Seven Reasons to Encourage Your Friends to Toprope

Toproping tends to get a bad rep in the climbing world, and for many good reasons. It's pretty hard to "cheat" and let your belayer take weight off through the crux if you're on lead, and toproping (usually) isn't as scary as tying into the sharp end. However, sometimes it can be beneficial to encourage your climbing partners to tie in to a pre-hung rope:

Luke wishes he was toprope belaying.

1. You can now belay with your butt in a lawn chair. You'll never fully recover between burns if you're standing to actively lead belay, and you need all the rest you can get to send. However, simply taking in slack can be done from your feet or your behind. Just make sure to pick a flat section of ground for your favorite lawn or foldable camp chair.
2. Using your Grigri becomes much less complicated.  There's a lot involved in lead belaying with a grigri: continuously holding down while paying out slack, not dropping the overly large device, and raising the handle just enough for a smooth, steady lower. Make your life simpler by only taking in slack and smoothly lowering with the handle after your partner has reached the end of their toprope. Even better, you don't have to crank down on the break hand if/when they fall like you would with an ATC; let the assisted belay device do the work for you.
3. No more cleaning your own draws. Especially on overhung routes, cleaning the draws on the descent can be an unexpected crux. But if you can get a friend to toprope through the draws and clean them on the way up, you'll never face this challenge again. Simply tell your partner it's good clipping practice—it's harder to unclip than clip—without the stress of leading.
4. You can belay by feel. No more neck pain, and no reason to spend your hard-earned dollars on belay specs. Whenever you feel the rope go slack, simply take in until the rope is taught again; no need to watch the climber. Still feel the need to be safe and watch your climber? Take number 1 to a new level and belay laying down on your back; neck pain solved again.
5. You'll have less wear on the rope. If your climber plans to fall a lot on the route, hanging toprope will put less strain on your rope as they fall with more rope out and onto more than just one quickdraw. Use this excuse whenever using your own rope and offer it as a "helpful suggestion" to your friend if using his/hers.
6. You get to show off your anywhere-anchor-building skills. Impress your friends with your ability to top rope unbolted and possibly previously unclimbed routes by disappearing over the top of the cliff, wrapping some cordelette around a tree, attaching locking biners, and rapping off. Volia: insta-climb. 
7. You'll look like the group tough guy/girl. Want to impress others at the crag by looking like the experienced one of the group? Being the only leader does just that. Leading 5.10 and above also helps.

Gear Review: The Butora Acro

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I hate stuffing my feet into tiny aggressive shoes. If it takes me more than a minute to tug, squeeze, and pinch my feet into a pair, and I get a foot cramp the minute they’re finally laced up, then I'm not going to wear them. I love the precision of a stiff, downturned sole, but, due to my self-preservation instinct, I won't use my feet if putting weight on them causes immense pain, which renders my aggressive shoes useless. Thus, up until this point, I've upsized aggressive shoes. For example, my 5.10 dragons are size 9 men's, and I'm an 8.5 women's—and they're still tight enough that I want to rip them off at the end of each pitch. But this fall I only used my Dragons twice…because I found these:

Say hello to the Butora Acro, narrow fit.

Never heard of Butora? I hadn't either until the company made its American debut this summer at the Outdoor Retailer trade show. Butora is based in Korea, but has recently opened sales internationally. The Acro is its most aggressive shoe, specially designed for steep and technical sport climbing and bouldering, and it comes in two styles: the orange wide fit and blue narrow fit (I now use the latter every time I climb outside). Even better, sizing is easy: For sport climbing they fit true to your street size (revolutionary, I know), and going a half-size down is recommended for bouldering.

So why are the Acros so great? Chris Kalous of the Enormocast summed it up nicely when he tried on his pair at the trade show: "I could wear these right out of the box."

I did wear mine right out of the box and was comfortable enough to climb 10 pitches in them at Rifle—that never happens to me with new shoes. The narrow fit is snug and 100% gapless on my feet, thus requiring a bit of tugging to get on, but, once they are strapped down, there are no pressure points that cause my toes, etc. excess pain. I agree completely with the online product description that these shoes combine the ease of a single velcro strap with "the extra security and custom fit of a lace-up shoe." The Acro is my only non-lace-up, and they form to my feet better than my Dragons. 

I climbed outside an average of once a week in my Acros from August through mid-November, and the rubber is only just starting to show signs of wear on the toes. I anticipate getting to at least May without having to resole them (which I most certainly will), as long as I don’t wear them for long gym sessions this winter. And at $154.00, they are about $20 less than the 5.10 Dragon and the La Sportiva Solution, so they’re great for saving a few dollars on your first (or tenth) aggressive pair, especially if you’re not used to ultra-tight shoes. 

Overall, I have zero complaints about my Acros and continue to be amazed by how comfortable they are. I give them five stars, as did the two other reviews on the website, and will not be buying shoes from any other brand for a long time. It’s also nice not having the same shoes at anyone else at the crag—you never have to worry about getting them mixed up.

Fun Fact: Butora doesn't have "men's" and "women's" specific shoes, only narrow and wide fit variations. If you click on the "men's" section, you get the same options as the "women's." I like this setup, as I know plenty of females with wide feet who routinely buy "men's" shoes, and other guys who wish the women's solution wasn't covered in flowers because it fits their narrow feet.  

Butora has specially designed shoes for traditional climbing, all around performance, children, and more. Check out its website for more models. 

If Climbing Genres Were Types of Coffee

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New Year's Climbing "Resolutions"

First, I should come clean: I'm not a New Year's resolution type of person. I don't join the hoards of two-week January Planet Fitness goers who lose interest in legs day long before Valentine's Day chocolates—I can't say I've ever done legs day unless jogging counts. Nor do I resolve that this is the year I'll finally finish cleaning out the garage, lose five pounds, cut down on my beer consumption, or any other Google-recommended New Year's resolutions. However, this year I've decided to make some (now public...) New Year's goals—less scary and official sounding than resolutions.

GOAL ONE: STOP BEING A PUSSY
I've conveniently gone from one leg injury to another for most of the past year and a half, leading to lots of top roping instead of routinely tying into the sharp end and repeating low-ball boulder problems. This has made me a complete wimp. After not taking a good whip in a few months, falling on lead now seems roughly 147 times scarier than it did when I first started sport climbing. This spring, once the weather is warm enough for me to climb without numbing out between bolts, I plan to grow a pair and start leading hard (for me) routes again. I also need to work on my gear placements—also requiring a bit of confidence, concentration, and tying into the sharp end. I truly miss the complete concentration of redpointing, so now all I have to do is sack up and take a few falls (and continue doing my knee physical therapy three times a week, so I'm strong enough to take some solid whips).

GOAL TWO: TRAIN CONSISTENTLY
I've lost count of how many times I've turned to my weekend warrior partners and said: "I wonder how good we'd be at rock climbing if we actually trained."
Well, frozen January in New England is the perfect time to start training. I'm going to stop calling six pitches at Rumney on Saturdays, three ab workouts each week, and messing around on UNH's mini bouldering wall adequate climbing training. I'm going to kick my butt into getting on some sort of regular schedule including three sessions each week of climbing, abs and lower back, knee and leg strengthening (as explained above), and light cardio (not all on the same day). I also want to incorporate more yoga and general arm strengthening days—realistically once or twice a week—into my schedule.

GOAL THREE: EAT LIKE A CHAMPION
Despite my love of food, I don't always eat as well as I should. I tend to snack constantly throughout the day (picture granola bars and bananas with peanut butter) instead of taking time to cook real meals for myself. While sandwiches, fruit, cereal and frozen ravioli are fine for when you're in a rush, I need to stop making packaged foods my main source of nutrition. My goal is to eat fewer processed foods and focus on whole foods (whole grains, fruits, veggies, eggs, nuts, minimally processed soy foods such as tempeh, etc.) and start learning to cook. I also want to make sure that I pack healthy "real" food for long climbing days instead of throwing six bars and an apple into my pack. Yes, making real food takes a little longer, but it's much easier to "forget to eat" your squished Clif Bar than a pesto, cheese and veggie sandwich, and, for long days, constant fuel is necessary for hours of performance.

So this post was pretty much 100% about me, but I hope it sparked a few ideas for your own New Year's climbing goals or at least made you feel better about yourself in comparison to my basic (feeding myself...) goals. Now what do you plan on changing, upgrading, or continuing to master in 2016?