5.10d in 1967?
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Anders Ourom
- Senior Member
- Posts: 328
- Joined: Thu May 18, 2006 10:38 am
The upper pitch of the left side of Yosemite Pinnacle, which I've done, is an offwidth/squeeze chimney in the mid 5.10 range. It was done free in 1965, led by Hamish Mutch. It's hard to grade squeeze chimneys and offwidths, but it's very doubtful it's easier than 5.10.
Another 'route' from that period that may be 5.10 is the direct variation on the third/fourth pitch of Slab Alley. Just above the three-bolt ladder, at the ledge, you move left and mantle into the bottom of the solution groove. I'm not sure when it was done.
I've also heard the stories about Les MacDonald doing some sort of free climbing on the second/third pitch of the Grand Wall bolt ladder, but never thought to ask Les about it. Maybe I will - it would probably be hard to identify now what he climbed (if anything, apart from a few moves), but anything in that area would be good 5.10 or harder.
As Steve suggests, we climbers can be a bit parochial about priority, and other things. The first 5.10s, by modern gradings, were probably in the Elbe region of Germany, before World War I. Oscar Eckenstein is the first recorded boulderer - at Pen Y Pass in North Wales, in the 1880s and 1890s. Some cliff dwelling peoples - the Anasazi in the U.S. southwest, the monks on various isolated places, inhabitants of Mali - were doing amazing things on rock long before we decided to make it a game with silly rules.
Another 'route' from that period that may be 5.10 is the direct variation on the third/fourth pitch of Slab Alley. Just above the three-bolt ladder, at the ledge, you move left and mantle into the bottom of the solution groove. I'm not sure when it was done.
I've also heard the stories about Les MacDonald doing some sort of free climbing on the second/third pitch of the Grand Wall bolt ladder, but never thought to ask Les about it. Maybe I will - it would probably be hard to identify now what he climbed (if anything, apart from a few moves), but anything in that area would be good 5.10 or harder.
As Steve suggests, we climbers can be a bit parochial about priority, and other things. The first 5.10s, by modern gradings, were probably in the Elbe region of Germany, before World War I. Oscar Eckenstein is the first recorded boulderer - at Pen Y Pass in North Wales, in the 1880s and 1890s. Some cliff dwelling peoples - the Anasazi in the U.S. southwest, the monks on various isolated places, inhabitants of Mali - were doing amazing things on rock long before we decided to make it a game with silly rules.
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