Pumpline  5.11a

757 page views Good page?

Type:  Trad, 1 pitch, 60 feet Consensus:  5.11a [details] FA:  Jim Yoder, 1984 Submitted By:  andyf on Aug 12, 2008 You & This Route  |  Other Opinions (3) Your todo list: Your stars: Your rating: -none- [change] Your ticklist: [add new tick]

Pumpline, circa 1994.

Lookin' good now, but momen...

Add Photo  Add Comment    Printer View

Description 

For years, this has been one of the Icicle’s trad testpieces at the grade. Thin climbing up a thin corner with some thin gear leads to a brief but burly off-fingers crux pulling a bulge. Hope you can make the exit look elegant. I couldn’t.

This climb was written up in a 1988 Rock & Ice article by Alison Osius, who’d once spent a summer guiding for Leavenworth Alpine Guides (LAG) and had come back to revisit old friends:

"For my last day, Katie [Kemble] trudged me up a loose hillside to a ‘wild crack’ she promised no one had ever done. A steep corner up thin edges led to push-palming and bridging up the seam. At the roof that caps the pitch, I ran into trouble… I sunk awkward thumbs-down hand jams, moved my torso up with hands still low, and frogged my feet high. Caving in my ribs, I half-cornered the arête to get a foot up onto a shelf. Then I couldn’t pull either hand out. I pumped out and rattled down to the rest. Repeating the process again and again and again, every time I panted ‘Sorry…one more time,’ Katie would sing out cheerily, ‘Oh, no problem.’ So I ventured and retreated at least eight times. A gouge began to trench into one hand. But I really wanted to finish the climb, and to name it the LAG Roof for Katie, [Jim] Donini, Karl [Schneider] and Dave [Stutzman]. Then came the magic moment when the jam felt just that tiny bit better. Visions of glory trumpeted; a great new route—maybe some copy so I could write the trip off! Then I was up, belly-flopping over the top.

That night something woke me at 3:00 AM—electric pain in my elbows. In the morning, I tried to tell myself I’d been dreaming. But, I thought, at least if I’d hurt myself, it was on something emotionally satisfying, that tied the climbs and people of Leavenworth together. An epiphany, come to think of it. Then, the more I thought about it, the harder the route got. Pretty soon my internal dialogue declared ‘Eleven-d, fer sure.’

I called Yoder, and asked him about that crack. He listened to my description, asked a question or two. ‘Yeah, Pumpline. Eleven-a. I did it three years ago.'"

("Penned in Leavenworth," Rock & Ice No. 25, May/June 1988)

Location 

Uphill past the Regular Route, look for the thin crack through an angled roof to the right of a prominent bolted arete (MJB Arete).

Protection 

To 2", include thin wireds/TCUs. Save some gear for an anchor.

Photos of Pumpline Slideshow

Add Photo

Pumpline circa 2005.

After the Pumpline os, 2005