GearNate Ricklin2 Comments

Equipment List: The Complete North Ridge of LPP in Winter

GearNate Ricklin2 Comments
Equipment List: The Complete North Ridge of LPP in Winter
gear1.jpg

This is an exact list of the gear that we took on the Complete North Ridge of Lone Pine Peak, which we completed last January in a 29 hour car-to-car push.

Keep in mind, we had a decent weather window and would have booked it out of there had the storm rolled in early.

Personal Climbing Gear:

  • Backpack (stripped down, no lid) Harness - the crappy old light one
  • Rock shoes (big enough for socks)
  • Belay device and locker (DMM Sentinal is the lightest HMS locker available)
  • Ice Axe
  • Crampons (ultralight aluminum - didn’t use them, almost pulled them out on the descent)
  • Ultralight Helmet (petzl meteor, but it looks pretty dorky)
  • Boots (La Sportiva Trango Evo S, freaking light and they climb really well)

Clothing:

  • Socks: one liner pair and 1 thicker pair
  • Light powerstretch gloves
  • Shell gloves that fit over the light ones
  • lightweight Long Underwear
  • Soft shell pants
  • Baselayer - Patagonia R1 hoody (this thing is unbelievably warm, only useful at freezing or below)
  • Shell - marmot 13.5 oz
  • Western Mountaineering down jacket
  • 13oz balaclava - didn’t use it (the r1 hood is super warm)
  • extra thin top layer - didn’t wear it
  • lightweight gaiters

Rack: (shared between 3 people)

  • Six nuts
  • Double set of cams from blue TCU to 2 camalot, and a 3 camalot
  • 6 or so tripled draws
  • 7 slings with 1 biner each (saves weight over a tripled draw)
  • 2 or 3 anchor setups (double length sling and a locker)
  • Rope - two pieces of 35m 8mm

Cooking Gear: (shared between 3 people)

  • Stove and Fuel: MSR Reactor and a partial canister of fuel (and a windscreen)
  • 2 Lighters
  • 1 Spoon

Food/Water:

  • Water: 2 liter capacity each (2 gatorade bottles)
  • Food: (shared between 3 people) summer sausage, block of cheese, pound of cooked bacon, handfull of choc-espresso beans, 2 packs of mashed potato flakes, half stick of butter, couple of gu’s/bars

Misc:

  • Headlamp
  • Spare headlamp (tiny petzl one)
  • Couple of light stuffsacks to organize stuff in the pack (since there was no lid)
  • Toilet Paper
  • Camera
  • Topos
  • Knife
  • Sunglasses
  • Pirate hat
  • Sword
  • Firecrackers

Notes: The rack was pretty big for a route like this. We took a lot of gear on purpose which allowed us to simul FOREVER. And we simuled or soloed the whole route except for a traversing bit on the lower section and one notch-headwall combo on the upper route.

The Reactor was awesome, made us about 9 liters of water really quickly. The windscreen kept the canister from getting too cold, so we didn’t have to play any crotch tricks to get it warm again.

Even though it was pretty cold, we never stopped moving and so never had to wear much clothing. Our two breaks were limited to about an hour and a half at which point the cold forced us to keep moving.

The climb-through-the-night push approach worked really well, though by about hour 25 I was at about 20% physically and mentally. A short half-hour nap totally refreshed us though, and we could have kept going for a while.

Next time: more food (would have helped us descend faster, I was bonking hard), some caffiene, a super-bright headlamp since we’re climbing all night.

end.jpg