Hi, my name is Jason Montecalvo with Sport Rock Climbing Centers, and today we’re learning how to safely climb into an Indoor Rock Climbing facility; remember, climbing is inherently a dangerous activity and you want to seek professional help by certified climbing instructors prior to engaging in this.
Next what I like to talk about is learning how to Belay safely in an Indoor Climbing Gym; first thing we need is a locking Carabiner and a Belay device, we also need to identify the fact that we need the Belay line not the Climbing line when we start to Belay. This is the line furthest from the wall. First thing that I want to do as a Belayer is clip my 2 pieces together, my Carabiner to my TC, to my Belay device; I will take my de-Belay device now and I will clip my Carabiner o my Belay Loop. At this point I want to discuss my 3 jobs as a Belayer; job number 1 is to take the slack out of the rope as the climber ascends, job number 2 is to catch the climber if they were to fall or they need to rest, and job number 3 is lowering the climber back down to the ground safely when they’re done climbing.
The first thing I need to do to load my device properly is to get a bite of rope, a bite of rope is rope that is right next to each other side by side and that looks like a Loop. We’re taking this bite and we’re going to force it to the bottom of my de-belay device, if I’m right handed I will use the right hole, if I’m left handed I will use the left hole. I’m going to force it down through the bottom of the device, now I need to capture this piece of rope inside my Carabiner, in order to do so, I will pull that rope down, I will open my Carabiner gate, I will slide my rope in and now I need to lock my screw gate down. Not only do I need to lock it but I need to make sure it’s locked by squeezing the Carabiner to make sure that I’m locked. Next I’ll identify the fact that I have a break end of the rope, and then a lead end that goes up to the anchor at the top. The break needs to be coming out the bottom of the device and is loaded properly at my Harness now. At this point I can show you how are we going to take out slack, job number 1 for a Belayer; we’re going to use a series of commands called Pull, Pinch and Slide, we have 2 hands that we need to use, a guide hand which is my left hand and a break hand which is my right. The number 1 rule in Belaying is that I can never take my break hand off of the rope. In order to do this properly I’m going to use the commands Pull, Pinch and Slide, which will look like this. Pulling out slack, taking my guide hand off, pinching the rope outside of my break hand and sliding my break hand back down the rope; and I will repeat, pulling out slack, pinching and sliding my break hand back, continuing on as the Climber climbs up the wall. Notice my break hand is never coming off the line and that I’m pinching outside of my hand, notice also that I’m using my left hand, my guide hand in order to pull slack down into the device as my right hand pulls out the slack. Pinching and sliding, pulling, pinching and sliding, that is job number 1. Job number 2 is catching the climber if they are to fall, if they were to fall, I will simply go down to this position between my legs, making this break bend in the rope. This bend takes an awful lot of friction and I’m able to hold the climber up if they were to fall or they need to rest with very little effort. I’m not using my muscle, I’m simply using this bend in the rope, the bend doesn’t need to be around your waist, it just needs to be right down beneath my legs making sure this bend is activated. At this point if the climber would like to continue climbing, I can continue Belaying by pinching, sliding, pulling, pinching and sliding; once they get to the top, they’re going to need to lean back into the rope and hang, therefore I need to put a break on, at this point I’m going to put 2 hands on to my break, once I have 2 hands onto my break, the climber can lean back into the rope, put their weight into the rope and I can slowly start to lower them down, by loosening the grip on my hands and letting the rope slide through my hands, I will not raise the break, I will keep the break down into its position. If they are coming too fast, I simply squeeze and stop them, and then I can safely lower them at a safe speed back down to the base. Once they have gotten back down, we have now finished the Belay process and next we will begin to learn our safety checks.
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