This series of articles attempts to demystify the use of ropes in Adventure Racing, the first considers the equipment needed, the second looks at techniques and skills used in abseiling (or rappelling as it’s called in much of the world) and the series concludes with advice on ascending ropes.

It is worth highlighting at this point that the climbing community in the UK has a pretty low opinion of people who go out and just abseil. To many climbers abseiling is just a means to get down. I mention this because if you do happen to get out and practice, try and avoid the climbers – they tend to get out of their pram if you put your muddy boots all over their prized climb. On that note a large number of natural cliffs have restrictions enforced to protect wildlife – so seek out a climber’s guidebook for advice on where to go.

It almost goes without saying that you would be a fool (umm … that’s a bit too polite) to run out and abseil just using this article. It is important to get live feedback on your actions. Also I’m not going to go in to any detail about how to set up the anchors for the ropes, so save your time, get on a course, or go out with a mate who knows.

Equipment

Before you spend loads of money on kit, try and get out and have a go, ideally with some adventure racers – this kit is expensive so it’s a good idea to know what you want, not what the spotty kid in the shop wants to sell you. It is also rather unfortunate that at the moment each race has a different requirement in terms of kit, so its another reason to hold fire until you really need to buy it.

Basic Kit

Rope

This is one bit of kit you are unlikely to buy initially, although I do think it is a wise purchase for teams so they can get out and practice. Broadly there are two types of ropes on the market, dynamic and static – the majority of ropes you will find at climbing walls and in use on the crags are dynamic ropes, the idea is that when a climber falls they stretch. Static ropes are used in ascending and abseiling; with the most common users being cavers. If you happen to abseil (or more importantly ascend) on a dynamic rope you will kind of yo-yo as the rope stretches, making the process very hard work.

Broadly speaking (and I’m sure someone will tell me different) static ropes in the UK are predominantly black or white, dynamic ropes tend to be a variety of colours.