How do you ever get into multipitch climbing?

hey guys, Im a highschooler who's been climbing off and on for about 3 years, and recently i've really gotten back into the sport. I live in the great state of georgia, where the tallest cliff is maybe 300-400 feet(just a guess). I was wondering how on earth a person from the south learns how to climb multipitch climbs. You can only do sport and top rope climbs for so long before you start craving to go higher. I definitely have the drive to learn, but I understand if maybe 17 is too young to even be thinking about climbs like these. You have to learn sometime though. Anyways I would just like to see some responses on how maybe you guys got into this style of climbing, and maybe give me some more info thanks guys!

I realized this topic should be under the multipitch section, but i realized it just now and cant copy and paste. Sorry if this causes any frustration.

i'm not familiar with the area where you're climbing but 300-400 feet is plenty of room for multipitch climbing. if there are any trad climbs on that cliff, it's hard to imagine there aren't also climbs that are at least 2 pitches.

maybe the question you should be asking is how do you get into trad climbing???

anyway, there are some folks from GA who're active on this site. i'm sure they can give you some helpful info that's specific to your area.

Here you go
Main Wall

What you want to do is...you and your partner study up on some anchor building techniques, then have one of your cool neighbors or your 13 year old unclebrother who has a full beard buy you each a six pack of PBR tallboys, then just go and Leroy Jenkins that shit.

Definitely do some sport multi first and learn to build anchors and swing leads, climb below your grade limit too.

There is a multi-pitch area for forum posts? News to me.

It's simple, brah. First you need some compadres with which to have these adventures into the multiverse. Then you find a route that has more than one pitch. Got some of those multi-pitch sport routes there? Awesooooome! That's the easiest. Otherwise you would have to learn to lead on trad gear. But if you have the sport bolted stuff, that is much simpler.

Just like belaying on the ground, you belay at the bolted anchors. But, and this'll kill ya, you have to belay up on the route, brah! So clove hitch your end of the rope to them anchors with a draw or some lockers.

Also, you'll probably have to rappel the route. Learn how to do that safely.

So here's your check list:

1. Righteous brahs to give you a catch and/or lead some pitches.
2. Ability to tie a clove hitch to the anchors with your end of the rope or a tether to tie into anchors attached to your harness.
3. Familiarity with double rope rappels. This includes finding middle of the rope and tying knots in ends so as not to rap off the end of the rope.
4. Did I mention some righteous brahs? Always important.

I too grew up in the great state of Georgia. However, in truth, I didnt learn to climb until I moved to Colorado for college. In any event, the South (Chattanooga area and the Red River Gorge specifically) arguably boast a greater concentration of higher quality, varied style rock climbing than ANYWHERE in the Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona area put together. That being said, these regions rule for long trad routes while not a ton of the Southern stuff gets that far off the deck. There are definitely some gems down there though. North Carolina seems to generally have more multipitch granite from what I can tell, while Chattanooga boasts the TWall and Foster Falls, as well as many other crags Im sure I dont know about. I hear the Obed is pretty awesome as well.

For trad, the Tennessee Wall (T Wall) cannot be beat. And since you are interested in multipitch climbing I would start with some single pitch trad routes. The T Wall is pretty stout though. You may climb 5.12 out at the sport crags for all I know, but the T Wall can be a tough place to learn as the ratings may seem a bit stiff compared to the typical sport fare. However, once you have the basics of trad climbing down (placing gear for anchors, lead climbing, anchor building) go on out and see what you can do with some of the moderate routes out there.

As far as guidance and instruction, the book Mountaineering: Freedom of the Hills, whatever the latest edition is, should be your new bible. I would strongly suggest that you take a couple guided/instructional courses in trad climbing before heading out and having a go at say, Art
or Prerequisite for Excellence

Once you are ready, I think you will be really psyched. After that, I would go check out some stuff at Looking Glass
and Tallulah Gorge.

I hear Mount Yonah is actually a great place to cut your teeth on first time multi pitch.

In any event, take her slow and dont forget to breath when you are a little above your gear. And thats true. Dont forget many of your most righteous Brahs. Always good fun sandbagging your buddies into some hard lead. Dont get em hurt though.

I don't know if multipitchsport is the go to way to get on your first big climb. I'm not sure if training is really necessary.

If you want to..., you are ready to commit..., ready to make obstacles temporary..., pick a realistic line: you will climb it.

I'm pretty sure that's what happens to me.

Steve

Read this book: http://www.amazon.com/Traditional-Lead-Climbing-Climbers-Taking/dp/0899974422

At your local crag practice the multi pitch scenario by leading a route, anchoring yourself, and bringing up your second. Practice on routes where you are in a "hanging-belay" setup and you must manage the rope by coiling it over your tether as your second follows and generates slack.

Also look for routes where you're simply able to stack the rope onto a ledge (much easier than the hanging belay situation and a better place to begin).

17 is not at all too young (as age is mostly irrelevant), but a lack of technical skills AND sound judgement will leave you hanging; literally

I'll echo the previous suggestions of leading WELL below your limit and also beginning on routes consisting entirely of fixed protection (sport climbs)

Simple: Spend the Summer post-graduation working in Yosemite NP.

yosemitepark.com/AboutUs_Em…

And dont forget your copy of the Dixie Craggers Atlas

You from Atlanta? Go on down to High Country Outfitter or Stone Summit Climbing Gym and see what those guys have to say. Generally knowledgeable folks. Man, I am way psyched for you!

The best advice I can give is to find someone who genuinely knows how to trad climb to learn from. The easiest way to do this is hire a guide who is certified by AMGA (yeah, it's pricey but a heck of a lot cheaper than a broken back). Just because someone has climbed for a few years doesn't mean they know what they are doing...perhaps they just haven't fallen on a poorly set cam or nut. You can go out any weekend and watch (in terror) as "experienced" climbers fumble with anchors or have gear fall out as they climb.

Books are a great place to learn concepts, and the recommendations above are great, but books can't replace time spent learning from (and following) an experienced trad climber.

In this country, multipitch means trad climbing most of the time. So you've got to get into single or two-pitch trad climbing. As you get better, work really hard on doing a lot of those single or two-pitch trad climbs in a day---keep track of how many feet you've actually climbed.

Multipitch climbs are just a bunch of single pitch climbs done one after the other. The main difference for most people is efficiency in handling and placing gear, setting up anchors, and changing over at the belays. You can begin to get that dialed on two-pitch climbs.

To pick a somewhat arbitrary number, if you can do five two-pitch climbs in a day, climbs that you don't know already and where you have to create the anchors, and if you are competent setting up and carrying out rappels, then you're ready to head out West for some longer routes.

Another possibility is to work on some girdle traverses of the crags, some of which are quite long even if only 100--200 feet high. Since this is not at all a common practice in the U.S., you'll have routefinding difficulties and will frequently have to build your own belay anchors. The leader also has to take extra care that the protection isn't arranged just for the leader. The second has to be protected from big falls too, and this may mean placing pieces in spots different from where the leader's pro goes. (On a traverse, the leader needs pro before a hard move, the second needs pro after a hard move.)

The advantage of traversing is that it isn't committing, since you aren't getting further and further from the ground. But don't do this on a crowded day at a popular crag, when you would be crossing and interfering with many ascending parties.

the best way is to find an experienced safe climber ... often they will know where there is an easy multipitch where you can learn ... you may have to travel a bit

youll often find these climbers in the various alpine clubs, and possibly in the gym if yr lucky ... they are often old geezers muttering about these things called hexes

remember to thank them for their time by playing for the gas, buying them beer and bringing them yung hawt women ...

if you cant do that a good alternative is to take a roadtrip to somewhere like squamish and book a guide up there ... youll get a lot of climbing in and learn in a fairly friendly place ... i see a lot of people coming from europe/states/aussie/kiwiland/asia do this ....

if yr stuck as a single pitcher most of the time ... try leading up an belaying from the top often ... thatll get you used to some of the basics ... also any trad climb with good gear placements can be broken up into 2 pitches for pratice

I'm originally from Ohio. My first multi-pitch experiences were at the Red River Gorge.. super adventurous albeit super short. Eventually I saved up enough money to go on a 6 month long road trip out west. Be careful venturing onto some multi pitch climbs in the South.. very traditional there.

Couple bits of advice you didn't ask for:

NEVER pass up an opportunity to learn something from someone. Don't loose connections. Don't worry about nagging people to take you out or for advice - in fact i encourage you to do so.

on mentoring: pindancing.blogspot.com/201…

get in touch if you ever have a question... if you feel so inclined.

good luck,
Braden

First, learn how to be safe-- and I'm talking triple-redundancy stupidly safe here-- on fully bolted single pitch climbs. Climb up, thread the rope through the anchors, rappel down. Do this on every single climb that you do. Hell, do it in the gym if they have a rappelling station that you can use.

Then, with a partner that you trust, go be stupidly cautious on an incredibly easy fully bolted 2-pitch climb; ideally it would be something where you can do a single rap down from the top of the second pitch to the ground. Do you climb 5.10c in the gym? Good- go find a 5.3 somewhere to practice this stuff on.

Hell, spend 5 hours doing two pitches if that's what it takes. Climb slowly, triple-check every single decision that you make to ensure that it can't possibly lead to either you or your partner hitting the ground, and learn from every single one of your time-consuming clusterfucks.

From there just keep going out every weekend and work on improving your efficiency and safety. Things that don't seem obvious at first will just *click* one day, and all those diagrams in the books that everyone is sure to suggest will make sense.

That's pretty much how I approached it at your age. Just be prepared to learn a lot, don't plan on setting any speed records for a few years, and don't do anything remotely stupid.

If you don't have the options of getting to places with multipitch with an experienced mentor:

1. Practice belaying from the top - Start on something you normally top rope where the anchor can be beyond the cliff-edge. Attache yourself to your anchor MP with a clove hitch. Do a normal re-directed belay. Figure out how to keep the rope managed while you belay. Try doing a direct belay using: Guide-type device, grigri, munter hitch.

2. Belay from the top of a sport climb. Try and find one that at least has a bit of a stance at the anchors, preferably a comfy little ledge. Set yourself up like in the top rope scenario so you're below the master point and redirect the belay. Practice keeping the rope managed, find out what happens if they hang or need to be lowered, and practice getting them into the anchor and setting up a rappel.

3. Find something short/easy that you can make an opportunity for an intermediate belay. It could be all of 10 feet off the ground. You might need some trad gear and placement skills to make this happen. Consider what's going to happen if the leader on the 2nd pitch were to fall at any point. Will they hit the belayer? where will the belayer be pulled? Try swinging leads first, then try having the same person lead both "pitches". My first "multipitch" was on a 50 foot tall corner crack with a little stance halfway up.

All of the above should be done on something that you have dialed, where the risk of something unexpected is low, and both you and your partner understand what you plan to do and what the risks are. Make sure you are both safe every step of the way. You could/should mock-up these systems and practice them ahead of time on the ground.

Edit to add: With a second rope (and optionally a 3rd person for a TR belayer), you can set up much of #3 as a "Mock Lead". You can also have your intermediate anchor just be a low hanging master point from the top of the cliff if there are no real belay anchor options (keep in mind rope stretch). The first "Leader" top-ropes up to it, attaches to it, then belays from there.

I can sympathise, as I also grew up and started climbing in GA. Tallulah Gorge actually has some great multipitch climbs. You'll need to be at a minimum a solid 5.8 crack climber to get anything out of Tallulah though. 2 to 4 pitch lines, bullet quartzite. And there is plenty of multipitch stuff in NC.

17 is old enough, it's not about the age, but more about experience. The problem I had in learning in the south was trying to hook up with partners (this was like 1992 or thereabouts, when the climbing community was much smaller and only a few computer geeks and college kids were regular internet users, so it's much easier these days with sites like this one).

Anchor building is really the only thing different than cragging. Especially in the south where you can climb for years without ever having to build a mandatory gear anchor (it's a jungle down there, there are trees everywhere..except maybe Sandrock).

That said, I didn't really start climbing longer routes until I moved west...mostly because my pool of partners at the time was pretty sad and primarily interested in toproping and occasional sport climbing.

Find an experienced mentor, or pay a guide for some sessions. Focus on practiciing your anchor building and gear protection skills, and start climbing multipitch stuff that is ridiculously easy climbing so you can focus on the anchors/gear. Something like the Mummy? (maybe it was the Daddy? easy 5.5 or 5.6 in Linville)...things like that, and work your way up through the grades.

Heed the old saying: "Challenge yourself in either the climbing or the protection, but not both at the same time", and you'll have a long healthy career.

Larry S has good advice for you above.

Good luck.

Do all the above....

Given your locale and my own personal experience with what you are trying to accomplish, once you have the technical safety aspects covered, start and branch out as follows....

Single pitch, develop technique, practice what has been said above at places like Sandrock, Jamestown, Currahee, some of the friendlier spots in WNC...the South Face of Looking Glass, etc.

Then take your prgram to Yonah for the two pitch climbs, then expand to the easy multipitches at Looking Glass....get your systems dialed, learn how to move quickly, simply.

Continuously climb harder single pitch lines at places like the Tennesee Wall, Sunset, Looking Glass, etc...and continue to boulder or go to the gym during this time.

Now comes the fun part. When you're ready, there are places such as Suck Creek and the Big South Fork in TN, the other parts of Looking Glass and adjacent crags, Laurel Knob and Panthertown, Whitesides, Linville Gorge, and maybe even some stuff in good ol' Alabama. These are the more committing, taller, more pristine venues that you are searching for.

The South is a nice place.
Approach the skill-learning, the gear acquisition, and the branching out to different, apprpriate venues systematically and it will reward you.

Well if you meant multi pitch climbing, you're probably already an expert.

It's......

Pitching off the same moves repeatedly.........

Sorry, seriously, I think the big thing is you have to be really focused on topping out, gotta move like you got a purpose.

Might also help if you find a few routes with a good topo, few route finding problems, easy descent and most importantly--BOLTED BELAYS.