21 December 2014

8a community based grades instead of topo grades

With more accurate grades, the climbing community would rather go for the highest quality instead of sometimes go for the softest ones. Would it not be better to give the grading power to the 8a community instead of one topo author acting like God? 8a reporting ascents means that we analyze the database looking for personal downgrades and number of "Soft" comments in order to give the most accurate grade possible. Most climbers always use the topo grade as they do not have the experience, they do not care or they are afraid to discredit friends etc. This is just perfectly fine but it also means that it is impossible to base the grade on a normal calculated average. In practice we report 8b (a+) once a quarter of the latest recorded grades differs but also the number of "soft" counts. In one way it would be good to have a formula that also could be used for the scoring. The easiest way could be to use the quartile 1, i.e. the third lowest grade from the last 11 ascents or equivalent. Another option could be to calculate a mean based on the last ascents were also "soft" and "hard" could give , 0.5 minus or plus of the chosen grade. Over the years, we have gotten many suggestions and if you have a great simple idea please forward it in a comment. What does not work is to calculate an average grade of all ascents as most do not care and also that a hold can break. Many have suggested that we should have both a personal and a topo grade column once you add ascents. We would like to do the opposite, i.e. just to search the name and add it without recording a grade, which is how it works via Tick List adding. At the same time, we and the community are thankful for personal grades and soft or hard comments. Grades can be motivating but they are much less important compared to the Adrenaline, Beauty and the Challenges.
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