Traditional Anchoring Options with a Rope

It's not terribly uncommon to be short on slings or cordelletes at anchor. Maybe they were left at the last anchor. Maybe you used them. Regardless, if you get to the top and you don't have any soft goods to work with, then the key will be to work with the rope

In the following videos, AMGA Rock Guide Lyra Pierotti demonstrates two quick and easy methods to build an anchor without any slings or cords. 

In this first video, the concept could be thought of as stacking. She stacks three cams on top of one another, then clove-hitches the rope to each of them. She places a figure-eight-on-a-bight on the bottom of the stack and uses that for her master point.

The biggest problem with this technique is that Lyra's end of the rope is tied to the anchor. This makes it difficult if she wants to continue leading. This system works much better when leads are swapped.

In this second video, Lyra uses the rope again. This time, it looks a lot more like a traditional pre-equalized anchor, but built with the rope instead of a cordellete.

As with the preceding video, Lyra is still stuck in the system, and will have to do a lot of messing around if she wants to continue to lead.

Using the rope in the system isn't the most elegant technique, but it can certainly help you out in a pinch!

--Jason D. Martin

•