In reply to zimpara:
I once went to a wall in Brussels that was set for top roping. The ropes were prominently numbered at the top. The routes had colour coded holds and the first hold of any route had a tag that indicated which number of rope you should tie in to. Some routes traversed considerably and started well to one side of the rope anchor. This was only possible because it was a top rope wall but did allow a wider variety of route setting than is normal without rope drag or crossing issues.
I remember one route in particular. It started innocuously directly below the top rope anchor but soon you were faced with what seemed like an impossibly long reach. After a while I noticed some holds of the right colour going horizontally right. These continued all the way to the R extremity of the wall (big swing potential) where there was a manageable reach. Above the hold you reached, however, there was another impossible reach but a line of holds leading horizontally to the L extremity of the wall (more big swing potential). This continued most of the way up the wall until the traverses got a bit smaller near the top because the swing would otherwise be just too violent. In this way they created a monster stamina pitch in a wall of relatively modest height. The swings if you came off at an extremity could easily have wiped out anyone else on the wall at the time.
The wall was in a square room and there were some routes that even started on a different wall than the rope you had to use. Some of these had clear deckout near the bottom or monster slamming potential higher up. Clearly HSE issues were not as much to the forefront in Belgium in those days as they are in the UK today!
