Try a girth hitch at the master point
I first heard of this technique from IFMGA guide and technical director of the American Mountain Guide Association (AMGA) Dale Remsberg, and a video (see it below) made by the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (VDBS).
Researcher and AMGA Certified Rock Guide Derek DeBruin partnered with Petzl USA to perform a rigorous analysis of the girth hitch master point. Conclusion (published September 2021), it's solid.
Why might you want to use a girth hitch at the master point?
Keeps the master point carabiner properly oriented, it can never spin and become cross loaded
Easy to untie after it’s been loaded (no welded knot to deal with)
Easier to tie and untie if hands are sore and/or cold, or you’re wearing gloves
Adjustable - If the load direction changes after tying it, you can feed slack side to side to get better load distribution
You can equalize three placements with a 120 cm runner and two placements with a 60 cm runner, if the bolts/gear are close together. Great if you are short on long slings
Redundant (even though it may not appear so at first glance. Really it is; cut one strand and it still holds, see a video testing on this below
Plenty strong (yes, girth hitching “weakens” the sling, but this is a 20+ kN runner; are you really worried about it?)
Endorsed by Climbing magazine and backed by solid research
If you try to tie a cordelette style anchor with an overhand knot in a double length / 120 cm runner clipped to three pieces of gear, the knot (almost always) takes up so much material that it can’t be tied. Given this, for a three-piece anchor, most climbers would automatically reach for their cordelette.
But, there’s another option. Provided the gear is fairly close together, the 120 cm runner works great if you make a girth hitch at the master point rather than an overhand knot.
The same technique also works with a two piece anchor and a single length runner. If you get to a two piece anchor and find you only have a 60 cm runner left, or you don't want to deal with untying a welded knot, or if you think carrying a huge cordelette is kind of a PITA, this is an solid alternative.
Let's address that “how strong is it / doesn't a girth hitch weaken the sling?” a question right off the bat. This was tested by our friends at HowNot2.com. It broke at around 28 kN.
Are you surprised by this? Think of it this way: the 22 kN sling is doubled, giving it a minimum strength of around 44 kN. Then you tie the knot which approximately by half. So, the resulting strength is somewhere in the neighborhood of the original untied sling. The takeaway: absolutely strong enough for any recreational climbing load.
Here's a break test of a girth hitch master point tied with Sterling Power Cord. This cord is wonderful for cordelettes and anchor building. It's 5.9 mm and rated about 20 kN. Our friends at HowNot2.com did a break test on this: 29 kN.
Let's look at some common concerns and questions about this method.
- Is it okay to use a girth hitch? I thought it weakens the sling too much. The maximum load you could ever have in a recreational claiming scenario of crazy factor 2 fall onto the anchor in somewhere around 9 kN. As you can see in the image above, this anchor tests somewhere around 28, kN so no problem.
- Is it redundant? It might not appear so when you first look at it, but in fact it is. Watch the videos below. You can see one strand being cut under load and not pulling through. (Having a sling get cut like this in real life is maybe a 1 in 100,000 occurrence, but yes, it has happened.) Consider the much more likely scenario of a piece of gear pulling and then the master point being loaded. If the sling were to slip, the carabiner clipped to the gear would slowly slide and eventually be stopped by the girth hitch. Some of the videos below show the sling actually being cut. You can test this without cutting your gear, just put full weight on it after unclipping one of the pieces.
- What about the video from “How Not To Highline”, where it says the girth hitch master point is not redundant because it slips under load? Yep, I saw that video. (Ryan is a great guy and is doing some very interesting testing, I love his YouTube channel.) Yes, this method can “fail” if: 1) a sling gets cut, 2) is then subjected to a very large (6-7 kN) load, and 3) that load is continuously applied. This is applicable to a highline set up, which is why Ryan tested it, but a constant load on an anchor of 6+ kN is very hard to achieve in a normal climbing scenario. (Climb team of four NFL linemen at a hanging belay? Expedition big wall climbing with 600 kg / 1,300 pounds of haul bags, all hanging from the same anchor point? Not gonna happen.)
(Some testing where it gets impacted with a sudden dynamic load of 7+ kN would be interesting. If anyone knows of tests like that, please let me know, I think the Alpine Club of Italy has some results, I'm trying to track it down, stay tuned.)
- Did you make this up in your backyard? I've never heard of it before. It's not yet widely used in the United States, but gaining in popularity. It’s widely used in Europe. It’s advocated by lots of IFMGA Certified Guides, the German Alpine Club (DAV) and the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (VDBS), demonstrated in the video at the bottom of the page. Do you think some of the most expert guides in the world would advocate a technique that’s unsafe?
- Can I tie it with a Dyneema sling? According to the video below made by the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (VDBS), the answer is yes. (Some climbers suggest using a 11 or 12 mm Dyneema sling (such as the Petzl Pur’Anneau) rather than a skinny 8 mm sling, which might lessen any slippage, if that's something you're concerned about.)
- Is there a usable shelf? Hmm Sort of. Maybe. Apparently the German Alpine Club (DAV) thinks not; I’m looking for a technical recommendation on that, stay tuned. But, IFMGA Guide Dale Remsberg says yes; but to use the shelf, a load needs to be clipped into the master carabiner, so the shelf is best used to belay from. If the shelf is an anchor point for a climber, you also have to have a climber in the master carabiner. You may find if you load the shelf and the master carabiner at the same time, some wonky carabiner loading issues start to develop because they're pretty much right next to each other. A shelf is an optional feature in anchors, and very rarely a requirement. Experiment with this in a controlled environment and see what you think.
- What about adding a twist in one strand before you make the girth hitch? Does that mitigate slippage? Canadian rope solo expert Yann Camus did an interesting study that showed this in fact might help. However, a piece of protection failing and a slow steady pull causing anchor failure is not going to happen, because the carabiner attached to the protection would wedge against the hitch.
- Can I top rope on it? Yes, but it’s not so great. The main reason is that’s it's difficult to tie this around two carabiners, which is what most people like to have at the master point when top roping. The secondary reason, at least for me, is that the security of this anchor relies on the cord being firmly snugged down around the carabiner. Over the course of a long top rope session it's possible that the hitch could loosen up and start to do some strange things on the carabiner, especially if no one is there to monitor it. For a long top roping session, other options such as a quad may be preferable.
- What are the best uses for this anchor? This is best used on multi pitch climbing. It’s a good choice if you need to equalize three pieces of gear and have a 120 cm runner and not a cordelette, or if you’re climbing in cold weather and want to tie it quickly with gloves on, and avoid dealing with a welded knot.
Are you on a SAR / rope rescue team and need to maintain a 10:1 safety factor in everything you rig? Are you trying to pull your car out of a ditch? This may not be not the best anchor for you. It’s another tool in the toolbox for more advanced climbers, and not a perfect technique for every situation.
- “I dunno, it just looks sketchy.” That's fine, sometimes what we feel can be more important than what we think. Alpinesavvy offers information and ideas, not advice. If you don't like it, don't use it. =^)
Test 1: Here's an unscientific (but still quite fun) test I recently did. TWO pretty big guys, Dyneema sling, both of them loading a girth hitch master point. One strand, cut . . . no problem!
Test 2: Full weight of climber hanging from anchor, slippery Dyneema sling cut very close to the master point, no slippage. Also, no slippage when using cord. (This Instagram post has three sections, the video is in clip 2 and 3.)
Test 3: Slow pull break testing in Germany, no issues with the girth hitch slipping.
Nylon sling, 2 arm anchor, one arm clipped, failure at 15 kN.
Nylon sling, 3 arm anchor, two arms clipped, failure at 23 kN.
Dyneema sling, very short, one loop of two clipped, test stopped at 12 kN.
Hey, don’t listen just to me. How about these reputable endorsements for the girth hitch master point?
Ortovox (a German company best known for avalanche transceivers and related ski mountaineering gear) has an excellent Youtube tutorial video series on many aspects of mountaineering. The video series has the (somewhat awkward) title of “Safety Academy Lab Rock”. It's produced in partnership with Petzl and the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (in German, “VDBS”). So, you can probably assume that the techniques shown have technical approval at the highest levels.
The video below shows various VDBS guides building multi piece anchors using an open (aka untied) cordelette.
In every case, they use a girth hitch to create the master point.
(The climber in the video is also using two techniques uncommon in the United States: 1) using an overhand knot to make a loop from his cordelette; and 2) threading the open/untied cordelette directly to the pitons / protection without using carabiners.)
Watch the video below. (The whole video is only 3:30, but if you have a short attention span, start at 1:00 and 2:00. )
Note the girth hitch at the master point in the thumbnail image below (and yes Eagle-Eye, this is for a four piece anchor.)
Dale Remsberg is an internationally licensed mountain guide (IFMGA) and technical director of the American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA). He has a great Facebook feed with regular tech tips. On it, he recently highlighted the girth hitch as a master point, calling it one of his “go to’” anchors.
Below is a screen grab of his post.
The photo and comments from Dale’s post:
image: Dale Remsberg Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10220309097824401&set=a.10204728922969767&type=1&theater
Below is a PDF article (LINK) from Erwin Steiner, a guide in the Dolomites. It's in German. A rough translation of the takeaways:
“Even when loading one arm of the anchor, it only slipped 1-3 cm”
“ . . . these tests gave us full confidence that the girth hitch can be used for anchor building. It has clear advantages in the guiding context when it comes to usability, use of material, security, speed, and comfort for the clients.”
This crafty anchor has a girth hitch on the top piton and at the master point. This image comes from a nice PDF file showing some European style anchor techniques, made by the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (“Verband Deutscher Berg und Skiführer” or “VDBS”).
IMAGE: STANDPLATZLOGIK VDBS 2019 - AUSBILDUNGSSTANDARD VDBS & ALTERNATIVEN
Here's another image from the same PDF. Note the use of an “open” or untied cordelette, which can be threaded through fixed gear like pitons, and then tied in an overhand knot. Once again, girth hitch at the master point.
IMAGE: STANDPLATZLOGIK VDBS 2019 - AUSBILDUNGSSTANDARD VDBS & ALTERNATIVEN
Here's another nice feature of this technique. It's easy to adjust the angle of pull if it changes. Here's a nice Instagram video clip from @GoldenMountainGuides showing how that works.
I get it that everyone is not going to be thrilled with this as an anchor technique. And that's OK, you don't have to. Alpinesavvy is here to offer ideas and information, not advice.
In the end, everyone has personal accountability for their own choice of technique and level of acceptable risk. (That's why they call it the “Freedom of the Hills”, right?) But, at least be open to new ideas, especially if they come from reputable sources.
