On Being Gripped
When I opened my first issue of magazine in 1999, I read the term “gripped” described as, “A colloquialism in climbing meaning in a state of fear.” I didn’t know it at the time, but over the next nearly two decades, I would find out first-hand what gripped meant. You never know when you’ll be gripped, but being run out, exposed high on a wall or negotiating a difficult traverse can all lead to its sudden onset. Below are a some gripping moments that I will never forget.
One time I was on a 12- metre crack at the Centennial Bluffs in Thunder Bay, Ont. I was 20 and had teamed up with a partner who was much stronger. We forgot a rope, so my partner suggested we solo the easy routes. We moseyed up classics that we knew well, nothing harder than 5.5, trying to keep it easy. I knew that at some short crags, like the Bluffs, even the “easy” lines were not so easy. The last route was a wide corner. The jams were good until the final moves. Looking down at the jagged boulders, I realized that I had no escape plan. My left foot wasn’t jamming and the crack forced me away from the wall. I felt dizzy. I locked into the best position I could and wiggled my foot up. It slipped out and for a second I thought I was falling. I rolled over the top, heart pounding, and knew soloing wasn’t for me.
Years later, I was climbing a new Rockies route. I headed up the unknown soon-to-be 60- metre crux fifth-pitch, a face with broken corners. I found my first cam after 40 metres. A little higher, I pulled on the rope and the cam broke the small, friable limestone f lake it was behind. I was looking at a 50- metre ledge fall. My calves cramped, I pushed my finger tips into breaking crimps and ground my teeth. I was scared. It took a long time, and lots of encouraging shouts from my partners for me to reach a small ledge with a piton-perfect crack. We named the 10- pitch route Eastern Posers 5.9 +.
With too many alpine-gripped moments to choose from, the next-best trouser-browning memory is f rom the Squamish Apron. It was my f irst slab climbing trip. We roped up for Unfinished Symphony 5.11b. I was a ways above the last homemade bolt when I froze. I couldn’t sort the next move and feared a cheese-grater fall down the granite. I could hear my shoe rubber squeaking off a warm crystal. I covered myself in chalk, yelled expletives to my belayer, watched other climbers and then focused on kite surfers in Howe Sound. At that moment, the next rusty bolt was all that mattered in my life. Nauseous, I inched upward on greasy stone and clipped it. Climbing to the next bolt would be just as gut wrenching. I took a breath, chalked up and embraced being gripped.