In reply to UKC Articles:
My attitude to soloing has been shaped by a number of forces - but, not glossy doublespreads of Alex Honnold or videos of Dean Potter.
One of the reasons I solo is the difficulty of getting partners. I'm employed on a precarious, part-time basis. Consequently, I'm often free to climb on week days; when there's a sunny spell, but rain forecast for the weekend, I ache to get out. Soloing has become a partial and unsatisfactory solution to this problem, for me.
Next, when I started lead climbing I sometimes found myself suddenly terrifed by climbing. I'd set out, full of enthusiasm, and halfway up a multipitch severe I'd be freaked out by a lack of gear, fear of being off route, exposure, a lack of self-assurance. Soloing became a way of trying to deal with this and break the spell. One sunny week day I went out to Warton, where there are limestone outcrops of 6-10m, and soloed a bunch of routes. Wow - the boost that gave my spirits!
Reflecting on this, part of the reason I climb is dealing with the political and employment situation I find myself in: feeling inadequate, a bit depressed, lacking agency - going out climbing helps me cut through that. If my climbing is partly about a sense of personal achievement, soloing routes can really amp this up. Last year I was trying to get comfortable leading VS routes; even though this was the hardest grade I was leading with gear and ropes, I found myself soloing short VS and even HVS routes. That feeling of achievement was fantastic, even as I recognised the gap between leading multipitch VS and soloing 6m VS routes.
Sometime back, I was climbing with a hard climber friend; he soloed Middlefell Buttress whilst a couple of us climbed it roped. He said something along the lines of, as you climb you build up a buffer. Below that, you might solo. Someone leading E5 might well be comfortable soloing many Diffs, VDiffs, Severes - maybe higher, depending on the situation. But, for someone leading severe, the bar is low. Maybe you will go for a nice walk without fear. Well, it seemed quite a common sense view to me, even as it was a little patronising. As a VS leader, I'm content to solo many scrambles, but I've never soloed even a Diff route above 10m.
I see that view reflected in this article. But, the problems with this common sense view are many. Firstly, how do we decide where that line lies for us? 3 grades below our onsight roped lead grade? 1 grade below? With what 'feels comfortable' (until it suddenly doesn't)? With the moves we "know" we can make, or the moves we know we can reverse? Second, it doesn't really relate to actual practices. People do solo above their 'buffer'. Third, it doesn't account for those dynamics that make us solo: i.e. it is not entirely a rational decision. It might be a bruised ego or a desperate desire that sends us out soloing. Fourth, objective dangers are not addressed by the 'go down a few grades and you'll be alright' school.
Recently, I was climbing with a ML from Norway at Trowbarrow. It was a Friday in January, wet in the morning, but gloriously sunny in the afternoon. We had the quarry to ourselves to start with, but as the afternoon opened up three other climbers appeared. One guy was alone, nipped up
Barnacle (HS 4b) and set a top rope up on Coral Sea. The other two people simultaneously soloed
Very Ordinary Route (M), with about 2m between them. Having extensively soloed at all the small crags in the Silverdale and Arnside AONB, I'd kind of been chiding myself on not having the guts to solo anything at Trowbarrow. But, my partner, who has climbed hard and done big routes, ski mountaineering, alpine stuff, etc, was absolutely astounded by the way these three people were climbing. I looked again at the routes and noted the fact that they're complete choss: tumbled blocks and creaking flakes, in an old Tarmac quarry where local climbers constantly joke about the Main Wall falling down. My Norwegian friend shook his head and commented that British climbers have a different sense of acceptable risk to Norwegian climbers.
A little while later, we were gearing up in the bay formed between Jomo and the Main Wall, when a goddawful boom resounded around the quarry. We looked at each other, then walked around the corner. A sense of dread started to seep through me. But... no-one appeared to be hurt - just a rock being launched down the face, on purpose or by accident...
What do we conclude from all this? There's only one thing I'd try to emphasise: as much as we constantly make decisions and judgments about what we're willing to solo, what we're not, when it's safe, when it's unsafe, how we move as we climb, and so on - there's an irrational kernel underneath that rational shell: the desire, the need, that is driving us out there. Whether it's the barbarous political atmosphere of the times, a personal wound or a sense of frustration, I think it's important that people reflect in a deep way not only on what, and how and when they solo, but also on why they solo.
Post edited at 13:50