30+ tips for more efficient aid climbing
Premium Members can read the entire article here:
Nearing the top of Moonlight buttress in a day, Zion National Park, Utah. Photo by me
“Speed climbing” on a big wall route gets a lot of press. But in reality, most of us plodders would do better to focus not on speed, but rather efficiency. Efficiency can mean not running out of water when your three day climb turns into four, avoiding strangling your partner (or vice versa), not taking 30+ minutes for a belay changeover, not climbing by headlamp when you could be kicking back in your portaledge . . . you get the idea.
Below is a somewhat random assortment of climbing tips to help you climb with greater efficiency, and thus speed. Why do I mention these particular tips? Because I ignored pretty much every single one of them on my first couple of walls and sometimes went pretty darn slow as a result. Sure wish I knew all these beforehand!
If you’ve been at the big wall game for a while, you probably know most of these already. If you're fairly new to aid climbing, these tips may be more helpful. These are merely my opinion/experience, and are by no means a complete list. In no order of importance, here we go.
Don’t rush
Speed does not mean fast. Speed means smooth, controlled, well-planned, and properly executed. The Navy SEALS have a saying: ”Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast.” Do the task you have in front of you at a proper pace, and do it right the first time. “Smooth” comes from practice and having your systems dialed before you get up on a real climb.
What you're really striving for is efficiency, not speed. If you achieve efficiency, you can actually slow down in your movements, be more relaxed, and enjoy your experience more. Another way to think about it: you increase your speed by minimizing the downtime when no one is making upward progress.
Wall ace Mark Hudon: “Most wall climbers today would gain far, far more time by simply understanding and doing the basic big wall tasks faster.” So, what are the basic tasks? Leading, cleaning, hauling, anchor building, belay changeovers, rope / belay management, staying fed/watered and comfy during the day.
Think of everything physical as a “movement sandwich” (rest, move, rest)
Unlike most other aspects of rock climbing, you can rest pretty much whenever you want to on a big wall. Use this to your advantage. From big wall expert Andy Kirkpatrick’s excellent aid climbing book, “Higher Education”:
“You should never find aid climbing hard. If you do, it means you're doing it wrong. If your arms are tired when leading, you're not resting on your fifi hook. If you get pumped ascending a rope, that means your lanyards are not set right or you’re standing in the wrong step of your aider. The same goes for hauling, if you're busting a gut then switch it up to a 2:1 or maybe space hauling. Almost everything physical should be a ‘movement sandwich’, movement placed between two slices of rest. Rest-move-rest. Rest-move-rest.”
Time yourself when practicing
Yes, we’re talking stopwatch. During your training, time yourself and your partner doing different tasks. How long did it take you to do EACH of these tasks - Lead the pitch, build the anchor, fix the rope, set up the haul, do the haul, clean the pitch, re-rack the gear, and have your partner start leading the next pitch? Repeat all these on the same training route different times maybe over different days, and notice your times hopefully start to dramatically improve. Have fun, and make training a little competitive. Time each segment, loser buys beverages.
Don’t “learn” to aid on a real route
People stuck behind you who have the skills to climb it for real will NOT be happy. EVERYTHING you do on a wall should be practiced BEFORE you get to the actual climb. To put it another way, on your actual route, you should never be trying something for the first time.
Do repeat laps on obscure 5.11 cracks until you get your movement and systems dialed. Time yourself.
Haul a 100 pound bag 1:1.
Experience “riding the pig” by rappelling with your fully loaded haul bag. ( Tip - don’t hang it from your belay loop!)
Set up your ledge on a real cliff and spend a night in it, not just in a backyard tree.
Poop in a bag, on your ledge
Do “aid bouldering” close to the ground, placing all manner of tiny stoppers, marginal hooks and micro cams until you really know how far you can push them before failure.
Practice passing a knot, both going up with ascenders and going down (rappelling).
Put in your training. Practice the core skills. You, your partner, and everyone behind you on the route will have a much better time. (People who go try Monkey Face at Smith Rock Oregon who have never aid climbed before and take 2 hours to lead and clean a short bolt ladder, I’m looking at YOU!)
You can practice just about every big wall skill on a short route
When practicing, make the best use of what you have. This could be a route in a cooperative climbing gym, or a one pitch obscure crack at your local crag. Don't start the pitch standing on the ground. Climb up just a few meters, make a hanging belay, and start from there. Make a few moves, build another belay, haul and bring your partner up and repeat. This gives you extra practice at anchor building, hauling, and transitions, which can be a giant time suck for beginners.
Have all the skills needed for your route
Study the topo, photos and trip reports. Is there a pendulum and a lower out? How far is it? Do you need to hook? Is there a burly off width? Do you know how to clean a traverse? What’s the hardest mandatory free climbing, and can I/we do it?
Do you know how to lead AND clean a roof? The classic “Kor Roof” pitch on the South Face of Washington Column in Yosemite has shut down many an ambitious first time big wall team. Roof climbing is admittedly hard to practice, but read the topo and do your best to train before you go. Try the underside of an outdoor staircase, playground swing set, rope between 2 trees, or roof route in a helpful climbing gym. If you’re in Yosemite, be sure to put in a practice lap or two on the LeConte Boulder.
There’s a bounty of route beta for just about every beginner route you would ever want to try. Study up, know what skills you need to have, and master them before you go.
Talk over each pitch before the climb
Before you leave the ground, go over every pitch in detail with your partner. Talk over who’s going to do what, when will it happen, and how you’re going to handle any anticipated difficulties. Do we have all the gear needed for the route? What’s the farthest we need to lower out the bags, and do we need a separate lower out line? Does a pitch go around a corner so we maybe can’t hear or see each other? (Better have a clear communication plan.) Are we leading in blocks or swapping leads? Who gets what pitches? What’s our anticipated timeline, and what do we do if we’re faster or slower than we planned?
Having an action plan means you don’t need to create one on the fly and make important decisions when you’re tired and stressed. Sure, you can change your plan, but it’s a starting blueprint that guides your actions, instead of pretty much winging it on every pitch.
Route topos
Make several copies of the route topo. One for each person on the team and one extra. I like to laminate mine at the office store, and put in a grommet, and then tie some cord through the grommet as a clip in point.
Save a photo or PDF of the topo (and other relevant beta, like the descent route) onto your phone, which is free and weighs 0.0 grams. This goes for your partner as well.
Always ask yourself when you have downtime: “What could I be doing right now to make this climb faster or safer?”
Especially for beginners, there’s almost always something. Be on a constant lookout for small potential problems, and deal with them before they become larger real problems. “Hmm, looks like that haul rope is hung up on something. I better deal with that right now before the leader starts to pull it up . . . ”
Andy Kirkpatrick: Remember the number one sentence that needs to be avoided on a wall: “Hang on a minute!”
Strive for well-organized anchors
This is probably the single biggest time suck and cluster-generator for newer climbers. Something as simple as which side of the anchor to dock the haul bag can create either an effortless release or an incredible tangle. Decide where the bag is going to go, use rope bags, have multiple full strength clipping points, keep the lead rope and haul rope separated and tangle free and you'll be well on your way.
Maintaining the psyche
Big wall expert Mark Hudon has some self-talk he uses when things get spicy: “I may be scared, but I’m at LEAST as good as the WORST climber who has ever done this route! If they got past this point, dammit, so can I!” Remind yourself of this, and maybe even laugh a little when you’re faced with a tough spot.
Be patient with your partner and do not “blame”, no matter whose fault something might be. Mistakes will happen. Work together to overcome the problem.
Use a day bag
Don’t be diving into the haul bags at each belay to get snacks, water, sunscreen, windbreaker, etc. It's big time suck, waste of energy, and greatly increases the chance of dropping something. In the morning, put all the stuff you need for the day in a smaller “day bag” (aka “piglet”) or wall bucket, tied outside your haul bag (probably on a gear tether) for easy access. (Remind your partner to get their day gear all ready at the morning bivy.) Check out the “RTFN bag” and Wall Bucket at Skot’s Wall Gear.
Second leaves the belay fast
Try to minimize time when both climbers are at a belay and not moving. Especially, strive for fast belay changeovers. Slow belay changeovers can be a huge time suck for beginners.
The leader should call down when they are getting close to the anchor (the 25 foot rule) so the second can start tidying things up. One good thing for the belayer to do at this point is to be sure the haul bags are properly packed away, unencumbered, the haul rope is running freely, and the bags and rope are ready for lift off, because the very first task for the leader is to pull the bags a little bit off of the anchor, so the second can clean everything.
The leader should never be “ready to haul” and have to then wait for the second to sort things out!fdecide
When the leader calls “rope is fixed” the second can clip their ascenders to the lead rope and fully weight it. This frees up most of the anchor, the second can get to work breaking it down, and get ready to release the bags.
Releasing the bags should be pretty much effortless if you use a docking cord, which is a tether that’s releasable under load. Forget the old school method of using a daisy chain or some other static sling to connect your bags to the anchor; this can often require brute force to get your bags moving, especially if the pitch above traverses.
If the next pitch traverses to one side (say the right), you probably want the bags docked on the right side of the anchor, so they don't swing across you and smack you when you release them.
There's really no need to haul the bags up snug with the anchor on every pitch, unless you’re spending the night there. Hanging the bags a bit below the anchor can make your belay less clustered.
Generally, the bags should never be undocked by the second until they have fully lifted off from the anchor, and the second can check that nothing is hung up, carabiner is being weighted correctly, etc.
Clean the gear in semi-tidiness
You don’t need to be super type A and organize every piece of gear immaculately when cleaning, but you also don’t want to clip it any which way.
A cleaning system that works well: have two single length / 60 cm runners, one over each shoulder. Use wider nylon slings rather then skinny Dyneema - wider is more comfortable under a load of gear.
Clip free carabiners and slings onto one runner, and gear onto the other. Generally order the gear by size, but don’t be too fussy about it at the expense of upward progress. Avoid racking gear on your waist loops, unless you like the feeling of 30+ pounds of hardware causing your harness to slowly creep down towards your ankles.
When the cleaner gets to the top anchor, these two gear slings get clipped somewhere safe, and quickly added back onto the lead rack by whoever is leading the next pitch.
Doing this allows you to quickly hand off the gear at the next belay, rather than unclipping things one by one from your gear loops. This is much faster, and there’s less chance to drop things.