Dogtooth Peak (10.302')- First ascent

Dogtooth peak is one of those obscure formations that has tickled my interest for some time. You can easily see it from various point at Courtright reservoir. From a distance the South face looks like it would be a fun adventure.

This past weekend, Kevin and I met up at Courtright with the plan to see what we could find on the face to climb. There are already 4 reported routes, 3 to the main summit, and 1 to the middle summit. 

We woke up at 5:30, and hit the trail by 6:30am. The hike is fairly far, maybe 5-6 miles, but its on a maintained trail (Cliff Like trail into the Dinkey Lakes wilderness) and is easy going. We were approaching the base of the mountain after about 3 hours of hiking

Approaching the East face of Dogtooth Peak

 The East face of the mountain looks quite impressive, fairly steep with featured golden granite, similar to what you find at Shuteye ridge. Apparently there are several undocumented routes up this face. In the future, this is where I think the higher quality, more interesting routes might go.

We traversed around the South side of the mountain towards the other summits. The first half of the South face looked interesting, but are short, maybe 2-3 pitches at most. There were a couple of nice looking cracks system that might be worth exploring in the future. 

The middle and main summits are much longer, ~1000 feet tall, but I was honestly a little bit disappointed with what we found.  The rock  looked like mostly low 5th class, with a series lower angled slabs and exfoliating granite flakes the main summit had a steeper, but crackless slabby face, which would likely require bolts for pro.

Looking up at the middle summit and the main summit to the right

We decided to climb a route on the middle tooth, far to the left of any known routes. We were aiming for what looked like a hand crack about half-way up.

We soloed up maybe 2 pitches worth of easy 4th class slabs, before putting on the rope and heading up for 2 full 60 meter pitches of low 5ht class climbing. This brought us to a big sandy ledge at the base of our hand crack. 

Low angle exfoliating slabs

 

Hand crack pitch

Keivn led the hand crack pitch, which was maybe 5.4-5.5, and then he led another easy 4th class/ low 5th class pitch above that. After that we sort of simul-solo-climbed maybe 80 meters to gain the summit ridge and unropped there. 

One of the interesting sub-peaks on Dogtooth

 We down-climbed form the middle summit, after climbing a false summit, we eventually found the easy 4th class route to the main summit of Dogtooth.

 

Almost to the top....

Summit!

We decided to call our route "Grant Submission" II,  5 pitches, 5.5.
named after my previous weeks hectic effort to get my NIH research grant submitted (thank goodness that's all done! )
Thanks Kevin, for letting me name the route! 

The climbing was fairly fun, very relaxing and super easy. It would for sure make a better way to tick the summit than the hikers route, and would be accessible to pretty much anyone with a rope and a single set of cams! I give our route 2 stars.

We hiked back to the trailhead, and were enjoying beer and chips+salsa by 3:30 PM. Not too bad

Well earned beer

We had a nice big fire that night, and camped on the East side of the lake. The next morning we had a lazy start, before rappelling into Helm's gorge to climb Power Dome. 

I led the first pitch of "A Lilttle Nukey" and then started up the second pitch, but completely lost my lead head. Its been a long time since I have frozen on lead, but I just was not feeling the 15-20 foot (albeit easy) runouts. I backed off the climb  and we rapped out, and did some cragging instead. 

I'm a little bummed I wussed out on Power Dome, I'm not sure what happened, but I basically had no psych for the climb. Maybe just tired. I'll have to go back and give it another shot. Ah well, they can't all be wins, sometimes its good to just trust your instincts.

Lone Pine Peak (12,949') - North Ridge (III, 5.7)

This weekend I met up with Kevin and Mitchell to tick off another peak from my big tick list - The North ridge of Lone Pine peak. I have been psyched to climb this for a long time, and it was great to finally get it done!

Secor and Supertopo give this ridge a grade of III, 5.5. I upgraded the route for our ascent as the presence of snow filled cracks and wet slabs seems to have upped the difficulty! I also think 5.5 is a bit of a sandbag for the short crux sections.

The three of us hit the Meysan lakes trail around 5am. We followed the National forest trail up towards the lakes for a couple of hours in the dark. Somewhere around 10,000' we broke off the trail and headed cross country towards the ridge. 

The sun started to rise just as we approached the base of the notch to gain the ridge. We climbed up some sandy class 2 slopes to gain the ridge proper. By the time we were on the ridge, the run had risen.

Early morning light on the Owen's valley and the road to Whitney Portal

Start of the ridge at sunrise

 The first section of the ridge was easy class 2/3 sand and talus. This section was quick and trivial. Soon enough the real ridge climb presented itself. We reached the top of a short tower and were presented with the view of the rest of the climb. A cool looking blade of rock sticking up from the ridge marked our path.

Start of the technical portions of the ridge. We were on 4th and 5th class terrain for over 8 hours

We down climbed to the notch and then back up again towards the rock blade.

Kevin traversing on the ridge. Photo credit - Mitch Q.

Kevin on easy 5th class terrain

Below the rock blade presented the first technical section of the ridge. A 30 meter crack system, that is maybe 5.5 or less. This would have made an easy solo, but the crack was full of ice and snow, so we roped up. I'm glad we did because it was slick and somewhat tricky with the snow!

Leading the 1st technical pitch. Photo credit - Mitch Q.

After the technical pitch, we unroped and continued on our way, traversing 4th class terrain for a while

Kevin emerges from the shade into the warm sun!

We eventually made our way to the the next technical section. There is a large steep tower about half-way up the ridge. The tower can't be bypassed, and has to be climbed to the top. Using the beta in Supertopo, we had no problem finding the "5.7 layback" crux pitch. Mitch led up, same as before, this pitch was full of ice and snow, making things interesting. Fortunately, the crux move itself was dry and protected by two fixed pins.

Mitch heading up the crux pitch at the start of the tower. Photo credit - Kevin J.

Following the crux section - photo credit Mitch Q.

We climbed the rest of the tower in 2 more pitches, another pitch of 5.5ish terrain which I led, and a pitch of 4th class/ low 5th which Mitch led. We topped out on the tower and warmed up in the sun. 

The next section of climb traversed along a fun and easy knife-edge section. I had a small scare when I slipped down climbing a crack, but fortunately I didn't fall to my death, as there was a ledge underneath. Yikes!

Looking toward the knife-edge traverse and the final summit headwall

After the knife edge, we down-climbed again, to the base of the last technical section, the large tower/headwall that guards the summit. Kevin led the last technical pitch a short 5.5-5.6 hand crack that led to easier 4th class above. He pitched it out to a snow covered ledge where we unroped and continued up.

The rest of the headwall was low 5th class and 4th class terrain, that went on for maybe 4-5 pitches worth of rock. We soloed through some sketchy sections, including a slippery slab and a giant off-width crack.

Kevin at a snowy belay after the 3rd crux section at the base of the summit headwall.

Soloing on the summit headwall. Photo credit - Kevin J.

 

4th class terrain on the summit headwall

Finally, we could see the summit block ahead!

Almost at the top! In the sunshine! Photo credit - Mitch Q.

We topped out to the big sandy summit plateau above. We enjoyed the sun, and warmed up our hands and feet.

Summit! Photo credit - Mitch Q.

Mitch is psyched to be on the top!

After relaxing on the summit for 30 min or so, we started to head down. We totally blew the beta on the descent, it taking us well over an hour to find the correct gully to drop down. 

Beta note: the gully is NOT very far from the summit (we went way to far) and there is a big vertical granite wall right along the side of the gully.  

We began the long descent back to the car. 

Descent gully. Photo credit - Kevin J.

We arrived back at the trailhead after dark, around 8:30 PM. It took us 15.5 hours car-car to climb the route. I think it would be MUCH faster if we did not have to contend with the snow and ice in the technical sections which slowed down the climbing considerably. 

We made it back to Lone Pin, just in time to catch the Mexican restaurant before it closed. Sweet!

Almost home. Photo credit Kevin J.

Thoughts on progression

I've never been a particularly good or strong climber. I usually see new climbers rapidly surpass me in ability. 

I have been loving rediscovering my passion for the sport, and have greatly enjoyed my time climb non-technical mountaineering type routes, but lately I have had the bug to actually get better at rock climbing. 

This has taken some self-reflection, why have I been stuck as a 5.10 climber? What is holding me back?

Warming up on an easy route at Rock Creek. PC - Teresa Brooks

There are a few things, first - my focus on mountaineering certainly has held me back somewhat. Especially this past year training for Denali took a lot of energy and time. But I think most importantly, is I have been really afraid to TRY HARD. Like may of us, its difficult to push outside of one's comfort zone.

Trying hard on Crocodile Tears (5.11c). PC - Michelle Johnson

I have compiled a list of things that I think are holding me back, and things I need to improve upon:

• Fear while leading steep routes
• Trying hard, giving it a real 100% effort
• My ego gets in the way
• I don't like to work routes
• Fear on steep gear routes 
• Too much time climbing in my comfort zone
 

So with this in mind, I have been spending the past 4 weeks or so trying to improve on this! I have been heading out to Shuteye a lot, and seeking to climb routes in the 5.11 range. 

 

Shuteye Ridge

 So far I have tried the following:

• Crocodile - "Poacher" 5.11a -- on-sighted the route
• Crocodile - "Crocodile tears" - 5.11c - many hangs
• Magic wall - "'Slight of Hand" - 5.11a - on-sighted the route
• Forty Licks - "Cornered" - 5.11a on-sighted the route
• Volcanics - "Unnamed" 5.11a - Red pointed the route
• Runnel Vision "Struggle withing" - Hung several times, lead fall

 

Michelle - showing me how to try hard!

 

Teresa and Penny after a day of hard climbing at Runnel Vision.

I have also really adjusted my gym climbing strategy. rather than just randomly climbing routes, I am now actively projecting (TR) as well as trying to get more comfortable on lead on steep routes.

 

Each gym session I warm up roughly as follows

5.10a, 5.10b, 5.10c, lead a steep 5.10d or 5.11a.

Then I move to a TR project in the 5.11d or 5.12a range. I do burns on the route for the rest of the session. Each time I come back to the gym, I don't move onto a new climb until either the route setters take it down, or I send it clean on TR.

 

So far I have successfully climbed 3 x 5.12a and 3 x 511d. It usually takes me at least 2-3 gym sessions to get the project clean. 

 

Teresa has been super supportive of this, and she has been doing a similar thing with her climbing. I think its already starting to yield benefits. I feel stronger, and more confident.   

Soon I plan to transition to projecting on the lead wall, with the goal of getting comfortable trying hard on lead! 

Teresa - as always super supportive.

With no real big alpine objectives on the near horizon, I plan to keep this up, focusing on my rock climbing until at least the late winter. I'll start to get back into mountain shape for the summer, maybe tarting in March.