It's peak season in Railay right now, which is more or less famous for its "holiday grades". I think nobody disagrees that Railay is heavily overgraded, but the vast majority of 8a.nu members seem to be happy with that and register the grades as given in the guidebook (guidebook=bible as Jens called it). The reason for this is currently discussed in the "Seynes chipping" thread. As it is not really transparent from the scorecards I'm curious how you see the grading situation in Railay. Take this as a kind of poll for the most overgraded routes in Railay. You won't lose points when you answer here ;-) Here's my contribution: Good Medicine, 7a -> more like soft 6c Lal Bab, 7a+ -> more like 6c+ (and not really hard for that).
I guess the best thing for the community to have an impact on the grade is simply suggest a lower grade or mark it as "soft".
We will never change a grade in a scorecard but when we rank the best routes in the yearbook we will sometimes use the lower suggested grade as a reference grade for a listed route. If you check the Railay data base, there are as you say many very soft routes and in fact, some 50 % of the routes have down grade suggestions.
Holly sweet f*** guys!!! Get a life....or get into body building,,, then you will be able to really witness your unbeleivable accomplishments!! Is it possible to read an article that is not about someones head that doesnt fit in the doorway anymore!!!!!! Grade this grade that... my dad is stronger than yours....
@ Philippe: Thanks for your valuable input! Of course there's a lot more to climbing than just grades, but grades are at least a part of it and if people aren't honest grades are useless. If you don't care for it, I wonder why you even answered...Greets to your dad - must be pretty strong! @ Jens: I actually noticed that some people suggested downgrades using the registered ascent, but by far not the majority. Good Medicine, 6c+/7a in Wee's guidebook, 66 ascents in the database: 5x 6c, 5x 6c+, 56x 7a (or higher) Some people wrote in the comment "6c" or even "6b" in one case but registered it as 7a. Lal Bab, 7a+ in Wee's and Sam's guidebook, 270 ascents in the database: 5x 7a, 265x 7a+ (or higher) Someone wrote "6c?" in the comment while registering it as 7a+. How does 8a handle the discrepancy between registered grade and comment?
When we publish a list of the routes we suggest grades based on all the information available. However, we never change a grade in the scorecard. There are many routes to be up or downgraded at Railay!
The climbing community is year-by-year getting faster to update and correct grades. I would guess, that in any average crag in the world, there are 8 % that deserves an upgrade and maybe 15 % that should be downgraded. The community do seldom climb the ones that should be upgraded. "We" know thay are hard but it takes some guts to suggest the upgrade. I would guess, that at Railay maybe 4 % should be upgraded and possibly 25 % that should be downgraded. I guess, only Kalymnos could match these figures in the world and to a less extent also Rodellar. If you take Frankenjura or Ceuse, I guess, 15 % should be upgraded and 15 % should be downgraded. The easiest way to find the easy graded routes are by looking at the Tick List! I should underline, that these figurs are pure speculations.
Most overgarded routes in Railay