1 October 2024
Pearson explains E-grades by an E-9/10 (8a R/X) ascent
James Pearson, one of the most acomplished trad climbers in the world, has made the first repeat of Jacopo Larcher’s Shikantaza in Valle dell'Orco. Non of the climbers initially suggested a grade but Pearson was kind enough to elaborate a bit why it could be considered E-9/10 (8a R/X). E-10 means that it is one of the hardest graded trad climb in the world using the British system which adds difficulty and danger into one E-grade. At the same time an 8a R/X suggests it is not that hard but there is a big risk for for a serious injury.
”I must admit that Grades are not my favourite subject, but on this occasion I believe you might be right in thinking there are some interesting information to be shared.
Shikantaza is a relatively short route, less than 15 m in height, and the difficult section is only a small fraction of this, perhaps 7 or 8 moves where you might actually fall off. Bouldry routes are always harder to grade in my opinion, because they are much more more likely to feel different based on the conditions on the day, and a climbers own experience. Longer routes tend to average out over their length, whereas shorter, routes can be all or nothing.
When it comes to trad climbing, ironically, shorter routes can also be more dangerous than longer ones, as once you pass 7 or 8 m, the consequence of a ground fall will be extremely serious regardless of the height, and a short route means that you always have less margin for error before you are in that groundfall territory. Take Rhapsody for example, the overall fall from the final move must be approaching 25 or 30 m (with rope stretch), but since you are very high, and the route is steep, its a safe fall into air. Shikantaza is much shorter, and though the length of the fall is probably less than 10m from the final hard move of the crux, you’ll likely hit the floor.
Since a large part of the overall e-grade is made up of the danger, how you protect the route plays a big role in how dangerous you perceive it to be. Protecting a trad route might seem simple in theory, and if it was a well protected crack climb, with easy to understand gear, then that would be the case, but on Shikantaza, there are lots of things you can do to alter this perceived level of danger, and how much each one of those would actually make a difference in the case of a fall remains to be seen.
For an example, the route is protected by a sky hook that is next to your feet, as you are finishing the crux section. If this skyhook holds a fall, then the route is technically quite safe, but we are talking about Skyhooks here! They are far from the most reliable protection that exists, and in the case of Shikantaza, it is the rock on which you place the sky hook which causes me the most doubt, not the skyhook itself. This piece of rock is very fragile. It is hollow when you tap on it, and you can actually see the hold flexing when you pull on it. It wouldn't surprise me if one day it breaks under somebody's fingers, let alone if somebody were to fall onto it. To be completely honest, I rated the chance of this protection holding a fall very low, and almost decided not to place it, so that I would at least know for certain the danger level I had to contend with, instead of crossing my fingers and hoping for a miracle. However, in the end I placed it, for the small chance that it would actually hold, or more realistically, slow down my fall and give my bilayers a little more chance to pull in the necessary amount of rope to keep me off the floor on the good Friend down below.
Speaking about the good friends down below. With a very good belayer I believe they would keep you safe for most of the crux, but falling onto them from the three or 4 final moves would almost certainly result in a ground fall. To give me the best chance possible, I decided to use two belayers on two separate ropes. The first rope running directly through these Friends, and the second rope running through the skyhook. One belayer would lock the rope, and even jump off a boulder, in order to take in as much slack as they could. The other belayer would allow the rope to slip through their plate, and give me a very dynamic belay, giving more chance that the skyhook might hold, and slowing down my fall so that belayer number 1 could take in even more slack. These belay tactics are obviously more complex than your average day at the crag, but can make the difference between possibly walking away from a fall, and not. Unfortunately, it brings another set of questions into the grade, and depending on how "Good" the belayers are at their job, the route, or more precisely your experience on the route, will be more or less dangerous.
Finally, I chose to place several crash pads at the base of the route to protect things even further. Crash pads are wonderful for protecting short, dangerous climbs, but they are a nightmare for grading them. It's really difficult to quantify how much a “set" of crash pads will affect the danger of a Climb, simply because the quantity of protection they provide is potentially infinite. Bring enough crash, pads and you can make almost any solo safe.
Obviously in the real world, the difference between zero pads, one crash pad, and five crash pads is less black and white, but there is a significant difference. How old are the crash pads? How big are the crash pads? All these things are really hard to quantify, but make a big difference to how dangerous a route will actually be. This is actually one of the reasons why some of my early first ascents on the gritstone were “downgraded", because I had graded them for using zero crash pads. Not as an obligation to future climbers to also climb without pads, but as a sort of theoretical base level, allowing future ascentionists to better understand the “raw" nature of the route, before climbing it in whatever style they preferred.
At eGrader we take a similar approach, giving the route a "danger grade” (D-points) without pads, and then using a "pad filter" to later remove some of that danger. If you prefer, you could also take into account the pads you used from the very beginning of the calculation process, which would simply mean the initial D Point is lower, but since this would end up with every climber having a slightly different opinion on the danger, it doesn’t seem that helpful to me when the grade is supposed to allow us to compare experiences… if not then why do we grade at all.
You can play with some numbers on eGrader, but my experience on Shinkantaza would be something like this
Difficulty - 8a
Danger - 3 = Dangerous - Ground fall likely from the crux. Injury is likely even if advanced and specialist ropework / belay techniques are used.
Pad filter - Medium Padded (4 to 6 pads)
E Grade = Easy E9
Without Pads it would be an Easy E10”
”I must admit that Grades are not my favourite subject, but on this occasion I believe you might be right in thinking there are some interesting information to be shared.
Shikantaza is a relatively short route, less than 15 m in height, and the difficult section is only a small fraction of this, perhaps 7 or 8 moves where you might actually fall off. Bouldry routes are always harder to grade in my opinion, because they are much more more likely to feel different based on the conditions on the day, and a climbers own experience. Longer routes tend to average out over their length, whereas shorter, routes can be all or nothing.
When it comes to trad climbing, ironically, shorter routes can also be more dangerous than longer ones, as once you pass 7 or 8 m, the consequence of a ground fall will be extremely serious regardless of the height, and a short route means that you always have less margin for error before you are in that groundfall territory. Take Rhapsody for example, the overall fall from the final move must be approaching 25 or 30 m (with rope stretch), but since you are very high, and the route is steep, its a safe fall into air. Shikantaza is much shorter, and though the length of the fall is probably less than 10m from the final hard move of the crux, you’ll likely hit the floor.
Since a large part of the overall e-grade is made up of the danger, how you protect the route plays a big role in how dangerous you perceive it to be. Protecting a trad route might seem simple in theory, and if it was a well protected crack climb, with easy to understand gear, then that would be the case, but on Shikantaza, there are lots of things you can do to alter this perceived level of danger, and how much each one of those would actually make a difference in the case of a fall remains to be seen.
For an example, the route is protected by a sky hook that is next to your feet, as you are finishing the crux section. If this skyhook holds a fall, then the route is technically quite safe, but we are talking about Skyhooks here! They are far from the most reliable protection that exists, and in the case of Shikantaza, it is the rock on which you place the sky hook which causes me the most doubt, not the skyhook itself. This piece of rock is very fragile. It is hollow when you tap on it, and you can actually see the hold flexing when you pull on it. It wouldn't surprise me if one day it breaks under somebody's fingers, let alone if somebody were to fall onto it. To be completely honest, I rated the chance of this protection holding a fall very low, and almost decided not to place it, so that I would at least know for certain the danger level I had to contend with, instead of crossing my fingers and hoping for a miracle. However, in the end I placed it, for the small chance that it would actually hold, or more realistically, slow down my fall and give my bilayers a little more chance to pull in the necessary amount of rope to keep me off the floor on the good Friend down below.
Speaking about the good friends down below. With a very good belayer I believe they would keep you safe for most of the crux, but falling onto them from the three or 4 final moves would almost certainly result in a ground fall. To give me the best chance possible, I decided to use two belayers on two separate ropes. The first rope running directly through these Friends, and the second rope running through the skyhook. One belayer would lock the rope, and even jump off a boulder, in order to take in as much slack as they could. The other belayer would allow the rope to slip through their plate, and give me a very dynamic belay, giving more chance that the skyhook might hold, and slowing down my fall so that belayer number 1 could take in even more slack. These belay tactics are obviously more complex than your average day at the crag, but can make the difference between possibly walking away from a fall, and not. Unfortunately, it brings another set of questions into the grade, and depending on how "Good" the belayers are at their job, the route, or more precisely your experience on the route, will be more or less dangerous.
Finally, I chose to place several crash pads at the base of the route to protect things even further. Crash pads are wonderful for protecting short, dangerous climbs, but they are a nightmare for grading them. It's really difficult to quantify how much a “set" of crash pads will affect the danger of a Climb, simply because the quantity of protection they provide is potentially infinite. Bring enough crash, pads and you can make almost any solo safe.
Obviously in the real world, the difference between zero pads, one crash pad, and five crash pads is less black and white, but there is a significant difference. How old are the crash pads? How big are the crash pads? All these things are really hard to quantify, but make a big difference to how dangerous a route will actually be. This is actually one of the reasons why some of my early first ascents on the gritstone were “downgraded", because I had graded them for using zero crash pads. Not as an obligation to future climbers to also climb without pads, but as a sort of theoretical base level, allowing future ascentionists to better understand the “raw" nature of the route, before climbing it in whatever style they preferred.
At eGrader we take a similar approach, giving the route a "danger grade” (D-points) without pads, and then using a "pad filter" to later remove some of that danger. If you prefer, you could also take into account the pads you used from the very beginning of the calculation process, which would simply mean the initial D Point is lower, but since this would end up with every climber having a slightly different opinion on the danger, it doesn’t seem that helpful to me when the grade is supposed to allow us to compare experiences… if not then why do we grade at all.
You can play with some numbers on eGrader, but my experience on Shinkantaza would be something like this
Difficulty - 8a
Danger - 3 = Dangerous - Ground fall likely from the crux. Injury is likely even if advanced and specialist ropework / belay techniques are used.
Pad filter - Medium Padded (4 to 6 pads)
E Grade = Easy E9
Without Pads it would be an Easy E10”
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