Win 300M Spanset Gold!!

[Caver Keith]

In Dudley Caving Club we take caver training very seriously and our training officer runs an exceedingly tight ship with regular training sessions, practices and assessments of capability, based on the feared and dreaded ?Training Matrix?.
This short video shows a typical evening?s training at Dudley Caving Club's HQ. Watch it to find out the answers to such questions as, will Mark pass his rigging assessment, who can?t tie an Alpine Butterfly and what?s limiting our ability to carry out even more training? There?s laughter and tears as the team are put through their paces by our no nonsense training officer, Andy.

http://youtu.be/nMNw0cjm3Bc

 

[chunky]

Edited brilliantly keith, though I can't understand why Andy wouldn't allow me to enter the matrix!

 

[Pegasus]

Times ticking by - 13 days to go.....

Thank you to those who have entered to date.

To those who'd like to win all this rope (and there is a lot of it!) but haven't entered (why not???) - all we need is a post about any training you have received (or given) on any caving subject by (to) anyone - easy 

 

[ianball11]

and this anonymous bloke mentioned that all you need to go caving is a torch

Wild guess that it wasn't Alexander Klimchouk.

I assume you're just name dropping because you're cooler than me    but it's interesting in the difference between the two situations.  Imagine living 500 kilometers from the nearest cave region, hours from the nearest road where there are 100m pitches for fun, ducks and sumps and meanders and all sorts leading into depths unimagineable.  It's safe to say that more than a torch is pretty necessary.

Living in the Dales, possibly more so than the gated communities, the curiosity of venturing into the dark unknown which must drive Klimchouk, would, I hazard a guess have led him to explore caves with just a torch many times before pushing past obstacles such as pitches, squeezes and the cold where better kit and more kit makes a difference.  Well I'd like to think so anyway. Someone who can organise an expedition to the deepest cave in the world must be pretty keen on finding out what's there!


Pegasus, please can I have another go at entering?

 

[graham]

and this anonymous bloke mentioned that all you need to go caving is a torch

Wild guess that it wasn't Alexander Klimchouk.

Not sure he was ever a member of the Red Rose.

Ian's story is an interesting one & should resonate with anybody who has been involved in a uni club. We genuinely want to give newcomers an interesting day and are all too aware that waiting in a wet line to ascend a waterfall whilst wearing utterly not waterproof old clothes is not one. On the other hand we are also aware that spoon feeding folks too much does not help produce the inquisitive explorers. You have to both strike a balance and be aware that this balance will be different for every individual.

I am immensely proud of the fact that I have helped bring through a lot of cavers who have gone on to discover significant amounts of new passage - and help to survey them and describe them properly. I am also delighted at the number who have simply gone on to enjoy visiting fascinating and beautiful places.

 

[Pegasus]

Pegasus, please can I have another go at entering?

Of course - more the merrier!

I am rather hoping cavers have more than one tale to tell about the training they've received/given.  Surely cavers don't simply learn by: 'Here's a cave, go to it' 

Why not enter multiple times in an attempt to try and win 300M (yes that's 300M!!) of Spanset Gold rope 

 

[Roger W]

Basic underground training given in Matlock Bath some (long) time ago:

1:  Hold the candle upright or hot wax will run onto your fingers.

2:  Don't stand under drips or your candle will go out.

3:  Watch out for places where the roof is low, or you'll bang your head.

 

[ianball11]

I once was asked by a CIC holder would I use a top rope when taking a novice srt caver underground for the first time.

As we'd just come out of Yordas Pot with a group of first time srt cavers, all without a top rope, the hint was obvious, and although I fudged a response about becoming fully competent in the common srt moves, rebelay, deviations, changing from up to down and down to up above ground in a training session or two or three or however many are required first, I changed my mind and decided that I'd always use a top rope in future.  Doesn't take much to carry or to rig it as you won't be doing the Black Rift as your first srt trip (some probably have!) but just means that there is significantly less chance of a clutch plummet accident on an autolock descender when there are two mostly separate systems steadying the descent.

Not formal training, but a quick useful lesson from a guy who knew what he was on about which I much appreciated a few years later as when the classic hair caught in the descender scenario occurred.  I took the load on the top rope allowing the descender to be slackened off and ponytail removed, it was still painful and scary but would have been so much worse if it wasn't for that second rope.  Could happen to anyone I suppose, but perhaps more likely with a novice?    to that CIC fellow.

 

[Antwan]

One thing Clubs seem to miss out when training novices is First Aid, I don't mean getting your St.Johns ambulance certificate for been able to tie a triangular bandage three different ways, more the basics of  blood goes round and round - air in and out And common sense ways of making it so if its not happening and basic kit that should go on a trip.

I write this thinking of when I first learned S.R.T.
I was a keen climber back then, although more into easy mountaineering and grade 3 scrambles than chasing E grades so began my introduction via a group of multi hobby friends after a short 30 metre cave. The location was horse shoe quarry, well known to me as a scuzzy sports crag. we had an afternoon after work that we had agreed upon to do this and followed a very basic two rope set-up. Steve had a set of gear and I had one, Whatever he did I copied and soon knocked of the full list of up, down, knot pass, re-belays deviations and changing direction. There was also another climbing friend learning too so one we were both confident we set up another rope and had S.R.T. races until it became dark and we retreated to the pub in time for last orders.

The journey home was a little interesting, on the long road between the Curbar roundabout and chesterfield I saw a young man waving his phone about in the road, Slowing to a stop I wound my window a little to find he had crashed his car even though it was no where in sight.

Using previously learned drills and skills I had him in front of my cars headlights to check him over, he wasn't making much sense at this point and even though he said he was driving home alone after work I had to check for any other casualties so I left him with Claire who was following behind and also stopped and headed across a field towards the glow of headlights from an upside down car. As I got closer hoping not to find anyone else my heart sank and I stood motionless for just a few seconds, about 10 feet in front of the car was a thin red shape about 5 to 6ft long in the grass. Something was saying dont go over there but I quickened my pace and jogged to 50 yards or so and thankfully the nearer I got the easier it was to make out the shape was half of the front bumper that had detached on one of the cars rolls.

The driver was lucky, He reckoned he had a broken arm which I'd argue against because he didn't go argh when I stuck it on a sling while we waited for the ambulance

I would have been home and in bed by 2AM, but we didn't leave the scene until half past 2 so when A police bike pulled up along side when I was cruising along the A1 at 85mph I looked across at the rider and he just carried along into the distance, I'm assuming that's Karma?

So that was how I learned to cave, and it made me think from the very start that is we had to wait over an hour for an ambulance on a main road then what if something happened underground? Mostly I cave with a small box with a card of Gaffa tape, a sealed bandage and two sandwich bags big enough to fit a hand in, not a massive amount of kit bit but very useful for a lot of things in addition to the 'Standard' survival bag most cavers carry.

I hope the BCA are going to do some more of there free first aid training sessions.

 

[ianball11]

 

[cap n chris]

Training for the Gouffre Berger (the deepest cave in the world at −1,122 metres, for a decade, until surpassed by the PSM)

I drove chipper young Mike W to Autrans. About half way across France, apropos of nothing at all and after a brief lull in conversation (akin to one of those awkward solemn pauses signifying the birth, somewhere in the world, of another policeman), Mike said in a glib and almost instantly forgettable way...
"I hope the SRT I've done is going to be OK for the Berger".

Continuing driving for several minutes enjoying the distant panorama and whizzing countryside my mind glitched and jibbed a bit, like one of those moments when you have a waking jump after being interrupted from a delightful daydream. I couldn't quite work out what had caused this; perhaps an insufficient number of cups of coffee that morning, or maybe a bewildering but nonetheless vital road sign which I couldn't translate had my cerebral cogs whirling. Then it came hauntingly back to me. In big large flashing neon. The sentence Mike just innocently said had a mental exclamation mark next to it in my head...
"I hope the SRT I've done is going to be OK for the Berger"!

I instantly perked up, sat bolt upright in my comfy seat, focussed on the road ahead and said in a please-don't-think-I'm-being-nosey-kind-of-way "Mike, what exactly do you mean by the words 'I hope the SRT I've done is going to be OK for the Berger"?
A pause. It was too long a pause. It became almost uncomfortable.
I added a further question to the awkward impasse, "How much SRT have you actually ever done?".
"Not much", came the meek, but chummily perky, response.
"How much is 'not much', Mike?"
"I've been to Hunters Hole...", said Mike, a bit more reservedly, but ending by adding in an authoritative and triumphant way, "... Twice!!".

Peace and quiet returned to the car. Not so much peace and quiet but certainly quiet. A lot of quiet. A huge number of thoughts arose, one imagining the newspaper headline "Instructor drives student to cave of death", and many of which were preceded with commonplace Anglo Saxon expressions but eventually culminated in what seemed to be sage advice and all I could muster without bit of foam flecking my lip.... "When we get to the campsite don't tell anyone what you've just told me".
More quiet.
After a further five miles, to make myself feel better about the prospects ahead, I breezily said "...Tell you what; you and me can do some SRT refresher training when we get to the cave".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5OynGOxVZI

Turned out that Mike was a natural at ropeymonkeyness and after a little bit of supervision, mostly to check he really was way too intelligent to make any safety critical oversights, he was fully functioning funstermungering on a little late afternoon proving trip down to and back from the Starless River. Further deeper trips followed.

The Gouffre Berger is a great training venue for trips to itself, it would appear.




NB Ideally a programme of significant coaching and/or fitness training ought to be undertaken before attempting caves of this nature - it's not big and it's not clever to visit big and clever caves without being as well prepared as you can become.

 

[graham]

Chris

At least you got to know before the trip. There we were at the bottom of Elizabeth shaft in Nettle, when one of the party - a climber of much experience but still early in what has been a long and glittering caving career - stood with a jumar in each hand and said:

How d'you use these things then?

That was in the early 70s and we have got rather better at training since then ...

 

[bograt]

?This knot is called a Bowline on the bight, if you step through the big loop then put your legs through the small loops it makes a kind of seat you can sit in on the end of the rope.?

This was my introduction to ?serious? caving, stood at the top of a shaft seemingly miles from civilisation in the middle of the wilds of Derbyshire, a hastily rigged tripod made of scaffold poles lashed together with a length of what appeared to be string on which was attached a boat pulley, the leader performed some caving magic with a few carabiners and swung me out over the shaft, ?when you  get near the bottom there is a pipe across the shaft, use your feet to steer round it, don?t straddle it!? with these words of advice he lowered me into the bowels of the earth.

175ft lower and our little group of 13year olds was assembled in a small chamber at the bottom of the shaft debating which of the four exits we were going down whilst waiting for our leader to abseil down. To our left was a large, airy passage fairly dry which we all preferred, behind us a slightly smaller one which seemed to have a lot of stagnant water, we didn?t fancy disturbing this, to our right a busy stream issued from what appeared to be quite a small passage whilst in front the same stream disappeared down another smallish route, we didn?t fancy either of the wet ways, although we had been fitted out with wetsuits.

Down came the leader and without further ado posted himself up the small way with the stream coming out of it!, with cries of dismay we followed. The passage soon enlarged slightly and there ensued quite a pleasant wet walk in an interesting coffin level which ended in a large chamber containing a flooded shaft and a waterfall. This is where we came across the third member of the leadership team who had disappeared whilst we were being lowered, he had gone to rig our exit. 

Yes folks, my first sight, feel, and experience of an electron ladder was the bottom of the waterfall pitch in Knotlow! My second was the free hanging second pitch, followed by the climbing shaft entrance. How we all managed that ascent to daylight I can?t recall, but I suspect there was a lot of help from a tight rope.

This all happened back in about 1964, a youth club weekend at Lea Green, the organisers had arranged the use of White Hall Centre?s staff and facilities. Over the next few decades I became heavily involved with caving instruction at various outdoor centres and must have introduced hundreds of newbies to the sport before retiring from instructing in the late ?80?s.

 

[ianball11]

Chris

At least you got to know before the trip. There we were at the bottom of Elizabeth shaft in Nettle, when one of the party - a climber of much experience but still early in what has been a long and glittering caving career - stood with a jumar in each hand and said:

How d'you use these things then?

That was in the early 70s and we have got rather better at training since then ...

Reminds me of being in Valley Entrance with a group of novice srters when the army came in, all 8000 boiler suited really happy to be there smiling fellows, they were laddering the roof tunnel clipping the lifeline to their 25mm lamp belts, rather than get in the way of them we let them steam off down the streamway and it was great seeing all these really happy faces going past
We were really there for a few goes up and down the roof tunnel pitch, easy watching access for someone at the top, easy rigging allowing a top rope and not too long so you can hear people easily on the rope, (which I rate as important) and it's not so short that they don't feel like the climb is unnecessary. 

As a club we had recently bought a left handed Petzl ascension, and very shiny it was too, and the one left handed caver had it and we felt very clever with ourselves for having the right kit.  Like many lefties though, some things they do left handed, somethings right handed, and having used a basic jammer and a right handled jammer before the left jammer was really confusing her, so I just swapped the left handled jammer with my basic, for her second go at climbing the pitch.  After we'd had a few goes each, I would be last up, the army returned from the Mastercave and possibly sending people into the Rowten sumps, I looked at my now left handled jammer and without realising said "How do I use this contraption?!"

The Army took charge, demanded to know who brought me caving without a correct equipment and the knowledge to use it, did I realise that caving was not an activity to be take lightly and there are serious consequences to venturing underground.  I was rather taken aback and not enjoying a volley of verbals from the Army, so whilst he was kitting up and explaining about the length of the Keld Head sump and the differences to the Rowten Sumps to his boiler suited free divers I nipped up the alcove and still feel smug today.

We set off out deciding a quick visit up the rope to Toyland was in order so all 8000 now blue lipped boiler suit wearers would go through the duck and lower it a little for us.

:tease:


 

 

[bograt]

Used to enjoy taking Army cadets down, usually game for anything and always responding with a respectful "Yes Sir!", the officer hierarchy made them easier to handle too.

 

[Filter]

I'm pretty sure I started learning to rig in the normal fashion - asking questions, observing rigging, derigging, tying knots, rigging on the training wall, rinse and repeat. Finally, it came for me to do my first rigging trip: Alum Pot, off the SW corner. I had been down some pretty big pitches, I had abseiled off of trees before; I figured this was no big deal.

Wrong. 

There is nothing more terrifying than hanging from a tree (on knots I had just tied by myself) 40m above empty space. Being the first is rather daunting, especially when I could see everything beneath me (or in this case, not beneath me, i.e. the rope). After triple-checking everything and checking with my second, I proceeded onwards and (obviously) didn't die.

I don't know if the guy who trained me knew that was going to happen when he chose to take me to Alum Pot, but I have never been scared rigging a pitch after that day. Cautious, yes, but never actually worried for my safety. He trusted me enough to do something crazy, I didn't let him down, and I (quickly) realised that if you know what you're doing, there's nothing to be terrified about.

 

[Fulk]

Filter:

Alum Pot, off the SW corner.

Are you sure it was the SW corner (near the waterfall) ? not the SE? It's just that the SW corner is not very 'popular' and I guess you'd have every reason to be a bit nonplussed.

 

[Filter]

Filter:

Alum Pot, off the SW corner.

Are you sure it was the SW corner (near the waterfall) ? not the SE? It's just that the SW corner is not very 'popular' and I guess you'd have every reason to be a bit nonplussed.

Fulk, you're absolutely right. I've apparently been mistaken (for YEARS now) that the 80m drop was NW.... The SE corner is indeed the 40m drop by the bridge.

The thought of going back up 80m of rope in a waterfall kinda put me off doing that route (ever).

 

[Fulk]

I've apparently been mistaken (for YEARS now) that the 80m drop was NW

No, you're not mistaken about that ? the 'normal' 80-m drop is at the NW, the route via the bottom of  the bridge is the SE.

 

[Filter]

I've apparently been mistaken (for YEARS now) that the 80m drop was NW

No, you're not mistaken about that ? the 'normal' 80-m drop is at the NW, the route via the bottom of  the bridge is the SE.

Right. Pictures. I came down the 40m pitch next to the waterfall, across from the 80m pitch. That can't be the SE corner if the 80m is NW.