JosephH

True enough lest we forget high school and collegiate climbing teams.

Yeah, hard to beat the strength to weight ratio, the challenge is of course, to still hike that shit after puberty and adolescence. Have seen that turn more than couple of hikers into wrestlers until they either bailed or put in the work to recover as young adults. A drive up Boulder Canyon says it's just getting warmed up. And hell, U.S. via ferratas are only just birthing but no doubt will be starting to branch out in the coming years (can you say Infinite Iron[y]...). They both appeal to a demanding, risk-averse demographic that will not be denied in the coming decades. Can't wait for the day sportos are bitching about via ferrati. Except it all keeps coming true, or at least it has consistently for the past three decades. I don't expect the next two to be any different.

Of course it's all RuMR and unfounded innuendo...

Sport climbing hasn't 'ruined' anything, it just fostered a massive bolt-bound demographic. That demographic has an unquenchable thirst for new bolted routes that overtime has and will continue to threaten and encroach on trad areas. Think I'm wrong? Check out Boulder Canyon or wait and we'll see the results of another twenty years. Or is it your contention that one day they'll just decide there are plenty of routes already and we don't need to go out and bolt more of them?

Aid past a certain point should just be rated R(oulette)1-5

In America the more common the denominator the lower it will become. It's the demographic reality of our culture as are the [convenient] ethics promoting the 'common good' and 'community service'. That and hero worship, where an incredibly small percentage of participants become idealized stand-ins for the popular good of all despite the fact they no way represent the capabilities of the aspiring majority demographic. But hey, a biner on every key chain baby and hot climbers in pharmaceutical ads - hell, we're livin' large now.

Dreamy, don't get the wrong impression of me, I've never stood on a summit and have never had the slightest interest in mountaineering. Walking to school in the winters in pre-global warming Chicago for most of my childhood pretty much took the thrill out of snow and ice for me. The only thing I like about ice is the fact you can wail the shit out of it without worrying about the damage, but I've done precious little of that as well. I'm pretty exclusively a rock climber by proclivity and practice. The whole idea of dressing up like the pillsbury doughboy and slogging up and down a peak and never getting to anything to climb is just more than I can bear. Finish school and then head out - it's what most of us did as there aren't a lot of native NW folk around. In fact, I'm pretty sure 50% of the population is from Michigan.

The point isn't about the progress of any Sharma-like individual, but rather it's a comment about the 'progress' of the overall climbing demographic it takes to produce one like him. Or, to put it another way, in 1976 you could randomly select 10,000 folks who'd been climbing for more than three years, hand them a rack at the base to the Bastille Crack, and most of them would be able to get up it. Do the same today and it would be interesting to see what the percentage would be in comparison. "Progress" would be if a higher percentage today could get up it than in 1976, but I suspect you'd instead find a remarkable, if not overwhelming, decline in that ratio.

Producing each Sharma today requires a base of about 200,000 5.11 climbers who will never touch an ice screw or a piece of pro and who would piss on themselves at the prospect of being handed a rack at the base of your average old school 5.7. Progress? I guess so, if you ignore the overall demographics and get heavily into hero worship.

What is the particular lure of the Florida college? What's the 'opportunity'? Sounds like you're an undergrad and any good college would do. That said, you have to be pretty damn disciplined to mix college and climbing - I wasn't and look at the pitiful result. Maybe you're better off in Florida.

And to add to that it may just take another republican / corporate ass-raping of the average redstater for them to get the message that republicans and corporations think they are the chumps who can be counted on when the chips are down. But then again, so far Karl hasn't been going broke betting on the stupidity of the average 'conservative'.

Get your flu shot if you haven't already. I kept putting it off, big mistake.

Sick as dogs here as well with the flu - I can't believe I missed two days like we just saw. Kudos to all of you who made it out for them wherever you went.

Eye of the beholder.

I believe it was Ammon who said once you commit to a piece, don't f#ck around, step as high on it as you can and get the next one in - keep some momentum going or a pitch will drag on forever.

Argh, that was one cold romp up the Corner at Beacon with ice on the slab and on the moves above the Tree Ledge and a frigid 50-60kt wind coming up and over the ridge ramp. Stopped at Rooster Rock SP to check out the waves on the way back but could hardly stand up in the parking lot.

The only lasting bet is that the republican base is still easily targeted with campaigns of fear, ignorance, and bigotry.

Wet, diamond core bit. Don't hammer drill. In fact, just take it to a countertop or headstone outfit and have them do it.

How many climbers can afford to live in neighborhoods with trees?

http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/1302372/Joe-Puryear-killed-in-Tibet

Ozone Guide for sale on Craigslist (not by me, just saw it...)

What is the food for thought - that gravity kills? It's the old Philly street saw - "fuck around, fuck around, lay around and bleed" or the venerable "if you can't do the the time, don't do the crime" at work. Sanitizing climbing isn't the answer - owning and adjusting your own behavior, needs, and choices is. Scott has clearly adjusted his.

I'd say your latter sentence is the perfect defense for the former.

Me? I go in and out of it. Usually with me, though, it's more about how marginal a pro I feel like climbing over an any given day than how run out it is, though it can be both on 'bad' days.

These discussions always seem to stem from some post that simultaneously covet and vilify some old runout routes.