New To Trad Climbing

[Snowpuppy]

Hello everyone. I'm new to trad climbing and learning how to place the passive pro. Just curious how long did it take before you felt comfortable with your gear placements to trust putting your weight on them.

 

Thanks.

[layton]

after about a day of fiddling w/the pro.

 

it's pretty straightforward. go for it! get some active pro too. passive pro is too lazy. but seriously, get or borrow some cams cuz nobodys gonna want to climb w/you if you only use nuts. save your $ on the hexes and cowbells and buy a cam. i suggest the red alien for starts. once you have one cam on your rack, it will constantly remind you to get more. borrow some cams to practice.

once the idea of how to use the gear becomes clear (should be a few hours of poking around) mock lead something ez and then lead it for real. place a shit load of gear. sew it up hardcore. that way you will not only be safer, you'll have gotten that much more practice placing gear. move to a harder climb, repeat. get your lead head and do it on day one. have your partner criticize every piece. read all the how to booksover and over and over again.

GOOD LUCK!

[carolyn]

cuz nobodys gonna want to climb w/you if you only use nuts.

 

DOH! Guess I will be standing on the sidelines this week!

and

Im NOT unzipping my duffle to take out the hexes, either.

 

 

[Snowpuppy]

You and me both. I'm doing this on a very tight budget, cams will be later. But when my partner and I get together, I'll borrow some of his. Thanks for the advice.

[lummox]

Hello everyone. I'm new to trad climbing and learning how to place the passive pro. Just curious how long did it take before you felt comfortable with your gear placements to trust putting your weight on them.

it will take just a couple aid climbs. take yer clean rack and a willing partner and aid up some easy cracks.

[Alpinfox]

Do what Lummox says. Aid climbing is the best way to learn about placing gear because you are placing a piece every 3ft and you put weight on every single piece. You will quickly learn what will stay put and what won't and how to place things so they are retrievable.

 

I learned to place trad gear while doing easy free climbs and (since I didn't fall) never really tested my placements. Sure, I had my second inspect them visually and they passed that test, but I never felt that confident about my placements until I did a couple of pitches of aid. Then I felt like I knew what I was doing. If I had my learning to do over again, I would go aid climbing sooner. "City Park" at Index will teach you to place nuts well.

 

Aid climbing as learning tool.

 

Unfortunately, aid climbing a full pitch requires a lot of gear and some extra shizzle (aiders, daisies, fifi, etc) that you won't need for free climbing which makes it a bit more expensive, but it'll learn ya reeeeel good.

[Matt]

Hello everyone. I'm new to trad climbing and learning how to place the passive pro. Just curious how long did it take before you felt comfortable with your gear placements to trust putting your weight on them.

 

 

Honestly, it took a couple of big whippers on cams, nuts, etc., before I was willing to start trusting them. When learning how to lead with natural pro the real problem is making mistakes that you don't know you are making-- the old Donald Rumsfeld conundrum--- there are things we know, things we know we don't know and things we don't know we don't know.

 

My advice is go climbing with someone who knows what they're doing and follow them on 20 pitches or so and then start leading yourself. This, along with reading several books on anchors, leading, and self rescue you should have what you need to get the job done.

 

For me it took a season before I was ready to confidently push grades while leading with a rack. It wasn't until I fell 15+ feet above my last piece and was "okay" that it really sunk in.

[Snowpuppy]

I definately will keep all this in mind. Around here I've got Red River Gorge and will be heading out there this weekend. All I've got to say is that it is quite a bit more challenging-yep and FUN!!!!

[Dru]

if you can place good pieces standing on the ground then you can place good pieces anywhere. that said it can be a good idea to get a more expeerienced climber to secvond you up a route and critique your placements.... "junk...junk...bomber...ok...junk...shit man you got this one good and stuck..."

[Ryan]

What it all comes down to is getting out and just diving right in. That doesn't mean go try to lead a hard route on shitty gear, but head out, find a line that looks doable, and see what happens. Placing pro beforehand (on the ground) helps a bit as well.

[chucK]

If you really do want to head out and dive right in, might I suggest "diving" into a pitch that has obvious cracks and many obvious rests from below. A guidebook would be a good thing to buy, and then looking for something with the description "good beginner lead".

[thelawgoddess]

i don't have a problem climbing with someone who only uses nuts. good nut placements are bomber, and i often find them just as quick (if not sometimes quicker) to place as a cam. some of you fuckers are so lazy!

 

i followed a number of climbs before i started leading. you can get an pretty good idea of what the placements should look/feel like that way. you can also have others follow you and critique. i am always surprised at how shitty some people's gear placements are, though! and like somebody up there said, aid climbing can be a great way to learn about placing gear.

 

oh, and if you don't feel comfortable putting your weight on a piece statically, adjust it until you do! they're not for looks ...

[Bug]

There was only passive pro when I started climbing (sonny). I have a pretty good selection of technoweeny pieces now but stoppers are still my favorite piece and I often take only stoppers on alpine climbs. Well, I always take a .5 and 1 tri-cam too. And usually throw in a purple camelot. A great alpine rack consists of about 8 stoppers slung on single runners plus a few wires and rabit-runners.

The springy cams are great for vertical cracks with parallel walls though.

[fenderfour]

Thanks for bringing up an alpine rack. I'm learning trad from some craggers and I would like to know what a decent alpine rack would look like. I hardly think that I will need all of my hexes, and cams for cold rock.

[Gripped]

Thanks for bringing up an alpine rack. I'm learning trad from some craggers and I would like to know what a decent alpine rack would look like. I hardly think that I will need all of my hexes, and cams for cold rock.

It really depends on the climb and your preference....

A set of stoppers, 2-3 cams, 10-12 runners (some singles, some doubles) is my standard alpine rack.

 

If I know I'm going to do a lot of running belays (lots of class 4 and low/mid 5th) then I might take a larger rack so that I can stretch each run out a little bit further. It saves time switching leads (of course the trade off is having to hoof more gear on the approach)

 

I'd say bring a piece or two more than you think you'll need on each climb until you've done several climbs and have a better feel for it.

 

Running out of pro and trying to set up a belay can really stain the undergarments.

[STORER]

I was wonder what pro I should have on my small but hopefully growing rack (no jokes guys). I have a full set of stoppers and two micro cams. Looks like I should save up for 2 or 3 cams. Are Camelots a good choice for us poor folks since they bridge many sizes compared to other manufactures?

 

Steve

[Bill_Simpkins]

Aid climbing helped my placments a ton. Now I can pretty much just look at the spot and grab axactly what will fit. Plus almost every piece on an aid climb has to support body weight. The down side is cleaning. But learning to clean is almost just as important.

[Snowpuppy]

What's the going opinion on tri cams?

[slothrop]

Do a search and you will come up with reams of opinion, poetry, slander, and spray relating to the hate-it-or-love-it tricam.

[tomtom]

I learned to place trad gear while doing easy free climbs and (since I didn't fall) never really tested my placements. Sure, I had my second inspect them visually and they passed that test, but I never felt that confident about my placements until I did a couple of pitches of aid. Then I felt like I knew what I was doing. If I had my learning to do over again, I would go aid climbing sooner. "City Park" at Index will teach you to place nuts well.

 

Aid climbing as learning tool.

 

Unfortunately, aid climbing a full pitch requires a lot of gear and some extra shizzle (aiders, daisies, fifi, etc) that you won't need for free climbing which makes it a bit more expensive, but it'll learn ya reeeeel good.

Learn more about aid climbing in THE NEW AID CLIMBING FORUM.

 

If we had one.

[Dru]

What's the going opinion on tri cams?

 

the pink tri cam saves lives. the red, brown and blues are quite nice. the green one can be used as an emergency smoking implement and the biggest yellow one can be used as an emergency belay/rappel device.

[Snowpuppy]

Cool. Yes that's what I've come up with you either love'em or you hate 'em.

[scratchandsniff]

Dru, sorry to lay it down this way dood, but the correct use for the biggest ones is exclusivly for self-defense.

[catbirdseat]

Cool. Yes that's what I've come up with you either love'em or you hate 'em.

I just love 'em. The thing about tricams is know where NOT to use them and how to recognize situations where they are superior to cams. Then you'll like them. There are situations where tricams will work great when nothing else will. I carry the #s 0.5, 1 and 2.