Tips on lead belaying

Hi all

I'm here to try and get some tips on lead belay.

I started lead climbing this year but was doing top rope for about 2 years and a half before that.

As a top rope belayer, I've always been very conscientious and confident. I double check everything, I'm quick. But top rope belay is very straightfoward.

When I started lead belay this year, the first comments I got were promising. I applied the same diligence to everything, but where top rope belay is pretty much just mechanical, lead belay has way more skills that come into it.

I know that I'm doing everything right mechanically. I flake the rope, always have my hands on the rope at the right place and all. But in terms of application and instinct, I've come to the conclusion that I am not great.

One of the girls in our climbing group, who is typically quite blunt about everything, has voiced her dissatisfaction to me enough times now that I know it's not just that I messed up something once or twice. I never let anyone fall or anything like that. And she says she doesn't worry I'll drop her. But she doesn't trust me to give her the right amount of rope or get out of her way at the right time. And I feel as if other people in our group also don't particularly like to be belayed by me but are too polite to say it. They're all much more experienced than I am.

It's been many months now and I feel like I plateau'd a long time ago.

I believe I have two main areas of difficulty:

1- when climbers come out of a roof, maybe once they get the first clip above the ledge.

2- with smoothing the fall, especially since I started using a grigri.

So about 1:

I never really know how much slack I should be giving. At once I know that if I give a lot and they fall far, they'll end up unable to climb back. And sometimes this is the kind of spot where they get a bit scared or ask for a take after the effort of getting out of the roof. And this creates an uncomfortable situation where I'm both trying to not give them too much slack and worried that if they do fall and I don't give enough, they might hit themselves on the ledge (if only the legs go under the roof).

I also feel similarly hesitant when the climber ends up in a position where  they're climbing right above a large volume or protruding hold. I fear that they might hurt themselves if they fall too far and hit it, but at the same time, the fact that I'm not giving enough slack can either make them uncomfortable, unwilling to go for the next move, or just result in stiffer fall. Even when it's just a very short fall, I can see that however little amount of rope I gave makes for a rather stiff collision (or scrape...) with the wall. Which I don't think I experience when I'm the one climbing. But I keep thinking the alternative is worse.

Anyone has struggled with this before? What tricks do you use to decide how much rope is needed in those situations? How do you decide how dynamic/static to make your catch?

About 2:

Until very recently I was using exclusively an ATC. And most of what I did to give a "dynamic catch" was to let a bit of rope through as I was catching. That and a step or two towards the wall, but the move always started with the quick feed. Now that I,m using a grigri, that's off the table, and I need to learn to dynamic catch using only my own movement. Which I find difficult... I just don't feel like I can react fast enough. I can do it when the climber warns of a fall, but when it's an unpredictable slip, I end up catching mostly statically.

It doesn't help that, somehow, I'm the heaviest guy in the group. I only weigh 175 at 6ft2. So it's not like I'm really that big of a guy. But all the other guys don't exceed 145 pounds. They tend to just be taken off their feet by a fall. I don't move an inch if I don't make it happen... But I know I should be able to dynamically catch either way.

Anyway. I know none of you can actually see me in the act, so I'm mostly looking for general tips. If anyone has any advice, I welcome all.

Thanks!

1. If they're clipping below the bolt, throw out 2 arms of rope, otherwise 1 is enough. See number 2, you can step toward the wall while feeding out rope to smooth it out.

2. Stand back ~3 feet from the wall and maintain a smile in the rope between you and the wall once the climber is ~4 gym bolts up.

3. Jump into the fall if the climber is >20 lbs lighter than you. Like raptor leap into it for maximum effect.

4. Climbers tend to fall in a parabolic arc missing most volumes on lead.

5. If you fall in a cave and can't get back, well shit don't fall and just take if you need to rest or work out a sequence. Otherwise try again if you were giving it your all.

6. If you want to take quickly, just back up physically from the wall.

I don't think that I'm a particularly good lead belayer, but there are a couple of things that I've done that have made me better.

#1 - belay glasses. It really helps a ton with reaction times if you're super focused on the climber, and it helps you keep an eye on the climber if you need to deal with kinks in the rope etc.

#2 - be very conscious of body position. I try to position myself so that if my climber needs slack quickly, I can pull an arms length through the gri-gri while I'm taking a step forward. A lead belayer should be ready to move quickly, and be aware of any obstacles around them on the floor or at the crag that prevents this.

#3 - try to put yourself in the climber's position and think about what you would need. Are they at a good clipping stance?

It kind of sounds like you're short-roping people when they're just climbing along (i.e., not clipping). If that's the case, you need to keep out more slack, plain and simple. Nothing is more annoying than being pulled off the wall unexpectedly when you're trying to move.

Ralph Finnes character in Grand Budapest Hotel

What is a lobby boy? A lobby boy is completely invisible, yet always in sight. A lobby boy remembers what people hate. A lobby boy anticipates the client's needs before the needs are needed.

Just replace "lobby boy" with "belayer" and you're good. 

But in all seriousness... it's mostly practice. Moving in and away from the wall a bit to give or take a little extra slack is really helpful.

The amount of slack to have out while they’re climbing depends on how far up the route they are. I have out less slack when they’re at the first few bolts and I stand to one side of the route in case they happen to fall, which is when you’d want to do a hard catch if they’re very low.

Once they start getting higher I leave enough slack so there is a J in the rope and then I stand in line with the first clip and a few feet from the wall. The lowest point of the J is usually around my knees. Much lower than that is too much IMO. Step towards the wall to aid in giving slack and when you pay out slack do it fast. If you notice that you’re shorting people start giving out two arm lengths. Don’t wait to see if they need two, just do it and if it’s too much you can take up some of it. If you can’t see your climber learn to watch the rope.

As far as the soft catch goes, don’t resist it when they fall. Let the rope pull you. I have a Vergo which doesn’t have any slip either, but having some slack in the rope and jumping a little will give a soft catch.

Don’t worry so much about the climber getting hurt if they fall. Chances are they will be okay if you belay them properly. Don’t make their decisions for them.

Your partners should instruct you on how to be a better belayer if you’re doing something incorrectly or unsafe. Have one of them watch you as you belay and ask how you can improve.

These methods may not be perfect, but they work for me.

Keep practicing and asking for tips/feedback from your partners.  I would just tell them you feel like you need help improving your belay skills.

Marc Hamond wrote:

Until very recently I was using exclusively an ATC. And most of what I did to give a "dynamic catch" was to let a bit of rope through as I was catching. That and a step or two towards the wall, but the move always started with the quick feed. Now that I,m using a grigri, that's off the table, and I need to learn to dynamic catch using only my own movement. Which I find difficult... I just don't feel like I can react fast enough. I can do it when the climber warns of a fall, but when it's an unpredictable slip, I end up catching mostly statically.

I would stop trying to let any rope run through your device (such as an ATC) while trying to arrest a fall.  While soft catches are ideal, I feel it's most safe to give this through the "jumping" technique --- more than through either excess rope, or by giving rope while catching.  

There's some YouTube videos made by a climber where they use high-speed photography to test forces by various techniques:  a) extra rope out, b) jumping, and c) both combined.  They found jumping-only (Option B) to be the softest catch ...and extra rope to be counter-productive.

Another way of thinking about this is ... the climber can't begin to decelerate until the rope is taught and beginning to stretch.  Extra rope can be critical for those edge cases (such as clearing a roof), but in all other cases is contributing to the climber accelerating before beginning to be caught.  The 'hop' allows you to keep the rope relatively taught, while still providing a dynamic and soft deceleration.  

The finesse comes in timing.  Too late and it's a hard catch.  Too soon, however, you will potentially give an even harder catch as you both weight the rope at the same time.  The ideal is to hop as the rope is coming taught.  For a bigger person this may not be the most dramatic ... you may only end up a foot or so off the ground, but im sure it would still help.

I wouldn’t worry about your climber falling to where they “can’t climb back”. Unlike some of your other concerns, that’s not going to injure anyone. A lot of this will just take practice, and feedback from your climbers, and letting go of wanting lead belaying to be anything like toprope belaying in terms of tension on the rope.

I’d recommend asking one or more of your climbing partners if they’d be willing to help you improve - they could climb a route that’s super easy for them, where getting short-roped or pausing to explain something won’t be a big deal, and give you feedback and tips every step of the way. That way they’re going into it with a teaching mindset rather than expecting a great belay on their project - and you’re going into it ready to learn and be coached rather than feeling pressure to perform.

And I’d be honest about where you’re at. You’re at a crag and someone asks for a belay, just tell them “I know how to belay safely but I’m pretty new to lead belaying and still learning how to give a quality lead belay. If this route is easy for you and you’re willing to give me feedback I’d love the opportunity to improve, if you need a more experienced belay you’d probably prefer to ask someone else.”

Personally I’d be really open to this, and would much rather take a couple laps on an easier route to help someone who wants to improve than be surprised by getting short-roped mid-climb. 

To soften the fall:

• Keep a small bend in the knees. Hard to have any impulsion with straight legs.
• Let the rope guide you. If you go with a continuous mouvement as oppoased to a quick jump, you'll have more leeway with the timing.  It's ok to start a bit early your mouvement, and then when you feel the rope gets tight on your harness make your jump. If you do the final push too late but still are moving somewhat, it'll still make the catch softer.
• Have a plan. Like " if he/she falls in this section, do I jump, do I want to taje slack in etc ". Ideally you should always be up to date with where your climber is at and what the best course of action would be.

I know people often talk about the "smile" or J of slack. I mean you don't want the rope necessarily straight up, but you don't need it down to your knee either. Imo that's somewhat of a workaround for a bad belay technic. That might be fine indoors, but it's not a great habit outdoors. Yes it buys you a bit of time to react (giving rope or react to a fall), but it's nothing you cannot achieve by paying attention. I typically just let it look loose with a very slight curve. I very rarely short rope, so my conclusion is that the excessive smile we sometimes see isn't essential

Marc Hamond wrote:

1- when climbers come out of a roof, maybe once they get the first clip above the ledge.

By "ledge", I think you mean "lip". Once I replaced "ledge" with "lip" in your first point, I understood it much better. That is actually a pretty big concern I have with inexperienced climbers. I love roofs, and when I have an inexperienced climber belay me, I do worry that they don't give me enough slack to clear the roof if I fall off shortly above the lip. When your climber is not very far above a roof, make sure they have enough slack to clear the roof if they fall off. In this case I'd err on the side of giving them too much slack than not enough. I'd rather fall into space and not been able to get back (if your climber knows what they're doing they would know how to get back on), than to have my legs clear the roof and smash my face on the rock.

It's probably better to ask the people you climb with to give you pointers on lead belay, because climbers don't necessarily want to be belayed the same way. For example, personally I like my belayer to give me just enough rope to clip without short roping me. If you just throw out two arm full of slack whenever I reach for a clip and wait for me to pull it up, I wouldn't want you to belay me. Dynamic belay with a Grigri just takes time, you won't get good at it if you don't get a chance to practice. Don't sit back in your harness like when you're trying to take slack out in a TR belay, crouch a little like you're about to jump up on a block, wait for the rope to come tight and tug on your harness, then just go with the pull and stand up.

If I’m being belayed by a newer belayer, I have two concerns: not being dropped, and not being short-roped. Obviously in that order. Avoid both, and you’ll be fine. As a general rule, if you feel a tug on the rope at any point - when the climber is clipping or moving - it means you’re short roping them. Learn to give out slack fast, and learn to take it in equally as fast.

If there’s any potential for the climber to deck or to hit a ledge, don’t worry about spiking them if they fall. Take in the slack and sit back if they’re about to come off. Otherwise, let ‘em go for the ride, and let yourself be pulled up. Watch your surroundings, and keep that brake hand on the rope throughout the fall. 

Oh  and one thing you could do - have a partner finish their climb with some fall. My partner and I often do that (just don't clip the anchor).we get to practice belaying falls a lot and it's great to improve timing.

If you don't have a partner to do that, tell them it's good to build up their lead head (it's true - it boosts your confidence to commit to sequence above bolts like crazy)

Bring snacks for the group 

Sean Baker wrote:

Bring snacks for the group 

^Love this.  

Other low hanging fruit: Carry gear, flaking ropes.

Maybe switch back to ATC?

When I use a Grigri- I let leader know “ I’m probably going to short rope you on b2,b3- pull it up slowly- it’s to keep your butt off the deck” after that just give em slack so that they can always pull up a few feet- be prepared for them clipping - Remember the main thing- don’t let them hit the deck. And don’t worry about the “take” if your going for a clean send- you can switch gears when it goes “full dog” 

Don’t let people get down on you because of their weakness.

Remember the MAIN THING

Good luck with it

Regarding timing the jump. It's less of a jump, and more of a little hop. The key is to have your knees bent before the climber falls, otherwise you have no time to react. Then as you feel the rope pulling on your harness, you just give a little hop. It feels more like you're just following the rope pulling you up.

Obviously keeping your knees bent at all times is super strenuous and not realistic. So what you do is you just get in that position when you can see that your climber is struggling and may come off.

If you want to practice, you can see if someone is willing to take toprope falls for you while you practice your hop.

Sounds like you are short roping. Ideally your climber never feels the slightest resistance when they move or pull up rope to clip. A few things that help:

Pay close attention to your climber, and try to anticipate their movements ie, did they just get into a comfy stance by a bolt? They are probably about to clip, so be ready to pay that slack out. Are they looking to be gearing up for a big dynamic move? Make sure they have enough slack.

Use walking towards/away from the wall to quickly adjust the amount of slack, it’s usually faster than feeding it out by hand, but be aware of any obstacles in the ground  

Don’t worry about someone falling into space and not being able to get back on. Your primary job is to keep them safe, so you always want to err in that direction, so if that means more slack, more slack it is.  If they complain they need to learn how to walk the rope/boink back up.

As far as timing the jump, it’s just practice. As some have said above ask your climbers to take some announced, on purpose falls while they are warming up. You don’t need to really jump much unless there is a huge weight discrepancy, just be ready to give up your connection to the ground. 

The fact that you are even asking this question makes you better than a lot of belayers out there. You seem self aware and willing to learn. Keep paying attention and with practice you will improve.

Also, I would add that climbers often look for reasons why they didn't send. Don't rule out the possibility that you did just fine and the climber was just looking for something/someone to blame. 

What GTS said. I think it was Einstien who said that knowing the right question is more important than thinking you know the answer. Or something like that.

When your leader needs slack to clip feed it out aggressively. 

So just to close the loop here, thanks again for everyone's advice.

I do think that I have been able to make a significant improvement to the quality of my belaying over the past few weeks using some of the advice you guys gave me.

I certainly have much left to learn, and there definitely are still belaying situations that make me uncomfortable, but I think I have a much better grip on the fundamentals than I did just a month ago.

For anyone interested, here are some of the things that helped me a lot:

• As many of you have pointed out, my initial post suggested that I was short-roping people. Which I was. I think this was a remnant from my experience as a top roper, and I suspect this might be something many new lead climbers who have stuck to top roping for a long time might experience. When top roping, most climbers are actually less experienced, and many really prefer you to give them very little slack. And there's always a good reason for a top roper to ask for even less slack.
  
  I tended to keep this mentality. Seems like they might hit something if they fell? try not to give slack so they don't fall that far. Seems like they just did a tough move? don't give too much slack that way if they fall they don't have to do it again. Seems like if they fall they might swing under a roof and hit themselves? Try to make sure they stop before that. They're under a very steep overhang and if they fall I probably won't be able to get them back on the climb? Give them little enough so they stay within reach.
  
  All of these ^^ come from a top-rope mindset, and I had to let go of all of this.
  
  As it turns out, none of that helps at all. And just accepting to give more slack already made a huge difference.
  
  As some of you have accurately stated, it's not the belayer's job to ensure the climber can get back on the route after falling. And for the other stuff, like hitting volumes on the wall or a roof, in fact, as a general rule, giving more slack helps much more to avoid these things than keeping the rope short. As one comment here pointed out, climbers tend to fall away from the wall, not right along it, and so allowing them to fall away will actually allow them to avoid obstacles in most cases.
  
  In other words, since I've stopped looking for every possible rationale to keep the rope short, I've managed to become comfortable with letting the climbers breathe. I've also paid close attention to how much slack the belayer were giving in professional competition in whatever instance I could find where we could see them in action, to convince myself.
• Moving back and forth when giving/taking slack. A huge improvement. What I used to do when someone was getting to a clip was try to give some rope exactly as they started pulling on it to reach the clip. If they had to take a good amount, I always struggled to give enough, especially with the grigri, which I would occasionally fail at preventing from blocking when I was panic-pulling too fast. Now I consider a wide step forward or backward as systematic, and the rope I feed with my hand is to give however more is needed. It's the tuning. Just by incorporating that, I'm usually able to give as much rope as needed for a clip (even on chicken clips) without the climber noticing I exist. Then the step back is the occasion to take whatever excess rope I might have given.

For catching the fall smoothly

• To help with catching falls, I've followed some advice given here and got some from youtube. One of the things I caught is that when you're heavier than your climber, you might position yourself a step or two further from the wall. This will cause the rope to have a larger horizontal component, meaning that a falling climber will not have to contend with your entire weight: it's easier to accelerate something horizontally than vertically.
• Assume a slightly crouched position when belaying. Keeping knees bend a little bit, instead of locked straight. This makes me naturally easier to pull up also (let's not get into the physics, but I get why it makes a difference). It really does. And it does make jumping to catch much easier.  You're already ready to jump when something happens, which isn't the case if you're already fully extended.
• Part of it was just to mindfully practice it. I got the first occasions by just not "taking" very much when climbers reached the last clip and timing a jump as they just let themselves drop back down. And the previous point of accepting to maintain more slack in the rope helped with that as well. There being more slack also means a bit more time to react. Now I tend to be taken off my feet for almost every fall without even thinking about it except for the first few clips.
• Last but not least, I explicitly asked for advice to people I was climbing with to know what they felt I was doing wrong. This is something I wasn't doing because initially, when I had just started, they were proactively giving me advice. But with time they had stopped and I assumed they had just concluded I was bad and given up on me. Which was probably the case since they might have felt like they had already told me all they could think of. But asking specific pointers and showing I was open to their advice got them to coach me much more directly.

I have to say, this has made climbing much more enjoyable again. I'm sure I will surprise no one by saying that it takes a toll and some of the fun away when you constantly feel like you suck as a partner. I can tell that my belaying has improved just by how climbers behave when I belay them. They no longer refrain from working big projects with me as a belayer, they take chances, commit to hard moves and take crazy falls without apparent hesitation. I've also started receiving props for good catches and such. So I'm quite happy with this improvement for now. I suppose the rest will come with experience.

Note that it didn't really take much time. If I'm already noticing a change in my partners' attitude, consider that improvement started manifesting itself within maybe 2-3 weeks (I've been going 3-4 times a week). With a few advice from the internet and open talk with my partners. So I guess... if you have a partner who really blows, well... don't give up hope XD

So again, thanks to everyone who contributed their advice, it was great help. Much appreciated.

P.S. I haven't tried the belaying glasses yet but my neck hurts a lot so... next step I guess.

Regarding short roping, I recently learned a small detail using an ATC: Some belay biners act differently when it comes to giving out slack quickly. 

In my past 20 years of belaying, I only remember short roping two guys: One making a big dynamic move and another guy pulling up the rope really fast when clipping. But in the last 6 months, I have experienced trouble feeding the rope and short roped a leader numerous times. I thought it was because my rope started getting old and fuzzy, so I bought a new (skinnier) rope, but to my surprise, it didn't fix the problem. I started to "experiment" with the belay biner and I found out that it was actually easier to feed the rope when I had the narrow side of the biner touching the ATC, which is complete opposite from my previous experience. I finally tracked down the problem: I had gotten a new belay biner earlier this spring and that was the main headache. I can visually not see much difference between the new biner (a pear shaped regular locking Trango with green sleeve) and my previous biner (a regular locking BD with black gate and blue sleeve). But the Trango is now retired from belay duty.