UKC

Jim Pope has repeated James Taylor's Olwen E9 6c at Rhoscolyn and made a rare - and only the second British - onsight of the classic Strawberries (E7 6b) E7 6b at Tremadog, (Craig Bwlch y Moch) in North Wales.

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Mega impressive to watch in person.

Great to see some on-sight climbing getting some love in the news section. Can’t remember the last time that was the case. 

Bleedin' plastic pullers. What's he ever done on grit. Oh, hold on

Pretty insane onisght, running it out like that must've been amping up the adrenaline, big time. And I am pretty impresseed that Glowacz onighted this 1987! Shit heavy gear and only half decent rock boots. Nearly 40ys ago!

Also the Gogarth rack by Jim might've been heavier!

I wonder how much of that is onsighting hard routes not being so popular any more? Would be hard to report on if there's nothing going on.

Maybe it just me but it's the onsighting Strawberries that really grabs my attention from that headline!

Yes, it was tough in the good old days, setting out in nailed boots, hemp rope, a few pebbles in your pocket and hope in your heart.

Didn't Steve McClure do some Hard onsights last year that were reported.

Probably a bit of both cause and effect with reporting vs popularity, witness Grit E6/7 headpointing in late 90s / early 00s.

But, primarily, in the age of clickbait headlines, E10 is “bigger” than E7 and it’s hard to explain the nuance of headpoint vs onsight within the limits of sensationalist vocabulary.

There’s the other matter that not all routes of the same grade are equal: note the relative number of ascents of Rare Lichen vs Indian Face. With onsighting there is even more going on (as you can see with sport routes too). Most will understand that Strawberries is difficult to onsight for the grade but there are many other relatively “hard to onsight” routes that most readers won’t know anything about.

PS: phenomenal effort to Jim. That rack must add about 15% of his weight too!

Fair. Still, that it is as newsworthy as back then impresses me.

A fair bit. Jim flashed an e7 the same day as Olwen and onsighted another e7 (albeit soft) yesterday.

There are quite a few dark horses out there that aren't too bothered about being known.

Makes me kind of proud, as a long-term expat Brit who grabbed the latest edition of Crags back in 1980 to read about Ron´s 1st ascent. I can´t imagine this sort of reaction to not making the cut in Bern from any of the other competitors there, except maybe from Ondra or Megos, and that´s not bad company to be keeping. Great achievement, Jim!

I'm sure you're right that this is a factor, but I'm slightly less cynical that clickbait culture is the 'primary' cause.

While people are eager to point out that hard on-sights do still happen and occasionally get reported, I'm pretty sure it's true that it's not happening nearly as much as it was, say, 15 years ago. Certainly not relative to the number of strong climbers around!

Another reason I'd suggest is that for most people, near-limit on-sighting is an intense, cortisol-loaded business - so it's a bit of a young person's game (with notable exceptions of course). Protagonists of a generation that was frequently on-sighting E7 and occasionally pushing E8 some years back are now a bit older. Some of them are easily still strong enough but that's not the type of climbing they're choosing to do, and who can blame them.

Meanwhile younger climbers have grown into a culture in which trad, never mind hard on-sighting, is no longer the centre of the bullseye. Plenty of other less complex items on the menu.

Having come from a old-fashioned trad on-sight background, without ever being very good at it, I have heaps of respect for the skills of those who can and do - the impressiveness of it is undervalued. But I can definitely understand why it's not how many people are now choosing to climb.

Oh yeah and nice one Jim!

Inexplicable why there aren't folk sitting out on the cabin porches enjoying the view  

My “primarily” referenced that, “..E10 is ‘bigger’ than E7 and it’s hard to explain the nuance…”

My comment about “both cause and effect with reporting vs popularity” was regarding if/why a smaller proportion of “higher grade” climbers focus on onsighting.

I’d argue that hard (for a given person) onsighting is not necessarily “a young persons game”; it’s more that it requires consistency and it’s a time consuming business with uncertain outcomes. i.e. less we’ll suited to those with many other commitments.

I think that's a big part of it. E9 just looks more interesting in headlines than E7.

Besides, how many has Caff onsighted? Can't be that hard then can it

Me too. Knowing where the holds are makes routes so much easier!

Actually, judging from the number of likes Tyler's post got, it is very far from undervalued. Quite possibly because it is the style in which most people climb most of the time and so can relate to just how impressive it is at a high level. 

Not saying there aren't plenty of people who appreciate it, I mean undervalued in how much bandwidth it gets generally in contemporary climbing culture and media.

I thought the same! How much to camp in a bog......

WHY has this received a "dislike"?

One of the reasons that modern climbers are so much better is that they sport climb and sometimes practice trad routes, just in a more distinct style than back in the day, yo-yoing etc, and can bring those skills to bear when they want to.

One of the interesting things about Strawberries perhaps is that it was right at the beginning of really hard, in the modern sense, trad climbing. Still reckon that pre-practice takes 2 grades away.

Rwoncerful video,fantastic  skill,never seen so much chalk

Perhaps the pendulum will swing back and we’ll get a generation of younger climbers who are phenomenally strong from comps, bouldering and sport and who might want to test themselves with hard but reasonably safe onsight trad. Pembroke is the ultimate place for that of course but there will be other crags and routes as well. 

Or less well suited to those with egos. Nothing like a trad onsight failure to keep the ego in check! Of course it’s not failure - it’s valuable experience. 

I think you may be right, Remus.  The trend started with hard grit and the widespread adoptation of headpointing, and nowadays pre-rehearsal across a whole range of different aspects of climbing has become commonplace.

The normalising of this approach is further underlined by those periodic "who is the best trad climber" threads.  Often the replies suggest someone who almost exclusively headpoints, whereas to me, the best trad climber is the one consistently climbing the hard trad routes on sight.  The headpointer is truly impressive at his / her chosen approach - ie. headpointing, but that is not the same - at least to me!

Of course it may be a generational thing.  I actually think my generation revered the on sight as the ultimate standard to aspire to, whereas the younger generation probably couldn't care less!  That's not to say one is right and one is wrong, but it is the reason why I am far more impressed by Jim's on sight of Strawberries, than I am of his headpoint of Olwen.  And yes, I also think that the headline should have had them the other way around.

What would be really interesting to know is which ascent challenged Jim more, and which he is 'prouder' of...

Finally a bit of a trivia quiz, which may be aimed more at my own generation.  Strawberries is unique, to my knowledge, in one particular, very unusual way.  I could give more clues, but I think someone will know the answer, so I'll restrict myself to just adding that whilst not impossible, it would be highly unlikely for this to be repeated for another climb in the future....

Anyone?

Most of the names that rattle around my head when it comes to 'best' UK trad climbers are responsible for both cutting-edge headpoints and hard onsights; I don't think they're mutually exclusive. 

Pearson flashed Something's Burning and was going ground up on Lexicon. Ste-mac onsighted Nightmayer. Bransby, Pasquill and Caff have onsighted loads of E7s/8s. Whittaker has onsighted E8 and 8b, flashed E9. Dave Mac has onsighed E8 I think. Birkett has probably onsighted E9 and told no one about it. Hazel Findlay and Emma Twyford have onsighted E7/E8. Are there any top UK trad climbers who don't have hard onsights to their name?

Hard onsights do happen, and it is the top climbers doing it, just maybe not as much as they're headpointing other routes.

Perhaps money and profile has something to do with it? You undoubtedly get more exposure from the punters and sponsors by either A)putting up a new hard route, which naturally requires cleaning and inspection prior, or B)repeating a well-known cutting-edge route. And the current limit of onsight climbing is not the cutting edge.

I wonder whether using H rather than E grades for headpoints when reporting ascents would result in a greater emphasis on onsighting. Big E numbers are what sell after all.

I come across a lot of climbers who've heard or read about some of the things I've done in the past, and almost invariably the one that they focus on is the headpoint with the biggest number. This despite headpointing being a style of climbing I wasn't into for long, as well as one I wasn't notably better at than I was some other styles. But the big number somehow gets through, where other climbs require a bit more knowledge or a bit more familiarity to better appreciate.

Is it the style in which the FA was done? Pre-clipped i.e. yo yo-ed on gear left in place so that he could come back the following day? I.e. not a clean ascent by modern standards.

I'd be mightily surprised if it was unique in that respect.

No, not that Tom.

I should perhaps qualify that I’m pretty certain that ‘Strawberries’ is the only UK example of this particular thing.  It is quite possible that there are foreign examples of the same thing that I’m not aware of.  They would be very rare if they did exist, though…

Is it the only route branching from a dairy product named for a fruit which goes naturally with that same dairy product?

One onsight per decade?

Very good Karl, but can you be certain it’s the only example out there… 🤣

Robate - not that either, I’m afraid.

Only route to be downgraded by two technical grades but upgraded by two E grades.

Is it the bolt hangers that were glued-on as a (bad) joke?

Nope. I bet there are some other examples of that…

It isn’t Grant. Something makes me think there has been at least one other example of that (though I can’t think of the route)…

It was featured on the front cover of the guidebook [1978?]  before it was even climbed?

Made the front cover of the guidebook before it had been climbed? 

Bingo! Congratulations Dewi… 🙂

Oh Duncan. Sometimes those fine margins are only a matter of seconds!

You need to learn to type faster.. 

Dodgy WiFi at the campsite in Font!

So why is it only dark horses doing the on sighting? I’m a bit sceptical about the ‘dark horse’ theory, there are plenty of really good climbers about giving E6s a quick brush, checking the gear or even fully headpointing them to make me think E7 on sights are still a bit of a rarity for the reasons given. Pembroke and high balls excepted. 

I presume the climber on the cover needs to be on the route-to-be itself, in which case I agree that another example may be extremely unlikely.

I did, hovever, go through a phase of climbing new routes that were in clear view in guidebook cover shots, but had yet to be conceived and climbed. The two I recall are Monotheism (E7 6b) on Moyer's Buttress and Flying Butt (E3 5c) on Stanage. 🙂

I do see what you mean, but I've met quite a few totally unknown climbers the last few years who are totally crushing. For example, the Indian Face got repeated a few weeks ago, but not many people know about it. 

I knew all that hanging out with Caff would get Mountain Spirit somewhere!

Although this was -obviously- a headpoint also so I’m not sure that really rebuts Tyler’s point.

I’d also say this Pembroke line is a bit tired. There are hard and difficult to onsight E6/7s in Pembroke, just most chose the well-known, chalked up ones to “onsight”. Like they do everywhere: Lord/Pretty Girls in the Pass, Mother’s Pride in the Peak, Dalriada in Southern Scotland, Demolition in Cornwall, etc, etc. There’s probably just more of all routes at that sort of grade in Pembroke (and the guidebook authors there err on the friendly side)

That was a great trivia question! I really enjoyed following that

Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I've always assumed that for a lot of people who are essentially full-time climbers, the longer and more involved process of headpointing a route eventually just becomes more interesting than repeatedly rocking up at a crag and trying to onsight something hard, going away and training a bit, trying to onsight something else hard, going away and training some more etc.

Thank you Blake.  I appreciate that.

After I posed the question, I realised that when the guidebook was published, it wasn’t Strawberries at all, but merely a future concept.  That is why I put ‘Strawberries’ in commas in the later post!

In fact before Ron climbed and named Strawberries, the line was widely known as Bananas.  I’m sure he was determined not to bow to the inevitable when choosing his accompaniment to Cream.  And of course John Redhead subsequently made sure the concept name wasn’t wasted…

I was aware of the other suggestions – glued on bolts, mega grade shifts etc, but I’m not certain any of those were unique to Strawberries, whereas, to my knowledge, putting an unclimbed route on the front cover of a British guidebook hadn’t happened before and hasn’t happened since.

And my reference to it being unlikely to happen again is purely down to the paucity of well known unclimbed projects nowadays.  Of course they weren’t called ‘projects’ back in 1978 when this guidebook was published, but I remember thinking what a cool thing it was to have an unclimbed route on the cover of a guidebook…

To complete this obscure diversion from the reality of BMC Meetings and Jim Pope’s headpoints(!), I’ve just had a root in the attic and found my old copy of the guidebook in question.  There’s now a photo of the cover, and of the caption, in my gallery.

Neil

Top history, Neil. Thanks.

I was under the impression though, that the unclimbed line was referred to at the time as Peaches rather than Bananas. Am I mistaken?

Actually, Neil this may not quite be true? I've just remembered the original North of England guide (Stew Wilson/Ron Kenyon 1980) had a route at Lazonby on the cover. It inspired me to climb the arete just behind it in 1987. It wasn't intended that the cover show an unclimbed line but that's what it did for me.

Blimey, yes - of course it was Peaches, not Bananas.

I blame Lankyman and his fruit post yesterday for befuddling my brain…

Hmm, yes I’ve got that guidebook in the attic too! I’ll dig it out and have a look, though from what you say, the arête you climbed wasn’t actually the route the climber on the cover was actually on (which was my point).

I never did get to climb at Lazonby, which looks like a great piece of rock in photos.  Though it probably was still accessible when I first climbed at Armathwaite (with the aforementioned Stew Wilson!). I think I was 19 at the time…

Neil

I loved Lazonby, much preferred it to Armathwaite. It seemed like a hidden Lost World where pterodactyls might be roosting. Stewie used to tell me that the 'locals' were scared of the place but that's typical of him and you always have to take his pronouncements with a big pinch of salt. I never did see anyone else down there though. We called in to see him and Maggie a few weeks ago. I can't think of a bigger sandstone crag in England? Hopefully, with a change of government, access to Lazonby and quite a few other Eden crags might be regained.

It was jocularly known as Peaches when it was a project, with a nod to Mr Gibson who was hitting his new-routing stride at the time. Every other of his routes had a Stranglers song name and this one was a suitable accompaniment to Cream. 

We were relieved to hear when Fawcett  christened it Strawberries.

 Peaches (E4 6b)eventually appeared later in the 80s.

Sorry, what do you mean above? You climbed new routes that had yet to be climbed?

Surely he means the lines were in clear view on the cover shots and that those with an eye for a new route could (or maybe should) have seen that there was a route waiting to be climbed there.

Exactly. Inspiration for new routes comes in many forms ... including guidebook cover photos!