New Rock Type - Adjustment phase

[McDonnell]

Hi-

I thought I would get the community to weigh in on this one.  How long do you think it takes you to adapt to a new rock type?  The classic example is granite (in the United States).  It tends to be not that steep, very technical, friction dependent.  Excluding cracks, even granite face climbs tend to be more techy than sandstone, limestone, etc.  

Have you been to a new area on a trip and gotten totally shut down by the rock, the style, etc?

How long does it take you to adjust?

[jetjackson]

We are pretty limited to limestone for decent sport climbing here in Texas. There are a bunch of older routes hat are all polished to glass. I get shut down on a lot of those, particularly as a lot of the foot nubs are heavily polished and I tend to slip off them.

I'd say that getting on sandstone felt a lot easier than the limestone I was used to and it didn't take longer than a climb or two to adjust.

I get shut down by a lot of stuff at new crags, spicier bolt spacing, slab, spicy bolting on slab, sloper holds, longer than expected approaches, altitude, etc.

[Chris W]

I've only ever been on diabase and sandstone. There's a passage somewhere in Good Book about Mike Anderson taking a trip to HP 40. He talked about getting shut down at first, then changing his focus and learning a lot about the rock. I think that if you approach new rock this way, it can make you a better climber.

Some day, when I'm old and brittle and have stopped procreating, I'll get a chance to travel and sample some new rock. Until then, Pennsylvania Diabase it is!

BTW, in general, the newer the activity, the steeper the learning curve. I wouldn't sweat it.

[jessebruni]

I think different rock types emphasize a particular strength and highlight a particular weakness. A well rounded climber will adjust to different rock types pretty quickly and easily, whereas one with super specialized strengths and weaknesses will not. Altitude affects adjustment time too, coming from Texas flatlands bouldering in Joe's Valley was literally breathtaking. I'd find myself winded after doing V0 warmups.

[tedwelser]

I have found there is almost as much variety within types as between them. My home base crags are the New and Red, but I found the limestone in American Fork and the Granite at City of Rocks very easy to adapt to. In contrast, the limestone in Misja Pec and granite in Yosemite were challenging and I did not have time to really adapt.

I would also add that a major challenge of new rock types is reading the features and learning the fundamental engrams for that rock type. Much of the challenge in moving to tufa rich limestone for a Red River climber is seeing the sideways kneebars and trusting more slippery feeling feet. I was only able to make a short visit at Maple Canyon this summer but I found that rock harder to read, since the chalk often blended in, and it was hard to tell which would be the good holds from below. I feel like the contextual clues are much stronger at places like the Red. I found it harder to onsight at Maple because I ended up committing to less than ideal holds in order to make a move work, and later I might find a much superior hold nearby.

The question of how long it takes to adjust depends on how you define "adjusting".  However, I would say that if you change more than two major paramaters you just have to accept a new grade baseline at the new crag.  For instance, if you move from the Red to an area with slabby granite of mainly friction moves, be prepared to drop down two or more number grades at first (at least that was my experience).  

I think if you have an open mind and you give a new area a week's worth of climbing days you should see a great deal of progress back towards your normal levels, or at least to the point that it becomes more fun.   

[seano]

I recently took my first trip to the Moab area. I learned to climb in Yosemite, so I'm no stranger to smearing, cracks, and awkwardness, but I kind of got shutdown on the sandstone in Utah. It's a whole different thing to smear on granite (rock) than sandstone (sand! it's just freaking sand!!) My experience definitely jives with Ted's; I drop my grade expectations big time when going to an area with new a rock type/style. I think unless I've got at least a couple weeks, I don't really plan on getting "dialed" to the new style.

[MarkAnderson]

A bit OT, but I will add that if you travel around a bunch, it gets a lot easier to adjust to new rock. I feel like I've climbed a fair amount on just about every type of rock out there (that is, all the broad categories). So now when I go to a new place, while the rock might be unique, it's usually pretty similar to something I've climbed before. At this point I feel like I can show up to any crag without much adjustment required.

[ETS]

I agree with Mark. The more rock types/styles you sample the easier time you will have adjusting. Granite is a classic american example of a unique style that shuts people down. It certainly took me a learning period to adjust but now my hardest sport climb to date was on granite. Likewise, I've seen people get shut down by very steep climbing on sandstone at places like the RRG and NRG. That 3D type of climbing is different with heelhooks, toe hooks, spinning around, etc. Also, clipping bolts hanging in space can sometimes be problematic if you don't think about which direction you are climbing afterwards, etc.

I think some people are inherently more technical, for many reasons, and adjust better to different rock types. I can recount many stories of friends (and myself included) encountering new rock types and getting stumped. Two that come to mind:
I went to el potrero chico one time with someone who had never climbed on limestone and it took him a week to figure out how to use his feet, while the rest of us had no trouble. I've currently got a friend who is learning the granite style and I routinely have to point out feet to him, as he seems blind to them. Maybe he smokes too much weed?

[jetjackson]

I think there are even differences in granite.

Just got back from a couple of days in Squamish. The granite there was awesome. Really fine granules, and the rock tends to cleave off in blocks along natural lines. The result was awesome slopers and blocky pinches - was a blast. Took a few climbs to get used to. There were very few incut holds, which I'm used to on limestone, and so I had to get used to resting on flat ledge 'jugs', rather than incut bombers.

Climbing was awesome though - they would give a single star to a climb that by my terms would be a 2 or 3 star route.

It was a very different experience from climbing at Enchanted Rock in Texas, where the granite has these large granules that are sharp and really cut into your fingers.