the
>lines have been written up as I prefer them to remain as adventures for
>future generations. If they are bouldered cleanly as new lines then so
>be it, and the new ascentionists can have their moment of fame.

Or they can leave them for others to find and cleanly aid again, or bolt to the crapper. Though once the bolts are there there is no longer the pretence of doing a new thing.

>By the way, my cohorts and I didn't write them up as new lines (even though
>some of them were), because we respected the real first ascentionists before
>us, that we knew had done stuff there, but we were unsure as to exactly
>what!

These grey areas are good. I like them. bouldering at arapiles you can never be qute sure what might have happened in the past.

>If the aid routes in question were put up as proper lines rather than
>practice only, then I disagree. They should retain their name and the first
>free ascent is noted as an 'interesting footnote'!

what's the first name you think of when you hear "procul harem", "yesterday", or "india"

>If they were put up as aid practice sessions, then it becomes a free for
>all and a clean bouldering ascent is valid for a first naming of the line
>involved.
For me its hard to imagine that the aiding wasnt just a wet winters mucking about. I think we agree its something to do with the level of intestment/comitment. I feel like in this instance the boulderers invested a lot more than the initial aid climbers. Imagine Madge McDonald insising that she was acknowledged for her endeavour with that particular peidce of rock.

Even with aid the goal seems to be eliminating aid. the old guidebooks were full of X eliminated 2 points of aid Y reduces aid to just 3 points...the end point of that being that Z managed climb with no points of aid. I think for climbers generally, this has been the starting point for a while now.