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Climbing, Adventure, Gear & Choss
It’s All About the Pitches
How many pitches do you climb in an average cragging day? A book on climbing training that influenced me heavily this year says that 3 or 4 is a warm up, then hit 3 or 4 onsight or redpoint attempts, and then do 3 or 4 cool down routes. The idea is that one of […]
Scarpa Instinct Review
I have to admit, I have never really been a fan of Scarpa shoes. I’d had a chance to try a few when I was working at Climbing Magazine for their shoe reviews, and they always seemed a little clunky to me. I mean, why would I wear those when I had my trusty Sportiva’s instead? After test driving the Scarpa Instincts, however, I have to say they have made some serious progress, and now offer shoes that can compete with the best of them.
Independence Pass Bouldering
Each year, on Memorial Day, Independence Pass opens for the season and climbers are granted access to one of Colorado’s best summer playgrounds. Aside from a plethora of fun bolted and gear routes, the Pass has hands down the best bouldering in the area. There are several guidebooks that do a good job of chronicling the many established problems, but there has also been a lot of recent development, and it was hard to get good info on this stuff. Until now, that is. A new site has launched, IndependenceBouldering.com, that offers a supberb guide to the more recent problems in the area.
Interview with Sam Lightner, Jr.
If you’ve spent any time climbing around Moab, chances are you’ve lowered or rappelled off an anchor that was replaced by Sam Lightner, Jr. He and his crew have been tirelessly at work, upgrading the old mank scattered across the desert, from Castleton to Wall Street. I recently caught up with him to find out more about what he’s been up to, how he got into it, and what else he enjoys in the desert.
Gone Climbin’
SplitterChoss is taking a break this week, to go climbing. Hope everyone is enjoying their summer and we’ll see you next week with the usual whit, charm and insight you’ve come to know and love.
The Open Road
What is it about the open road that calls to us? And not just any open road, but the wide open highways of the West, where the landscape fades to the edges of the horizon, where the possibilities are as endless and big as the scenery.
Dumb Things Climbers Complain About: Pink Points
I’ve thought about renaming this column “Dumb stuff I saw on Mountain Project this week,” but I’ll stick with this for now. Generally I consider MP to have a higher quality audience than Super Topo or Rock Rhyming.com, but every now and then the same tired arguments get resurrected over and over, only to be beat back into submission by the masses. Bolts next to “cracks”, tick marks, sport vs trad, etc. This time around, it was pink points, and one individual was upset that the magazines don’t differentiate between a pink point and a redpoint in sport climbing.
Guidebook Maintenance, Part 1
While many areas have seen updated versions, there are likely still some older books in your collection that may not be holding up so well. A common problem is that pages start falling out, which is usually the beginning of the end for a guidebook. However, there is a simple fix to remedy this problem and get many more years of use out of that trusty guide (or at least until the fancy new color version that costs $40 comes out.)
Black Diamond Demon Pack Review
I have a love/hate relationship with specialized gear. The simple part of me wants one piece of equipment for a given task, something that works well in all conditions. The realist, however, knows that what’s good in one situation doesn’t work well in another. Sometimes I need a pack that can carry everything but the kitchen sink, and sometimes I just need a little guy for some local sport cragging. And that’s where the Black Diamond Demon comes in.
The Lost Art of Nutcraft
We were sitting around the living room, racking up for a weekend of climbing on the Front Range. My friend grabbed a set of nuts, and mentioned how he was excited to get to climb on some granite where he could actually use them. Around here, you see, we don’t get the opportunity often, as we’re either clipping bolts or sinking the occasional cam, so this was going to be a nice change.
Bulldog Creek Dog Walk (IV WI 4+)
Hayden Carpenter and Tom Bohanon recently repeated an obscure ice climb on the south side of Mt Sopris. Given a brief mention in Jack Robert’s ice guide, Bulldog Creek Walk is described as being 100 meters of WI 4. What they found was seven pitches of ice in a remote setting that makes for one […]
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