UKC

With all the link-ups and extensions creating increasingly longer routes, for example in the the Santa Linya cave, I think an interesting question presents itself:How do we grade pure endurance?I mean, is there a formula like 8c+ + 8c+ = 9a+? If so, when is it valid?If you don't get pumped, and...

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Some of these replies were posted on Björn's old blog website, and so won't be from registered UKC users

ps
what wrong with 14 yrs old kids?

If hypotetically it would turn out that 14 year olders are widely superior in some specific endurance routes, well...then it is the exact demonstration that they are hard routes, in the sense that only very few of those practicing the sport can do them.


Or is the climbing population made by 50% teenagers and 50% the rest?



And about the 9a+ onsight jike : no matter how easy something is to a single climber, if he's the only one in the planet able to ascend it, then it is the hardest climb in the world.

If a mutant kid would grow to onsight a 9b, an then stop climbing. And after that many try the route and everyone fail for many and many years before a second ascent...would it be worth downgrading just because it was a mutant kid who climbed it?

Actually one could see climbing hard outdoors as a special form of "being different", of showing a special talent. And if special physical gift came from having a certain age we should accept it, as we accept that female gymnasts peak their career as teenagers.

Correctly suggested...I think that there is a huge difference in purity of line between Jumbo Love that just is a mega route, whereas all those link ups are artificial combos rather than pure lines. However, the point is really valid: if you link 8c+ into 8c+ and have a no hand rest in between, then this is not a 9a+.

You already have an example of a boulder grade on a route.
If it's valid or not, is up to the climbers who repeat it.

The Fly being the exampel in this case. 9a route - 8B+ highball

True, but 'The Fly' is an extreme example as there's just the crux sequence and then you're on top. On 'Akira' you climb a few meters, then the 8B+ and after this a 8b+ route passage followed by an 8a.

what is the humblest definition of grade we can get?

I'd say : a number telling you how many humans can climb that.

this is easy to turn in statistics, and statistics are relatively easy to verify and even to observe "on the spot" until the top level...a good thing would be observing what happens on some routes in the mid grades.

Take for instance a 7b bouldery strenuous route, say 15 hard moves, and register the average level of the redpointers.
Then take some other routes who could roughly be the linkups of two 15-move 6b's, two 6c's, two 7a's, with several different resting options (good rest bad rest total rest).
And just see which combinations give you the same "average ascensionist" profile as the reference bouldery route.

Note : grades are relative, it is not important that you take a 7b and not even that you take a "real" 7b. the important part is that the relation in difficulty between the initial route and the split sections of the endurance routes is clear.

that said my experience is that hard7b-jug rest 5 to 10 minutes-hard7a could be well worth proper7c.

What's wrong with 14 year old kids? Well... any number of things, but annoying perhaps?
No, seriously, there's nothing saying 14 year old couldn't be the best climbers, it was just an observation...