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Accident at climbing gym 19th May 21-Jan-2006 At 11:03:06 PM alrob

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On 21/01/2006 Rock Weasel wrote:
>Training for leading? Lead climbing indoors (and 'sport' routes) are glorified
>top-roping anyway.

I'm not sure if o'm understanding you right, but from what i can tell, your saying that theres no need for training on lead because its just the same as toproping? i reckon your WAY off there, cos anyone can feel completely comfortable pulling hard moves on toprope. Put that same person on the same route, but lead, and if they don't have a headspace for leading, they'll probably shit themselves at the first hard move where the bolt is below their waist.

>However, it can be disconcerting to lead in some gyms
>because whilst there are plenty of draws, they are sometimes embedded in
>no more than 20mm plywood, which is rated for who knows how may kilo-newtons.
>I guess that's why they don't let you skip any draws.

I would have assumed that safety regulations would require gyms to place bolts for draws through the structure itself! i'm quite suprised if this is not the case...(can someone who works at a gym shed some light on this?)

>As for having to re-clip draws on the way down, St Leonards gym in NSW
>has a good system of metal 'pig-tails'. If you can't get the rope back
>in on lowering you can just flick it back in from the ground, and it is
>a significantly easier to remove on ascent (compared with unclipping a
>draw). It works well on shorter walls, but I think that the AME at Cliffhanger
>is always going to be a pain in the arse.

There is a short roof at cliffhanger which has the same system. works well IMHO. toprope the roof, lower off at the end, grab the big pole, and 're-wind' the rope into the 'pig-tails'. A very good alternative, and it would leave draws free for leading on a wall.