Climbing Course

The harness🔗

Putting a harness on:🔗

• there shouldn't be any twists and turns
• equipment hooks should point downwards
• metallic hooks should point to the outside
• should not slide up/down the hip bone

Using figure-8 knots to tie-in🔗

Figure-8 knot tie-in:🔗

• loop should be as big or smaller than the belay hoop
• should pass through both upper and lower harness hoops
• slack should be less than 10cm
• measure rope length from left shoulder to right arm length
• make a snowman, give him a scarf, poke him in the eye
• with inner loop pointing to the right, follow the knot after passing the slack through the upper and lower harness hoops: OUTSIDE, OUTSIDE, INSIDE

Belaying🔗

The device:🔗

• climber end should point upwards
• hand end should point downwards
• make a rope bite, pass it through the belay device, then pass carbine through the rope bite, the belay device cable and into the belay loop
• there should be a knot near the end of the rope

The technique:🔗

• always use full hand grips (4 fingers + thumb around)
• thumbs always point towards the belay
• right hand grips below the belay
• left hand pinches rope above the belay, detects slack and gently pulls it down
• move right hand below the device as fast as possible
• grip with (full) left hand above the right hand
• bring right hand to about 10cm below the belay
• move left hand back to pinch position

Body checks🔗

Climber body check:🔗

• compare the knot loop length to the belay loop length
• check that the figure 8 is correctly tied (5 times 2 on up/down sides. 4 parallel lines on left/right sides)
• check that the slack is not longer than 10cm

Belayer check:🔗

• check that the belay device is correctly positioned and configured
• tap the carbine to make sure it's correctly closed

Both climber + belayer body check:🔗

• check the harness -> equipment + metallic hooks positioning
• check the harness -> should not slide up/down the hip bone

Rope checks:🔗

• check that the rope is the same
• check that there are no twists and turns
• check that there's an extra knot near the end of the rope

Signaling🔗

Before each climb:🔗

• belayer shouts "on belay!"
• climber shouts "climbing!"