Weekend Whipper: A Slab Climber’s Worst Nightmare

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Are you planning to climb a runout slab this weekend? After watching this week’s whipper, you might think twice.

Earlier this month, Vincent Krause and a friend set out to climb Schweiz Plasir at Switzerland’s Grimselpass. “I was nearly at the belay of the first pitch, 10 meters (32 feet) above the last bolt,” Krause told Climbing. “I touched the only wet spot on the slab with my right foot while I wanted to clip into the bolted belay.”

Krause slid down nearly half of the pitch before he spotted the last bolt he had clipped. “Because of the angle and the friction of the granite, I slowed down and I grabbed the last placed quickdraw to stop the fall and avoid hitting the small ledge below me,” he said. In the process, he scraped off a thick layer of skin from his right hand, both ankles, and also received burn blisters on his fingers.

We won’t pretend to know what the “right” course of action really was for this fall. Surely sliding down that slab for another 30 feet—and skidding into a ledge, or the ground—would have been heinous. However, we must point out that Krause was extremely lucky to not de-glove his finger by grabbing the quickdraw in this fall. Krause experienced the absolute best-case scenario for a fall of this length and style.

“I put on bandaids and a lot of tape and finished the pitch, but was unable to use most of my fingers on the right hand,” Krause noted. “I handed the rack to my climbing partner who then led the remaining 12 pitches, up to 6b+ (5.11a) to the top.” Krause followed using his left hand and primarily his right thumb, since his remaining fingers were just too painful to crimp.

Krause reflected: “I learned that the Magnus Midtbø quote ‘On slabs we are all equal’ is true and that a 5c slab feels harder than a 6a crack.”

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