Redpoint (climbing)

For other uses, see Red Point (disambiguation).

In rock climbing, redpointing means to free-climb a route while lead climbing, but only after having practiced the route beforehand (either by hangdogging or top roping), or after having fallen or rested on the rope, on the first attempt. Climbers will try to redpoint a route after having failed to on-sight it (free climb the route on the first attempt with no falls and no prior information), or flash it (free climb the route on the first attempt with no falls but with prior information). Redpointing is sometimes narrowly defined as climbing a route after a failed first attempt (regardless of how long ago, or how many failures occurred).

Description

Climbers can rest during a redpoint ascent, but not using the rope or any artificial aids (e.g. they can hang off the holds, or use a kneebar). Where the climber falls on a redpoint ascent, they must return to the very bottom, pull their rope free of the route, and completely re-start the ascent from scratch.

Redpointing differs from the largely traditional climbing action of "headpointing" (i.e. practicing the route on a toprope before making the first ascent), and since the 1980s, the term has become largely exclusive to sport climbing routes (i.e. with protection bolts pre-fixed into the rock at regular intervals).

Where the quickdraws are pre-placed into the protection bolts (i.e. the climber is just clipping in the rope on their lead), it is called "pinkpointing"; in practice, most climbs on extreme sport routes are really pinkpoints, as are most climbs in modern climbing competitions, but the term "pinkpoint" is less frequently used.

Since the 2010s, traditional climbers have introduced the derived term "greenpointing" (or the Grünpunkt movement, as a play on the Rotpunkt movement), to describe climbing a pre-bolted sport-climb, but only using "traditional protection" (i.e. climbing protection that is not permanently fixed via pre-placed bolts or pitons); as with redpointing, the climber may have repeatedly practiced falling on the “traditional protection” before making their greenpoint ascent.

Etymology

The English term "redpoint" is a loan translation of the German Rotpunkt that was coined by Kurt Albert in the mid-1970s at Frankenjura. Albert would paint a red "X" on any fixed metal pitons on a rock climbing route so that he could avoid using them while climbing, thus not using any artificial aid. Once Albert was able to free-climb the entire route, and avoid all the red "X"s, he would then paint a red "dot" (the "Roter Punkt") at the base of the route. His first Rotpunkt was the aid climbing route Adolf-Rott-Gedächtnis-Weg (V+/A1) at the Streitberger Schild crag in the Frankenjura, which he freed at 6a+ (5.10b) in 1975. Albert got the idea for the "red dot" from the logo and name of a brand of German coffee and kettle maker. To achieve a Rotpunkt, Albert additionally defined that if a climber fell during the ascent, they had to return to the base, pull the rope free, and re-start the climb from scratch (i.e. as if the climber had only just approached it).

The connotation spread of a "redpoint" being a route that had to be repeatedly attempted because it was so hard – which is why metal pitons had been hammered into the rock as an aid in the first place – until it could be climbed in one clean push (i.e. no falls, and any falls required a full re-start), and without any artificial aids. Because these routes were already established aid climbing routes, Albert could not remove the pitons (that would happen in later decades), however, his Rotpunkt laid down a mark to other climbers that the route could be free climbed without the use of the metal aids, and thus became an important moment in the development of free climbing. Eventually, Albert's Rotpunkts became associated with the development of sport climbing in the 1980s, as many of these aids were on routes that had no possibility of even natural traditional climbing protection (e.g. no cracks), and thus bolts would be needed for protection (but not aid).

Notable redpoints

Further information: List of first ascents (sport climbing) § Redpointed by men, and List of first ascents (sport climbing) § Redpointed by women

Notable redpointed climbs are chronicled by the climbing media to track progress in rock climbing standards and levels of technical difficulty; in contrast, the hardest traditional climbing routes tend to be of lower technical difficulty due to the additional burden of having to place protection during the course of the climb, and due to the lack of any possibility of using natural protection on extreme sport climbs.

As of December 2022, the world's hardest redpointed route is Silence at a proposed grade of 9c (5.15d), which was climbed by Adam Ondra in 2017; it has yet to be repeated. There are a number of routes with a grade of 9b+ (5.15c), the first of which was Change by Ondra in 2012, and the second of which was La Dura Dura, also by Ondra and Chris Sharma in 2013. As of December 2021, female climbers Angela Eiter, Laura Rogora, and Julia Chanourdie have redpointed established routes at 9b (5.15b), and Rogora's ascent of Erebor is considered to be the first potential female redpoint of a 9b/+ .

See also

• Sport climbing
• On-sight climbing
• Flash (rock climbing)
• Traditional climbing
• Pinkpoint

External links

• Watch Alex Megos Red Point Film Rotpunkt, a 2020 film by Alex Megos on the history of the "Rotpunkt" (Gripped Magazine, February 2020).