three points of contact rule?

You mean for TCCs?

It's a good learning rule, good rule of thumb for professional climbers... but it's like one handing and climbing towers without tying in... you have to use judgment.
 
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I remember a guy mentioning that to me 19 years ago. But im not really sure now,thats was more for free climbing.


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I remember a guy teaching that to me 45 years ago. Free climbing was all the rage back then, Jeff, when you were just a glimmer in your grandaddy's eye. I think it went out of fashion due to people coming into sudden contact with hard limbs or terra verra firma.
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Now ropes are all the rage. I still find my body counting 1 hand 2 knee 3 foot okay then, away we go! But nowadays that's more in relation to machine ops, not climbing.
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If the rope counts as one...then..hand and foot=three ;)

I've done head jams or off-width stances when the rope wasn't giving me support and I needed both hands on the saw.
 
Does each butt cheek count as a point of contact? I cant be the only one who as a newbie found it more comforting to shimmy out a limb than it was to walk it. :-P
 
I could swear I remember reading it in ANSI. I think it said you can use it where the canopy is thick enough that the rope inhibits movement or something.

I don't do it and don't care enough to get up and look it up...

love
nick
 
I've heard of this rule ever since I started climbing. Dad used to do some free climbing way back when, and he always went by this rule. I sometimes do it too. Not at work usually, but when I'm hanging with friends or something and we go climb around the park and stuff, I always follow the 3 points of contact rule.
 
USFS National Tree Climbing Guide (2001) 4.2.1: "The 3-point climbing system incorporates the basic principles used at all times when free climbing..." only those body parts capable of supporting full weight count, so Jef, unless you have very strong and prehensile butt cheeks they do not each count.

Maybe they count as one, if you can grip the branch tight with them. Hey maybe if you did this trick in a tcc you might draw interest from the lavender crowd...

"While climbing, 3 points must be placed firmly in position on a secure surface before moving to another point...When you learn and apply this basic rule, it becomes a matter of habit to safely climb using the 3-point system." The USFS still teaches it this way, I am told by one of their trainers.
 
In conifers USFS rated climbers can climb without rope attachment in certain circumstances.

Just so I can't stop wincing when I read 'free' climbing. You are indeed talking about free climbing when no gear is used to AID the climb. Rope for fall protection doesn't effect whether you are free climbing or not. Free is just using your natural climbing ability, rope or no.

When you do it without fall protection you are climbing 'solo'. The kind of climbing your talking about when you just climb a tree kid style is technically 'free solo'... although with trees I prefer 'kid style'.

Kid style is the coolest way to climb but it's also the most dangerous, all other things being equal.

3 points does NOT guarantee safety. I know of someone who had four points when a limb she was standing on snapped, she fell and fractured her spine.

Like all rules, 3 points is a good starting point, but it's not hard and fast, it's a guide. Anybody that climbs rock knows that it's not unusual to be on a single, sketchy point.

Climbing is VERY natural thing for humans, we were arboreal for eons. Just climb the damn tree.
 
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So the USFS standards are in reference to free climbing, or in conjunction with some type of fall protection?

[/ QUOTE ]not necessarily conjoined, so in blink's terminology they allow solo/kid's style.

a lanyard counts as 2 points of contact. the pub is #9E9H70
 
There are no rules, only recomendations. There is no ANZI "Police". As climbers we assume all risk and expose ourselves to danger every time we leave the ground. We must excersize caution and competance, use our heads, and climb safe.
 
this is why i'm asking cause, before i started working for daveys, sometimes if a tree is real limby i will just(i hate saying it this way because it really deflates the true meaning) "free solo" the tree to set my tie in. i'm in control of myself and have no intention of doing any work and if i stop: i position off using my lanyard. i have climbed as high as 75'- 100' using this method without feeling uncomfortable or feel like i'm in the slightest danger.
that said i have set lines from the ground in 40' tall pin oaks just because. most of the time on a large removal i will ascend the tree belayed from the ground with a rope until i hit the tie in and if the tree is "right" i will "free solo" to the top to set my tie in and rigging lines(if there needs to be any) before i start working, if it's not "right i will use the alternate lanyard technique to ascend to my tip.
 
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(i hate saying it this way because it really deflates the true meaning) "free solo"

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Hence, 'Kid astyle'. I've done lots of free solo on rock and it definitely isn't the same kind of head game... but neither is 'free climbing'.
 
Id consider myself a 100% tie in climber, meaning, from the time I leave the ground I am secured.
However, I have been in many trees that were so thick you couldn't fall out if you tried. No kidding.
I remember the days when I used to gaff up the first 20-40 feet of the tree, completely unsecured.

Can't believe I used to do that!!
 
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