With about a year of low grade adventure climbing as experience (and no lead falls as yet) there is a point above Mother Earth when my mind says if you go now you are in sh ....

This seriously undermines the ability to make that next fluid move, notwithstanding the fact that there is a decent BD cam and nut about 2 m below my feet.

Do i need to practice taking some falls on this gear to get past the fear that these devices may not work ...

what say you all ...

Why do I get the feeling that this is \"Drifter\" who has been reincarnated as \"GBM\"...

Drifter...come out...come out...wherever you are...

Hey, iam newto this site but i have already seen some of this \"drifter\" characters stuff ... IT AINT ME ...

Stephan I am not GBM.

GBM the protection is only there for back up. You shouldn't I believe fall for fun on protection. In trad climbing you should not rely on the equipment I believe. You never know, it could come out so you only use it when you really have to take a fall. I don't like falling for fun either on outdoor sports climbing. You can practice taking small falls in the indoor gym just to teach yourself to put your legs and arms out when you fall to protect yourself however this should come naturally to you anyway.

If you take big falls on your rope that does reduce the life of your rope.

I would rather take a fall on a well placed nut than a cam.

Start off doing some straight forward aid climbing on trad gear this will help you get used to the idea... bounce test some of the gear and gradually move up to mini falls and soon you will realize that this stuff actually works!!! I'm a whopping 95kg and I have taken some hefty falls onto gear... Of the most recent I was almost 2 meters above my red BD C3 (it's quite small, especially when compard to me )

Go to your local sport crag, clip that 'trusty' bolt and place some gear above it. Then follow Fanta's advice and weight the gear and then begin to take bigger and bigger falls onto the piece. Just make sure that if the piece does go you're not going to hit the ground.

Also, vary the pieces that you place and try to assess their quality before you bomb onto them. It'll probably surprise you that some dodgey looking pieces are actually quite solid.

Doing this should help you to put some more genuine confidence into the gear that you're placing.

_________________
Open hand, open mind...

Yeah I know this is getting old, but I couldn't resist:





Like anything, you just need to do it for long enough (while being safe) - the falls will come, and they'll get less scary. Its that simple.

Thanks for the advice guys/girls; I’ve been reading \"The Rock Warrior's Way - a mental guide to climbing\" in which the author (Arno Ilgner) punts the notion that learning to fall takes away a lot of \"the fear of falling\" which often so inhibits our climbing ... makes sense to me.

You mean you havent fallen yet? Time to take a tumble! (practice on sport climbs first, the gym is way too close to the ground and not recommended as a safe place to practice falls). Do a trad leader course so you at least get to know which gear will hold and which placements wont, you're risking your neck unnecessarily if you dont know this stuff.



Whats the point in placing it then?? For that matter why bother commenting on stuff you know sweet f-all about??????

Techtip from www.climbing.com
http://www.climbing.com/print/techtips/ttsport227/ on how to fall

A friend and often Trad climbing partner phoned me last week to say she had taken a leader fall and was o. k. but on crutches, but was elated that her pro held. My reply was that in Trad, your pro hopefully stops you from getting killed, but not necessarily from getting hurt. Lets face it, on Trad routes you cannot always place good pro exactly where it is needed and sometimes you have to \"run it out\" a bit. Maybe a good idea to practice falling on good bolted routes, but would hesitate to do so on Trad pro.

Just another thought. It is also probably good for \"beginner\" belayers to practice holding a fall on bolted sports routes as well as the climber him/herself.

I don't like falling, but would prefer falling on well placed trad pro, unless it was on a bolt freshly placed by me. Atleast with trad gear, if it's your own, you have a history. With bolts you have to trust the variables, including the bolter. The bolter dictates the clips. On trad, the rock dictates. Often you can place extra gear to make yourself comfortable.

I have been climbing since the early 90's and ensured that by belayer can catch a fall and the climber can fall with out getting hert. I have always taught the required lesons in sport so that when we do trad they know what to do.