UKC

Eight years after Johnny Dawes made his ground-breaking first ascent of Indian Face, the infamous E9 6c at Clogwyn Du'r Arddu, in North Wales, it received a second and third ascent just days apart. These two climbers were Nick Dixon and Neil Gresham.

In this interview, Nick Dixon tells regular UKC contributor Sam Schofield more about his second ascent of the UK's most sought after tick, and why he thinks that the reputation of this bold climb does more to entice people to try it, than to put them off...

Read more at http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=5756

In reply to UKC Articles:

Comes across as a really decent, humble guy. Interesting comments about doing IF three weeks before his daughter was born, and great to hear he's still out there climbing hard.
Nice interview, Sam.

In reply to UKC Articles:

It's always great to see owt to do with Nick Dixon. He's put up a lot of really nuts routes, which speaks volumes about the man.

I'm not too sure about this though:

"Indian Face’s reputation as dangerous – life-threatening even – could unjustifiably prejudice those who climb it as reckless, fearless, taking risks with their own neck. But the amount of practice, research and exploration each ascensionist has afforded the route, or just their years of rock climbing experience, giving them a deep understanding of their own ability, contradicts this assumption."

It makes it sound as if taking massive unknown risks is wrong, which is a bit preachy. People can climb however they like and uncalculated risk is where the future of trad has to be.

In reply to Franco Cookson:

This and what you said in the interview after your recent new route, sounds like you've been reading too much Satre or similar. Everything alright with you Franco?

In reply to Franco Cookson: silly statement.. even the boldest will take calculated risks... you do.. look at your recent monodigit route? you didnt just try to lead it onsight with no idea about it.

In reply to UKC Articles:

Good interview, i'm quite enjoying this series.

As an aside, could anyone fill me in about West Indian Face (I haven't got a Cloggy guide)... was this a Dixon route that Dawes repeated? Anyone else?

And has Face Mecca had any repeats?

In reply to TobyA: I don't read. But thanks, I'm grand, I just see this singular approach to trad headpointing and think it's terminally constrictive.

One sees the danger, or doesn't, and can decide to lead the route on the desire alone. One doesn't have to weigh the desire against the risk, or tope a plod to death till the risk is a mili-fractional nugual. H10 is 8b, people can climb 9b - enough said I think.

In reply to Franco Cookson:

Do take this as the compliment it’s intended as, Franco, but really I think you do young – on the internet, anyway – better than anyone I’ve ever come across. Please don’t change – well, not until the right time, anyway.

Enjoyable interview, but FFS try and write better English. Starting off a sentence ‘without stating the obvious’ is just a signal that you’re about to say something obvious, and ‘nobbles’ is what you do to favourites, not something you hold on to.

jcm

In reply to jobertalot:

West Indian Face is an unrepeated Dawes route.


Yes - Dawes. Intriguing that the low resolution photo of the FA in the guide seems to show a runner much higher than described in the text?

In reply to C Chestwig; Treacherous climber:

JD says in his lectures that he was fortunate on his ascent of Face Mecca to have prepared for it with a good deal of gritstone bouldering, which wouldn’t be the obvious choice for most climbers. And also that it’s much easier than IF because you have the belay of GW only 70 feet beneath you – an observation which certainly had this audience member wondering about rope stretch and how high the first pitch of GW is anyway.

Still, as JD also observes, these routes are all a lot less serious since the invention of mobile phones.

jcm

In reply to C Chestwig; Treacherous climber:

Thanks. So does WIF share any common ground (the crux?) with IF? I know this detail is easily checked by looking at a topo in a guide, but as I said I (shamefully) don't have one.

It would be interesting to hear about Dawes' motivation for this route (WIF) - I don't think I've ever read about it or heard him mention it in an interview. Come to think of it, I don't recall that he mentions it in his book (i could be wrong).

I should have posted this in the thread following his interview, really.

In reply to jobertalot:

Jo, I think he’s quoted somewhere as regarding it as a ‘poor non-route’, because persons unknown have chipped runner placements on it (I think maybe before his ascent, even?). IIRC it joins IF from the left, maybe even from the GW belay, and then does the crux of IF from the ledge or thereabouts, presumably in a rather safer version. Sounds like it might deserve more popularity to me!

From memory - as Ally says it's all in the guide.

jcm

Should be called East Indian Face then! ...or maybe he saw the face of a West Indian one snowy day!

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

Most of the most outrageous pieces of climbing have come from 'the young', so aye, I do endeavor to stay in that place 'the old' see as disillusional. But then 'the old', just like the young, only have a singular perspective - so there's nowt to say their correct. The only difference is they don't solo at their limit, which is sad.

In reply to Franco Cookson:

Never mind disillusional, whatever that means, I suspect JCM may have been referring to pretentious youth, at least in terms of your on-line musings (your actions on the rock can and do speak for themselves). But don't let that stop you, it's all very enjoyable

In reply to Skyfall:


I think it's very simple: The party-line is "oooo, it's only right to climb a bold line after you have it dialed". Well yeh, if you want to do that then fine, that's why trad routes are getting more and more sport-climby in style, so that the numbers can go up without the climbing becoming any less secure. If you want to better the incredible efforts of things like the Indian Face though, you're gonna have to out-death Redhead et al. There's only one way to do that and it aint calculations.


I don't see how that's pretentious.

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

You need a new dictionary, nobbles is definitely a hold type...

In reply to Franco Cookson:

BTW, have you met Johnny? If not, I think you should. You'll either get on really well, or really badly. I don't know which )

In reply to Gordon Stainforth: never in flesh, but I think you get to know everything you need to from doing the crux of windows.

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:


I wonder whether jcm does old -- on UKC, anyway -- better than anyone else. What's the competition? Al Evans?

In reply to Coel Hellier:

I'm quite good at doing old sometimes ... sadly. (At other times: far too young for my age ... equally sadly )

In reply to Matt Vigg:

Knobbles, surely?

jcm

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

Hmm, you could have me there, never had to spell it.