Things do change in climbing as the years blow by. One of the more frustrating things I encounter when I go to popular climbing places is “Top Ropes”. Nothing wrong with that IMHO. As long as the top ropers are willing to let me pull their junk aside so I can lead the sucker.
Most folks are pretty accommodating and that is just great.
I am always willing to wait my turn while the other climbers try the TR
I have observed this occurrence more and more lately.
Almost all the climbers I see are not even close to doing the climb, at all. If the climb is 5.11, none of the climbers are even getting the 5.9 opening moves. Lots of pulling on the rope gets them up to the 5.10 part…. again nothing. More pulling on the rope, gains a few more feet… lots of people yelling “awesome”…. but still nothing.
To me it’s very obvious that they don’t have the skills acquired to climb at that grade.
Sometimes I like to go give advice and I try to approach in a nice way and I sometimes point out this fact and I tell them this. “you need to bring your aim down a few notches, go climb something easer, when you can do that with no falls, go up one notch and repeat the no falls thing. That is how you will get the skills needed to climb harder stuff.”
The most common answer I get is this: I don’t know what’s wrong; I can climb 5.11 all the time in the gym.
Am I the only person who has a problem with this?