Mountain Project Logo

Shelf Road Top Rope Soloing

Original Post
Andrew Krueger · · Colorado Springs, Colorado · Joined Apr 2012 · Points: 10

Hi All,

Can someone advise a good crag to visit at Shelf Road for top rope soloing? I'm new to the Springs and historically haven't done a lot of sport climbing, but I want to get stronger :D. Ideally I could do a few laps, move the anchor, do some more, and not get in anyone's way. TR sport up to 12a?

Thanks,
Andrew

J. Broussard · · CordryCorner · Joined Feb 2011 · Points: 50

Walking down the walls you can find breaks to achieve the top. All of the anchors are placed for leading, so you will have to navigate the distance from the top of the wall to the bolts.

More importantly though, Shelf is a mad house and this would only be plausible on a weekday. I had the place to myself last Friday, come Saturday, people were like mosquitoes in the Wind Rivers in July and August.

Any C.Springs climbers have any better suggestions for this guy to get out and get strong?

James Hicks · · Fruita, CO · Joined May 2012 · Points: 131

Just a warning that there is quite a bit of loose junk up above the routes in a lot of areas at shelf. Be real, real careful walking around up there. Also, a lot (probably most) of the anchors tend to be far enough down from the cliff tops that reaching them for a top rope set up might be difficult at best and dangerous at worst.

Alan Doak · · boulder, co · Joined Oct 2007 · Points: 120

If you're going to be there on the weekends, I'd suggest finding partners. Post on MP that you're looking. Walk around camp, asking if anyone has room for 1 more. Walk along the base and ask for belays. Don't be shy, you'll make some friends. If someone seems like they're on a tight schedule and reluctant, say "no problem, I don't want to impose" and keep moving.

If you're there during a weekday when no one is around and you want to climb on your own schedule, another possibility is to put yourself on self-belay with a gri-gri and solo-aid up the route with a stick clip. This avoids dealing with anchors that are out of reach from the top, trying to figure out which climb you're at the top of, kicking rocks down on people, or dealing with a party that gets on your route while you're approaching from the rim. Once you're at one anchor, scrambling or self belaying to adjacent anchors is commonly easy.

Quick how-to on self-belaying:
1) Anchor one end of the rope to blocks, gear, trees
2) Rig the gri-gri as if you were rappelling off that anchor (climber icon pointing to anchor) and feed out rope to yourself as you climb.
3) For extra safety, take 10-15' of brake hand rope and tie a figure-8 on a bight, and clip that with a locker to a strong point on your harness. This is in case the gri-gri fails to lock, or the gri-gri biner gets cross-loaded and blows up (unlikely). Untie the back-up and re-tie 10-15' further down the rope as needed.
4) clip the rope through the bolts as you climb. If the ground anchor is marginal, or you decide to skip step 1, you can clip the rope into the bolts with a knot.

Or, you could do what solo speed climbers do (like Honnold on the Nose), skip the self-belay and just hop bolt to bolt, but yer gonna die.

Andrew Krueger · · Colorado Springs, Colorado · Joined Apr 2012 · Points: 10

That's good advice. I definitely would be going weekdays. Maybe just rope-soloing a .9 and then moving the anchor would be the ticket. I have a CAMP Safety I use from TR soloing, but I'm not sure if it's suitable for lead soloing.

Cheers!

slim · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2004 · Points: 1,103

if you are going weekdays, it should be pretty quiet. it is actually pretty straight forward. there are a lot of gulleys that are easy scrambles to get to the top. then you can use some trees or gear in cracks to get you down to a bolted anchor. then just scramble back up and grab your first anchor.

i used to do a lot of TR soloing there. good way to dial in routes, or do obscure routes at obscure walls that nobody else wants to do.

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

Colorado
Post a Reply to "Shelf Road Top Rope Soloing"

Log In to Reply

Join the Community

Create your FREE account today!
Already have an account? Login to close this notice.

Get Started.