UKC

For this week's Friday Night Video slot, we have a double bill of some extraordinary climbing in Australia. The first video shows the captivating headwall on the Taipan Wall classic Groove Train (f8c) and the second is from Flinders Island in the Bass Strait and follows Simon Bischoff on an ascent of Firetail (f8a).

What incredible rock at Flinders Island! Who eats an orange like that though....

I just wondered, watching this and other videos, is it not cheating a bit having the quickdraws already in place? Not wanting to take anything away from the expertise and difficulty of this route, but, really, wouldn't it be 'real climbing' or as near to trad, if you had to place the quickdraw too?

When it’s a red point it is usual to have draws in place.

You're either trolling, or massively missing the point here and having some weird trad ego trip.

Is there some local ethic that prevents the first part of Firetail being bolted? Is the first section part of a trad line?

I don't know about there but there are places in the world where if its a decent crack you put trad gear in and if there isn't someone puts some bolts in. Or t'other way around, to save on money you only put bolts in where they are needed and otherwise people are expected to place their own runners.

Amazing looking rock that Firetail climbs isn't it?

The first section appears to be common with the neighbouring route Thrasher - which is described as trad although it shares Firetail's first crux and uses the bolt there. Firetail is, however, the earlier route; it was done in April last year while Thrasher was only done this month. Both routes, though, were done by the same person - Simon Bischoff, the subject of this video - so maybe he had already spotted the largely trad potential of the later line and thus used trad gear as much as possible on the shared ground when first doing Firetail.

Just conjecture, though!