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slacklinejoe
May 6, 2008, 8:37 PM
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This year the International Climbers Festival will feature a slackline competition and clinic. I will of course be there helping get things setup and going and it looks like it's going to be a really awesome event.
This year’s festival will be held July 9th - 13th, 2008 in the classic mountain town of Lander, Wyoming.
In addition to the slackline comp the following is in store:
Slideshows Film festival Festival-long Climbing Competition
Trade Fair
Climbing Clinics
Parties and bands
Dyno Comp
10K Trail Run
Raffle/Auction
Pancake Breakfast
Yoga in the Park
Check out their Schedule of Events.
There will be a lot of swag to be won of course as well as a trade fair to check out some of the new gear available on the market.
Hope to see you there!
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shaun_the_conqueror
May 7, 2008, 7:05 PM
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Hopefully there's no ratchet failure during the comp... That would look really bad.
What's the line length and height going to be and how will the judging be done?
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slacklinejoe
May 7, 2008, 7:24 PM
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shaun_the_conqueror wrote: Hopefully there's no ratchet failure during the comp... That would look really bad. What's the line length and height going to be and how will the judging be done?
Eh? I don't use low quality gear... Whatever, I'm volunteering to help out for a good cause: scholarships in the name of our fallen fellow climbers and rebolting areas that need it - this is not the place for personal grievances...
I haven't decided which spans just yet as I haven't been to Lander's Park. We have our area picked out by the competition organizers and it sounds good, 20's, 30's and 40's for the comp. I plan on setting up a 100-200's for fun but I don't want to judge the comp on them, it just isn't as fun for the crowd and it takes up a lot of space considering what all will be going on.
I'll stick with average tension & height (waist-ish with sag down to 8"), but if someone requests a surf line, a super tight jump line or height suitable for below manteling we'll accomodate as it only takes 30 seconds to adjust.
The format will be a top 5 scoring tricks + a seperate judge for overall style and crowd appeal. Same as what we've used for other comps and it's seemed to work out well. The official trick list w/ points will be released closer to the comp, but we always leave room for making up your own tricks and scoring them on the fly. There will be three judges who have their own section to score to help keep consistency among the scoring and keeping things quick.
If possible we will have a V or a triangle going to allow for line to line transfers and the lines will have different tensions to allow people to start on whichever they want as they don't have to use the other line at all. I usually stagger the height on these a bit to make it more interesting for transfer jumps.
(This post was edited by slacklinejoe on May 7, 2008, 8:10 PM)
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shaun_the_conqueror
May 9, 2008, 4:39 PM
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slacklinejoe wrote: Eh? I don't use low quality gear... Whatever, I'm volunteering to help out for a good cause: scholarships in the name of our fallen fellow climbers and rebolting areas that need it - this is not the place for personal grievances...
There is no such thing as a high quality slackline ratchet. Ratchets were not designed to be used for slacklining and were not created to deal with dynamic loads to the degree seen by slacklining. That wasn't a personal grievance, I'm saying "hey hopefully there isn't ratchet failure in front of a bunch of spectators which will create negative appeal for slackline."
You should be concerned with this matter as well since it's your product on the line and not mine. If Andy Lewis and I make it out there, there's a good chance you're going to have to deal with the reality of a ratchet popping open and shit going wrong because it's happened many a times for us in the past. It's just something to be aware of and to take into consideration, that's all.
As far as the judging and running of the comp goes, it sounds like you have it pretty dialed in and it should make for a good time. I really like that you're taking into consideration multiple lines side by side for transfers. That should make for some very very interesting combos :-)
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slacklinejoe
May 9, 2008, 5:09 PM
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shaun_the_conqueror wrote: Ratchets were not designed to be used for slacklining and were not created to deal with dynamic loads to the degree seen by slacklining.
I'm not exactly sure why you are trying to bust on me - at no point did I ever mention using ratchets at the comp, you do know that I use CMI pulleys, carabiners and other systems like a griphoist for rigging as well right? I would prefer if you did it that it was in another thread as this one has a different purpose, one of trying to bring slackers together for a fun event.
Design wise carabiners, pulleys, span sets, shackles, quicklinks or rap rings or any other hardware in the system aren't designed for slacklines. Matter of fact, if you take it up with BD, Petzl, CMI and the likes they'd prefer you didn't use their gear for such uses. They are however willing to let it go on as long as you don't reuse it for life critical application.
They are all designed and tested for static loads, they are just built beefy enough not to be negatively impacted when proper safety margins are used. Carabiners are tested for shock loads but not for application in such a manner. We happen to know such hardware is generally adequate due to field testing, but that's about it since the sport is so relatively below the radar of major industrial testing.
In our case, our hardware is good to 10,000 lbs with major certifying bodies. If you broke that under normal slacking use without breaking the webbing or without improperly rigging it I'd buy you a steak dinner. The other hardware and webbing breaks long before the tensioning systems.
If you are buying and using inadequate gear, that sounds like poor puchasing decisions. If it's similar gear and rigged poorly it sounds like your rigging method was wasn't up to snuff.
For the comp our most popular system already has a hard pointing system built into it so the tensioning systems can easily be removed from the line, thus completing making the point moot. That said, I haven't decided which methods I planned on using yet. I'm certainly not above rigging it with whatever method I want to play with as I seem to manage to be able to make just about any system work. That said, I'm still not a fan of carabiners - too much grunt work for solo use for my liking - I'm lazy that way.
Besides if you want something to nitpick here you go: http://www.slacklineexpress.com/blog
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shaun_the_conqueror
May 9, 2008, 8:31 PM
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All you had to say was that you weren't rigging the comp with ratchets.
You are absolutely right though. The materials we use to rig lines aren't designed for slacklining and are only used because we know they are bomb.com and we are not exceeding their safety margin. I am also well aware of the fact that most of those companies don't want their gear used for slacklining.
Once again, that wasn't meant to be an attack on your product so I don't know you're so up in arms and defensive. I was simply stating that I hope there's no ratchet failure during the comp. Sorry I assumed you would rig a comp with ratchets, you are after all known very well for preaching ratchets and I guess it was wrong to assume you would use anything other then ratchets for rigging...
If you want to find out how well your design holds up, feel free to mail me one of your kits. I'll let Andy huck a couple of flips and we'll see how long it holds 
As far as the comp goes, it looks like it will be a fun event. I've been actively spreading the word and have sent off emails and posted the comp up on several Euro forums.
PS you owe me a steak
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slacklinejoe
Jul 8, 2008, 4:50 AM
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Just a heads up the slackline comp will be this Friday at 12:30 to 2pm at Landers. The free beginners slackline clinic will be at 4pm. If you've got time to kill we'll be at the vendors booths from 10am to noon.
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