Sixish 

Great route with nice rock and a nice variety of climbing on it. Overhangs, flakes, jugs, horizontal jug pulling on a face, roof traverse with a little pull to deal with. Does demand a lot of a 5.4 leader particularly in the area of rope management.

Not sure it belongs in the 5.5 category with Ursula, Jackie, RMC, etc. On the other hand you, or least I, could make a case for making Horseman a 5.4. Also not sure it is any harder than Gelsa, maybe not as straightforward, but not any more difficult. All said and done folks probably best to pay attention to what John says since he has at least 20 years experience on me.

Jeremy if I may ask, why only 2 stars.

The third pitch traverse is great fun! Bring some smaller cams.

Anybody have a sense of what the rating is by skipping the 3rd pitch traverse and just going straight over the upper roof (not the huge lower one)? I did that a year ago and it was a lot of fun, but certainly felt harder than 5.4.

I second Mike's question. Any rating opinions?

I followed the pitons at the third pitch instead of moving right and ended up pulling an overhang that felt much harder than 5.4 or even the 5.6 variation of the first pitch. I think I topped out somwhere between Jean and Sixish. I'd give the overhang move a 7 or 8 but that's the perspective of the new trad leader who has unknowingly gone off route and only had a bent old piton protecting the move.

This is one of my favorite routes, and it's really pretty easy to link P1 and P2 - just clip almost everything at & around the traverse with a 2' runner, then take care to mostly place stuff to climber's right until you've gotten to the P2 crack.

However, with a newer second, definitely do NOT link the pitches ...

Just climbed this yesterday. Absolutely fantastic climbing, one of the best routes at its grade anywhere. The second pitch is fabulous- steep rock, good holds, decent pro, great views and exposure. I found the crux on P3 to be harder than anything on Horseman, and IMHO it's solid Gunks 5.5

I enjoyed leading it today and didn't think getting thru the notch in P3 was that hard, provided you can reach a certain hand-hold, and have the strength to hang out and feel around to find it. Which I could just barely. I suspect if you're much less than 5'5" tall, it gets more interesting - (a statement which could be made about other Gunks climbs).

Seemed like the vertical crack at the crux on P1 didn't like to hold my stoppers. Next time I'll try just sticking some cams into it.

From bottom to the top of P3, this is a varied, fun, and sometimes exposed adventure.

Pitch 1 starts with a left-facing (corner) 5.6 move that I find to be reachy, and I have a long reach. But the hands are there and feet become obvious once you commit to the move. A .3 C4 slotted under the obvious hand at the crux helps protect the move.

Found all pitches to be pretty fun and the protection to be G with the exception of the pitch 3 traverse. I kind of got a 00 mastercam in, but my girlfriend said when she cleaned it only one lobe was in. Not really a big deal since the traverse has good feet, but if you have a second who might get nervous on a traverse with a swing, might be scary for them. Might not be great with 2 seconds either. Going up through the notch felt awkward for the first move to me but was well protected and easy after initial move. No rap when we reached the top, ended up heading climbers left a ways and going down Baby since no one was on it.

I did not enjoy this climb. I did the 5.6 variation of the first pitch, which was the only good part. I'm 5ft 4in and did not find the crux reachy at all. Key feet made for a very fun move. I think off-sets would have been beneficial for gear in the rest of the corner, along with very long runners.