UKC

On 22 February, visiting Polish climber Filip Babicz repeated Greg Boswell's Bring Da Ruckus XII 13 on Lochnagar's Shadow Buttress. The steep line involving a crux roof section was first climbed by Greg in January and is Scotland's hardest mixed climb (UKC News). Filip made a ground-up attempt before opting to inspect the line on abseil ahead of his successful redpoint, where he placed all gear on lead.

Following his ascent, commenters in our forums and on social media have criticised the lack of rime ice and snow on the line, judging by Filip's photos and comparing them to those depicting Greg's ascent. We sent Filip some questions to find out more about his ascent and his approach to Scottish winter climbing ethics.

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In reply to UKC News:

Good article (and I look forward to the winter conditions one). 

For me, it seems like they had a very narrow window to climb a very specific route and made it happen regardless of the local style and ethics. I'm not that bothered about time on the route if it was iced etc... but they lost me talking about pure redpoint style.

Choosing the right venue and route with the forecast to make an onsight or ground up ascent is what makes Scottish winter magic. If you get turned away by the conditions you come back to try your luck another day.

I'm sure they had a fun adventure climbing it, but it's not anywhere near as impressive as Greg's ascent.

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In reply to UKC News:

Interesting interview, cheers. I suspect most observers will have to agree to disagree (putting it diplomatically!) with him regarding the route being 'in condition', but it's great that he's clearly thought a lot about it since and is psyched to get back for other projects.

In reply to UKC News:

This season I’ve noticed a lot of petty finger-pointing over conditions and I’m honestly sick of it. Filip has come to visit Scotland and clearly had a great time in the hills, which is what it’s all about at the end of the day (some people seem to have forgotten this…) I’m not arguing that the route isn’t black in the photo, just that people have the tiniest shred of sympathy and don’t immediately turn into judge, jury, and executioner on the Instagram comments. It makes the Scottish climbing community look negative and hostile, which I find disappointing as it is our community after all. 

In reply to Will Hempstead:

Agreed this season has seemed to be pretty toxic, maybe because there have been portions of the season where not a huge amount has been 'in'. 

Clearly shouting at people on Instagram isn't a constructive way of critiquing climbing style, but there needs to be some way of doing it. Misha got told that he should let 'SMC and the other gatekeepers discuss it' and not comment on insta. If theres no visible critique ascents like this will be normalised at all grades, which although not 'wrong' or 'bad', would be quite sad for Scottish winter.

I think the pile on after Greg's FA was pretty ridiculous and likely just makes on lookers think the 'rules' are arbitrary and stupid, and may as well just be ignored all together.

In reply to James Milton:

Just point them at that eloquent blog post of Nick Bullock's. It did the trick on that other thread very effectively.

In reply to Will Hempstead:

Is giving an opinion on social media being "judge, jury and executioner"? It's called social media after all. I keep seeing references to "pile ons" and the like - I know you didn't use that term but other have - but is a few people posting things like "in the picture it doesn't look like acceptable winter conditions" really a pile on? No death threats, no calling someone else the C word, no calling up someone's sponsors to complain etc.

You should have tried it in the 90s. I've been interested in the idea of "community" for a couple of decades, both in climbing and elsewhere. What is the community in this case? Is the communitarian impulse not inherently insular anyway? How much do we actually have in common with each other beyond liking winter climbing?

In reply to TobyA:

I did notice that the two people saying the arguments this year have been particularly bad are relatively young. Bloody, erm, snowflakes….

In reply to Tyler:

I'm not that young and I also feel that the Scottish scene has felt a wee bit toxic this year with regards to conditions.  Comments on social media are often impulse driven, heat of the moment things which I suspect are partly driven by people wanting to feel included in the discussion (often whilst doing very little climbing themselves).  I love the banter in winter between mates but I dont think it comes across at all well for visiting climbers with our already hard to understand ethics and its often hard to tell on forums (such as the FB blackwatch one) when its a couple of folk who know each other taking the piss or something more serious.

For what its worth I think the roof looks pretty black on Filips ascent but having now seen the pictures of the coire etc I think its pretty cool they went for it with limited time scale and that its not that different on paper to gregs ascent.

In reply to UKC News:

Why not give it a D grade then? As impressive as it is to get up that piece of rock, and I'm not belittling the physical effort and technical difficulty, his excuse for ignoring the winter climbing ethics in another country is a load of pish - he was dry tooling it effectively so why not call it that.

In reply to Tyler:

I very consciously stayed away from that word despite it being oh so fitting to the wider subject of discussion!  

In reply to TobyA:

Hi Toby.

The following quote is relevant to me: "your ascent does not count" versus "I do not think that your ascent counts".

I think its just about giving people a certain amount of respect and not trying to put others down on social media. Maybe I'm being old fashioned. Or maybe I'm being a snowflake.

I have raised the concept of community because it's really important to me. I winter climb a lot, and live up in Fort William. I personally think that there is a great sense of community amongst Scottish Winter climbers, both for newcomers and the seasoned enthusiasts. I think the fantastic thing is that a lot of the time we don't have loads in common beyond liking winter climbing.

The distinction to make is that all of my positive experiences of community have been out in the big bad real life world, rather than the digital realm of UKC forums and brand sponsored instagram content.

In reply to Tyler:

James, we've been called snowflakes on an internet forum. One point to us.

In reply to Will Hempstead:

I would say that today's winter climbers, and climbers generally, are kinder and more considerate of each other than we were 40 and more years ago. Don't let some squall on social media disillusion you.

It's only climbing, it's the people that matter not the grades.

In reply to Will Hempstead:

To be fair, think folk have been a lot more understanding on here than if e.g. MacLeod/Muskett had turned up and given it a go in that nick. You can't blame some for shaking their head when he seems to have gone for about the only black line on the mountain (or at least, in the photo of the first few buttresses).   

In reply to James Milton:

The funny thing about that was there was no pile on. It was literally Misha and about two others.

In reply to Michael Gordon:

And while only a few agreed his point, it is cleat that it did set a precedence. And to be fair, on both cases much of the actual crag (during Gregs FA and now this ascent) was white/wintery... the meat of this climb was pretty darn black on both occations. In fact,if one were to take the time and crop the roof, a bit below it and bit above... I've say that you would be hard pressed to say which is from which ascent.

Kudos for Filip to also dig up the previous example from Anubis... I do recall the similar discussion and hubhub going on here after the FA. But does anyone remember what kind of conditions did Dani Arnold have, when he repeated it)

In reply to HeMa:

Wow the conspiracy theorists have descended, we live in a post truth age, but what you have just said is clearly not true, a precedent was not set on gregs FWA it was clearly in winter nick ( it is rare for the underside of roofs to rime up), the pictures of both ascents paint a completely different picture of the conditions on the  day, not sure what pictures you are looking at?

It doesn't really fit your narative,  Dani Arnolds ascent was in full winter condition and not controversial.

In reply to TobyA:

Looking at my dislikes it wasn’t worth replying just to crowbar in that pun!

In reply to Will Hempstead:

Crikey, if I’ve started my own culture war and somehow ended up on the wrong side!

In reply to Will Hempstead:

Interesting thoughts Will!

That's great to hear. I suspect that the increasing normality of women winter climbing would considerably change the 'vibe' on the scene. When I rocked up in Glasgow in the early 90s, having picked my university mainly due to it's proximity to the Highlands, being English and student seemed bad enough in the eyes of some, but definitely the Scottish winter scene felt quite insular and super-blokey. Even in uni clubs, women winter climbing were very rare. Having said that, some of my oldest and dearest friends still are the people I winter climbed with back then, and when we did a few new routes or first winter ascents, Andy Nisbet at the SMC journal was nothing but supportive and friendly in correspondence. But it did feel like the activist circles were rather closed and there was nothing like sharing conditions info that there is now (this was literally a year or two before the internet started really becoming a way people could and did share info).

I think this is great point, although after climbing for a bit over 30 years I have some great climbing partners who I've met in, say, the last decade who I hugely value going out with, and who I have met and arranged to climb with purely through on-line interactions. This includes via UKC but even through Facebook groups, despite Facebook being possibly the most toxic of all social media sites!

In reply to rogerwebb:

These days it's name calling on the internet. Not quite the same as punchups in the Kingshouse! 

In reply to TobyA:

I don't think that is only valid for Scottish winter climbs...

You might still remember how it was (and still is) here in Finland... a lot of the places to climb are still "need to know"... and if you need to ask, you don't need to know. Granted we won't have published winter climbing topos/guides... and a lot of the cool stuff is often involves thin or delicate hanging ice --> the less people there, the more likely it will be climbable. 

You might see stellar pics of stuff, and even route names can be available in social media... but no clue where that stuff actually is.

In reply to HeMa:

Yep - very true. I don't think I've ever come across in the UK 'private access agreements' where a group of climbers negotiate with a land owner that they can go and climb on a cliff on the owner's land, but they must not tell anyone else about it! But there were a few instances like that I remember in Finland. Don't know if that is still happening?

In reply to UKC News:

For those that don't do Scottish winter stuff, would it be possible to explain why the condition is so critical? To me it looked fairly winter-y. Is it that the climb is harder when it is properly icy/snowy, does the temperature make it harder generally, or is this due to people not wanting the rock to be scratched from crampons etc? I'd have thought that proper wintery conditions would make elements easier, like sinking an axe into proper ice. 

To an outsider with no prior knowledge some of the criticism seemed unnecessarily grumpy and ill humored... particularly if some of the fun of this stuff is the ephemeral and changeable nature of the conditions? But perhaps I'm missing something! Not trolling.

In reply to Eduardo2010:

There are different takes on this and everyone will have a different way of explaining it. For me, in essence, if something lacks snow and ice then it doesn't really seem like a bona fide winter ascent. There has to be something other than cold temperatures and time of year to make others go "yeah, that's winter". The difficulty factor does come into it for snowed-up rock climbs, but isn't the main thing I would say.

You're correct about the ephemeral nature of Scottish winter climbing, but I'd turn that on it's head a bit. It should suggest that good conditions are worth waiting for. If any conditions are fair game then this magic ephemeral aspect has become rather null and void.

In reply to Eduardo2010:

Fair questions - I think of it as fundamentally two issues: 1) protection of the climbing environment, if the route has turf on it, the turf should be frozen. 2) Giving the route a "fair go" - it should make sense as a winter route, and it should make sense to climb it as a winter route.

So - point 1) being frozen makes it much harder to strip turf off the route. Much turf is arguably ecologically not very important, but for climbers it is important. If turf is stripped away routes often become harder and less secure to climb. You can get into long argument as to whether scratches on rock really matter, but whatever you feel on that - if you climb a turfy route where lots of placements are thwacking your tools or kicking your points into well frozen pliant turf, you won't be scratching the rock. But some turf is very ecologically valuable and holds rare alpine plants that often exist in few other places, and can be destroyed by people climbing unfrozen and uncovered turf. This interestingly seems to be more of an issue, or maybe more recognised in England and Wales than Scotland - but this may well be that us English and Welsh winter climbers tend to get funnelled to the same few places because conditions are even more marginal here, so there are very few reliable places so they end up with heavy traffic.

Point 2) is why is this route a winter route? If it would be easier to climb with fingers and rock shoes or cramponless boots, it's not really a winter route, or not in winter condition. When routes are covered in rime and/or hoar, or just blasted with sticky wet snow and have gone white, they're just harder to climb than when they're not - it's more of a challenge and it's obviously winter.

So Babicz's ascent seems to have a few obvious issues. He said himself the turf on the first pitch wasn't frozen - he dry tooled a different way to avoid the wet turf. Sort of admirable but sort of missing a big flashing neon sign at the bottom of the route saying "not in condition!" I have no idea whether any of the hard climbing above the roof needs turf, but if it does, there's probably less of it now than when Boswell and team climbed it, because the second ascensionists climbed when it was unlikely to be frozen. Beyond that, with the rock being black, why do it in February? Or why climb it with tools? If there's not snow or rime on the rock making things more challenging, why not just wait until a nice day in June and come back then? If you climb it with tools in June wouldn't it be essentially the same challenge?

In reply to TobyA:

Thank you (and Michael), this is v helpful background and a great answer to my genuine question! I get the turf point and can see that although this route probably doesn't get much traffic, there is a thin end of the wedge argument that would apply much more materially to more busy routes. I also understand the summer/winter point - perhaps the logical conclusion of that is whether it would be acceptable to dry tool up this for the sake of doing it with tools during the winter months (even if that is slightly contrived) and the answer appears to be no for various reasons.

I'm still on the fence though. Conditions are more and more variable and increasingly unlikely to be perfect. Shutting down visitors like this for borderline conditions feels a bit gate keeper-y to me. Part of the fun of the sport is that it isn't like a golf club where a group insists that everyone wears a strict uniform and behaves in a certain way. But I also think those that engage in the activity have the right to set ethics, so I'd readily accept nobody should listen to me!

Both parties looked like they had rad days out, even if one was a bit more rad.

In reply to Eduardo2010:

I suppose there's two answers to that as well. One, it wasn't borderline, it simply wasn't in condition. Now I wasn't there, I've only seen the pictures and read what Filip says himself. But just by saying "not in condition" rather than "borderline condition" makes the issue sound a lot more clear. 

And then secondly, local ethics are generally respected. Lots of people travel to the Peak to climb grit and none of those visitors have tried bolting the routes because that's what they're used to. And if you want to go and climb East German and Czech sandstone, you don't use cams and nuts because that's not what they do there. I know UK winter conditions are complicated, but I don't think it's really gate keeping to say, this is how it works - if you do it differently most people won't consider it a winter ascent. It's a shame he wasn't able to team up with a talented local who could have showed him around and explained the ethics stuff. 

In reply to TobyA:

And, in addition, it remains quite clear that wasn't his intent. His intent was, in his own words, to climb the hardest scottish route and nothing else. If you follow his Instagram, you see that he has a climbing career of, admittedly skilled and impressive 'hard ascents'. The route obviously isn't in nick, even to a lay person, but I suspect a lot of the vitriol remains because, essentially, the climber doesn't care - he got the tick for his own public betterment at the expense of all other Scottish climbers. 

It's been referenced enough times in the thread, but even a cursory read of 'the games climbers play' - gives an impassioned case for rules (like being in condition). We might argue in some cases - as TobyA quite rightly does - that it protects a vulnerable environment - but in most cases it's that climbing is meaningless without these rules. You pull on gear in the Alps because the risk of the mountain environment is the most relevant risk. You could walk up the tourist track to the top of Ben Nevis, and you'd end up in the same place (if you got a little lost) as someone who just topped out Darth Vader. The meaning attached to the climb is entirely shaped by the method and the conditions.

In reply to neuromancer:

Surely that meaning is a personal thing though? 

I've never been involved in the Scottish winter scene, but from the outside (damaging turf aside) it all seems rather arbitrary to say I only like to use tools in the most challenging conditions so you should only use tools in those conditions too.

Surely it's either OK to use tools on a piece of rock or it's not?

If we agree that tools can be used on a certain piece of rock, what's the difference to anyone other than the climber whether it's done ground up, or redpointed, whether there's hoare on the rock or not?

I don't really understand this - he said he took a more direct line to avoid damaging the turf, so what was the expense to all other Scottish climbers?

In reply to Ciro:

It ceases to become a personal thing when he acts in a way that changes the international image and culture around Scottish winter climbing. By publicly claiming to (in effect) be the best (or among the best) Scottish winter climber(s). He has announced that he, because he is competent and strong, gets to decide the ethics of Scottish winter climbing.

As long as the turf was in nick, I suspect few people would be up in arms had the individual done it quietly and told nobody - as we've all conceded, a light dusting of rime does little to protect rock from scratching.

The thin end of the wedge is someone looking at filipos ascent and thinking 'that's what constitutes the game of Scottish winter climbing - it's just drytooling'. Maybe it isn't special. Maybe I'll just go climb the route in November - I mean, it's pretty cold in November right?

People gain happiness and value from the idea that Scottish winter climbing is a different game to drytooling. As the 'rules of the game' are ephemeral and cultural, those that gain this satisfaction from adhering to the rules are poorer now by his ascent - and he has undermined the culture (and most importantly, made it clear he doesn't care - thereby decreasing the value of the game of 'scottish winter climbing'). The meaning and value attached to prior (and future) climbs by followers of the game is cheapened by the ascent, let alone that it was all (in the end) about his bloody ego / image. 

Tldr it's not about the scratches and games have cultural and therefore moral significance. 

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In reply to neuromancer:

So if he'd come out and said "I wanted to do the second ascent of the hardest Scottish Winter climb, but it wasn't in winter nick so I did the first dry tooling ascent of a direct line avoiding the turf instead" would that have been OK?

In reply to Ciro:

No, because there's no tradition of dry tooling Scottish mountain routes. 

Also, looking at the video of the first ascent the bit on turf up to the roof looks like a relatively minor section of the first pitch, so I think his 'alternative start' avoiding the turf is a bit of a red herring. Good that he didn't pull that turf off but if it wasn't frozen why would turf elsewhere on the route be frozen? I looked at the turf at the base of a route yesterday - it wasn't frozen, so we binned it and went and did something else. 

In reply to TobyA:

Why would adding a new type of climbing (that doesn't involve changing the rock) to Scotland affect your enjoyment of the traditional type?

It's not like adding bolts to a route and therefore changing its nature.

You could still wait for routes to be in nick and climb them in your preferred style, if someone else was dry tooling them?

I had the impression that the turf had been avoided, turning it into a dry tooling route. If they have in fact caused damage elsewhere on the route then I could understand concern about that. But that doesn't seem to be the concern being raised on this thread?

In reply to Ciro:

Do you know if in the crack above the roof there isn't any turf blobs or even just mud in the crack that provides secure sticks? I don't. But if the turf 5 metres lower wasn't frozen, why would that be?

In reply to Ciro:

Imagine turning up a couple of months after Ron Faucet’s ascent of

Slip 'n' Slide (E6 6a)

in 1976 after a prolonged spell of rain!
 

Climbing on grit is frowned upon in wet conditions. There is a defined rule that it is the case.

Imagine there was a crucial pebble at the start.

You came from abroad to repeat this test piece. You recognise that the pebble is best left alone.
You try the route and found that indeed with the wet rock things are a bit gritty as you paste your feet on.

You decide to abseil the route and do a funny little side traverse which doesn’t avoid the crux but the pebble. You also decide that you’d put a few pads.

 You then tell the world you have made the 2nd ascent of the route in the footsteps of Ron.

To my mind, this is what has happened here.

Still an amazing level of skills doing that route, particularly in unhelpful conditions. But it’s not a valid 2nd ascent, is it?

In reply to TobyA:

I have no idea, that's why I'm asking what the problem is.

If he'd just gone dry tooling on pure rock pitches in the Scottish Highlands and posted about that, would that be OK?

In reply to French Erick:

In 1976 , a few months after the first ascent, I doubt anyone gave much fuss over climbing grit in the wet.... showing how ethics and consideration of conditions change with time

In reply to wbo2:

Perhaps? I wasn’t born so I can’t comment. Just assumed people might have given it more thoughts. Was just trying to make a valid analogy. It seems I failed.

In reply to Ciro:

What do you mean by ok? Would it be breaking the law? I don't think so.

But that's not what he did or claimed. He claimed he made the second ascent of the route, which if you accept it wasn't in winter condition, he didn't actually do.

In reply to TobyA:

By OK, I mean if he'd claimed the first drytooling ascent of a pure rock route would the people who are currently unhappy, be happy?

Or is it the case that dry tooling is "acceptable" in the Scottish mountains when the conditions are sufficiently challenging, but not when it's a bit easier?

Because the latter is the impression I get as an outsider to the scene reading this thread.

In reply to Ciro:

Have you considered where the "dry" bit of "dry tooling" comes from? It's what separates it from normal winter climbing That's why if you want to dry tool, go to the few dry tooling crags round the country where you can do it to your hearts content. If you want to winter climb go to the mountains and wait find a route in winter condition.

In reply to French Erick:

Didn’t see the auto-correction of Ron’s name! Fawcett it should obviously be and not the tap!

In reply to TobyA:

Of course I have, but it seems to me that if you can navigare around the turf then the same damage would be done to the rock whether climbing this as a dry tooling route or a winter route, so I'm not sure why one would be OK and the other not, or why someone doing one would be taking away from someone doing the other?

 It's not like, say, turning up on Czech sandstone and using metal gear, which would damage the rock in a way that local ethics don't, it's just doing exactly the same thing at a different time?

I don't want to dry tool, I don't have skin in the game, I'm just trying to understand what the big fuss is if someone does.

What's wrong with people enjoying the rock the way they want?

From the outside I'm struggling to see the difference between the approaches, so it smells a bit like localism in surfing.

In reply to Ciro:

But you don't know if any turf was ripped out. You should really have a go at some winter routes, then you might appreciate this issue. 

And, as I said above, he didn't claim to have dry tooled the route, he didn't give it a D grade or M grade. He didn't say he was enjoying the route in his own (different) way. He said he had done it he second ascent of Boswell's XII route. 

If a visiting climber comes along and does the second ascent of some super hard trad route, let's say an E10. But she drops a static line down it with figure of 8 knots in it every 2 mtrs, then leads it clipping those knots like they were bolts, are you going to credit her with the second ascent? When you see that reported on non UK websites as the second ascent, would you agree (I've seen Babicz's ascent called the second ascent on Gripped's website and I think [my Italian isn't up to much] Planet Mountain)? They've not damaged the rock any more than the first ascent. They enjoyed the rock in their own way... 

You could go and dry tool a IV tomorrow - if you didn't pull off turf, it wouldn't really matter*. If winter climbers saw you, they might laugh and think that's pretty strange behaviour, but stick a pic up on your socials saying "I've done a grade IV!" you could fairly expect some piss taking. 

*It actually would because climbing in season and in condition keeps down the number of ascents down of routes that can be summer as well as winter classics, so they don't get as heavily scratched - but that's another point...

In reply to TobyA:

So it's just the reporting of it as a winter ascent that bothers you?

In reply to Ciro:

Whilst trolling is well established within the lexicon of 'games that climbers play', your quality has deteriorated over time to well below average, and that this has happened in spite of the forum being in perfect condition (a concept you struggle with) is a truth that reflects poorly upon you as a person.

In reply to Ciro:

And yes, because it makes us all complicit in his dishonesty. 

In reply to Ciro:

What about my E10 "second ascent" idea? I put some effort into thinking that one up! Has Strong Julie Foreigner done the second ascent?

In reply to Ciro:

Oh, and I'm not really "bothered", not in comparison to our Government that seems to want to recreate the refugee camp scene in Children of Men in real life, or even my house's guttering that has been dislodged by the creeping snow pack in the thaw yesterday and I don't have a ladder long enough to get up to it. 

I do like winter climbing though, and I am interested in the sociology of climbing as a subculture.