Hey Ben, I am a climber, engineer and avid viewer of your channel. Recently, I had a lot of free time and set up a simulation environment for climbing falls. It includes all the parameters you investigated in recent videos including, slack, the behavior of the climber/belayer, friction and more. It is not quite ready yet to be published but if you want, we can talk a bit about it and see if it might be useful for some future case studies. Hit me up if you are interested in some collaboration :)
I’d imagine that a large portion of what determines the peak horizontal velocity would be determined by the integral of the sine of angle that the climbers tension vector makes with the vertical multiplied by the magnitude of the tension vector. Given the relative simplicity of this system of equations, a closed form solution for an optimal catch may be reachable using the calculus of variations.
@@tazking93 In principle yes, good idea. I recommend you the papers from Leuthäusser about climbing ropes, he did a lot of similar things already using closed form solutions. However, including all fall-specific parameter (wall profile, position and friction of quickdraws, ...) will be very hard using analytical methods.
I'm not as on it with the math, but if you are modelling at this kind of detail couldn't you look at peak acceleration/forces rather than the peak horizontal velocity? Because peak velocity is less of a concern with a more significant overhang in the same way that peak vertical velocity is less of a concern as long as you have sufficient ground clearance.@@tazking93
Me as being usually the lighter I feel hard catches frequently my gess is they jump way to soon, when I hit the wall they are past deadpoint and coming back down like a bag of led. It's timing
Answering your question: as light belayer I gave really hard catch to my heavier friend only once in my climbing career (doing lead climbing for ~10 years) and I came to the same conclusion as you - it was due to my lack of experience in soft catch, since I had never needed to put an effort. In that particular system there was a lot of friction. But still the amount of experience mattered, because the next fall on the same spot was a soft catch - I already knew the timing from all previous experiences, just needed to put effort and do it more actively than I used to. So lighter climbers: don't behave like a bag of potatoes!
glad you explored this topic. Like always very lot efford invested, thanks a lot. Points people should leran from this video: 1. belaying ( good belaying ) is way more difficult than most climbers think. 2. becoming an expert belayer needs a lot of practice. 3. the learning curve never stops. Every route, rope, climbers, belayers are different. 3. Grigri or any semi-locking device isn´t always the best belay device, sorry for that. people always wonder why we belay (mostly) with tube, and it´s because you can give the best belay, with a lot of practice though, when belaying with manual devices. No need for any "slack", which you need to give a decent catch with a grigri. As you noticedm you need a little reaction time, to time the belaying. With no slack, falls are unforgiving hard. Slack on the other side, increase the falling distance, and therefore energy in the system. Or velocity of the climber. When for example, i belay with a manual device, i do not need additional slack, i can control braking force as soon as the rope tightens. avoiding unnecessary acceleration from beginning. I am pretty sure though, you won´t had a perfect expert tube belayer on hand to do your research on that issue. Falling distance control and a soft catch is the best with manual devices, so are the possibilities for mistakes though. Do not get me wrong. You need very very much experience to get the cat reflexes right with a manual device. there´s no time to think in a sudden fall scenario, if you´re not into that "cat reflex mode", due to exhausting training (for years/decades) with manual devices, you never will be (or become) an expert belayer. So the grigri is a fine lazy cozy hang around at the site belay device for beginners and intermediate belayers (belayers not climbers), you can be a 10a climber and still be a novice belayer. but when you need to be a perfect belayer, and weight ratio, friction, etc. are suitable, the tube (omega pacific sbg 2 in detail) is my prefered belaying device, if ropes aren´t too skiny. Becoming a expert belayer is a long journey, where you may start with a grigri, but it´s not the end. People always complaining about manual devices being "unsafe" never will get that learning curve and therefore never become more than a average / good belayer. What can a manual device do better you ask ? belaying with no slack needed, no fall extension. When rope start running, you can choose how much resistance you give ( breaking force), without any jumping or timing issue, even relatively light people can belay heavier climbers without even get lifted up (depending on height over quickdraw of course). With perfect control you can just break permanently a little, or a little more, or less, like needed to give a soft catch, or let the climber fall over a roof without impacting the wall at all. Something you can only do with excessive slack with a locking device. And yes, there are scenarios i use a locking device too. It´s not the device making a belay good or bad, it´s always the belayer, and sometimes a good belayer can belay better with a tube. But that would need permanent training with tube. people always belaying with grigri, and once a year belaying with a manual device, i would never trust. When i stop sometimes training with tube belaying, ( i haven´t been climbing 3 months now), my reflexes become worse again. Everything has to be trained regularly. So independent from any devices, i want all climbers (belayer) to get more experince in belaying. you will never become better just on waiting for "take" and "down". Think over hard & easy´s videos (very perfect) and get out climbing/falling and belaying, the more the better. start small and don´t risk too much, but if you never risk anything, you won´t proceed as a belayer for sure. all the best everyone, stay climbing
I did that falling when your name is called thingy yesterday and that actually helped quite a lot. After that I was comfortable enough to just fall when I wanted to test it. Not fully comfortable yet, but quite sure it will come
This is a great report and the visual graphs are awesome! The one thing missing through is the acknowledgement that “slack” isn’t the only factor which increases rope stretch. Just having a longer length of dynamic rope from belayer to climber increases rope stretch, leading to a softer catch. For instance: a fall at the first bolt will always be more hard than a fall at the last bolt. Therefore: it’s not always a matter of having slack near the belay device, but just having more rope, and more dynamic stretch in the system. If a leader takes a fall at the very top of a super long 200ft pitch, the catch will def be soft regardless of slack near the belay device or not.
Yea, many factors, at this point I'm just presenting the findings, I'll make a Belay Master class episode on catching falls eventually to put everything into practical sense.
You're generally correct but don't forget rope drag can make a huge difference. Lots of routes have large direction changes mid pitch, and that's where extending becomes really important. A high-angle bend in the rope can effectively shorten the amount of dynamic rope in the system by almost isolating the rope before and after the bend.
One concept few climbers talk about from a "fall practice" perspective is getting the lower body especially to be able to absorb the forces and prepare for the potential earlier in the session. Managing fear over a bolt or pad, getting comfortable with falls in either, and learning to do those is great, but I spend every session doing increasingly more forceful landings including one and two legged and using boxes and harder surfaces. Getting the connective tissue in the lower body able and prepared to withstand those impacts is important.
I saw your video about money related to your videos. It surprised me. I have to say that i see you as such a beautiful soul. This combines your care for nature, following your passion, and putting finances below joy. Your way of being honest and caring is what i like most about al your work! And of course, the quality of your videos is insanely high.
Have you also looked into the method of Sensorhanddynamik? It‘s a German name and can be translated as „dynamic belaying with the sensor hand“. It is a method for when there is really a lot of friction in the system. Or when the climber is really super light. You basically give the first part of the catch with your upper hand: the hand that holds the rope above the belaying device. For this method you manage the slack in a different way, it is not hanging between your belaying device and the first draw. Instead, you hold one armlenght of slack hanging BETWEEN that hand and your belaying device. The hand holding this armlength of slack is positioned low, close to the belaying device. When the fall happens, you use the strenght of the hand to hold on to the rope, and let it‘s arm actively (and softly) resist the rope pull as the arm straightens up. Once your arm is straight you‘ll have created an active soft catch via your hand. At this moment you procede and use your full body to also move into the soft catch. It is a method for special cases. But in these cases (lots of friction, or very light climber) it enables you to create this armlength of soft catch with the hand. In both scenarios the fall creates only a very reduced „pulling force“ on the belayer, making the timing of a standard (jumping or running towards the wall) soft catch super difficult! I’ve learned about it via DAV, the German Alpine Association. But I ask myself how much of an effect this „one armlenght of soft catch with the hand“ actually has on a fall. DAV says that this ca. 1 meter of hand controlled catch does make a very significant difference. Do you have any thoughts / opinion on this? Thank you for all of your output on belaying! It‘s so super important and has been very helpful. ❤ PS: Edited for (I hope) better description of the method.
Cool, it has a name. I 'invented' this technique for myself. Also I always wear gloves so I can even have a bit more then arms length and let is slide trough my hand without burning myself. I'm doing this because I'm usually a lot heavier than my climbers. Added benefit is that is gives you a heads-up a split second before you want to step forward or jump in case you visually missed the fall. Over time I've discovered that combined with the friction on the draws I often softly catch my climber without the grigri even locking
Thank you for this great dive into lead falls! I would also like to see some testing done with an Ohm. I was taking a "Lead Fall class" and my assigned belayer weighed a lot less than I did so we used an Ohm. This worked OK as we learned how to jump to give a soft catch. The final fall was with a lot more slack than we had done before. I can't remember where the belayer was in relation to the wall. I remember feeling that I was falling faster than I had before and the catch was very hard and I was slammed into the wall. The route was a vertical gym wall outdoors. I had a bone bruise in one ankle and hyper flexed ligament in the other ankle. This took about 6 months to heal enough that I could resume most of my activities but getting close to a year out I still can feel the effects of the accident.
Software dev here, not a physics guru, BUT @ 7:11 Something is nudging me about that Red curve compared to the curves (Yellow and Green). You are definitely under deceleration for a longer period of time, however, the arc of the curve has a really wide knee compared to the green curve. What is fascinating is the farther fall (red curve) increase the area under the curve (total force felt), but the comment from your belayer said "that was softest". This leads me to postulate that a "soft catch" is actually just a smooth curve without a sharp knee. This definitely backs in if you look at the curves from the hard catches! Anyway, watching the rest now! EDIT: my theory stands :) @ 8:48 smoothest curve was softest catch. Hmm... so even though peak acceleration is higher, a _transition_ from vertical to horizontal spread out over a long period of time feels "softer" to the climber. Fascinating!
You're right! And it totally makes sense, since what's normally perceived as a "catch hardness" is jerk, or in other words, a variation in acceleration (which can mean both magnitude and direction, since acceleration is a vector value!). The more gradual that variation over time the lower the jerk, which translates to the sensation of a softer catch. The same way flooring the gas pedal on a car which accelerates extremely quickly will cause you to feel that strong jolt that pushes you hard into the seat, whereas pressing on it more lightly will get you to the same top speed but in a slower time span and without that jolt.
I actually measured Jerk as well, that's what you would perceive upon the "impact" of the rope, but Excluded from this video, because what actually matters more is how hard you would hit the wall and that's basically horizontal speed at the moment of the hit to the wall. And while Jerk was interesting to see - I did not want to make this video toooo complicated.
Wish I had known this earlier, in late October I broke my ankle and had to get surgery because I hit the wall too hard, but watching how you guys handle falls is showing me where I made some mistakes, hopefully part 2 comes out before august when I can finally start climbing again. I’ve been really bummed not being able to do anything to improve while I can’t walk, but this helps.
Yea that sucks.. I guess pull ups until August? =] Part 2 in Dec and then I'll make a belay master class episode with practical aspects of catching falls.
Having so far always been a lighter person I probably have given quite a few harder caches than I could have without getting sucked up to the first quick draw and I know the "I'm getting flung up to the wall anyways so I don't need to jump" feeling all too well. I've still tried to learn the soft catch technique, but instead of jumping when the rope starts to pull I just stand up fast and then get lifted off the ground by the rope in a gradual movement. The aim is to give the rope as much time as possible to absorb the forces, if you're just waiting for the rope to yank you off the ground then that's a pretty short window of time compared to kneeling down and eating up the slack, getting the rope tight and starting to accelerate with it upwards by your own force. Regarding the push away from the wall. I've been taught that if you're on an overhang like this then no you'll just create a bigger pendulum, for more vertical, slabby or ledgy probably. Basically if there's a danger of hitting something falling straight down then it's better to try create some distance between the wall and yourself since it's easier to be prepared to absorb the swing in to the wall than just straight up falling down and hitting your leg on a ledge etc. Very nice research, looking forward for part two.
One thing that is never mentioned: longer fall gives you more time (and sometimes space) to adjust body position before hitting the wall. This may be an important factor by itself.
Great work, but to me what your data is mostly showing is how important the experience and attention of the belayer is. How well they time the soft catch matters so much more than the amount of slack by itself that I'd take away that you should give however much slack gives you an intuitive reaction time (probably half an arm to an arm or so)
as someone who belays heavier and lighter climbers i've noticed being low in your knees (crouching a little) helps, because as the tension in the rope builds and starts pulling you up you can jump up with it, but if you are upright you can only anticipate when they load the rope, having some slack in this Situation helps as you notice the slack disapearing and jump up to create the soft catch
Earlier this year I fell from about 1.5-2 meters above the bolt and sprained my ankle. Seeing now that it was a mix of me pushing the wall, my (light) belayer, and maybe some excess slack in the system, I realize what can be done better both as a climber and belayer. Your service to the climbing community is unparalleled, thank you for what you are doing and I can't wait to see the rest of your study.
These test are great for overhanging routes but not useful for routes less than vertical where the main hazard is hitting a small ledge on the face. Most climbers do not climb over hanging routes. Most climber hurt themselves on less than vertical routes. More slack or jumping increases your chances of hitting something. I think this is important to tell new climbers where giving more rope is the opposite of what you want to do. Do the test on less than vertical routes. You will quickly see that more slack is not better.
For all the Ohm users here, make sure the belayer stands directly underneath the Ohm when they are belaying. If they are standing away from the rope line (where the rope would fall straight down from the first bolt/Ohm naturally) then the Ohm will bite immediately and the climber will essentially get a static catch. If the belayer stands directly underneath the Ohm, the device won’t bite as immediately, giving time for the belayer to jump into the system (normal soft catch technique) and the climber will get a soft catch. Remember, it isn’t the first bolt the belayer needs to be afraid of, but the speed they approach it. They will get pulled closer to it, but at a slower speed than no Ohm (and be safe from injury), and the climber will get a soft catch.
Thank you very much for doing all this intensive research and sharing it with the world. Being a data person (and a newbie climber), I really appreciate the content you produce, and I also enjoy watching you present it (those things usually don't correlate, but you do an outstanding job in presenting interesting data in a very entertaining and accessible way). The information you provide helps me greatly in understanding the physics behind belaying, giving me a solid foundation on my way to become a better belayer (and climber, hopefully).
Most belayers don't use the left arm at all, which is where the magic is for me. The physical cues are more natural and automatic if you resist the fall with the left arm first. Obviosuly the amount of slack needs to be managed to avoid rope burn, but that's a non issue once you get the swing. The goal is to start the belayer's mass accelerating before the first impulse. The belayer's whole body gets organized for the catch as a result of introducing the forces gradually. It really helps take the timing element out of it for more consistent catches. The problem with whole body timing based on vision is that people tend to brace for the catch, so they're generally out of position to soften the catch. Most hard catches seen here, that weren't simply short pendulum arms, were just bad timing.
Came back to watch this video after receiving a hard catch from my belayer... Really helps watching this video after some lead belaying practices - the nuances do stand out
really appreciated. Used to belay my 25kg heavier father at a young age. Usually didnt clip the first bolt so ive more way to get pulled up. To his words - softes catches ever. in my expierence id still advice as SMALL push off the wall, at least as long as the wall isnt overhanging an inch. It gives you time to adjust yourself and sort your limbs before kissing the wall. I've often seen newbies with the "no push, short fall"- attitude in flat walls.. and it looks just painful. Realize your corestrength, chill, and enjoy the flight. there is nothing more fun than a 10m wipper (as long as the wall is alright and your belayer knows his job) Best thing is to practice, both the climber and the belayer. Climbing is fun, but falling is the real pleasure. Learn to enjoy it and loose your fear and stiffness. Panic and too much tention just ruins your life, especially in a high focus sport like climbing. Pratice, enjoy and enhance your limits.
Sometimes me and my partner do the same thing: clip the 1st and 2nd bolt, come down a little and unclip the 1st bolt. Softer catches and more comfortable for the belayer.
Incredible! Fantastic work Ben. Testing the effect of the belayer's weight could perhaps be improved by using a weight vest rather than different belayers. Your soft-catch technique looks significantly different to Anna's.
Belayer with weight west can't jump as high as a heavier belayer (who has more leg muscles) so it makes it a bit weird... Although would work for hard catch scenarios... In part 2 we actually added extra friction instead of weight west... I think that is better idea
I witnessed a broken ankle with a light belayer. The friend that took me climbing outside for the first time knew absolutely nothing about soft catches (or short-ropping, or keeping the hand on the brake side of the rope even with a Grigri...). But I trusted her because her ex-boyfriend who taught her was a climbing instructor. She must weight 50 or 55kg. One time as she was belaying a relatively light male climber (65kg I'd say), he fell and had a nasty sideways fall (he was pretty far to the right of the bolt). He immediatly began screaming and complaining about his foot, and we had to rush back to the car. Turned out he had a broken ankle. I understood months later, on my own, that it probably could have been avoided, by giving him a much softer catch. I found out because I asked around, researched online and watched YT videos like yours! So thank you very much, the work you've been doing is a very important contribution to the sport.
Might be covered in a part two, but I do wish that you mentioned somewhere that the way you belay can also be heavily dictated by the terrain you climb on. In a gym or at an overhung sport crag, falls and catches are generally much cleaner than in an area with slabs and ledges. In alpine terrain, trad climbing, or other outdoor sport areas a soft catch could easily result into a sprained/broken ankle if your climber smacks into a feature. All that to say, I would almost always prefer a hard catch to a fall stopped by my feet crashing into a ledge below me. Thanks as always for the quality content!
Hey Ben! Thank you for another great video about falls and catches. I learned so much from your videos, I wanted to thank you with something more than the usual comment. But please, buy some beers also for your brave and patient crew! They deserved it :)
Great study Ben! Thank you for being curious, coming up with a study and sharing the information in a practical way for all climbers and for safer climbing practices.
I was wondering what are your thoughts on kneeling to catch falls. Timing, absorbing the fall by having « assisted standing up » before jumping to really give the softest catch as possible. I find that there is a lot of benefits into this method. Softer catch, safer for first clip falls, easier to give rope when required by the climber… Of course you cannot use this on multi pitch routes after the first pitch. Thank you for you answering my question.
Hands down, your videos are the most useful in terms of climbing how-to and how-not-to out there! Thanks for the great content - I'll crank up my PATREON support :)
Great video. I’d love to see this with an ohm as well. I often feel it gives a very hard catch. Also how does the distance from the wall (and thus the change in angle at the ohm) change the catch. I think instead of having different belayers for light/heavy, putting a weight vest in the climber would be more accurate. This will ensure the belayer has similar technique. It’s very clear that there were different techniques.
You did great!!! You might need a protocol or two to be written, a data manager and a statistician. One protocol could be for outdoor climbing and another for indoor climbing. A statistician could take the great data you collect to help you understand the data even better. I can’t wait to see Part 2!
There is a 30kg difference in weight between my belayer and me so we mostly use the ohm. It gives suuuper hard catches sometimes, but I feel more safe falling knowing my belayer wont get dragged up the wall. The chance my belayer gets hurt feels like its far greater than mine when not using the ohm since they are basically guaranteed to get stuck at the first bolt.
I'm in a similar situation with my climbing partner (~25kg weight difference), and what works really well for us is using a "Z-Clip" (clipping the first bolt of the neighbouring route, and then the second bolt of your own route). It enables me to give soft catches without being violently pulled into the first (or second...) bolt. If you have the possibility at your climing faciliy, might be worth a try :)
@@gehteuchnixan5180 for me the issue with that approach is that the rope needs to be "dragged" up, since it the increase in friction is constant. The ohm at least lets the rope through easily if one doesn't pull on it too much.
The closer the belayer is to being directly underneath the Ohm, the gentler it will bite and the softer they can give a catch (if they use normal soft catch jumping into the fall techniques). My belayer is 60lbs lighter than me and she is able to give soft catches with the Ohm this way.
7:17 I think the elongation/stretch of the rope is a variable that helps the climber perceive the fall as "softish". It looks like a sweet middle between stretch and making contact with the wall is what a good belayer has to achieve, that soft j slack
This was very anticipated and woaw how greater than my expectations it is ! Thank you so very much for all the work you've put out there for us to learn and climb safer
Thank you very much for this video! My last "hard catch", felt like a very soft catch (vertically), but with much horizontal speed. And in fact, I pushed myself away from the wall a little bit, because I knew, there's a ledge beneath. Usually I get very soft catches from my belayers - despite of (?) me being the heavier one, with 10 to 20 more kg.
Interesting video. It would also be useful to see how this compares to more vertical walls, since I have never climbed on such overhangs outdoors, though I can see why you would focus on overhangs for safety reasons
Thanks for the great content! Last summer, I got a veeeery hard catch from a much lighter but also very unexperienced climber/belayer...and...I fully ruptured my achilles tendon by kicking the wall. So, I totally agree with the theory, that experience goes over weight!
Great video! As a very light belayer myself it is very interesting to see these results. I need to be more active than I thought. I have a suggestion: Maybe you could perform a test where you (or the same person) catch all falls and, instead of changing the belayer you can change the person falling, someone lighter or heavier than you. This way you remove the catcher "experience" variable out of the table and test the "lighter and heavier" belayer effect with a little bit more control. :)
Amazing video! I love the mix between climbing and science :) I was just thinking today I went climbing to watch one of your videos to remind me about the science of falling. Glad it popped into my home page so didn’t have to look!
Commenting on the "hard catch by light belayer" situation, I think rope drag changes everything, if you have enough drag, you don't need much force to hold that fall so the belayer weight doesn't make any difference. Having a good amount of slack and letting the drag itself take some of the energy before it reaches the resistance of the belayer seems the way to go.
This was an amazing video to watch. Thank you for the time & effort you guys invested putting all this together. I'm going to go watch & like your part two video now!
I am roughly 30 kg heavier than my belayer, and we use an eldrid Ohm to even out the differance. I've had some very hard falls, that even ended flipping me over some how (?). We are both very new to lead climbing, but we also quickly learned that jumping with the fall is super important.
Awesome video, really informative and enjoyable. I'd never thought about the pendulum length as a factor, but it makes so much sense! I see there is a part 2 so maybe this is stuff you already plan to cover but I am also interested on what falls are putting the most forces on the gear/bolts? I'd imagine this is simpler and based on how hard the catch is more than the speed you impact the wall. Also I know this is annoying but it might be worth having a bit more of a safety disclaimer at the beginning. More slack and longer falls with softer catches are great if you have space, but I wouldn't want someone to try to implement that and take a ground fall, or hit bits of sticking out wall on the way down! Edit: Its also making me realise how much more skillful belaying can be than I realised, judging slack and timing soft catches and knowing when these are/aren't safe to do. Its a bit more involved!
Great research, absolutely one of the most useful channels on the topic!! Will you also do the same test on vertical (non-overhanging) walls? It would be interesting especially for beginners ♡
The take aways on this video is more or less applicable for vertical walls - the peak horizontal speed is at the bottom of the pendulum, as I said that gives good indicator of how hard the climber would hit a vertical wall ;)
@@HardIsEasy Agree - unless you hit something sticking out on the way down. I think this is the major concern falling on near vertical climbs. In this case you would want your fall to be as short as possible, to reduce the probability of hitting something and to get as low vertical velocity as possible...
@@HardIsEasy Dynamic belaying can be dangerous on a vertical walls, it's depend of the environnement. when there is a risk of falling on a rock it's important not to be too dynamic.
In a climbing gym I gave my climber a very hard catch once. We are both very light(55kg), I gave very little slack and didn't jump. He had also fallen multiple times at the same spot within a few minutes. Maybe 10m up the wall taking a 1.5-2m fall. Either a Grigri or tuber.
I think the angle of impact into the wall is also very important. As it severely affects how we absorb the fall with our feet, changing the feeling if hardness. This also means that the distance from the wall after peak velocity also matters, as over longer distance, we can absorb the impact softer.
Thanks for this great video! Just this weekend I was unexpectedley belayed hard by someone lighter than myself. Timing is everything!!! So annoyed by being belayed badly...
I think an important limitant is than in all those examples you are super alert to the fall. This soft catches may not represent unexpected real life falls, unless it is a super expert belayer with awesome reflexes. However it seems very difficult to test that in a estandarizad way. Thanks for the video and theinformation
Im curious about the stepping forward method. I've done a lot of belaying over a period of more than 30 years. As well outside as indoors for comps. I've always preferred the stepping forward method. I feel like this (for me) gives me more control over the catch and this allows me to time the catch better so that the maximum of force is absorbed at the moment of the highest vertical force. The more you can absorb at that exact moment, the less it translated into a horizontal movement. And in this video you also can see that timing (experience) is a crucial factor. I'm curious if the data will agree with me. The stepping forward method also gives great control over the slack given at any moment. Certainly when a climber is quick to clip. Giving slack in combination with a step forward is very fast to give enough slack to clip. I the climber fumbles the clip at step back in combination with taking slack is also very quick to manage the slack at any point. Do note that I'm a heavier climber/belayer.
I experienced a hard catch with a lighter belayer (10kg difference) and absorbed the impact with the right foot only. It got kind of crushed, nothing broken, and took me more than a year to be pain free.
I took a hard catch on a 5.11 sport climb inside - not over hung wall - and my belayer wasn’t much heavier than me, she may have had 5-10lbs max on me. I’m 118lbs. She wasn’t use to lead and hunkered down on my fall. I didn’t expect to fall but feet slip and falls Happen. I flung so aggressively to the wall I tore my ATFL in my right ankle and had to take 8 weeks off :( sucked. But lessons learned for sure. Thanks for the great video!!
Could you do a study on falls on trad gear, specifically how gear orientation and fall direction can move placements as they are loaded? Also you could explore zippering and how belayer position can help avoid it
As a relatively light belayer, I'm still going to keep my belay tight because I don't want to risk letting my climber get anywhere near the ground, even if it might end up as a harder catch :) That was still a very interesting watch though. I'm really excited for part 2!
I'm a light belayer and keep my belay tighter for the first few bolts. Ease up as the climber is further off the ground. But I also won't climb with climbers who are out of control that often push their limit too much that they may fall in the next couple of bolts and may land on or kick me. You could get seriously hurt. My friend hurt her neck from being landed on and affected her forever 😢
This is really good data. TH-cam is full of high-quality self-investigative science like this that is easily publishable in a journal. There should be some kind of journal for stuff like this that self-investigators can submit to. And TH-cam or someone else should offer a service to help non-scientists prepare papers! That would be seriously cool and offer some real credibility, validation, and opportunity for funding to the amazing work done by Ben and others.
Hey, thank you for your work!Just want to share another video idea with you - breathing. Are you conscious of breathing when you climb? Do you breathe through nose or mouth? In other sports it seems to play an important part. It would be cool to see if it can help in climbing as well. In theory, breathing through nose can result into getting less pumped:)
I had the hardest falls when I was a scared beginner climber with a scared belayer and very little slack. Falling from directly above the quickdraw with zero slack really slams you into the wall. The quickdraw pulls you in and doesn’t give you room to extend your legs and lean back. Even though my belayer was 10kg lighter than me. I think as long as you don’t belay like that everything is fine, as long as you don’t hit the ground or other things.
Hello, thanks for your video !, You forgot to mention a few super important things: it's all about falling on the overhang, dynamic belaying off the overhang can be very dangerous.
Thank you very much for these videos. I would like to see the conclusions with something as underestimated as the type of belay device. If you were to do these same tests with the Black Diamond ATC Pilot, you would be amazed at the results. Thanks for all this information. Best regards
just one fall with a really hard catch which banged me into the (quite overhanging) wall - it was a light weighted belayer and I was surprised because he was a quite experienced lead climber. my guess is either he was not prepared and surprised in that moment of fall - or simply out of practice since it was our first lead climb together in a while.
15:00 you can clearly see you're giving way softer of a catch than she is. You're leaping up, she's barely moving by the time the rope's straight. From her starting position (one leg on the rock face, and the other straight behind her) there's no way she even *could* give a soft catch IMO. Extremely great effort on the part of all involved.
I am interested to see if in Part 2 you talk about a more active belay, where the belayer manages the slack between the climber and the last piece of protection, before the the rope gets tight. In my experience of belaying both much heavier and much lighter climbers and when climbers are in odd positions or off to the side of the climb I have found that I'm able to control the fall and catch with more accuracy and safety while giving the "best" fall depending on the situation.
Great stuff!! I learned so much from this video! I believe much of this did not exist as “knowledge base”. Great contribution for the future of the sport!! Let’s go!!
As en experienced climber and Guide I describe the difference of the light girl compared to you like: Problem is the Timing. You Jump in to her Fall. Make it soft. She gets pulled up/ Speed up because of the Fall. She didnt Jump into the fall. Wrong timing or Lack of Knowledge.
A light person on a trampoline feels the change of direction in the bottom of the bounce stronger compared to a heavier person. I assume the heavier climber and belayerallows the rope stretch to work better too.
Have you considered attaching accelerometers to the climbers torso and/or feet? Seems like it could be easier and possibly more accurate than judging based on camera footage (btw, very impressive how you were able to get that data). I would think you could do this pretty inexpensively with a small embedded system (like an ESP32) and solid-state gyro/accelerometer.
Most times I got a hard catch from a lighter belayer was when using Ohm. The reason was the belayer had no experience giving soft catches. It also happened a few times when there was a lot of rope drag, but not so hard as with the Ohm.
As usual a great video, thank you ! Like other have mentioned, I too would appreciate to see other wall profiles (vertical or slab). At my level when I lead climb it's almost never in overhang. And I'm curious what is the best catch technique on a slab, because if you do a hard catch, the climber gets slammed into the wall, but if you try to give more slack or soft catch, he might fall along the wall with more speed and possibly hurt himself while rubbing against it too. I guess it's more difficult to test due to the risk of getting hurt, and yet this is probably the kind of climbing the beginner/moderate climbers mostly do.
very interesting observations! i'm a heavy climber (90 kg) and in 99% cases my belayer is 10-25 kg lighter than me. i don't remember i ever had some hard catch. the riskiest thing i observed: the lighter belayer - the deeper i fall and the belayer is up. my main concern - not to catch ground or shelf fall as well leave belayer safe. so i always ask belayers not to go very far from the rock to prevent this case. (my guess: the far belayer is - the more rope between us, so the deeper is fall. From other side if the belayer is far from the rock - there is more friction between the rope and the first quickdraw that I assume can decrease the fall depth. But in real life it seems doesn't work...) so it's just my very high-level assumption: the major impact on the softness of the fall makes the dynamic rope. and big slack can lead to deep fall.
Between you and Ryan (from how not 2), the service to the climbing (and "rope assisted sports") community is inmense. You guys are a treasure
Yeah seriously.. I am so fucking grateful to have these resources. I wouldnt be half the climber I am today without these guys.
Hard is easy + how not2 >> UIAA
Hey Ben, I am a climber, engineer and avid viewer of your channel. Recently, I had a lot of free time and set up a simulation environment for climbing falls. It includes all the parameters you investigated in recent videos including, slack, the behavior of the climber/belayer, friction and more. It is not quite ready yet to be published but if you want, we can talk a bit about it and see if it might be useful for some future case studies. Hit me up if you are interested in some collaboration :)
Hey, I was actually going to write a similar simulation as well! Hit me on ben at hardisessy.com ;)
I’d imagine that a large portion of what determines the peak horizontal velocity would be determined by the integral of the sine of angle that the climbers tension vector makes with the vertical multiplied by the magnitude of the tension vector. Given the relative simplicity of this system of equations, a closed form solution for an optimal catch may be reachable using the calculus of variations.
@@tazking93 In principle yes, good idea. I recommend you the papers from Leuthäusser about climbing ropes, he did a lot of similar things already using closed form solutions. However, including all fall-specific parameter (wall profile, position and friction of quickdraws, ...) will be very hard using analytical methods.
I'm not as on it with the math, but if you are modelling at this kind of detail couldn't you look at peak acceleration/forces rather than the peak horizontal velocity? Because peak velocity is less of a concern with a more significant overhang in the same way that peak vertical velocity is less of a concern as long as you have sufficient ground clearance.@@tazking93
Me as being usually the lighter I feel hard catches frequently my gess is they jump way to soon, when I hit the wall they are past deadpoint and coming back down like a bag of led.
It's timing
"I was too scared to think..." - Thanks for capturing the essence of my climbing experiences for perfect replication of reality.
Answering your question: as light belayer I gave really hard catch to my heavier friend only once in my climbing career (doing lead climbing for ~10 years) and I came to the same conclusion as you - it was due to my lack of experience in soft catch, since I had never needed to put an effort. In that particular system there was a lot of friction. But still the amount of experience mattered, because the next fall on the same spot was a soft catch - I already knew the timing from all previous experiences, just needed to put effort and do it more actively than I used to. So lighter climbers: don't behave like a bag of potatoes!
glad you explored this topic. Like always very lot efford invested, thanks a lot.
Points people should leran from this video:
1. belaying ( good belaying ) is way more difficult than most climbers think.
2. becoming an expert belayer needs a lot of practice.
3. the learning curve never stops. Every route, rope, climbers, belayers are different.
3. Grigri or any semi-locking device isn´t always the best belay device, sorry for that.
people always wonder why we belay (mostly) with tube, and it´s because you can give the best belay, with a lot of practice though, when belaying with manual devices.
No need for any "slack", which you need to give a decent catch with a grigri. As you noticedm you need a little reaction time, to time the belaying. With no slack, falls are unforgiving hard.
Slack on the other side, increase the falling distance, and therefore energy in the system. Or velocity of the climber.
When for example, i belay with a manual device, i do not need additional slack, i can control braking force as soon as the rope tightens. avoiding unnecessary acceleration from beginning.
I am pretty sure though, you won´t had a perfect expert tube belayer on hand to do your research on that issue.
Falling distance control and a soft catch is the best with manual devices, so are the possibilities for mistakes though.
Do not get me wrong. You need very very much experience to get the cat reflexes right with a manual device.
there´s no time to think in a sudden fall scenario, if you´re not into that "cat reflex mode", due to exhausting training (for years/decades) with manual devices, you never will be (or become) an expert belayer.
So the grigri is a fine lazy cozy hang around at the site belay device for beginners and intermediate belayers (belayers not climbers), you can be a 10a climber and still be a novice belayer.
but when you need to be a perfect belayer, and weight ratio, friction, etc. are suitable, the tube (omega pacific sbg 2 in detail) is my prefered belaying device, if ropes aren´t too skiny.
Becoming a expert belayer is a long journey, where you may start with a grigri, but it´s not the end. People always complaining about manual devices being "unsafe" never will get that learning curve and therefore never become more than a average / good belayer.
What can a manual device do better you ask ?
belaying with no slack needed, no fall extension.
When rope start running, you can choose how much resistance you give ( breaking force), without any jumping or timing issue, even relatively light people can belay heavier climbers without even get lifted up (depending on height over quickdraw of course). With perfect control you can just break permanently a little, or a little more, or less, like needed to give a soft catch, or let the climber fall over a roof without impacting the wall at all. Something you can only do with excessive slack with a locking device.
And yes, there are scenarios i use a locking device too. It´s not the device making a belay good or bad, it´s always the belayer, and sometimes a good belayer can belay better with a tube.
But that would need permanent training with tube.
people always belaying with grigri, and once a year belaying with a manual device, i would never trust.
When i stop sometimes training with tube belaying, ( i haven´t been climbing 3 months now), my reflexes become worse again.
Everything has to be trained regularly.
So independent from any devices, i want all climbers (belayer) to get more experince in belaying. you will never become better just on waiting for "take" and "down".
Think over hard & easy´s videos (very perfect) and get out climbing/falling and belaying, the more the better. start small and don´t risk too much, but if you never risk anything, you won´t proceed as a belayer for sure.
all the best everyone, stay climbing
I should have joined your study. This looks like a great way to get over fear of falling.
Oh yea for sure :DDDD I always need guinea pigs.
I did that falling when your name is called thingy yesterday and that actually helped quite a lot. After that I was comfortable enough to just fall when I wanted to test it.
Not fully comfortable yet, but quite sure it will come
@@HardIsEasyhi! Can you make a video on how to un-kink ropes and why they get all kinked? I have a few methods i can share with you
@@felipegarcia05189 He briefly covered it at the end of his Complete Guide to Climbing Ropes video: th-cam.com/video/ncUGR2JbefY/w-d-xo.html
For anyone who doesn't know @HardIsEasy has really excellent series of videos on overcoming fear of falling. It think about it all the time.
This is a great report and the visual graphs are awesome! The one thing missing through is the acknowledgement that “slack” isn’t the only factor which increases rope stretch. Just having a longer length of dynamic rope from belayer to climber increases rope stretch, leading to a softer catch. For instance: a fall at the first bolt will always be more hard than a fall at the last bolt. Therefore: it’s not always a matter of having slack near the belay device, but just having more rope, and more dynamic stretch in the system. If a leader takes a fall at the very top of a super long 200ft pitch, the catch will def be soft regardless of slack near the belay device or not.
Yea, many factors, at this point I'm just presenting the findings, I'll make a Belay Master class episode on catching falls eventually to put everything into practical sense.
You're generally correct but don't forget rope drag can make a huge difference. Lots of routes have large direction changes mid pitch, and that's where extending becomes really important. A high-angle bend in the rope can effectively shorten the amount of dynamic rope in the system by almost isolating the rope before and after the bend.
This is an enormous factor at that. I was going to say the same thing.
Followed by drag as also mentioned.
One concept few climbers talk about from a "fall practice" perspective is getting the lower body especially to be able to absorb the forces and prepare for the potential earlier in the session. Managing fear over a bolt or pad, getting comfortable with falls in either, and learning to do those is great, but I spend every session doing increasingly more forceful landings including one and two legged and using boxes and harder surfaces. Getting the connective tissue in the lower body able and prepared to withstand those impacts is important.
I saw your video about money related to your videos. It surprised me. I have to say that i see you as such a beautiful soul. This combines your care for nature, following your passion, and putting finances below joy. Your way of being honest and caring is what i like most about al your work!
And of course, the quality of your videos is insanely high.
Have you also looked into the method of Sensorhanddynamik? It‘s a German name and can be translated as „dynamic belaying with the sensor hand“. It is a method for when there is really a lot of friction in the system. Or when the climber is really super light.
You basically give the first part of the catch with your upper hand: the hand that holds the rope above the belaying device. For this method you manage the slack in a different way, it is not hanging between your belaying device and the first draw. Instead, you hold one armlenght of slack hanging BETWEEN that hand and your belaying device. The hand holding this armlength of slack is positioned low, close to the belaying device. When the fall happens, you use the strenght of the hand to hold on to the rope, and let it‘s arm actively (and softly) resist the rope pull as the arm straightens up. Once your arm is straight you‘ll have created an active soft catch via your hand. At this moment you procede and use your full body to also move into the soft catch.
It is a method for special cases. But in these cases (lots of friction, or very light climber) it enables you to create this armlength of soft catch with the hand.
In both scenarios the fall creates only a very reduced „pulling force“ on the belayer, making the timing of a standard (jumping or running towards the wall) soft catch super difficult!
I’ve learned about it via DAV, the German Alpine Association. But I ask myself how much of an effect this „one armlenght of soft catch with the hand“ actually has on a fall. DAV says that this ca. 1 meter of hand controlled catch does make a very significant difference. Do you have any thoughts / opinion on this?
Thank you for all of your output on belaying! It‘s so super important and has been very helpful. ❤
PS: Edited for (I hope) better description of the method.
My coach uses this technique when belaying with an assisted braking device. He doesn't jump at all, and the catch is soft, so the technique is legit.
@@0xADF That‘s cool to know! Thanks for sharing your experience! 🤍
Cool, it has a name. I 'invented' this technique for myself. Also I always wear gloves so I can even have a bit more then arms length and let is slide trough my hand without burning myself. I'm doing this because I'm usually a lot heavier than my climbers. Added benefit is that is gives you a heads-up a split second before you want to step forward or jump in case you visually missed the fall.
Over time I've discovered that combined with the friction on the draws I often softly catch my climber without the grigri even locking
Thank you for this great dive into lead falls!
I would also like to see some testing done with an Ohm.
I was taking a "Lead Fall class" and my assigned belayer weighed a lot less than I did so we used an Ohm. This worked OK as we learned how to jump to give a soft catch. The final fall was with a lot more slack than we had done before. I can't remember where the belayer was in relation to the wall. I remember feeling that I was falling faster than I had before and the catch was very hard and I was slammed into the wall. The route was a vertical gym wall outdoors. I had a bone bruise in one ankle and hyper flexed ligament in the other ankle. This took about 6 months to heal enough that I could resume most of my activities but getting close to a year out I still can feel the effects of the accident.
+1 Testing the ohm would be interesting. I find the catch very harsh. More harsh than I get even from my bigger partners.
Software dev here, not a physics guru, BUT @ 7:11 Something is nudging me about that Red curve compared to the curves (Yellow and Green). You are definitely under deceleration for a longer period of time, however, the arc of the curve has a really wide knee compared to the green curve. What is fascinating is the farther fall (red curve) increase the area under the curve (total force felt), but the comment from your belayer said "that was softest". This leads me to postulate that a "soft catch" is actually just a smooth curve without a sharp knee. This definitely backs in if you look at the curves from the hard catches! Anyway, watching the rest now! EDIT: my theory stands :) @ 8:48 smoothest curve was softest catch. Hmm... so even though peak acceleration is higher, a _transition_ from vertical to horizontal spread out over a long period of time feels "softer" to the climber. Fascinating!
You're right! And it totally makes sense, since what's normally perceived as a "catch hardness" is jerk, or in other words, a variation in acceleration (which can mean both magnitude and direction, since acceleration is a vector value!). The more gradual that variation over time the lower the jerk, which translates to the sensation of a softer catch. The same way flooring the gas pedal on a car which accelerates extremely quickly will cause you to feel that strong jolt that pushes you hard into the seat, whereas pressing on it more lightly will get you to the same top speed but in a slower time span and without that jolt.
I actually measured Jerk as well, that's what you would perceive upon the "impact" of the rope, but Excluded from this video, because what actually matters more is how hard you would hit the wall and that's basically horizontal speed at the moment of the hit to the wall.
And while Jerk was interesting to see - I did not want to make this video toooo complicated.
Wish I had known this earlier, in late October I broke my ankle and had to get surgery because I hit the wall too hard, but watching how you guys handle falls is showing me where I made some mistakes, hopefully part 2 comes out before august when I can finally start climbing again. I’ve been really bummed not being able to do anything to improve while I can’t walk, but this helps.
Yea that sucks.. I guess pull ups until August? =]
Part 2 in Dec and then I'll make a belay master class episode with practical aspects of catching falls.
@@HardIsEasy I wish Dec comes soon😢 I'm checking at least twice a day
@@mirmeierHaha, Dec is here.... the video I would say 85% done :D
Having so far always been a lighter person I probably have given quite a few harder caches than I could have without getting sucked up to the first quick draw and I know the "I'm getting flung up to the wall anyways so I don't need to jump" feeling all too well. I've still tried to learn the soft catch technique, but instead of jumping when the rope starts to pull I just stand up fast and then get lifted off the ground by the rope in a gradual movement. The aim is to give the rope as much time as possible to absorb the forces, if you're just waiting for the rope to yank you off the ground then that's a pretty short window of time compared to kneeling down and eating up the slack, getting the rope tight and starting to accelerate with it upwards by your own force.
Regarding the push away from the wall. I've been taught that if you're on an overhang like this then no you'll just create a bigger pendulum, for more vertical, slabby or ledgy probably. Basically if there's a danger of hitting something falling straight down then it's better to try create some distance between the wall and yourself since it's easier to be prepared to absorb the swing in to the wall than just straight up falling down and hitting your leg on a ledge etc.
Very nice research, looking forward for part two.
One thing that is never mentioned: longer fall gives you more time (and sometimes space) to adjust body position before hitting the wall. This may be an important factor by itself.
That would go for the vertical part and the swing
They talk about it around the 11 minute mark
Great work, but to me what your data is mostly showing is how important the experience and attention of the belayer is. How well they time the soft catch matters so much more than the amount of slack by itself that I'd take away that you should give however much slack gives you an intuitive reaction time (probably half an arm to an arm or so)
as someone who belays heavier and lighter climbers i've noticed being low in your knees (crouching a little) helps, because as the tension in the rope builds and starts pulling you up you can jump up with it, but if you are upright you can only anticipate when they load the rope, having some slack in this Situation helps as you notice the slack disapearing and jump up to create the soft catch
Earlier this year I fell from about 1.5-2 meters above the bolt and sprained my ankle. Seeing now that it was a mix of me pushing the wall, my (light) belayer, and maybe some excess slack in the system, I realize what can be done better both as a climber and belayer.
Your service to the climbing community is unparalleled, thank you for what you are doing and I can't wait to see the rest of your study.
These test are great for overhanging routes but not useful for routes less than vertical where the main hazard is hitting a small ledge on the face. Most climbers do not climb over hanging routes. Most climber hurt themselves on less than vertical routes. More slack or jumping increases your chances of hitting something. I think this is important to tell new climbers where giving more rope is the opposite of what you want to do. Do the test on less than vertical routes. You will quickly see that more slack is not better.
Yea this is just presenting the data, I'll make a separate Belay Masterclass video on catching falls with practical details later ;)
For all the Ohm users here, make sure the belayer stands directly underneath the Ohm when they are belaying. If they are standing away from the rope line (where the rope would fall straight down from the first bolt/Ohm naturally) then the Ohm will bite immediately and the climber will essentially get a static catch.
If the belayer stands directly underneath the Ohm, the device won’t bite as immediately, giving time for the belayer to jump into the system (normal soft catch technique) and the climber will get a soft catch. Remember, it isn’t the first bolt the belayer needs to be afraid of, but the speed they approach it. They will get pulled closer to it, but at a slower speed than no Ohm (and be safe from injury), and the climber will get a soft catch.
Thank you very much for doing all this intensive research and sharing it with the world. Being a data person (and a newbie climber), I really appreciate the content you produce, and I also enjoy watching you present it (those things usually don't correlate, but you do an outstanding job in presenting interesting data in a very entertaining and accessible way). The information you provide helps me greatly in understanding the physics behind belaying, giving me a solid foundation on my way to become a better belayer (and climber, hopefully).
Most belayers don't use the left arm at all, which is where the magic is for me. The physical cues are more natural and automatic if you resist the fall with the left arm first. Obviosuly the amount of slack needs to be managed to avoid rope burn, but that's a non issue once you get the swing. The goal is to start the belayer's mass accelerating before the first impulse. The belayer's whole body gets organized for the catch as a result of introducing the forces gradually. It really helps take the timing element out of it for more consistent catches. The problem with whole body timing based on vision is that people tend to brace for the catch, so they're generally out of position to soften the catch. Most hard catches seen here, that weren't simply short pendulum arms, were just bad timing.
Came back to watch this video after receiving a hard catch from my belayer... Really helps watching this video after some lead belaying practices - the nuances do stand out
really appreciated.
Used to belay my 25kg heavier father at a young age. Usually didnt clip the first bolt so ive more way to get pulled up. To his words - softes catches ever.
in my expierence id still advice as SMALL push off the wall, at least as long as the wall isnt overhanging an inch. It gives you time to adjust yourself and sort your limbs before kissing the wall. I've often seen newbies with the "no push, short fall"- attitude in flat walls.. and it looks just painful. Realize your corestrength, chill, and enjoy the flight. there is nothing more fun than a 10m wipper (as long as the wall is alright and your belayer knows his job)
Best thing is to practice, both the climber and the belayer. Climbing is fun, but falling is the real pleasure. Learn to enjoy it and loose your fear and stiffness. Panic and too much tention just ruins your life, especially in a high focus sport like climbing. Pratice, enjoy and enhance your limits.
Sometimes me and my partner do the same thing: clip the 1st and 2nd bolt, come down a little and unclip the 1st bolt.
Softer catches and more comfortable for the belayer.
Incredible! Fantastic work Ben. Testing the effect of the belayer's weight could perhaps be improved by using a weight vest rather than different belayers. Your soft-catch technique looks significantly different to Anna's.
Belayer with weight west can't jump as high as a heavier belayer (who has more leg muscles) so it makes it a bit weird...
Although would work for hard catch scenarios...
In part 2 we actually added extra friction instead of weight west... I think that is better idea
How about a weight west on the climber?@@HardIsEasy
@@HardIsEasy Thank you for all the hard work you do for the climbing community! Looking forward to part 2!
I witnessed a broken ankle with a light belayer.
The friend that took me climbing outside for the first time knew absolutely nothing about soft catches (or short-ropping, or keeping the hand on the brake side of the rope even with a Grigri...). But I trusted her because her ex-boyfriend who taught her was a climbing instructor.
She must weight 50 or 55kg. One time as she was belaying a relatively light male climber (65kg I'd say), he fell and had a nasty sideways fall (he was pretty far to the right of the bolt). He immediatly began screaming and complaining about his foot, and we had to rush back to the car. Turned out he had a broken ankle.
I understood months later, on my own, that it probably could have been avoided, by giving him a much softer catch.
I found out because I asked around, researched online and watched YT videos like yours! So thank you very much, the work you've been doing is a very important contribution to the sport.
Might be covered in a part two, but I do wish that you mentioned somewhere that the way you belay can also be heavily dictated by the terrain you climb on. In a gym or at an overhung sport crag, falls and catches are generally much cleaner than in an area with slabs and ledges. In alpine terrain, trad climbing, or other outdoor sport areas a soft catch could easily result into a sprained/broken ankle if your climber smacks into a feature.
All that to say, I would almost always prefer a hard catch to a fall stopped by my feet crashing into a ledge below me.
Thanks as always for the quality content!
Hey Ben! Thank you for another great video about falls and catches. I learned so much from your videos, I wanted to thank you with something more than the usual comment. But please, buy some beers also for your brave and patient crew! They deserved it :)
Amazing amount of work behind this video! YOU are brilliant Ben.
Two things that I love the most: climb topics with science.
Now every channel that I see is a brilliant sponsored channel
Great study Ben! Thank you for being curious, coming up with a study and sharing the information in a practical way for all climbers and for safer climbing practices.
Thank you sooo much for all this work that you've been doing. You're being really through with your research 👏
And the video quality also is top notch
I was wondering what are your thoughts on kneeling to catch falls.
Timing, absorbing the fall by having « assisted standing up » before jumping to really give the softest catch as possible.
I find that there is a lot of benefits into this method.
Softer catch, safer for first clip falls, easier to give rope when required by the climber…
Of course you cannot use this on multi pitch routes after the first pitch.
Thank you for you answering my question.
Hands down, your videos are the most useful in terms of climbing how-to and how-not-to out there! Thanks for the great content - I'll crank up my PATREON support :)
Amazing video, as a heavy climber this info was very interesting
Great video. I’d love to see this with an ohm as well. I often feel it gives a very hard catch. Also how does the distance from the wall (and thus the change in angle at the ohm) change the catch.
I think instead of having different belayers for light/heavy, putting a weight vest in the climber would be more accurate. This will ensure the belayer has similar technique. It’s very clear that there were different techniques.
You did great!!! You might need a protocol or two to be written, a data manager and a statistician. One protocol could be for outdoor climbing and another for indoor climbing. A statistician could take the great data you collect to help you understand the data even better. I can’t wait to see Part 2!
Interesting scientific study demonstrating some intuitive principles in belaying, thank you very much!
Oh wow Ben! This is work of a very high standard. Incidentally: hard catch, no slack, broken ankle - yes, I tried that myself!
This is the best climbing channel I've ever seen! Keep up the great work
Nice work and research on your part and all those who've supported you. Looking forward to part 2!
There is a 30kg difference in weight between my belayer and me so we mostly use the ohm. It gives suuuper hard catches sometimes, but I feel more safe falling knowing my belayer wont get dragged up the wall. The chance my belayer gets hurt feels like its far greater than mine when not using the ohm since they are basically guaranteed to get stuck at the first bolt.
I'm in a similar situation with my climbing partner (~25kg weight difference), and what works really well for us is using a "Z-Clip" (clipping the first bolt of the neighbouring route, and then the second bolt of your own route). It enables me to give soft catches without being violently pulled into the first (or second...) bolt. If you have the possibility at your climing faciliy, might be worth a try :)
@@gehteuchnixan5180 for me the issue with that approach is that the rope needs to be "dragged" up, since it the increase in friction is constant. The ohm at least lets the rope through easily if one doesn't pull on it too much.
The closer the belayer is to being directly underneath the Ohm, the gentler it will bite and the softer they can give a catch (if they use normal soft catch jumping into the fall techniques).
My belayer is 60lbs lighter than me and she is able to give soft catches with the Ohm this way.
Such a fascinating video. It would be neat to see how the ohm compares to soft/hard catches and slack management too.
Idonno, I don't think you've done anything more interesting report than this! Nice! Interesting! Thanks!
7:17 I think the elongation/stretch of the rope is a variable that helps the climber perceive the fall as "softish". It looks like a sweet middle between stretch and making contact with the wall is what a good belayer has to achieve, that soft j slack
Ben,
Your TH-cam channel is awesome! Thank you so much for this valuable contribution to the climbing community. Keep up the good work!
Great job, thank you! Part 3: SLAB falls? We need recommendations for non over hanging configurations!
non overhanging Slab :D but I get it... will do ;)
This was very anticipated and woaw how greater than my expectations it is ! Thank you so very much for all the work you've put out there for us to learn and climb safer
Thank you very much for this video!
My last "hard catch", felt like a very soft catch (vertically), but with much horizontal speed. And in fact, I pushed myself away from the wall a little bit, because I knew, there's a ledge beneath. Usually I get very soft catches from my belayers - despite of (?) me being the heavier one, with 10 to 20 more kg.
Interesting video. It would also be useful to see how this compares to more vertical walls, since I have never climbed on such overhangs outdoors, though I can see why you would focus on overhangs for safety reasons
THANK YOU for this video. MASSIVE help to the climbing community
Climber and physicist here, this is really nice work, you should publish it in a journal as well.
Thanks for the great content! Last summer, I got a veeeery hard catch from a much lighter but also very unexperienced climber/belayer...and...I fully ruptured my achilles tendon by kicking the wall. So, I totally agree with the theory, that experience goes over weight!
Great video! As a very light belayer myself it is very interesting to see these results. I need to be more active than I thought.
I have a suggestion: Maybe you could perform a test where you (or the same person) catch all falls and, instead of changing the belayer you can change the person falling, someone lighter or heavier than you. This way you remove the catcher "experience" variable out of the table and test the "lighter and heavier" belayer effect with a little bit more control. :)
Amazing video! I love the mix between climbing and science :) I was just thinking today I went climbing to watch one of your videos to remind me about the science of falling. Glad it popped into my home page so didn’t have to look!
Commenting on the "hard catch by light belayer" situation, I think rope drag changes everything, if you have enough drag, you don't need much force to hold that fall so the belayer weight doesn't make any difference. Having a good amount of slack and letting the drag itself take some of the energy before it reaches the resistance of the belayer seems the way to go.
I just liked and shared the video in Blanco, just imagining how much work @hardiseasy have put into this.
Kudos to you!
Btw in Blanco I meant without watching it whole, just the first couple of minutes
This was an amazing video to watch. Thank you for the time & effort you guys invested putting all this together. I'm going to go watch & like your part two video now!
My pleasure!
I am roughly 30 kg heavier than my belayer, and we use an eldrid Ohm to even out the differance. I've had some very hard falls, that even ended flipping me over some how (?). We are both very new to lead climbing, but we also quickly learned that jumping with the fall is super important.
Awesome video, really informative and enjoyable. I'd never thought about the pendulum length as a factor, but it makes so much sense! I see there is a part 2 so maybe this is stuff you already plan to cover but I am also interested on what falls are putting the most forces on the gear/bolts? I'd imagine this is simpler and based on how hard the catch is more than the speed you impact the wall.
Also I know this is annoying but it might be worth having a bit more of a safety disclaimer at the beginning. More slack and longer falls with softer catches are great if you have space, but I wouldn't want someone to try to implement that and take a ground fall, or hit bits of sticking out wall on the way down!
Edit: Its also making me realise how much more skillful belaying can be than I realised, judging slack and timing soft catches and knowing when these are/aren't safe to do. Its a bit more involved!
Great research, absolutely one of the most useful channels on the topic!! Will you also do the same test on vertical (non-overhanging) walls? It would be interesting especially for beginners ♡
The take aways on this video is more or less applicable for vertical walls - the peak horizontal speed is at the bottom of the pendulum, as I said that gives good indicator of how hard the climber would hit a vertical wall ;)
@@HardIsEasy Agree - unless you hit something sticking out on the way down. I think this is the major concern falling on near vertical climbs. In this case you would want your fall to be as short as possible, to reduce the probability of hitting something and to get as low vertical velocity as possible...
@@HardIsEasy Dynamic belaying can be dangerous on a vertical walls, it's depend of the environnement. when there is a risk of falling on a rock it's important not to be too dynamic.
Thanks for the video!!
I had plenty of hard catches from my lighter belay but it’s more an experience thing
Great study! This definetelly deserves a scientific publication!
lol this is far from scientific
In a climbing gym I gave my climber a very hard catch once. We are both very light(55kg), I gave very little slack and didn't jump. He had also fallen multiple times at the same spot within a few minutes. Maybe 10m up the wall taking a 1.5-2m fall. Either a Grigri or tuber.
I think the angle of impact into the wall is also very important. As it severely affects how we absorb the fall with our feet, changing the feeling if hardness. This also means that the distance from the wall after peak velocity also matters, as over longer distance, we can absorb the impact softer.
Perfect scientific work, thank you very much for all the efforts ❤ looking forward to watch next part.
Great work, I am not a climber, Just knot lover nice to benefit me to have these valuable information. Thanks
Thanks for this great video! Just this weekend I was unexpectedley belayed hard by someone lighter than myself. Timing is everything!!! So annoyed by being belayed badly...
Big thumbs-up for the use of Sav-Gol filters!
I think an important limitant is than in all those examples you are super alert to the fall. This soft catches may not represent unexpected real life falls, unless it is a super expert belayer with awesome reflexes. However it seems very difficult to test that in a estandarizad way. Thanks for the video and theinformation
Im curious about the stepping forward method. I've done a lot of belaying over a period of more than 30 years. As well outside as indoors for comps.
I've always preferred the stepping forward method. I feel like this (for me) gives me more control over the catch and this allows me to time the catch better so that the maximum of force is absorbed at the moment of the highest vertical force. The more you can absorb at that exact moment, the less it translated into a horizontal movement. And in this video you also can see that timing (experience) is a crucial factor.
I'm curious if the data will agree with me.
The stepping forward method also gives great control over the slack given at any moment. Certainly when a climber is quick to clip. Giving slack in combination with a step forward is very fast to give enough slack to clip. I the climber fumbles the clip at step back in combination with taking slack is also very quick to manage the slack at any point.
Do note that I'm a heavier climber/belayer.
I experienced a hard catch with a lighter belayer (10kg difference) and absorbed the impact with the right foot only. It got kind of crushed, nothing broken, and took me more than a year to be pain free.
Incredible. Appreciate this depth of info.
I took a hard catch on a 5.11 sport climb inside - not over hung wall - and my belayer wasn’t much heavier than me, she may have had 5-10lbs max on me. I’m 118lbs. She wasn’t use to lead and hunkered down on my fall.
I didn’t expect to fall but feet slip and falls
Happen. I flung so aggressively to the wall I tore my ATFL in my right ankle and had to take 8 weeks off :( sucked. But lessons learned for sure.
Thanks for the great video!!
Could you do a study on falls on trad gear, specifically how gear orientation and fall direction can move placements as they are loaded? Also you could explore zippering and how belayer position can help avoid it
I did not expect that epic dropkick!
As a relatively light belayer, I'm still going to keep my belay tight because I don't want to risk letting my climber get anywhere near the ground, even if it might end up as a harder catch :)
That was still a very interesting watch though. I'm really excited for part 2!
I'm a light belayer and keep my belay tighter for the first few bolts. Ease up as the climber is further off the ground. But I also won't climb with climbers who are out of control that often push their limit too much that they may fall in the next couple of bolts and may land on or kick me. You could get seriously hurt. My friend hurt her neck from being landed on and affected her forever 😢
Wow great job especially with motion tracking
This is really good data. TH-cam is full of high-quality self-investigative science like this that is easily publishable in a journal. There should be some kind of journal for stuff like this that self-investigators can submit to. And TH-cam or someone else should offer a service to help non-scientists prepare papers! That would be seriously cool and offer some real credibility, validation, and opportunity for funding to the amazing work done by Ben and others.
Incredible work, I really respect all the effort for this. Thank you!
Hey, thank you for your work!Just want to share another video idea with you - breathing.
Are you conscious of breathing when you climb? Do you breathe through nose or mouth?
In other sports it seems to play an important part. It would be cool to see if it can help in climbing as well. In theory, breathing through nose can result into getting less pumped:)
I had the hardest falls when I was a scared beginner climber with a scared belayer and very little slack. Falling from directly above the quickdraw with zero slack really slams you into the wall. The quickdraw pulls you in and doesn’t give you room to extend your legs and lean back. Even though my belayer was 10kg lighter than me. I think as long as you don’t belay like that everything is fine, as long as you don’t hit the ground or other things.
Hello, thanks for your video !, You forgot to mention a few super important things: it's all about falling on the overhang, dynamic belaying off the overhang can be very dangerous.
Thank you very much for these videos.
I would like to see the conclusions with something as underestimated as the type of belay device. If you were to do these same tests with the Black Diamond ATC Pilot, you would be amazed at the results.
Thanks for all this information.
Best regards
No big difference between using different belay devices, We tested against typical Tube, but will show you the results in future edits ;)
just one fall with a really hard catch which banged me into the (quite overhanging) wall - it was a light weighted belayer and I was surprised because he was a quite experienced lead climber. my guess is either he was not prepared and surprised in that moment of fall - or simply out of practice since it was our first lead climb together in a while.
This is so good. My fear of falling is real. I’ve been dropped twice. It’s not fun when you hit the deck. I was 20 ft up as well.
I hope your future belayers will be watching my videos - and you'll get over your fear of falling fast ;)
Great job, love the dedication!
15:00 you can clearly see you're giving way softer of a catch than she is. You're leaping up, she's barely moving by the time the rope's straight. From her starting position (one leg on the rock face, and the other straight behind her) there's no way she even *could* give a soft catch IMO. Extremely great effort on the part of all involved.
Fantastic video, can't wait for part 2!
I am interested to see if in Part 2 you talk about a more active belay, where the belayer manages the slack between the climber and the last piece of protection, before the the rope gets tight. In my experience of belaying both much heavier and much lighter climbers and when climbers are in odd positions or off to the side of the climb I have found that I'm able to control the fall and catch with more accuracy and safety while giving the "best" fall depending on the situation.
Brain porn ! So much commitment and quality it's an enlightenment, thanks a lot bro !
Great stuff!! I learned so much from this video! I believe much of this did not exist as “knowledge base”. Great contribution for the future of the sport!! Let’s go!!
I wish I could subscribe to you over and over, Ben. Thank you for your content!
As en experienced climber and Guide I describe the difference of the light girl compared to you like:
Problem is the Timing.
You Jump in to her Fall.
Make it soft.
She gets pulled up/ Speed up because of the Fall.
She didnt Jump into the fall.
Wrong timing or Lack of Knowledge.
A light person on a trampoline feels the change of direction in the bottom of the bounce stronger compared to a heavier person. I assume the heavier climber and belayerallows the rope stretch to work better too.
15:20 Anna didn't get the timing as well as you did though!
Yep
Have you considered attaching accelerometers to the climbers torso and/or feet? Seems like it could be easier and possibly more accurate than judging based on camera footage (btw, very impressive how you were able to get that data).
I would think you could do this pretty inexpensively with a small embedded system (like an ESP32) and solid-state gyro/accelerometer.
Most times I got a hard catch from a lighter belayer was when using Ohm. The reason was the belayer had no experience giving soft catches.
It also happened a few times when there was a lot of rope drag, but not so hard as with the Ohm.
Yea with OHM it might be tricky, it all depends how far the belayer is from the wall - it changes the angle of the rope and how aggressive OHM catches
As usual a great video, thank you !
Like other have mentioned, I too would appreciate to see other wall profiles (vertical or slab). At my level when I lead climb it's almost never in overhang. And I'm curious what is the best catch technique on a slab, because if you do a hard catch, the climber gets slammed into the wall, but if you try to give more slack or soft catch, he might fall along the wall with more speed and possibly hurt himself while rubbing against it too.
I guess it's more difficult to test due to the risk of getting hurt, and yet this is probably the kind of climbing the beginner/moderate climbers mostly do.
very interesting observations!
i'm a heavy climber (90 kg) and in 99% cases my belayer is 10-25 kg lighter than me. i don't remember i ever had some hard catch. the riskiest thing i observed: the lighter belayer - the deeper i fall and the belayer is up. my main concern - not to catch ground or shelf fall as well leave belayer safe. so i always ask belayers not to go very far from the rock to prevent this case. (my guess: the far belayer is - the more rope between us, so the deeper is fall. From other side if the belayer is far from the rock - there is more friction between the rope and the first quickdraw that I assume can decrease the fall depth. But in real life it seems doesn't work...)
so it's just my very high-level assumption: the major impact on the softness of the fall makes the dynamic rope. and big slack can lead to deep fall.