UKC

There seems to be some confusion about  what is an on sight ground up ascent .I heard the only true such ascent was a First Ascent on an unclimbed section of a rock face? Walking up to a crag spotting a line and climbing it to the best of your ability. A climb that has most if not all its holds previously chalk marked,  sport or trad, seems to be not a true on  sight ? 

You're nearly right. A true on sight can only be made if you approach the cliff blindfolded though (or at night).

And you have to decide on your rack before seeing the starting holds too.

That's not really true... you can approach the crag even durign daylight, and not wearing a blindfold... provided you have already decided on your rack... and you can only do this once per crag... So multiple ground up onsights are impossible at the same crag as you already have the beta for the other routes as you've seen them...

If you take the phrase 'on sight' literally, as in you walk up and climb a thing with no prior information, then a description of the line and a grade could indeed be regarded as 'beta'. However those things are generally allowed within the definition.

Obviously the presence of chalk can make a massive difference to the actual difficulty. A well-chalked on-sight could be easier than a minimal-beta flash. This allows cynical manipulation of climbing media headlines, and makes people's brains hurt.

Yes, the confusion is with your generation. 

We now use it to mean a first go ascent with no information other than what's in the guidebook (if used). 

Why don't you use a different term for your macho desert tower adventures.

Like 'onsight first ascent' or

'onsight and unchalked' 

Heroic! 

When I started climbing in the early 90s an onsight for me was rocking up to a route I’d never climbed before, I hadn’t abseiled down or top roped previously, then successfully climbed it without any falls or rests on gear, carrying whatever trad rack looked appropriate from the ground (which for me was usually my whole rack because I was always worried about not having a piece I needed) and without any beta from any nearby climbers or belayer if they had climbed the route before. I never came across overly chalked routes and even if there were some chalked holds it didn’t mean that I would use them or that they were the best holds for me. So chalk on holds didn’t blow an onsight. If I had been to a crag before, I could legitimately claim an onsight of a different route at the same crag because I couldn’t see the holds from the ground on that different route (albeit this wouldn’t apply if so had climbed a closely adjacent route or had abbed down or top roped on closely adjacent rock).

My understanding of ground up is that someone comes for an onsight, falls or rests on the gear, lowers to the ground, pulls the ropes leaving all or some of the gear in then tries again and repeats the above as many times as happens until they climb the route in a oner from bottom to top without any falls or rests on the gear on that particular go. 

But I have no doubt that I am totally out of touch in terms of current thinking and definitions. 

Ground up means you put a handful of soil in your chalk bag at the base of the route, and then deposit it at the top, thus somewhat mitigating the erosion we all inevitably cause. This helps to preserve the crag for future generations.

"Onsight" is actually a misspelling of the correct term: on-site. This distinguishes the ascent from the practice that was common in the 70s of constructing a facsimile of the route indoors and then flashing it there.

This is a good point but fortunately Panasonic are developing some gear to help people get multiple group up on sights at the same crag:

https://www.dezeen.com/2018/10/17/panasonics-wearable-blinkers-concentrate-...

Serious point....... I would not consider viewing from an adjacent route (as long as gear has not been weighted) to invalidate an onsight. Indeed doesn't "onsight" literally mean you are allowed to look at it and I've never heard of any restriction on the viewing point. I've often peered over the top of routes and felt holds and, yes, occasionally climbed an adjacent route primarily for the purpose of gaining useful information. As long as gear is not weighted I think it's all fair game.

I haven't done that many ground-up ascents but have been ground down by routes a fair few times

An onsight ground up ascent is simply an onsight ascent. If you you started at the top instead of from the ground, it would be an onsight descent.

Onsight top down surely.

And does an onsight ground up ascent invalidate a subsequent onsight top down ascent?

What if you fell off the top of the crag and saw the crucial gear/holds on the way past? Assuming you survived the fall and went back I think you're on shaky ground ethically

Yep.  Or 'led' as we used to say for short.

Me too.

Well, yes, although I suppose my point was that ground up and top down are equally redundant if combined with ascent or descent respectively.

Obviously the kudos for an onsight descent goes primarily to the second, provided they belay sufficiently far back to preserve the onsight element.

"Led"? That sounds like a modern bit of willy-waving. "Climbed"  was always good enough for me. Or perhaps " conquered" a generation or two back. Or in the modern gutter press (all of it).

If you've looked up the whereabouts of the crag on a road map (or digital equivalent) you've also blown the true onsight so make sure you turn you sat nav off on the way in.

In a similar sort of way, I always feel that directions to the start of orienteering events (both road to parking & on foot to the start) are a bit out of place. If you can't work out how to get there, what chance have you on the course?

Location definitions should be sufficient. I do of course realise that this wouldn't be very helpful for beginners.

That makes no sense!

OK I give up ...as expected lots of word play by those who have little concept or experience  of  on sighting  uncharted rock, both  here in the UK  and abroad. ... sad really . Bye the way my last 'onsight first ascent', as you advised me  to call them, might have just been in your generation 2018 ?   Have a nice day. 

I assumed willy waving was the reason you started the thread but your first post left a little margin of doubt, mostly by being quite strangely worded. I guess this settles it.

If you want congratulations for doing lots of first ascents, you'd probably have been better off just saying so. A first ascent is legitimately impressive, but that has nothing to do with the commonly understood definition of an onsight.

I don't think I could count climbing and adjacent route to look as an onsight, for myself, though I've done exactly what you've suggested.

Out of interest, what do you think about pegbolts?

Well said. I suspect you, like me, have guide books on your shelf with dates next to route names, the name of the person you did the route with and symbols like "L", "S", "So", "F" and even the odd "one rest". I would also hazzard a guess that you haven't too many videos posted on Youtube either.

Glory to breeches  and Ron Hills!

As much as Onsight Ground-up... Onsight ascent is by definition also ground up.

Ground up, only comes into play, when you fail to onsight somethting. So then you can either handdog it up and proceed to toprope it until it's good for yer redpoints.. you you ground up redpoint it...

By that definition you'll be alright with abseil inspection too?

Each to their own, and I've made a conscious effort to give less of a toss about defining ascent style in my own climbing, but that sounds like a definition that doesn't really tally with what most people regard as 'on-sight'.

A mate of mine tried that. But sadly he forgot to take off the blindfold and when he got to the top we had to tell him he'd lost lost the onsite. He was absolutely gutted.

In reply to USBRIT:

Who cares, unless you are a sponsored athlete claiming a first then so what? As long as you are clear and honest about what you did, then within reason.... do it your way. If someone told me "you'll be glad of that size 4 friend just below the..." and I walk up to a route I've not been near before and climb it. To me -- that's still an onsight. Maybe not for someone else. Will the world stop turning? Does my choice affect your climbing?

(But I will be honest I was told about the friend or the whatever, in the unlikely scenario anyone cares enough to ask.)

I would call it Clean Onsight. Then, as you say, once that had failed,the ground aspect up would be brought into play.

The only Onsight is "clean", after that is just varies ways of failing (so we made up new "styles" to make us feel better... after failing the OS).


nb. can't even remember when I have actually OS something... but I've come to accept failure.

Historically it's the other way round, after lots of dodgy stuff, onsight was made up as the best way of succeeding.

It's all just climbing though.

And if you go back to the actual "The games climbers play" essay, you'll see (or already know) that the smaller the size of the climbing, the less relaxed the rules are.

At one extreme expedition mountaineering, virtually no rules, ladders across crevasses, whatever. At the other extreme, bouldering, don't touch that hold, only use that hold for your left foot, etc.

I struggle to believe that anyone climbed a girdle traverse as their first route on Castleton Tower.

As a consequence of this I'd suggest that this was not an on sight FA.

I know... and I have read that.

To be honest, even in bouldering eliminates are considered "bad form", but they do certainly exists... and sadly not for only historical reasons.

And even in eliminates, there are levels of stupidness... Eliminating one obvious far away hold to make the line more consistant is the best case (or say eliminate the areta so that you need to climb on the face and only use the face holds)... But when it get's more tricky than that (only allowed to use this for the right foot, when Venus is rising from Mercurius and you have bowed three times towards Mecca, once towards Vatican and once mooned towards DC , then to hell with 'em... 

Guilty as charged - except for the legwear...  I started in flared denim, graduated to lycra and have settled on Prana to keep me respectable.

I have been dismayed by the disrespectful tone in many of the replies to one of our most respected rock climbers and pioneers, who has been climbing for nearly 70 years! There is an element here of teaching one's grandmother how to suck eggs.

When the meaning of a word or phrase changes slightly with time, it does not mean that the etymology or the original usage was wrong.

It may not have been wrong as a definition at the time, but to insist the modern usage is mass "confusion" on the part of almost all current climbers smacks of deliberate antagonism, deliberate oneupmanship or something of that ilk. 

Although I'm a great fan of respect-for-the-elders (being one myself), I also think that respect shouldn't be unconditional. Respect is more about taking what they say seriously (and judging it seriously) rather than just succumbing to knee-jerk responses. In general, elders deriding the efforts of youngsters for "not doing something that way I did it" is quite reasonably going to get short shrift - even after serious consideration.

Respect also goes the other way. Sometimes you (as the elder) have to accept that the world is not that same as it was when you were young(ish). The world moves on and to ignore that shows a lack of respect for the decisions other grown-up - albeit younger - people are making.

I know people who will claim an ascent with a rest or a fall. Those ascents are onsight but not clean.

I don't think that follows. Abseil inspection is a deliberate act to get beta for a ground up attempt. A casual glance from an adjacent route is not - unless it was the entire purpose behind climbing the adjacent route.

The two approaches differ in their primary intent (with the caveat I mentioned).

A few of the comments directed towards Paul on this thread have been petty and demeaning of someone who's actually achieved stuff in his long climbing career. Whether or not you disagree with his view on what the current nuances of 'onsight' mean that's still disrespectful. You can engage in a debate and agree/disagree and enlighten but Paul's record as a pioneer stands on its own merits. I've climbed a few of his routes in the Lakes and even if I disagreed with his views on something I'd respect what he's achieved and respond appropriately and hopefully politely.

Yes...

But considering the core and indeed definiton of onsight is a first try succesful ascent (no gear weighed) of a line with no prior knowledge or beta of the line (for that we have (beta)flash, where you were given info/beta on the holds, sequences, gear etc).

So with falls, rested on gear... is by any means an onsight (even if it is the first try), as it is not a free/pure ascent... Which is why, we don't have that as an option here in UKC logbooks (or do we have, Onsight... with falls or rested).


That being said, if you were to nit pick... how/what would you call an first try, no prior knowledge, no falls aid ascent (of and aid line) .


Edited to add, unless they are professionals and/or operating at the cutting edge of climbing grade spectrum... I don't really care what/how people call or classify their ascents (unless it's raining and I'm bored... like now). Each to their own, as long as they don't cause problems (hog a classic line by dogging it, when others are waiting in line for their turn.... or break critical placements/holds while resting on it)...

I don't know anyone who would call that onsight. I think most would call it a failure.

Read what Robert wrote again.

Personally I think climbing an adjacent route purely for the purpose of gaining beta is stretching the "onsight" definition further than I'm comfortable with, but I get the argument from a purely pedantic point of view.

Abseil inspection is definitely crossing the line, though.

I'm being pedantic only to illustrate the silliness of trying to have rigid definitions - if for example "you are allowed to look at it [without] any restriction on the viewing point", someone is going to game that to its limit so they can 'claim' an ascent was this or that. Puke.

I agree with you regarding intent. The spirit in which you climb matters more than hard and fast rules.

No, absolutely not!

I've just made a logical extension of the rule that you don't weight the gear. If you can look at the route from the ground then you can look at it from anywhere as long as gear is not weighted. Abseiling weights gear.

If you don't allow viewing from a neighbouring route, where do you draw the line?

Paul didn’t claim it was his definition. He said he had heard it, but he did insert a modicum of controversy and that statement was always going to invite criticism from modern climbers. This thread has nothing to do with his reputation and palmares, so take off, what could be misconstrued as somewhat sycophantic spectacles and accept other people can have a valid opinion, even the sarcastic ones, the majority of whom don’t even know who Paul Ross is.  However it is also a fact that time or opinion will not diminish his huge contribution to UK and US climbing. Just to state my own understanding I’ve been climbing for well over fifty years and for me and everyone I know, on sight always meant climbing a route with only the guidebook description, chalked holds an irrelevance, although this can make things easier, Midsummer Nights Dream on Cloggy being a prime example. A further evolution of this is an on sight first ascent, which obviously attracts more kudos.  

I don't.

I think that concern for categorising ascents into a small set of styles is missing the point.

If you want to take steps to improve your chances on a route, to reduce the challenge, or indeed to go out of your way to keep it harder, that's absolutely fine. I've climbed routes in every style imaginable! But the idea that style is on a single axis with clearly definable boundaries, and that every ascent has to be precisely one thing or another, is daft. I think everyone should decide how to approach a route purely on the basis of what kind of challenge they want that day, not on whether they can make it as easy as possible while still being able to say it 'counts' as this or that.

I'm not saying terms like 'on-sight' or 'ground-up' don't mean anything - they're useful broad descriptors, but nothing more.

I agree with Andy in that the intent is important. If you climb a route for the enjoyment of it and happen to glance at the adjacent route's holds, that's different from climbing it specifically to gain beta.

The outcome may be the same but the intent is different. I suppose you could call it Kantian climbing ethics...

I suppose I just like the idea of logically consistent definitions and boundaries for those broad descriptors, if only to tell me how much I have bent them!

It more nuanced than that (IMHO): I can respect what PR achieved (whether that was 30 years or 30 days ago) and at the same time not respect him for what he's saying today.

I would try and do that to anyone. No one should need to 'earn' politeness.

I think so long as everyone remembers that there is actually quite a broad range of style within what we call 'on-sight', it's all good.

Yes. What someone has climbed should have absolutely no bearing on the amount of respect they are accorded (unless it is with regard to specific knowledge gained from their experience, obviously).

First Ascent Ground up onsight is the best climbing I have ever done, but just going to a crag with out a guidebook and Climbing insight ground up is just as good, you just do not get to name the route, but in reality who cares.

I would highly recommend that people do leave the guidebook at home and give it a try.

But USBRIT, you have had the privilege of climbing in the UK when there were loads of unclimbed lines to climb, it also helps your a ballsy bugger with quite a bit of talent, but would you be happy going to a crag and Climbing ground up yada yada yada, if you could not name the climb at the end of the day?

There still are, and with modern gear , a lot more feasible. You just need to know where to look or travel north.

it also helps your a ballsy bugger with quite a bit of talent, but would you be happy going to a crag and Climbing ground up yada yada yada, if you could not name the climb at the end of the day?

That's how he started. Ratching about near shepherds as a 14 yo or so,  and soloing little cham where he had seen climbers . 

Paul has always been a bit abrasive probably just to set the pecking order. Give as good as he dishes out and he can be quite pleasant company .

Nothing wrong with abrasive, it's the sneaky buggers who say what they think you want to hear, and I like USBRIT.

But my question still stands, would he have been as happy just climbing lines if they were not First Ascents.

Much warmer going south for unclimbed rock and Iess midges

An example is Bachar-Yerian 5.11c X Medlicot Dome, Tuolomne.  "Ground-up" was particularly important to Bachar since bolting from the top-down was becoming common practice in sport climbing. Bachar as you know was opposed to sport climbing and placed all the bolts on lead. This route is a good example of a ground-up, onsight ascent without rehearsal or a priori knowledge.

Previous criticism of your post is psychologically analogous to children rebelling (though latent) against their parents. 

No it isn't. 

Bachar Yerian was NOT an onsight, ground up FREE ascent by what almost everyone now understands the terms to mean

He rested on skyhooks to place the bolts, as he clearly describes here:

 http://www.alpinist.com/doc/ALP26/first-ascent-bachar-yerian

It was a monumentally impressive ground up first ascent.

This doesn't take anything away from it, but the accepted meaning of 'onsight ' has moved on.

"Resting on the hook could give me an advantage and lead to unfair runouts for future onsight climbers. Thus each time I placed a bolt off a hook I'd lower back down to a no-hands rest, keeping the rope at the highpoint and freeing back up yo-yo style" 

Bachar. 

Actually that wouldn't even be a first free ascent by today's standards!

He did the first free ascent days later after at least one fall. 

As you say, the accepted meaning has moved on, but for a long time onsight just meant what it said on the tin. You turn up, see the route, and do it.

All of the comments on this thread have missed the point completely.

As with all objective measurements the key thing is the observation of an event, so it's what your mates think happened that defines the account of an ascent. If they think that you climbed a death route with no prior knowledge then by definition that is what happened and you are good to bask in unearned glory.

Ah shit, rumbled again...

I find it quite satisfying when you walk up to a crag you've not been to before, see a nice line and say "that looks alright, I'll lead that" without opening a guide book. Is it more 'pure'? I don't think so because knowing the grade is not going to alter the challenge of the climb. It's just satisfying because you feel reassured of your ability to read a route and judge that it looks doable. 

The meaning of an 'on-sight ground up ascent' is less confusing than your initial post. 

Scaled.... I always use BBC nomenclature and log my ascents as "scaled"

If it seems confusing that a word has changed its meaning, try looking up the etymology of the word 'nice'.

Over the course of a few centuries its meanings spanned ignorant, weak, foolish, timid, fussy, fastidious, delicate, precise, agreeable and kind.

I tend not to respect this macho bullshit regardless of someones climbing ability. 

Is it alright for me not to care?

Call it what you like, do you what you like, have fun, don't die, don't ruin it for everyone else, be honest.

That's it really.

Either that or it's a Beta flash..... :P