When is a route a suitable project?

[iclimb2improve]

So this question may have been answered in the book, but when is a goal route a suitable or realistic project? I know the book goes over the idea of building a pyramid for yourself around your highest grade outdoors, but should you be aiming to only complete a route that is only a letter grade above your previous highest ascent? For example, if your personal best was 5.12a outdoors, should you be aiming to complete a 5.12b on your next season or would it be better to have higher expectations like climb a 5.13a?

Another question is, if you are falling on the route at about every bolt on your first attempt on the route, but you are able to do all of the moves after an attempt or two, is the route a reasonable project or is it above the climber's pay grade? Or is the route much more realistic project if the climber is only taking one or two falls on their first attempt? This is making the assumption that the climber has already completed their entire training season and is in their performance phase.

Also, regarding the first case in the previously mentioned scenarios, if it is not a suitable project during that season, is that route a suitable project for the climber's next season or should they aim higher?



I am currently rehabbing an injury, and I was looking for some clarity and other opinions on goal setting for the season after my injury is fully healed. Before I started training, in the gym, I would project a route that was categorized by phase one, and I did meet success a few times (and other times failure), but I also found that I was unable to get the endurance required to complete the entire route since some of the moves would be near my maximum strength. I've found I've been generally more satisfied by completing routes that were categorized in case 2 in the gym and outside during short performance phases I have taken during this school year (these "projects" were generally completed in one or two days).

I'm curious about what your opinions are on this matter and look forward to your responses!

[scojo]

For the first question, I think this is ultimately a personal question. If you choose to do a route that will take a long time to complete, you have to ask yourself how much satisfaction you'll get sending this route and is it worth all the time and effort. In the same amount of time, you could send many more projects that are a grade or two lower.

My opinion, is that most of the time, you should choose routes that won't take you too many days to complete (building up a pyramid). In a future season, you might improve enough as a climber that the hard project you had in mind will only take few days, and you can spend more time on other projects or training. This is even more true if you're making consistent progress with your training.

Every once in a while, you might find a hard route that is so inspiring that it's worth putting in the extra time and effort into projecting the route. I think this is pretty similar to what's argued in the book.

[jessebruni]

Very personal question and will vary a lot depending on what kind of routes are available to you. Generally I think it's a good idea to have several goal routes. Some would be one grade above your previous best, maybe one or two that are 2 grades above, and several at your current best. So for someone who's previous best is 12a I'd think it'd be good to have two 12b's, one 12c, and four or so 12a's. I'd suggest having some onsight goals too, like trying to onsight 11b or 11c. This should build your pyramid nicely, give you a hard project to really push yourself, and give you a lot of smaller projects to keep you motivated.

But that's just my opinion. And the grade you are climbing does matter in this case as gains slow down drastically as you get stronger/get closer to reaching your genetic potential.

[erick]

I have always taken the "one letter grade up" approach especially when I am on a climbing trip. I think this is great since at first you will be getting on routes that you will be able to send very quickly but as you will quickly move up the pyramid till you reach your potential.

Here is my experience so far, my first real performance phase was this last July. Before RCTM 12a redpoint was a big achievement although I had sent one 12c during a previous uncompleted RCTM season. I always new I had potential for more and figured I could send 13a with a lot of effort. During this first performance phase I picked three levels of projects (reach 13a, realistic 12c, and easy 12a). I started with the easy project, which I onsighted, got on my hard project which was a two hang, and tried the reach project once. I realized that the reach project was too much of a reach (hanging at each bolt but could do the moves). I sent the hard project on my 4th attempt plus several more 5.12 onsights.

Next phase was the same thing, picked three projects, 13b tried once, 12d RP, 12b OS. Again I picked the mid difficulty to project which I sent and added several more routes lower in my pyramid.

This performance phase I am finally determined to get on a route that is at my original reach grade, 13a, and I feel super confident in my chances to send in 1 week. I think that if I had tried to send that 13a on during my first performance phase I may have succeeded but I would have sacrificed all the other sends I was able to get that trip and if I did not send I would have come away empty handed.

I am realizing that my climbing could benefit from a long term project, my hardest OS and my hardest RP are relatively close and I think there could be a lot of skill development and route reading lessons I could learn from finding a project that requires me to climb it absolutely perfectly. But for this I am looking for a local route that I am able to visit frequently instead of picking a true "reach" project while on a climbing trip.

[MarkAnderson]

I think most redpoint climbers gravitate towards projects that are too hard. You would improve more as a climber by picking goals you can send relatively quickly, then moving on to something new that offers entirely new challenges and learning opportunities. I think 3-4 day projects are the best, but YMMV. I don't think you learn very much, technically, from 2nd or 3rd go sends, but that approach can teach you to try really hard during redpoint attempts (whereas dialing the shit out of everything over several weeks teaches you to say "take" at the first sign of difficulty).

Anyway, I would start by going one letter above what you can onsight, then keep going up from there until you find that sweet spot that you enjoy while also challenging yourself and learning new skills on each attempt.

[iclimb2improve]

Based on your responses, I think the one letter grade approach is what I'll use in my next season. I like the idea of having both onsight goals and redpoint goals to improve my climbing, and so I'll probably try and beat my last PRs based on them. OS: 5.11c-->5.11d RP: 5.12a-->5.12b/c (short term)------>5.13a (long term) Thanks for your input guys!