Video: Sociable Belay System for Top Rope Rock Climbing

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In the sociable belay system (also known as the bottom blade or sling shot system) for tope rope rock climbing, everyone starts on the ground. Learn more in this free rock climbing lesson on video.

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Video Transcript

Hi! I'm Bill with Zoar Outdoor with expertvillage.com. We are here today at Chapel Ledges at Ashville, Massachusetts, trustees of the reservations property and in this series I am going to be talking about preparing to climb. We are going to talk about systems for top rope rock climbing. What does that mean? As the climber, the rope is always above me so if I take a fall, I am not going anywhere. The rope is right there to take care of me. So two variations on that; one is the bottom blade or sociable belay or sling shot system. The other we will talk about in a minute is a top manage system. So in the sociable belay, everyone starts out at the bottom. There's a climber end of the rope, there's a belay end of the rope, climber starts from the bottom climbs up to the top of the anchors, comes back down to the bottom. The advantages of that is everyone is together, everyone is sociable. People on the ground can coach, people on the ground can help and people on the ground can take care of the gear. The climber comes right back down and everybody is together. So that's probably the most common top rope system that you will find.

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Sociable Belay System for Top Rope Rock Climbing

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