Efficient technique for handling trad gear?
I have been practicing trad climbing and I've run into some difficulty managing and handling the gear. Specifically, I'm awkwardly taking cams off my gear loops, fiddling with them, and finally placing them in the crack. To summarize my basic technique:
- Grab the carabiner of the cam with my hand and unclip from my harness.
- Bite the stem of the cam.
- Slide my hand to the cam trigger.
- Place cam and clip rope.
The #2 and #3 bullets seems awkward to me. I've found plenty of articles online about cam placement and harness configurations but can't find any about handling/managing techniques.
What technique am I missing here? Would a gear sling help? I referenced cams but I'm also having similar issues with nuts, so any and all advice is appreciated.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/q/9894. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
1 answer
I don't grab the biner first, I grab the cam first, pretty much as I would if I were placing it, I then unclip the biner from my gear loop with the cam in hand. There's no fumbling with it during or after, the more steps you put into placing gear, the more likely you are to drop it. I watched a video of this one girl climbing a 5.14 on trad, she had her gear duck-taped to her belt so she could grab it off her belt and place it all in one quick, smooth motion. So that's my advice, grab your gear off your rack as you intend to hold it when you place it.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/9897. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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