Hot Takes 2024

Let’s hear em - 

I’ll start it off with a steamy one for the sport climbers 

- if you’re stick clipping up an entire route, you don’t belong on that rock climb. What are you doing.

- where did saying “on trad” come from and why hasn’t this died yet. “I climb 12a on sport but 11b ‘on trad’ “ I don’t feel like this one really needs much explanation but I can’t be alone here.

- and just a reminder day flash isn’t a thing 

Carry on, in style 

almostrad wrote:

where did saying “on trad” come from and why hasn’t this died yet. 

Carlo Traversi was talking about trying Empath on gear and referred to it as “on trad”. It was surprising to hear that from someone so elite

“Ground-Up” shouldn’t be an ethics conversation when it relates to equipping sport climbs - it’s a tactics conversation. If you’re using a power drill, the difference is largely one of convenience in either direction. If it’s easy to get in an anchor, rap bolting is more convenient. If it’s not, ground-up is more convenient. Either way, for a true sport climb, it’s not a matter of bravery and your moral indignation about doing it is tiring. Especially when you use it as an excuse to leave the climb barely cleaned and poorly equipped. Everyone is equipping ground-up when it’s steep, but this take applies to stance bolting as well

Drilling holes for removable bolts is more LNT-conscious than putting an actual bolt on the wall

The stronger someone is, the less weight their opinion has on grade nuances that are far below their project grade. e.g If you’re able to send a 14, you probably cannot differentiate between an 11d and a 12a, and you sure as hell can’t tell apart an 11a and 11b

José Flovin wrote:

Drilling holes for removable bolts is more LNT-conscious than putting an actual bolt on the wall

My hot take - I disagree, removable bolts are not the perfect sustainable ethics solution we hope for.

It was tried here quite seriously, with heavy use the removable bolts get jammed, then the cable snaps, then they have to get drilled out and extracted just like a dynabolt anyway.

José Flovin wrote:

Drilling holes for removable bolts is more LNT-conscious than putting an actual bolt on the wall

My hot take is bolts have minimal impact compared to cleaning a route or just walking around at the base of the crag

Too many climbers (mainly pebble wrestlers) have YouTube channels for their climbing.  No one cares about your 5'6" +2 ape index beta for a V4 in Kraft and you don't have to be the tenth person posting a beta video in the comments for said boulder just to shill your YouTube channel with 10 subscribers.  Also no one wants to watch fifty 20-second videos of you climbing moss covered, 1 star boulder problems.  At least learn some basic video editing techniques and combine them in to a single video.

Removable bolts are not it.  People just leave them in place and forget about them, and they are nowhere near as bomber over time.

Another one - 

If you can’t do the dedicated warm up at a crag, get stronger/better and come back when you can. Don’t bolt an easier route that doesn’t fit the spread of the crag. 

How about… stop using crappy, loud music in your climbing videos. In fact, how about using no music at all. I much prefer hearing the actual sounds of climbing… the breathing, grunting, communications between climber/belayer, clipping, and so on. So, lose the music. 

Daniel Joder wrote:

How about… stop using crappy, loud music in your climbing videos. In fact, how about using no music at all. I much prefer hearing the actual sounds of climbing… the breathing, grunting, communications between climber/belayer, clipping, and so on. So, lose the music. 

god, so much this. it’s always the worst fucking music too.

My hot take is that people give too much weight to both their own and others subjective opinions on style. Stick clip the 3rd bolt or don't, pinkpoint, top rope, onsight, who gives a shit as long as you are courteous. 

The irony of spraying my opinion on how opinions are overrated is not lost on me. 

Tal M wrote:

“Ground-Up” shouldn’t be an ethics conversation when it relates to equipping sport climbs - it’s a tactics conversation. If you’re using a power drill, the difference is largely one of convenience in either direction. If it’s easy to get in an anchor, rap bolting is more convenient. If it’s not, ground-up is more convenient. Either way, for a true sport climb, it’s not a matter of bravery and your moral indignation about doing it is tiring. Especially when you use it as an excuse to leave the climb barely cleaned and poorly equipped. Everyone is equipping ground-up when it’s steep, but this take applies to stance bolting as well

Follow up take: R-rated sport climbs aren't cool, they are just poor development and show that you are a hack. 

Jacob Bice wrote:

Removable bolts are not it.  People just leave them in place and forget about them, and they are nowhere near as bomber over time.

If they are not removed maybe we should call them "un-removable bolts"  or maybe just "ugly unsafe bolts".    And there are lots of examples of removable bolts, after being fallen on a few times, becoming un-removable.  How Leave No Trace is that?       

Connor Dobson wrote:

Follow up take: R-rated sport climbs aren't cool, they are just poor development and show that you are a hack. 

Maybe, but it depends on your definition of "sport climb".   There are hundreds of trad climbs that are "fully" bolted and have some serious risk.  Here's an example: Sisyphus Summits.

With a 1000' foot approach, 1000' route and 2000' descent, it's not a sport route.  

In my not so humble opinion, a sport climb is "Bolted in such a way that the climber can focus on the moves and not the consequences of a fall."

Connor Dobson wrote:

Follow up take: R-rated sport climbs aren't cool, they are just poor development and show that you are a hack. 

Agree with John here - sport doesn’t mean “bolt protected” and I’m totally kosher with runout bolt protected climbs, presuming they were done ground-up and free (I don’t care if you hang on a hook to drill - honestly that’s way scarier than drilling from stances in my experience - but if you aided between bolts that’s whack). That being said, having a drill on you while going ground up can feel a bit like a safety blanket sometimes (granted, you also have to be able to use it for it to work) and I’ve found repeating some of the more runout ground up climbs I’ve done to be scarier than the FA itself.

Actual follow up hot take: keeping climbs of a consistent character is way under-focused on when it comes to development, specifically around mixed development. Having long G-rated trad sections to an R rated bolt protected section on a climb is annoying. I can see the LNT argument but if you found yourself scrubbing away centuries of moss and lichen and loose rock anyways, that goes out the window.

This is doubly true for hard routes. Commonly, developers are climbing hard and seek out other hard things to climb. They’ll look at a wall and bolt the hardest possible passage through the wall, half-chaining together disparate features. Have of the time you end up with a 5.10 to a 4-move V7 to a 5.9 outro, resulting in a 1.5 star 5.13a (that they’ll inevitably give 4 stars) instead of just a consistent, 3 star 5.10.

I think it’s fine if you want to equip hard lines, but IMO priority should always be given to the better line, not the harder one. 

1. Anything attached to the outside of your pack that swings around as you walk screams gumby. Example: shoes, helmet, etc.
2. Clipping a draw directly to a cam's racking carabiner is fine.
3. Gym parkour boulder problems are trash and NOT actual climbing.
4. Dogs do not enhance anyone's climbing experience at all.
5. Any amount of alcohol is bad for recovery.
6. Simul-rapping is fine.
7. Getting your quickdraw reversed won't cut your rope from micro nicks on the bolt side.
8. Speed climbing is trash for one main reason: the route never changes.
9. You can't "set" a cam by pulling on it.
10. PAS is very useful as long as you don't do the thong method. 

and 11. GATES OUT!!!

Bryan K wrote:

Too many climbers (mainly pebble wrestlers) have YouTube channels for their climbing.  No one cares about your 5'6" +2 ape index beta for a V4 in Kraft and you don't have to be the tenth person posting a beta video in the comments for said boulder just to shill your YouTube channel with 10 subscribers.  Also no one wants to watch fifty 20-second videos of you climbing moss covered, 1 star boulder problems.  At least learn some basic video editing techniques and combine them in to a single video.

That’s not a hot take at all. You guys are all constantly complaining about the pebble wrestling videos.

The real hot take: I *like* the bouldering videos. I watch them all. I find them interesting. Even hotter: I want *more* beta videos. I watch them for problems I’ve already done. Throwing kneees down topping out a V3, sick, I want to see it. I also like them individually separated - I  don’t want six problems to a video. One star V1 moss fests didn’t even know it was a climb and probably never should have been, hell yeah. Keep ‘em coming everyone, I am one of your six subscribers  

grug g wrote:

1. Anything attached to the outside of your pack that swings around as you walk screams gumby. Example: shoes, helmet, etc.
2. Clipping a draw directly to a cam's racking carabiner is fine.
3. Gym parkour boulder problems are trash and NOT actual climbing.
4. Dogs do not enhance anyone's climbing experience at all.
5. Any amount of alcohol is bad for recovery.
6. Simul-rapping is fine.
7. Getting your quickdraw reversed won't cut your rope from micro nicks on the bolt side.
8. Speed climbing is trash for one main reason: the route never changes.
9. You can't "set" a cam by pulling on it.
10. PAS is very useful as long as you don't do the thong method. 

and 11. GATES OUT!!!

I will fight or hug you for these takes. 

1. Shoes outside the pack so they don't stink up the inside.

2-6. *hugs*

7. I've noticed it actually does add to abrasion and I started getting a full extra season out of my ropes once I organized my rack to have specific rope/gear biners. But no, it won't cause some sort of catastrophic failure. 

8-9. *hugs*

10. It's a PAS thong even if it's not a PAS thong.

11. Gates in gumby

bonus round

12. Ohm is for gumbies only IDC your weight difference.

Daniel Joder wrote:

How about… stop using crappy, loud music in your climbing videos. In fact, how about using no music at all. I much prefer hearing the actual sounds of climbing… the breathing, grunting, communications between climber/belayer, clipping, and so on. So, lose the music. 

Also the sound of nature is the best background. The birds, waterfall, wind, rustle of leaves.... everyone raves in the comments about Mellow's music, but idk, it's pretty lame to me.