"Honk If You're Horny" "V7" Backside of the Rombatron Boulder
This is a photo of John Garcia on this problem a couple years ago.
I revisited Honk If You're Horny this weekend. I was able to climb it again relatively quickly and felt very controlled on it. The tenuous hand foot match followed by the upward creep toward the lip via a minuscule crimper, and the final stretched deadpoint for the lip were not as desperate as I remembered finding them to be the first day Tweakman and I climbed this problem (which is the same day this photo was taken). I think the problem comes down to leg strength. After hiking erock so many weekends in a row my legs are stronger than when we originally visited this problem. I stood up to grab the lip with more control than on previous attempts. My left hand did not leave the gaston crimper as we thought was necessary to reach the lip. My switch to trad over the last year has helped my leg strength because a rack and rope etc... weigh much more than a light crash pad, shoes, and chalk. I think that we may have overgraded it and that it is more possibly a V6 or V5 depending on your dimensions.
Conrad
dude.
ReplyDeleteI'm not in full agreement. While I agree that length strength will help, Dylan and I flailed on this thing for about an hour at the Gripper with no success from either of us. I'd say your height and reach are major contributors. So, perhaps V5/6ish for you, but this thing requires funky power. Of course, anytime one gets stronger everything they were struggling on feels easier, which is why people don't like strong mo fo's grading problems that are several grades below what they're currently cruising. It's a constant dilemma.
In either case, it brings up a point I've been thinking about and discussing with Dylan a lot recently. Namely, we don't have any standard problems against which to weigh new problems. I don't know if you agree anymore, but at one time you and I were both in agreement that many of the problems at ERock were inconsistenly graded. Hence you desire to get the consensus rating system on ERockOnline and our desire to revamp the grades as we saw them after cruising through a circuit, and so forth.
There's always the opportunity for split grades. HP40 utilizes the split grade very often... perhaps too often. But maybe a V6/7 grade is better for this one? The business is all in one move, but I still feel that it's one funky hard move. How would you compare this to Pretty Good Privacy just left of it?
I jumped on this problem with Matt at the Gripper and got within the last move. I would be upset if it is downgraded more than a v6 because it is a very tough problem for someone 5'8''. I would say it is harder than frogatron direct, which would be a similar line.
ReplyDeleteI agree that some major inconsistencies in grade exist. Consensus is hard to reach with so few boulderers hitting up the problems at erock.
ReplyDeleteAs far as regrading, i'm not set on it. Since you and Odie are of the opinion that it is aptly graded at V7 and you are doing well on other difficult problems then i'm fine with the grade where it is.
As far as Pretty Good Privacy goes, that problem is much more difficult than Honk if You're Horny. I have yet to climb through the bottom section. It is at least one to two grades more difficult than whatever Honk turns out to be graded.
Dylan and I speak of this a lot. We both compare it to Aid Seam Right and Cleaver Left. Both of which we did during the Gripper first go. Aid Seam Right now feels like a warm up to me and Cleaver Left just a little harder. But I feel that their grades are good from my personal experiences in climbing, though i question whether they are consistent even w/in the ERock grading system. Either way, Pretty Good Privacy is much harder than Cleaver Left... I'd say if it were agreed upon that Cleaver Left is a v7 then Privacy could easily be a v9, but my gut tells me that I'm not climbing that hard and that Privacy is more like an 8... meaning CL should be downgraded to a 6 and Aid R to a 5.
ReplyDeleteI don't know... it's all terribly hard to juggle at one time. That's why I really want to establish "classics" in the higher grade ranges. To do that properly though means going around to slightly easier established ERock classics and then climbing the harder ones in the same day.
There's the elusive undone ERock V9 that I'm always looking for, or its bigger brother(s), but I'm not convinced I've climbed it yet. It's all about being consistent within ERock though. I personally don't really care whether we have an image of being soft or hard, I just want consistent grades here and now. It's like have split personalities or schizophrenia... gotta simplify and clarify.
I am not opposed to Honk being downgraded but my personal opinion is that it's harder than Frogatron and my gut says at least v6.
damn, my list of not only unsent projects, but big picture projects just keeps growing. The establishment of classic and firmly agreed upon grades in the higher grade range seems pretty important to me though... I've been thinking about it every time I go out there. It's the cornerstone for being able to more accurately gauge success and progress and I think we all owe it to ourselves and to the public to pursue this. I guess the first place to start is by filling in grades in the route consensus thingy that Sean put together for us on ERockOnline.
Agree / Disagree / comments?
CRad,
ReplyDeleteSpoke w/ Austin, who is the only other person to send this to my knowledge, and he also feels it's more like a solid 5. He is also tall and has a huge ape. Dylan and I still feel 7 is good in our views. You think a split 5/7 grade is in need, or just an averaged 6? All I can think of is the funky ass position I have to get in to to make the surge to the top. I don't see solid v5 climbers doing this with ease. That gaston-sprag-crimp-deadpoint move off of a super high foot feels harder than any other v5 moves I've done. Hell, it's harder than Cleaver Left for me.
ah well...