This is a minor incident that happened yesterday, April 30, 2010. I got a little bruised up and my ankle is a bit sore, but I'm fine. I'd just like to discuss what happened so that I can be safer in the future.

I was climbing an off-width crack in Zion National Park called Sumo Wrestler (5.10-). I usually don't climb this sort of route so I thought it was a chance to try something a bit out of the ordinary.

I think I was about 40 feet up and had placed several pieces deep in the crack. Each piece was clipped to a short dog-bone quickdraw. No extension slings were used. My last piece was a #4 Camalot.

At this point, I made a mistake. I saw some thin flakes protruding from the face high and to the left of the crack. I jammed a leg in the crack and grabbed the flakes. I knew the flakes were weak and liable to break. However, off-width technique is not my strong suite and I gave in to the temptation to pull down hard on the flakes. Almost immediately, the flakes crumpled in my hands and I was airborn.

As I came down, the rope sheared on the left side of the crack. My belayer says that he jumped back away from the wall to shorten the fall. I slammed into the wall fairly hard, bruising my left hip and tweaking my right ankle. I won't be climbing again for at least a few days.

What is very disconcerting, though, is that the rope was sheared to the core. As a matter of fact, a few of the core strands were severed. I feel that if the edge had been sharper, you might be reading about another incident similar to the July 11, 2009 Seneca Rocks incident ( see other thread ).

By my own analysis, the cause of the fall was pulling down on holds that I knew were likely to break. The cam was about at my feet, so I was not run out. I've been wondering if it would have been wise to put a runner on that last cam; would that have prevented the rope shearing on the edge of the crack? The crack eans a little bit to the left at the point where the rope presumably sheared, so that probably contributed to the shear damage. Would it likely have prevented damage to the rope had the belayer given a dynamic belay instead of jumping away from the wall?

Off-width junkies, please chime in? :-)

Just a bad catch, nothing more, nothing less.

Just a small point:

The rope didn't "shear" against the edge, it was abraded and/or cut by the edge.

As the others have said, if your belayer had just locked off instead of shortening the slack in the rope you would have had a softer catch. Most likely no need for any "jumping up/forward" business.

If I'm picturing it correctly, you put yourself in a sketchy position and your belayer did the absolute worst thing possible.

Your rope was running deep inside the crack up until your last piece, whereupon it angled out to follow you. When you fell, your belayer pulled the rope tight against the edge, and the rope ground against the edge the entire distance that you fell.

You were 40 feet up and your last piece was at your feet. Your belayer should have given you several armfuls of slack. If he had done this, the rope would not have come taut until you were well below the piece. You would have received a soft catch which would have saved your ankle.

Well, actually there is, leading way above his abilities. A 10 anything off width is as a general rule, serious business.

Maybe next time try working on those skills on something a little easier, maybe the .7 to .8 range. Leading at your limits on a route you yourself admitted are not all that skilled at is probably not the best idea.

Glad to hear things didn't turn out worse for you. On the other hand, maybe you learned a valuable lesson here.

Don't be complacent with the numbers.

Now I'm not that old (31) but I'd been through most of my hard knocks by the time I created an account online.

It never really occured to me to post an analysis of every time I busted my ass. I'm not flat out saying that you shouldn't post but it's just a fall that wasn't too pretty.

We've all had a hundred of them.

Still the best advice which has only been alluded to on this thread is that there are many times when it's not OK to fall, to be able assess when you're in that situation is more important than your runners or how much practice you've had placing pro.

That and your belayer should buy the beer for the rest of the trip.

Absolutely worst thing possible? I can picture something much worse.

This seems not to be what the OP is describing: "The shear is about one meter above where the tie-in point would have been."

As already discussed in several threads, giving armfuls of slack does not soften the catch but actually increases the fall factor, except for falls with a factor already >1. Giving slack does not equal to dynamic belay.

As I came down, the rope sheared on the left side of the crack. My belayer says that he jumped back away from the wall to shorten the fall. I slammed into the wall fairly hard, bruising my left hip and tweaking my right ankle. I won't be climbing again for at least a few days.

I'd like to offer up a correction. My belayer now tells me that the way I described the catch is not entirely accurate. He says that he did not "jump back" away from the wall. Rather, he simply stepped down to remove slack from the system. Still, it felt like a tough slam into the wall.