• Home
  • Basics
    • Types of Climbing
    • Understanding Route Grades
    • Basic Principles of Climbing Anchors
    • Toprope Belay
    • Rappelling/Abseiling
    • Safety Checks and Commands
    • Basic Moves
    • Basic Knots and their Applications >
      • Figure Eight
      • Figure Eight on a Bight
      • Overhand on a Bight
      • Barrel Knot/Double Fisherman's
      • Girth Hitch
      • Clove Hitch
    • Beginning Gear
    • Other Basic Stuff >
      • Which Belay Device Should I Buy?
  • Sport
    • Sport Leading: Basics
    • Clipping Bolts on Lead
    • Lead Belaying
    • Setting a Bolted Anchor
    • Intermediate Moves
    • Sport Climbing Gear
    • Other Sport Stuff >
      • Sliding X: Too Much Extension?
      • Expert: Ground Runner Belay
      • Preventing Rope Drag
  • Traditional
    • Cleaning a Route
    • Placing Protection >
      • Placing Passive Protection
      • Placing Active Protection
      • Using Natural Protection
      • Preventing Rope Drag
    • Setting a Traditional Anchor
    • Setting a Multi-Pitch Anchor
    • Rope Management
    • Knots for Trad >
      • Munter Hitch
      • Munter-Mule Knot
      • Butterfly Knot
      • Yosemite Bowline
      • Prussik Knot
      • Klemheist Knot
      • One-Handed Clove Hitch
      • In-Line Figure Eight
      • Water Knot
    • Crack Climbing Techniques
    • Building A Rack
    • Other Traditional Stuff >
      • Emergency and Rescue Techniques >
        • Escaping the Belay
        • Ascending a Rope
  • BLOG, etc.
    • THE DIRTBAG BLOG
    • Climbing Vocab and Jargon
    • Climbing Library: Books and Movies
    • Climbing Videos
    • Our Favorite Climbing Products
    • Links
  • Contact Us

Preventing Rope Drag - the Alpine Draw

Picture
A nicely extended piece reducing rope drag
This is more commonly an issue on traditional routes where the lines are more likely to wander and bulge, BUT it still can be an issue when sport climbing.

Rope drag occurs when the friction generated from the rope running through the quickdraws and over the rock builds to the point where the climber noticeably feels the drag and potentially cannot climb any higher. This happens when the angle the rope takes to run from one quickdraw to the next is too great. There will be essentialy zero rope drag on routes where the bolts are in a perfect vertical line, while there would be extreme rope drag on a route with a 90 degree angle between two bolts (unlikely, but you get the idea).

So what do you do?

The solution is simple but will require a few extra pieces of gear. All you need is to construct a few alpine draws and include them in your sport rack. An alpine draw, composed of two carabiners and a runner, can be used the same way as a quickdraw, BUT if you need to extend your clip in order to reduce rope drag, you simply unclip two loops of the runner from one of the carabiners and it will easily extend to twice the length.

You will need:
A 24" runner (preferably dyneema if you're concerned about weight)
Two carabiners

Watch the video below to see how to construct an alpine draw, and how to extend it.

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.