UKH

What do you think is the hardest e6 in the UK, my mate did stage fright the other day and it looked horrendous for e6

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Ray’s Roof, unless you have the skill set required?

jcm

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

Rays Roof is E7 in current guidebooks (as you well know) but I doubt it would be harder than the sandbag E6s out there.

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Stage Fright is steady, well protected by the difficult moves especially since Rob added another peg into the cluster at the top of the groove. Obviously fairly run out but it does get easier.

I guess there is the hardest e6 & then the scariest e6 be really cool to know what they were.

Hell's Wall (E6 6c) at 7c/+ is up there for e6's but it is a sport route....

Gigglin' Crack (E6 6c)? if its even climbing.......  Horrendous stuff, I've since deleted Brimham from memory.

In reply to richard_briggs7:

A Little Peculiar (E6 7b)

In reply to Tyler:

At least Pete repeated that. I wonder how many Nadin E6s are still unrepeated (I can't access the grit list for some reason to check... and I'm not sure the terrifying looking creaky roof E6 stuff on Great Gate is even on those lists). There are others in past discussions here... did Caff get round to doing Borderline on Scafell? Rays Roof is almost a trade route in comparison with some of these obscurites....  Also by hard for E6 I assumed we were talking adjectivally.

In reply to Offwidth:

Borderlines around f7b & given e7 these days, definitely tough on paper.

Along with borderline quite alot of Berzins routes in the lakes have had subtle upgrades I think ataxia was his route & its brutal even at e6, were all getting soft!

Ataxia (E6 6b)

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Another vote for Hells Wall. Not sure Its ever been onsighted?

Giggling crack isnt that bad really. Just not very regular climbing

In reply to Adam Lincoln:

A Couple I thought were tough for e6 - 

King of Kings - anglezarke 

Master of Reality - Hen Cloud (Only if the bottom is climbed straight up the wall without recourse to the left arete) 

In reply to Tyler:

That mantel sounds freakin nailz.

In reply to Offwidth:

Heya 

I am sure some of the E6s at  Iron Crag are as hard as nailz.

In reply to Mountain Spirit:

There is only one and it seems fair for the grade??

In reply to Offwidth:

You are right - there is only one E6 there!

Western Union (E6 6b)

I wouldn't know as I have never climbed there but I do know two people who have climbed there.

Sav

In reply to Scott Quinn:

Looks interesting

Is it a sport route because if the pegs?

In a thread of mine, I asked what is meant what is fingery climbing.

MS

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Conan the Librarian given E6 in the guidebook, Gogarth North. E7 on UKC: https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/gogarth_north_stack_and_main_cliff...

In reply to Adam Lincoln:

On sight soloed in shorts and t shirt by Terry Hirst many moons ago.

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Incantations (E6 6b) seems to be lacking ascents in logbooks, and it's quite a well known route

I would also offer Menstrual Gossip (E6 6b) and Boys Will Be Boys (E6 6b).

In reply to overdrawnboy: For the record, I sussed out the entry moves to get established in the crack & then put on a rugby shirt for the solo. Bit more sensible attire for arm barring & general thrutching towards the top. 

Something in Pembroke that was first done with pegs, and offered safe but physical, sustained climbing, and is now bold as hell due to demise of the pegs. Light at the end of the runnel for example. 

In reply to overdrawnboy:

And also Jerry Peel, no?

In reply to Jon Read; BwbB can’t be hard because it was my first E6, though I wouldn’t have cared to onsight it.

In reply to GedD: It’s funny ‘cos it’s true!

jcm

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

Wasn't meant to be funny! I bet there's a few old E6 that are worth e8 now. 7b+ climbing with no protection. 

In reply to richard_briggs7:

Could be two different questions:

What's the most undergraded E6? (i.e. gets E6 in guidebook but should be E8)

What's the hardest route that consensus would maintain is correctly graded at E6?

Either way you won't get a meaningful answer!

In reply to Terry Hirst:

Ya big softie, no wonder you moved down south !

In reply to overdrawnboy:

Yep, I could have understood multiple crashpads (didn’t exist back then) and/or kneepads (didn’t exist back then) but the rugby shirt admission has seriously knocked my immense respect for Terry's climbing prowess.

Pete.

In reply to richard_briggs7: The Cure for a Sick Mind (E6 6b) is 8a, famously reachy, and with only 5 bolts in 45m of climbing, it must be one of the hardest!

In reply to Ben_Roberts:

I thought the established grade for that one was E7 7a -- a bit different esp the tech grade!

In reply to Ben_Roberts:

A good example of why it’s always worth consulting the local definitive guide!

In reply to johnyo:

I'd presumed it got re-graded as a result of feedback.

Am I right in thinking you'd done it (or have I completely imagined that)?! If so, what were your thoughts?

In reply to Ben_Roberts:

Even the best protected trad 8a’s are by definition E7 as the first UK sport routes of that grade were graded E7 before french grades quickly became the norm

In reply to Scott Quinn:

Martin Berzins and his partner sieged the much sought after line together but it was the steel fingered Chris Sowden who ultimately solved the crux sequence of Borderline and graded it E6 at the time.

https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/scafell_east_buttress-681/borderli...

In reply to Rob Greenwood - UKClimbing:

Yeah I have Rob (though Caff might disagree!). You do some hard climbing, then the crux of Rainbow and then some substantially harder climbing  than anything on the crux of Rainbow. Plus you have the gripper clipper, which I extended,  as I believe was done on the first ascent. Way more sustained and harder than Rainbow which gets E6 6b!  The original E7 7a is much more representative for an onsight than E6 6b in my opinion.  

In reply to richard_briggs7:

There are a few ridiculously hard ones on grit. Clock People Clock People (E6 6c) (Fawcett, 1984) has a crux which is at least Font 7b+. Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand Adam Smith's Invisible Hand (E6 6b) would be a very hard on-sight being gymnastic F7b+ above questionable fixed gear.

I’ve done a few of the ones mentioned and agree the Lakes has some of the harder ones.

Peak Lime as well. All Systems Go All Systems Go (E6 6c) is probably worth F7c. If you fell off the last move of the crux sequence you’d be very close to the deck.

White Hotel The White Hotel (E6 6c) felt hard when I failed miserably on it.

In reply to Offwidth:

It’s also well protected. E for effort.

In reply to Mountain Spirit:

All the high grade E,s at Iron Crag are hard for the grade and all you need to know is Western Union is a Dougie Hall route, the best on sight leader I ever climbed with and that includes Ron.

In reply to johnyo:

I'm not sure who provided the feedback, but if it was someone like Caff or Pete then the downgrade doesn't surprise me - they're too good to provide a reliable opinion on a route's actual difficulty 😂

I'll send a quick email to Mark, just so it can be adjusted as/when the next edition comes out.

In reply to Rob Greenwood - UKClimbing:

Hi re: Cure for a Sick Mind.

so I can’t remember if it was Caff or someone else’s feedback for cure. Or indeed whether I spooned 6 rather than 7 on the keyboard as I was typing the route, followed by an oversight by several document checkers, human error sorry. I remember  some of the lines were tweaked as the result of the checkers who had climbed the harder routes on the rainbow so they better represent the line climbed.

I’ll get the grade changed in the master document later today and update  UKC logbooks as well. As I am working on a massive update for the app and a 2nd edition of the NWC book at the moment which are not due until the end of the year at the earliest. 

I would agreed that at E6 it seems a bit of a sandbag. But I’ll check with Caff face to face to see if he gives a wry smile if he says E6. As he loves a sandbag. He jokingly suggested Meltdown was 8c+ because another local was getting close and he didn’t want two 9a climbers in the area! He was more than happy when the second local 9a climber was a Cumbrian lass though! 

Thanks for the feedback. All gratefully received. 

In reply to Tom Briggs:well Tom, I have done the white hotel just a little while after I did The WItching Hour but it was very greasy at the time but it had one particularly hard move if I remember rightly?

In reply to richard_briggs7:

https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/deer_bield_crag-352/pretty_in_pink...

This might be a contender? 

In reply to richard_briggs7:

How about War and Peace at Craig Doris? 

https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/craig_doris-8161/war_and_peace-134...