UKC

Does anyone know why the new Langdale guide has a grade comparison table that is different to everyone elses tables?

For example English 6a ranges from French 6c to 8a? Surely English 6a cannot span that range!

In reply to Craig McMahon: Haven't seen the table but the example you give seems about right.

Rumour has it that Raindogs at malham (which gets f8a) doesnt have a move harder than eng 6a, though there are lots of eng 6a moves and no real rests. Plenty of cruxy f6c sport routes will have eng 6a moves on them.

Having said that it seems quite strange to have a table that compares english tech grades with sport grades. English tech grades are for single moves whereas sport grades are for entire routes, seems a bit apples and oranges.

In reply to remus:


I suppose if you come from Europe or America where you climb using those grading systems, it is useful although I would be surprised if a visitor were to buy the definitive guide for the area.

In reply to remus: Is it not strange that their table is different to the one on the bmc or rockfax table?

Surely all tables should have the same values?

For example:

E7 ranges between 6c (bold) and 7a (safe) in all tables. In the Langdale guide E7 ranges between 6a and 7a.

In reply to Craig McMahon:


E7 6a: http://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/c.php?i=210830
E7 7a: http://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/c.php?i=10876

In reply to Craig McMahon: This doesn't answer my real query. I'm aware that grades exist out of the norm, however, why are the comparison tables showing different values?

In reply to Craig McMahon:

There aren't any definitive translations between French and UK grades - its apples with oranges so all you have is one guidebook author's view of the most useful interpretation

In reply to Craig McMahon:

The grades I gave as an example above are English (not English to French comparisons).

I feel my question wasn't clearly written. My query is not just about English to french really. Its more about the tables English grades not matching.

In reply to Craig McMahon:


So which one do you think is right?

In reply to Craig McMahon:

>Does anyone know why the new Langdale guide has a grade comparison table that is different to everyone elses tables?

All these tables are nonsense, but on the basis of the examples given so far on this thread the answer appears to be that the Langdale guide's table is slightly less crap than, for example, the Rockfax one.

jcm

In reply to Craig McMahon:

E7 ranges between 6c (bold) and 7a (safe) in all tables. In the Langdale guide E7 ranges between 6a and 7a.

All of the grades on the langdale table differ from everyone elses grade table. I suppose it must be the Langdale one? I just think its no wonder people get confused over grades if comparison tables and grades differ between books.

In reply to Craig McMahon:

For God's sake, man, try and keep up. E7 does not range between English 6c technical and English 7a technical. If other tables say it does, they are wrong.

jcm

In reply to Craig McMahon:


Which is wrong.


Which is better.


Then again, E-grades were invented by Lakes climbers...

In reply to elliptic:

Maybe one is a 1 sigma confidence limit and the other is a 3 sigma confidence limit ?

In reply to elliptic: Not sure about that. I believe Pete Botterill is credited with coming up with expanding the E grades by suffixing with 1,2,3 etc. but even then I had heard this discussed in pubs around Llanberis for a couple of seasons around that time.

In reply to GridNorth:

Thanks for posts.

In reply to Craig McMahon:

You're right. Goose Creature is UK 6a, and around 6b/+ sport grade (but not in Langdale). So 6b to 8a is more realistic.

In reply to Craig McMahon:

Cos langdalians are diffrent to everyone else....

In reply to Craig McMahon:

While E7 6a is unusual, E7 6b is quite common.

In reply to AlanLittle:


No it isn't; a 6a move is too hard to feature on a F6b. Goose Creature is a pretty tough F6b+ and has a couple of very easy 6a moves above 4c/5a climbing.

In reply to remus:


And sport routes that have one hard move also get sport grades....which is where is doesn't work well

In reply to Bulls Crack: I've never really understood the French grading system. If the hardest move on a sports route is 6b the route will get 6b, right? If the route comprises several, no not several, numerous 6a moves does that mean it may also get 6b? That's the only way it would make sense to me. I find it much easier to get my mind round a grade based on the hardest technical move with an additional element for other factors.

In reply to GridNorth:

There's no such thing as a French 6b move. But if you think of it in UK, a route which is solid UK 6a from bottom to top gets a higher French grade than one which has only one move of that difficulty. It's more equivalent to the adjectival grade than the technical grade, making the assumption that the protection of the two routes is equivalent.

In reply to AJM: Interesting but I'm not convinced that everyone sees it like that. Perhaps I'm mixing with too many aged trad climers.

In reply to GridNorth:

They're wrong then. It isn't really a matter of opinion!

In reply to GridNorth:

For both (single pitch) trad and sport climbs, the UK adjectival grade and the (French) sport grade are equivalent. That is, they both attempt to classify the overall difficulty of the pitch so you can compare the two.

The UK tech grade was originally a bouldering grade and can only really be applied to a short series of moves so you shouldn't be comparing it to the sport grade, i.e. you'd be comparing apples and oranges.

ALC

(an aged trad climber)

In reply to a lakeland climber: I like AJM's suggestion that there is no French grade for a move. Despite this most climbers I meet, especially at the wall, still tend to give a French grade to the crux move (Most routes in my experience have at least one move that is harder than the rest) I don't agree that the comparison should be with the adjectival grade alone, to me it seems to be a mixture adjectival and technical perhaps with a bias towards the adjectival. I think this is what the comparison tables try to achieve. It works quite well for me and my trad grade is very close to my sports grade according to that table.

I agree comparisons are a little meaningless but hey ho it's a climbing discussion forum and I've nothing better to do at the moment.

In reply to a lakeland climber:

No. Uk tech came from Southern sandstone, it is grade of toproping it.

In reply to ian caton: but the sandstone grades were taken from bouldering grades used at Fontainebleau, so UK tech grade = bouldering grade

In reply to GridNorth:


You meet some weird climbers.

jcm

In reply to AJM:


whilst I agree with you in principle you better tell the authors of some of the alpine climbing guides I own that. I always take one move of F6b to mean a typical F6b crux ie uk5c....

stevo

In reply to AJM:

Strictly, you're right, but what do you call an average move on an average F6b route (i.e. a route which is not too cruxy and not too sustained)?

In reply to ian caton:

No, the tech grade was imported to this country by Nea Morin and friends from Fontainbleau. It is a bouldering grade.

ALC

In reply to Misha:

If I have to, I tend to refer to it as something like "6b ground", with a clarification if needed regarding the length of the 6b in question. But that's more about sections of climbing. For example, I've referred to the top section of my project as "being like a couple of bolts of a short techy 7a+".

Otherwise I'd estimate a V or uk grade if it was for an individual crux. So if you were saying you had a 6a with what you're thinking of as a "6b move crux" I'd probably say "its cruxy", "probably a V2 crux". Or "don't worry, that move wouldn't look out of place on a fr6b", if they've just been shut down by it!

In reply to Craig McMahon:


Why not?
jk

In reply to a lakeland climber:

And one which I automatically apply to all the climbing I do - bouldering, sport trad...it seems a constant to me anyway

In reply to Bulls Crack: I often do a conversion to UK grading to a) help me get my head round it and b) relate the difficulty to a partner. It works surprisingly well at least for me. I just forget the protection element of the E so that it becomes an E for effort.

In reply to GridNorth:

Same here - I get loads more e-points that way!

In reply to jkarran:

To be honest I'm surprised that there are 8a routes without any moves harder than British 6a on them.

In reply to Michael Gordon:

Lourdes, famously? Not that I've tried it mind you, yet.

In reply to AJM:

Never heard of it but then I'm not a sport climber. If folk say it is I guess I'll believe them but I do find it surprising.

In reply to AJM:
Fair enough. I like '6b ground'.

In reply to Michael Gordon:

That would be then like max F6b+/c, perhaps that would be pushing it or rather long stamina route with no crux at all, just continuous moves of F6b+ all the way.

Generally to rule of thumb for sport routes that are not über cruxy, but still have a crux would be the crux portion would have a boulder problem of one full grade less. So 8a sport that is mainly stamina route, would have a crux sequence that would in it's own be a boulder of F7a.