Challenge of the Week # 10

For me, it's getting to that time of the term where there just aren't a lot of holds for me to use or at least holds I can use. One of the things we have yet to figure out is when we're going to wear through our bolts. We repair a lot of them by re-threading them (if that's not the right term, you probably know what I mean), but after many rounds especially during smaller rounds of stripping, it can be hard to tell right away how many bolts were lost to the wall. Anyway, enough complaining, sometimes you just have to deal with it.

So here's the challenge:

Have someone randomly select 10-15 holds for you. It's best if they have set before or else you might get a really weird assortment. While they are randomly selecting holds, decide upon a grade that you will set and stick to it. Once they give you the holds, use and many or as few as you want to set your route. Do your best to stick to the grade.

Good luck!

Challenge of the Week #9

Sorry this is so late. I went climbing outdoors on Monday and when I got home, I ate a bunch of food and fell asleep.

This Challenge of the Week is to create a route inspired by an outdoor climbing problem. That's all. If you post a video of your route, don't forget to say what route it is inspired by and where you would find the route. If you haven't gone climbing outside, you should and then set a route!

Challenge of the Week # 8

I recently heard the awesome name of a move I've thought was very cool for a while: the thumbdercling
A thumbdercling is a move that forces you to use your thumbs for an undercling rather than your other fingers.

Here's the challenge: Force at least one thumbdercling that will be use later in the route as an undercling. You must force the thumbercling such that it cannot be used as an undercling right away.

Go to it! I'll set again as soon as I have bolts to use...which I don't unfortunately. If you have questions about the challenge, comment below.

Interpretive Dance

Route Name: Interpretive Dance
Grade: V4
Types of Holds: Pinches, Slopers, Crimps
Moves Incorporated: Undercling, Rainbow, Gaston

I wanted to set this route to be a little bit more reachy so that I could force the rest of the climbers to do a move that I thought would be really cool, Unfortunately, because I'm so short, it is incredibly difficult to force a height dependent move that I can actually forerun. It is often a problem I have.

Watch the video and comment below.

Green Green Valley

Route Name: Green Green Valley
Grade: V2
Types of Holds: Pinches, Jugs, Slopers, Crimps, Pockets, Edges
Moves Incorporated: Match, Layback, Undercling

This was the other route I set for the Advanced Setting clinic. I tried really hard to make the route at V2 level, but with challenging beta and it seems like it worked out well. For a V2 climber, I was able to force a zig zag movement across the wall that increased the length of the route and made the beta more challenging.

Open Sunshine

Route name: Open Sunshine
Grade: V3
Types of Holds: Pinch, Pockets, Jugs, Crimps
Moves Incorporated: Layback, Heelhook, Undercling, Match, Butterfly, Rainbow

I set this route for the Advanced clinic. I definitely put my all into it. Actually I probably put half of my all into it because I was setting two routes at once, but you get the idea. This route turned out to be reasonably challenging, but is actually pretty fun.

In Limbo

Route Name: In Limbo
Grade: V4
Types of Holds: Slopers, Crimps, Slopey Crimps, Pinches
Moves Incorporated: Mantle, Bump, Match

I really like this route. It turned out really well after it started out being incredibly difficult. One of the great things about setting in the CAVE, is that there is no real official requirement for the grades that need to be set. I definitely wanted a route I could project, but I wasn't sure how hard I wanted it to be. V4 or V5 was pretty good for me.

Originally, the first move was to a really grippy, but not very positive sloper. This caused the route to be much harder and much more burly than I wanted. I changed the hold to a slopey crimp and the route became much more reasonable. I would definitely say that for newer climbers who are likely taller than me, but the crux is the back arch to get around the move from the starting hand to the crimp. Maintaining the opposition to stay on the wall can be really hard on this route.

The next move was supposed to be a bump to a far crimp, but that can actually be pretty difficult for short armed people. That move required me to stretch by my full wingspan. In the video, Ian manages to get the move, but when I sent it I used a slightly different beta.



My beta which you will see when I post of video of it requires the climber to wedge themselves between the boob and the a foot in order to bump the right hand up to the far crimp. Additionally the climber can mantle off the boob and rainbow with the right hand to avoid rainbowing later on.

Extended Basics with Steve Wong

Almost two weeks ago, Steve Wong came in to challenge 11 of our aspiring setters in the Extended Basics Clinic. The format of the clinic  focused around two setting competitions to inspire people to set exciting routes. Since this was a setting clinic I took the opportunity to try setting a type of move that I had never set before - a dyno.

I had recently been watching the ABS Nationals and many other comps online and I was definitely inspired to work towards being able to set solid dyno routes. Unfortunately, I definitely overestimated my potential ability to dyno -which I struggle with and I set a pretty hard dyno. I was pretty surprised by how hard a route can become when it is built around a dyno.

I wasn't able to get a video of anyone doing the route, but here is a picture of the route. The holds I used were blue and red.

The dyno was definitely the crux of the route. It forced the climber to dyno diagonally out from the corner. For climbers who like dynos and are good at them, they really liked it. For everyone else, it wasn't well liked though I got complaints that they couldn't static the route and that the holds were so far they had to dyno. I didn't win the first setting competition, but I did get to learn about setting a dyno. 

Ian came in Second place by setting a really cool route with a high hand foot match and a deadpoint from an undercling to a pinch. 

Sarah came in First place by setting a crimpy technical route with a dihedral mantle near the end. 

The second comp was equally exciting and a bit more challenging since we were provided less time to set. The route I set forced the climber to go directly over the boob. Unfortunately during the judging process, one of the climbers slipped and hit is head on the boob. After this, I think a lot of people were too scared to climb my route. After this, I named it Cuidado. This didn't win either, but received a better score than my first route as well as a higher place in the comp. 

Hristos came in 2nd place with a pretty reachy V4. The moves were cool though. 

Paul came in 1st place with an overhung V5. I wasn't able to send it, but the movements looked really cool. 

While I didn't win either of the competitions, I definitely challenged myself by trying to set something I had never set before in a style unfamiliar to me. I definitely learned a lot from the setting clinic and will learn how to tweak my routes more. 

Challenge of the Week #7

Set a route of any grade of your choice of 15 moves exactly that uses no downpulls.

Comment with links to videos of your routes below!

5 Onsight Routes for the Challenge of the Week

This week's challenge of the week was to set 5 routes, each with a different style all at the same grade. I took this opportunity to encourage all the climbers at the CAVE to treat them as on-sight practice routes. All of the routes would be completely new to each of the climbers and would only be up for the night. It was like a mini-competition against yourself to on-sight as many routes as possible.

I barely managed to set five routes. After the extended basics setting clinic from Sunday (which you will eventually be able to read about), there just were not enough bolts readily available. Finding footchips to use was incredibly difficult. We'll hopefully get more bolts of the reasonable length soon (we were seriously hoping for some huge holds -- we'll get them one day). After setting a bunch of routes with bolts that were just a bit too long, I managed to find enough time to finish a school related project and make comment sheets for climbers to fill out. I actually felt really successful, since I had gotten a bunch of people to fill stuff out until I realized that I had forgotten to take the pictures of the routes that had been up for less than a day. 

Since I forgot to take pictures, I have made color coded tables in order for this to be more visually appealing. It didn't work that well. 

Route Name: Red

Intended Grade: V2

Average Grade: V2 (Or a really hard V1)

Moves Incorporated: Lay Back, Rose, Match, Gaston

Types of Holds Used: Slopers, Crimps and Pinches

From memory, what I remember from this route is that the start is a layback into a large and slightly positive edge. From there, the climber does a rose move into another edge large enough to easily match on it gets a little ladder for about two holds and then it's a nice gaston to the top.

Route Name: Yellow

Intended Grade: V2

Average Grade: V2

Moves Incorporated: Bump, Deadpoint, Undercling

Types of Holds Used: Crimps, Jugs

My favorite part about this route is that I found an awesome jug that when flipped over made a decent crimp and could then be used as an undercling. A lot of bumps happened. 

Route Name: Green

Intended Grade: V2

Average Grade: V2 (Or another really hard V1)

Moves Incorporated: Cross, Lay Back

Types of Holds Used: Jugs and Positive Pinches

Except for the beginning the route focused on hand over hand laybacks while walking feet up the wall. The Beginning started with a slightly balancey cross that required a decent core. 

Route Name: Blue

Intended Grade: V2

Average Grade: V1

Moves Incorporated: Bump, Mantle, Cross

Types of Holds Used: Pinches, Jugs, Edges

The route started on the boob and I made it pretty easy for fear that edges may be too challenging. Unfortunately, this turned out in the average grade being a V1 and two people listing it as a V0. It can definitely be difficult to fit with the consensus. Sometimes when you forerun a route, it just feels like it is hard enough for a certain difficulty when it isn't. I definitely set the farthest away from the intended grade on this route. 

Route Name: Purple

Intended Grade: V2

Average Grade: V2

Moves Incorporated: Hand-Foot Match, Undercling

Types of Holds Used: Jugs

This route was very dynamic without forcing deadpoints or dynos. The same style holds that I used in purple penguin were used in this route. I really wanted to force heel hooks on these holds, but a lot of climbers in the CAVE borrow shoes and since they don't really size them correctly, we have a lot of shoes with squished heels that don't work for heel hooks. Instead, I ended up forcing a hand foot match at the start and a long move from an undercling. 

Overall, this was pretty successful. I hit the target grade for 4/5 of the problems and the grade for the 5th is debatable and easily adjustable by simply getting rid of a foot or moving it else where. Next time I do this, I will hopefully remember to take pictures.

Questions, comments, and other combinations of letters, spaces, and punctuation go below. 

CUIDADO

Route Name: Cuidado!

Grade: V3/V4

Moves Incorporated: Heel Hook, Mantle, No Hands Rest, Cross, Lay Back

Types of Holds: Sloper, Crimps, Pinch

So I set this route for the extended basics clinic taught last Sunday by Steve Wong. It's mildly dangerous and it sketched loads of people out, so for that reason, I call it a success, but for actual it's pretty fun. It was slightly inspired by comp style slab routes that are pretty balancey, so I definitely had a fun time setting it.

The holds I used are all orange with orange tape. Since they are all pretty obvious, I won't do anything weird to the picture to highlight them.

This route challenges newer climbers with a pretty slopey start. It may not seem hat great, but once you get your foot on the huge footchip under the boob, you immediately realize how solid it is. It continues on with a bump for each hand to some crimps. You then bring your right foot up switch the heel hook to a toe and bump you left hand up to a pinch. From there you mantle off of the no shadow hand sloper and get the most amazing no hands rest -- you could stand there for days if you have nice friends to bring you food. The route so far has brought you over the most awkward part of the boob to climb -- the boobiest part of the boob. From here, you carefully lower yourself down to another great foot cross hands and lay back for the finish. I have to say the end was pretty scary. The left hand crimp is solid, but really only lets 1/4 to 1/3 of the pads of your fingers to hold on. You trust it, lean back, and reach for the finish. My hands were shaking as I reached for the end. I set an extra foot so climbers could adjust their hands to either climb back down or jump more easily.

Here's of video of me sending the route. You can totally notice my "jazz hands" as I reach for the finish.







Comments below!