Topic

There was a Cambridge Climbing and Caving Club meet at the YSS and Jane had organised a permit for Rumbling Hole on Leck Fell. We also had a number of beginners to SRT along for the weekend so Jane opted to take them on a separate trip accompanied by Alex Walman and Steve Kirk (CPC). The Rumbling party was to be Neil Burgess, Gordon Scott, myself (also all YSS members) and Stuart.

Things didn't get off to a great start when I didn't feel too well on Saturday morning and couldn't eat my breakfast. Stuart volunteered to solve that problem by taking it off my hands! Gordon, Stuart and Neil then set about packing the rope bags and later that morning we found ourselves in Bernies Cafe for some retail therapy. It was after midday on a fairly misty day with a light drizzle, that we found ourselves parked on Leck Fell. Having changed we navigated our way to the Hole and then Neil started to rig the first pitch, I elected to follow in second carrying the next rope bag and Stuart and Gordon followed on behind. I managed to demonstrate to myself quite effectively that I hadn't had a lot of caving practice this year . Following my knee injury in April I'd not been underground until very recently and this was my first SRT trip since the injury. Everything seemed harder than it should have been, especially passing deviations, down climbing the waterfalls in the streamway, and thrutching through the rift to gain the fourth pitch head.

Eventually we found ourselves at the sump and it was clearly a day when it would not be advisable to attempt to get through to Lost John's. Knowing that rain was expected later in the evening we had a discussion about who was going to de-rig and Gordon volunteered. So Neil and I set off for the surface. On the way back I again had a trouble squeezing off of the fourth pitch head and back through the rift, somehow I couldn't match the space available to the bulk of SRT gear on my D loop! After a few minutes of struggling I did force through and continued up until I met Neil asleep at the pitch head just before the short climb up the waterfall in the stream passage. He offered to assist me up the climb and then wait for the others to help them carry out the ropes. So with some assistance from Neil I was up and away. Again I struggled to get past the deviations on the way up, the problem being I couldn't get my feet onto the opposite wall because it was just too far, and I'm not very good at one arm pull-ups having spent a lifetime of desk work! At this time it was obvious that water levels were rising and the cave was starting to live up to its name. Eventually I did find myself on the surface and it was now raining. The final few metres were again a struggle because of the rope above the hang on the main pitch ran against the rock (Neil found the same thing on his ascent and re-rigged it for the others). On the surface it was very damp and misty and it took a lot of concentration to find the way back to the car. The others didn't arrive back for another 1.5 hours so the trip had taken about 7 hours in total. It was thus late when we arrived back at the Hut, but Jane and the others had already got the meal ready so we sat down to eat. However I still hadn't recovered fully since the morning and so decided I was better off going to bed. Despite all the difficulties I found it a very enjoyable trip.

Get yourself a pull up bar to help with the strength thing or join a climbing club (if you got time) that helped me loads underground.

And the second C in CCCC is for.............

You're right when I was regularly climbing my power to weight ratio was probably better than it is now, although at least some of that was due to less weight

So yes if I had time then increasing my strength would be a goal, but I'd also hope that there might be a few technical tricks I could learn to gain a bit more of an edge.

clarkm wrote:

So yes if I had time then increasing my strength would be a goal, but I'd also hope that there might be a few technical tricks I could learn to gain a bit more of an edge.

Fiona has often been heard to comment that men tend to rely on strength when doing SRT or climbing underground, whereas women tend to be forced to develop technique instead. I think she's probably right, if for no other reason that there aren't any tricky SRT manoeuvres I've come across that she can't do despite not having much strength.

The climbing club though, not only helps strength but it does help with the technique too.
However in SRT I sometimes use strength out of lazyness and speed, i.e. cannot be bothered to get out my hand jammer to make a more stable platform when going down past that free hanging rebelay. Using strength though is not something I would do on long trips or expeditions however.

There are times in caving though where I find only strength will do such as pushing through that tight verticle bit or getting up those climbs where the only hold is at the top and only way you can get up is to drag yourself up.

alexr wrote:

The climbing club though, not only helps strength but it does help with the technique too.

Hi Alex perhaps my reply wasn't clear, I was a climber for about 20 years before I took up caving. Although never a bold leader, I've climbed classic routes all over the UK and also in the Alps, including limestone sea-cliff climbs in Pembroke, and granite in Cornwall, gritstone in the Peak District, and various other rock types in Wales and the Lake Dstrict. I was particularly keen on slab climbing, such as Wall End Slab at Stanage, or a memorable climb of A Dream of White Horses on Anglesey, and many routes on the slabs in the Grimsell Pass in Switzerland. So I've experience of a lot of different techniques on rock and when I'm caving I can usually manage to cope with the rock sections.

dweare wrote:

Fiona has often been heard to comment that men tend to rely on strength when doing SRT or climbing underground, whereas women tend to be forced to develop technique instead. I think she's probably right, if for no other reason that there aren't any tricky SRT manoeuvres I've come across that she can't do despite not having much strength.

Hi Damian, exactly and perhaps I should seek advice from Fiona! The thing I seem to struggle with most are hanging deviations that are pulled a long way from the vertical and where it isn't possible to push off from the opposite wall with your feet. When ascending I move up to the Krab and then I take a loop of rope from below me and push it into the gate and to the back of the Krab. However I then usually struggle to release the rope above me because I'm not strong enough to pull mine and the ropes weight in enough to create slack in the system.

Finally on Saturday on the long pitch into Rumbling I clipped a large D Krab into the P-hanger that the deviation was connected to, used it as a handle to pull me in closer, then clipped in my short cows-tail to that Krab. That then allowed me to use both hands to release the rope through the deviation which was now slack. Finally I had to then release my cows-tail and to recover my D-Krab. This worked for me on Saturday but I'd like to find out what other tricks might also be useful in such a situation?

Hope this description makes sense?