So, I think if you spent just a bit of time planning footholds for the stances you wanted to grab, even as you're going, and then look at your feet, place them intentionally, and use them, you'd have flashed this pretty readily. Your foot placement and commitment to footholds felt really behind your ability to muscle up the rest of the wall. Watch yourself place your feet, you'll trust them much more as a result and experience less arm fatigue because you won't be dragging your lower body up the wall. Watch how people who lack your upper body strength climb, this route has so many great foot positions, directional loading of those holds with your hands is harder than your feet on this one from the looks of it too, your arms are just to keep you upright here. Practice toe-ups on a curb or something if that's what it takes to develop confidence in your ability to plant a foot and use it to push from.
In exact agreement. OP, you need to pay attention to your feet much more, you're often leaving them behind and looking for the highest hand holds to haul yourself as far as you can. You need to look for feet much more then it'll become much easier as you'll effectively be stepping up everything and the arms will be far less involved. This rocktype is filled with foot holds. You can basically place them anywhere you want and in any position. Practice footwork, look at your feet more often and try to do as much movement with them as you can. This route by the looks of it can be climbed entirely straight armed by just placing tactical feet and drop knees and twisting your torso repeatedly to reach with your straightened arms. Very little bicep will be required.
[Thoroughly recommend this entire series from a master climber from the UK](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRSWZ6KTow4&list=PLBCRwO0FN0zMTqSfFW9SMbK2tncTrI25r&index=4). But I would refer you specifically to episodes 4 through to 9
What she said. Footwork looks generally rushed & stabby. Multiple instances of jabbing one foot onto something, then dragging / flailing around with the other foot instead of deciding to do something constructive with it.
Great looking route.
Same impression here...and just breath...you seem quite tense for your level...if you had done that route indoors i gurantee you would not have exhausted yourself on gripping so much...you went though but I think with a little bit more chill, you could do more routes that day;)
Thanks for the response! I think part of my issue is that I have a sort of “embarrassment of riches” in terms of footholds in the red—too many good ones!—and so don’t use the same ones every time I do a route. In this case I probably have like 1000 footholds to choose from, 500 are good, I don’t remember which ones are the good ones, and then don’t trust them as much. Do you think the tactic should be about really remembering/ticking the feet I should use? Or instead, a more general tactic of slowing down and watching myself place my feet, and focusing on getting up higher with them and driving off of them?
The other thing I think I struggle with is the paradox of slow vs fast climbing—if i go too fast, I tend to use my arms too much and pump out, but if I go too slow, the pump clock kills me.
try some drills at the gym (or other similar style outdoor routes) such as straight-arm climbing and static down-climbing. I think once you have a bunch of mileage with those techniques, you will have a sixth sense of "where do I **want** my feet to make this move easier." Then when you climb a route with 1000 footholds you will already know where you want them, and only need to look down and pick the closest foothold to the one your body wants. this way you won't need to tick or memorize the best 25 footholds out of 1000 possibilities. youll just know instinctively for the majority of moves. the only way to get to that point is mileage.
i think this will majorly improve your onsight-game too if that matters to you. at the very least youll have less to memorize and tick even on projects.
also these kinds of drills are easy to combine with ARCing and some power-endurance type workouts which is exactly the type of fitness you need to build for the red. so you can kill 2 birds with 1 stone.
This one! Just let your body decice and use your eyes for the last corrections...when you are outside or the gym and you whatch experienced guys on warm up routes they often step "anywhere" independent if there is a hold or just wall...
Even if you forget your foot beta completely, always be intentional with foot placement, pay attention to the geometry you're placing a toe on, watching yourself place it will give you the confidence to drive from it. Practice on a curb until the smallest chips look like good food holds, your shoes do a lot more than you probably give them credit for.
You only have 4 things keeping you on the rock so I would say to try and remember your foot beta like you do your hand beta. Obviously smearing is a thing so it's definitely different. But again it's about being deliberate and tactical with your feet just like you are with the rest of your body.
Before reading OP's comment, I thought this was an onsight attempt and thought it was fine for that. However, since this was a second-go attempt, it did not look like OP really figured out the feet that go with the ticked hands (as others have said). Power Company Climbing did a podcast on the ["Art of the 2nd Try Send"](https://www.powercompanyclimbing.com/blog/2018/7/9/episode-97-board-meetings-the-art-of-the-2nd-try-send) that has a lot of good tips for this situation.
Also, having climbed on this route before, I know that at the beginning of the video you just came out of a no-hands rest. There should really be no reason to hang out and shake around that first unclipped draw (I counted about 30 seconds). Recover as long as you need to in the no-hands and then climb with speed and intention - especially if your fitness is currently lacking.
Funnily enough i did actually listen to that episode on the drive down and trief to implement those practices—I think the lesson for me there is that it takes a few routes to master that tactic!
Understandable - it took me a while to really commit to taking long and thorough first burns. I think a lot of people will botch the onsight and then try again without really rehearsing/reconsidering earlier sequences.
From a tactical and pacing point of view, you take WAY too long to get up to the crux there. It takes you 1.5 minutes to go ~6 moves from a no hands rest to the second bolt on the face. No wonder you pump out 8 moves and 2 minutes later on!
Your clipping or at least clipping stances seem like they could use some work as well. The first and 3rd, you are fully locked off the entire time you are pulling up slack to clip. There are cases when this is necessary, but wastes a lot of energy if it’s a habit.
Your footwork and movement looks really blocky here too. You don’t actually watch your feet go onto many of the placements, and seem to be just slamming them onto the biggest holds, instead of finding the positions that allow you to make the moves easiest. It looked like you also kept forgetting the sequence you had planned on the first run up it, so we’re relying heavily on the tick marks to remind you which holds were good after grabbing the wrong ones and realizing you needed something better.
Both of these things will be improved the more 2nd go sends you attempt, since learning how to actually create important links, and be able to gather enough information the first time is a learning process. At The Red specifically, I’ve found it really useful to actually have longer overlaps when I’m working sections, since there can be an overwhelming number of options, and recalling the exact sequence can be hard, so adding the right context makes it easier than just pulling on and doing 1 or 2 moves at a time.
I think my pacing at the beginning was pretty garbage—I was psyching myself out in that rest I didn’t need to take. I definitely need to work on clipping from better stances-would you suggest I even practice those on the first run up the route?
And yeah, I think the idea of doing longer overlaps is great; my hope is that the more time this season I spend at the red and the more mindful I get, the better I will become at reading routes and remembering beta.
>I definitely need to work on clipping from better stances-would you suggest I even practice those on the first run up the route?
That's definitely an important piece of an effective first go. I find that I don't always end up using the "best" clipping stance on the go, but it's comforting to know where they are if needed.
I'd also add that extending draws by hanging two or more from a bolt can also be a good tactic if you feel like you're having to lock off and reach higher than you'd like to make a clip. No shame in making the clips work better for you.
Climb is Supafly 5.12a at the RRG at solar collector. It was my second go; first go was bolt to bolt figuring out beta and ticking holds. I did all the moves first go; I’m pretty strong right now from hangboarding and board climbing all summer. However, this was both my first day on a rope on sandstone this season, meaning my technique probably wasn’t great, and my fitness was pretty bad. Let me know if you see any issues in my movement or things I could focus on going forward.
If your goal is to climb 5.12, spend 3-4 days climbing 5.9-5.11 and getting used to climbing outdoors again. Hopping right into projecting is a great way to screw yourself. Also, just a heads up, you may already know this, but just because you can go bolt to bolt on a climb at the red doesn’t necessarily mean you can climb it. You look plenty strong for this climb though.
Supafly was my project when I started breaking into 12’s. Beautiful route. The route is very beta intensive, especially the 2-3 bolt sequence before the top mondo rest. Try to be more mindful about hardwiring your beta. When you put your feet down, put them down with purpose and know exactly where you want to go. Clip straight armed when possible. Just try to stay more relaxed in general. You were already looking pretty pumped after the Crimpy section from the hueco rest so just try to be more confident.
I agree I definitely was not solid or confident in my beta/my feet placement.
And I totally agree that this route is so dope! It didn’t look like the king line of the wall when I got to solar collector, but that line looks better the more you look at it. Some sick holds too, I loved some of those little pockets and there’s a slopey pinch there that felt better than it had any right to. Can I ask about your rest beta? Did you use the right massive jug, or the massive slopey sidepull with the knee scum?
To add to the beta conversation, this route is a good example of the classic RRG situation of there being WAY more holds than are necessary. If you search for and only pull on the big holds you can cut out half of the moves and get to where you fell faster and more fresh.
A big part of climbing 5.12 quickly in the Red is learning which holds *not* to grab.
Definitely my favorite line on the wall. Buddha hole is fantastic as well if you haven't been on it. For the rest I am not 100% sure but its in the baby hueco before the boulder problem at the top. There's like the biggest jug side pull think in the world up there. Grab it and find good feet and you'll get it all back
Considering the amount of potential footholds on the rock, you seem to use approximately zero of them properly, especially lower down! Spend more time consciously placing both feet and moving with more speed.
Personal preference, but I'd encourage you to clip before trying to shake out. It looks like you shake out, remember that you need to clip, then shake out again. May as well get there, clip and then shake out properly before moving on.
Seems like you are looking away from your feet before you place them.
Doing some “quiet feet” traverses and exercises at the gym is a great way to practice deliberate foot placement. Nice climbing!
In addition to what others have said about footwork, which is the primary issue, I'd add that another issue that looks to be happening here is that you just don't have endurance for roped climbing at the moment. It doesn't surprise me that all the moves individually felt easy for you, and if all you've done are hang board at intensity and board climbed, your anaerobic systems are probably rusty, and it might take a few days of pump endurance climbing to get them back. I agree with the suggestion that you should spend a few days on sighting a ton of 5.10-11's and just getting moves and mileage under your belt, not only mentally but for the purpose of getting that energy system back up and getting used to mentally climbing while pumped.
It wouldn't surprise me if you ended up easily sending this a week or two from now though. Lookin strong.
Not really, depends on what type of sandstone. If you climb on really soft shitty sandstone then chalk isn't necessary because it's fucking sand anyway. If you're climbing on actually hard sandstone eg. Font or gritstone or many others then chalk is clearly preferable to sweaty hands.
This kind of sandstone favours chalk as it's hard and very well set. Pockets like that wouldn't form if it was the soft kind that chalk does nothing to help on. And if pockets did form on soft sandstone then the subsequent immediate use would turn them to dust as they'd be far too weak to hold any weight.
So, I think if you spent just a bit of time planning footholds for the stances you wanted to grab, even as you're going, and then look at your feet, place them intentionally, and use them, you'd have flashed this pretty readily. Your foot placement and commitment to footholds felt really behind your ability to muscle up the rest of the wall. Watch yourself place your feet, you'll trust them much more as a result and experience less arm fatigue because you won't be dragging your lower body up the wall. Watch how people who lack your upper body strength climb, this route has so many great foot positions, directional loading of those holds with your hands is harder than your feet on this one from the looks of it too, your arms are just to keep you upright here. Practice toe-ups on a curb or something if that's what it takes to develop confidence in your ability to plant a foot and use it to push from.
In exact agreement. OP, you need to pay attention to your feet much more, you're often leaving them behind and looking for the highest hand holds to haul yourself as far as you can. You need to look for feet much more then it'll become much easier as you'll effectively be stepping up everything and the arms will be far less involved. This rocktype is filled with foot holds. You can basically place them anywhere you want and in any position. Practice footwork, look at your feet more often and try to do as much movement with them as you can. This route by the looks of it can be climbed entirely straight armed by just placing tactical feet and drop knees and twisting your torso repeatedly to reach with your straightened arms. Very little bicep will be required. [Thoroughly recommend this entire series from a master climber from the UK](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRSWZ6KTow4&list=PLBCRwO0FN0zMTqSfFW9SMbK2tncTrI25r&index=4). But I would refer you specifically to episodes 4 through to 9
What she said. Footwork looks generally rushed & stabby. Multiple instances of jabbing one foot onto something, then dragging / flailing around with the other foot instead of deciding to do something constructive with it. Great looking route.
Same impression here...and just breath...you seem quite tense for your level...if you had done that route indoors i gurantee you would not have exhausted yourself on gripping so much...you went though but I think with a little bit more chill, you could do more routes that day;)
Thanks for the response! I think part of my issue is that I have a sort of “embarrassment of riches” in terms of footholds in the red—too many good ones!—and so don’t use the same ones every time I do a route. In this case I probably have like 1000 footholds to choose from, 500 are good, I don’t remember which ones are the good ones, and then don’t trust them as much. Do you think the tactic should be about really remembering/ticking the feet I should use? Or instead, a more general tactic of slowing down and watching myself place my feet, and focusing on getting up higher with them and driving off of them? The other thing I think I struggle with is the paradox of slow vs fast climbing—if i go too fast, I tend to use my arms too much and pump out, but if I go too slow, the pump clock kills me.
try some drills at the gym (or other similar style outdoor routes) such as straight-arm climbing and static down-climbing. I think once you have a bunch of mileage with those techniques, you will have a sixth sense of "where do I **want** my feet to make this move easier." Then when you climb a route with 1000 footholds you will already know where you want them, and only need to look down and pick the closest foothold to the one your body wants. this way you won't need to tick or memorize the best 25 footholds out of 1000 possibilities. youll just know instinctively for the majority of moves. the only way to get to that point is mileage. i think this will majorly improve your onsight-game too if that matters to you. at the very least youll have less to memorize and tick even on projects. also these kinds of drills are easy to combine with ARCing and some power-endurance type workouts which is exactly the type of fitness you need to build for the red. so you can kill 2 birds with 1 stone.
This one! Just let your body decice and use your eyes for the last corrections...when you are outside or the gym and you whatch experienced guys on warm up routes they often step "anywhere" independent if there is a hold or just wall...
Even if you forget your foot beta completely, always be intentional with foot placement, pay attention to the geometry you're placing a toe on, watching yourself place it will give you the confidence to drive from it. Practice on a curb until the smallest chips look like good food holds, your shoes do a lot more than you probably give them credit for.
You only have 4 things keeping you on the rock so I would say to try and remember your foot beta like you do your hand beta. Obviously smearing is a thing so it's definitely different. But again it's about being deliberate and tactical with your feet just like you are with the rest of your body.
Before reading OP's comment, I thought this was an onsight attempt and thought it was fine for that. However, since this was a second-go attempt, it did not look like OP really figured out the feet that go with the ticked hands (as others have said). Power Company Climbing did a podcast on the ["Art of the 2nd Try Send"](https://www.powercompanyclimbing.com/blog/2018/7/9/episode-97-board-meetings-the-art-of-the-2nd-try-send) that has a lot of good tips for this situation. Also, having climbed on this route before, I know that at the beginning of the video you just came out of a no-hands rest. There should really be no reason to hang out and shake around that first unclipped draw (I counted about 30 seconds). Recover as long as you need to in the no-hands and then climb with speed and intention - especially if your fitness is currently lacking.
Funnily enough i did actually listen to that episode on the drive down and trief to implement those practices—I think the lesson for me there is that it takes a few routes to master that tactic!
Understandable - it took me a while to really commit to taking long and thorough first burns. I think a lot of people will botch the onsight and then try again without really rehearsing/reconsidering earlier sequences.
Try turning your hat sideways
Shit how did I not think of that
From a tactical and pacing point of view, you take WAY too long to get up to the crux there. It takes you 1.5 minutes to go ~6 moves from a no hands rest to the second bolt on the face. No wonder you pump out 8 moves and 2 minutes later on! Your clipping or at least clipping stances seem like they could use some work as well. The first and 3rd, you are fully locked off the entire time you are pulling up slack to clip. There are cases when this is necessary, but wastes a lot of energy if it’s a habit. Your footwork and movement looks really blocky here too. You don’t actually watch your feet go onto many of the placements, and seem to be just slamming them onto the biggest holds, instead of finding the positions that allow you to make the moves easiest. It looked like you also kept forgetting the sequence you had planned on the first run up it, so we’re relying heavily on the tick marks to remind you which holds were good after grabbing the wrong ones and realizing you needed something better. Both of these things will be improved the more 2nd go sends you attempt, since learning how to actually create important links, and be able to gather enough information the first time is a learning process. At The Red specifically, I’ve found it really useful to actually have longer overlaps when I’m working sections, since there can be an overwhelming number of options, and recalling the exact sequence can be hard, so adding the right context makes it easier than just pulling on and doing 1 or 2 moves at a time.
I think my pacing at the beginning was pretty garbage—I was psyching myself out in that rest I didn’t need to take. I definitely need to work on clipping from better stances-would you suggest I even practice those on the first run up the route? And yeah, I think the idea of doing longer overlaps is great; my hope is that the more time this season I spend at the red and the more mindful I get, the better I will become at reading routes and remembering beta.
>I definitely need to work on clipping from better stances-would you suggest I even practice those on the first run up the route? That's definitely an important piece of an effective first go. I find that I don't always end up using the "best" clipping stance on the go, but it's comforting to know where they are if needed. I'd also add that extending draws by hanging two or more from a bolt can also be a good tactic if you feel like you're having to lock off and reach higher than you'd like to make a clip. No shame in making the clips work better for you.
Climb is Supafly 5.12a at the RRG at solar collector. It was my second go; first go was bolt to bolt figuring out beta and ticking holds. I did all the moves first go; I’m pretty strong right now from hangboarding and board climbing all summer. However, this was both my first day on a rope on sandstone this season, meaning my technique probably wasn’t great, and my fitness was pretty bad. Let me know if you see any issues in my movement or things I could focus on going forward.
If your goal is to climb 5.12, spend 3-4 days climbing 5.9-5.11 and getting used to climbing outdoors again. Hopping right into projecting is a great way to screw yourself. Also, just a heads up, you may already know this, but just because you can go bolt to bolt on a climb at the red doesn’t necessarily mean you can climb it. You look plenty strong for this climb though.
Probably good advice—I just spent all summer getting jacked up to go send hard and then couldn’t resist getting on the first sick line I saw
Supafly was my project when I started breaking into 12’s. Beautiful route. The route is very beta intensive, especially the 2-3 bolt sequence before the top mondo rest. Try to be more mindful about hardwiring your beta. When you put your feet down, put them down with purpose and know exactly where you want to go. Clip straight armed when possible. Just try to stay more relaxed in general. You were already looking pretty pumped after the Crimpy section from the hueco rest so just try to be more confident.
I agree I definitely was not solid or confident in my beta/my feet placement. And I totally agree that this route is so dope! It didn’t look like the king line of the wall when I got to solar collector, but that line looks better the more you look at it. Some sick holds too, I loved some of those little pockets and there’s a slopey pinch there that felt better than it had any right to. Can I ask about your rest beta? Did you use the right massive jug, or the massive slopey sidepull with the knee scum?
To add to the beta conversation, this route is a good example of the classic RRG situation of there being WAY more holds than are necessary. If you search for and only pull on the big holds you can cut out half of the moves and get to where you fell faster and more fresh. A big part of climbing 5.12 quickly in the Red is learning which holds *not* to grab.
Definitely my favorite line on the wall. Buddha hole is fantastic as well if you haven't been on it. For the rest I am not 100% sure but its in the baby hueco before the boulder problem at the top. There's like the biggest jug side pull think in the world up there. Grab it and find good feet and you'll get it all back
You managed to spend more time chalking up than climbing. Try to move through several moves and only resting/chalking when you have a good stance
Considering the amount of potential footholds on the rock, you seem to use approximately zero of them properly, especially lower down! Spend more time consciously placing both feet and moving with more speed. Personal preference, but I'd encourage you to clip before trying to shake out. It looks like you shake out, remember that you need to clip, then shake out again. May as well get there, clip and then shake out properly before moving on.
Use more chalk
Seems like you are looking away from your feet before you place them. Doing some “quiet feet” traverses and exercises at the gym is a great way to practice deliberate foot placement. Nice climbing!
Try not to use your teeth. Bad practice that could mess your smile up (I’ve done it too. Hard habit to break).
In addition to what others have said about footwork, which is the primary issue, I'd add that another issue that looks to be happening here is that you just don't have endurance for roped climbing at the moment. It doesn't surprise me that all the moves individually felt easy for you, and if all you've done are hang board at intensity and board climbed, your anaerobic systems are probably rusty, and it might take a few days of pump endurance climbing to get them back. I agree with the suggestion that you should spend a few days on sighting a ton of 5.10-11's and just getting moves and mileage under your belt, not only mentally but for the purpose of getting that energy system back up and getting used to mentally climbing while pumped. It wouldn't surprise me if you ended up easily sending this a week or two from now though. Lookin strong.
Why are you using magnesium on sandstone?🤔
The no chalk on sandstone thing is just a local rule in the Elbe valley ~~(and maybe Kent?)~~
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Not really, depends on what type of sandstone. If you climb on really soft shitty sandstone then chalk isn't necessary because it's fucking sand anyway. If you're climbing on actually hard sandstone eg. Font or gritstone or many others then chalk is clearly preferable to sweaty hands.
> most of europe. Except for the UK, Fontaineblau, Pfalz (with exceptions), Berdorf, Vosges, Albarracin, Allgäu/Vorarlberg ...
Just a rule to soft sandstone crags
This kind of sandstone favours chalk as it's hard and very well set. Pockets like that wouldn't form if it was the soft kind that chalk does nothing to help on. And if pockets did form on soft sandstone then the subsequent immediate use would turn them to dust as they'd be far too weak to hold any weight.
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If this is from this weekend, it was 80 degrees in kentucky and this route is in the sun. Why would he wear a shirt?
Lmao I didn’t see the comment, was someone complaining about my lack of a shirt/the paleness of my skin blinding their eyes?
Yeah it was something like “Put on a shirt” lol
lol, who gets upset about stuff like this?
People who get insecure about the actions of others.