I survived. I made it. I’m pretty sure I passed, but still haven’t received word. My American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA) rock-guide course and aspirant exam are OVER!
This was my least stressful course so far, in terms of prep and logistics. I love Red Rocks (where the seven-day course and three-day exam was held), I’ve climbed there before, and I felt ready, but still, there’s always a certain amount of anxiety going in–What if they throw me on a sketchy route (kinda happened)? What if I blow the rescue exam (went fine)? What if everyone else is a stronger climber than me (pretty much!)?
The first day of the course was actually the first day of examination–namely, the “rock rescue” and “knot pass” drills. The rock rescue involves “rescuing” a client in 45 minutes. The drill begins with your “client” (in this context, a fellow candidate on the course) below you, hanging on the rope. The guide is belaying the client directly off his waist, without a redirect (this means the client’s full weight is on you, your device, and the rope; the rope isn’t “redirected” through a piece or the anchor, thereby taking some of their weight). The clock starts and the guide must tie off the belay device, then “escape the belay,” which means getting the client’s weight onto the anchor, rather than the guide’s waist/harness/belay device.
All of the above (and following) maneuvers can be accomplished in a variety of ways–there is no “AMGA way” as I hear so consistently on the ‘net and at the crags. If the candidate accomplishes the task in the allotted time, with an appropriate margin of safety, then s/he passes, period. There are certain rules to be followed, for example, at no time can there be more than two meters of slack in the system, nor can the client be secured/suspended at any time off a single friction hitch. If either of those scenarios happen, it’s an immediate “no pass” and you fail the rescue portion of the exam. (This generally means re-testing on that portion of the exam at a later date–a hassle and expensive!)
Once the guide’s belay device is tied off, she must “get out” of the system, meaning transfer the client’s weight onto the rope (rather than her body/harness/device) or more likely onto a cordelette, and then onto the rope. By transferring the weight onto a short length of cord, then the guide can untie her belay device, affix the rope to the master point of the anchor, tie it off–then release the shorter cord and put the load onto the main rope–but now the guide is “out” of the system and able to…go for help, rappel to the victim, haul the victim up to her, etc.
Once the client’s weight is off the guide and onto the rope, which is affixed to the master point (almost invariably with a munter hitch which is blocked with a mule-overhand knot), the system is at “baseline.” From this point the guide could release the munter-mule-overhand (MMO) and lower; she could set up a raising system, then release the MMO and raise the client; or leave the MMO in place, chuck down some extra rope and rappel to the client (“fixing” that strand of rope, or securing it to the anchor so she can rappel safely).
The examiner indeed tells the candidate which of the above options he’d like to see. No matter in what order they’re performed, the candidate has to do all three: raise the client at least one meter (changing the mechanical advantage at least once, from 3:1 to 5:1 to 6:1), lower the client a meter, and rappel to the victim, then reascend the rope. Once the candidate has accomplished all three tasks, then she does a counterbalance rappel (you’re rappeling on the rope against the client’s weight, with the rope through the top anchor), securing the client on the way down, then arriving at a second anchor.
All the above should take about 20-25 minutes, barring mishap, mistake, drama, utter flailage…which happens, believe me. One guy on the course wasn’t managing the slack in his system properly (and got dinged by the examiner), another guy accidentally loaded a clove hitch at the top anchor (instead of something releasable like a MMO–he passed, but only by four minutes, as he had to figure out a “block and tackle” system to take the weight off the clove hitch, then reestablish baseline), and I’ve heard of many, many failures on other courses. Anyway, it pays to double-check your systems and sacrifice a minute or two on your overall time, rather than try to break a speed record and go too fast.
Once the guide and client arrive at the second anchor, the trick becomes getting both the client and guide onto the anchor and off the rope, so the guide can pull the rope through the top anchor, retrieve it, and set up a rappel or lower. There’s no magic or trickery to it; again, typically most guides use a short section of cord to create a releasable tether attaching herself and the client to the anchor. Then, once the rope is threaded for rappel, the guide puts the client and herself on rappel, releases the cord (typically a MMO on the guide’s harness with the cord attached to the client on the other end, looped through the anchor), and lowers their combined weight onto the rope (assuming they’re going to rappel in tandem, rather than rap one at a time in a “pre-rigged” situation).
My only drama during the exercise came at the very end–the examiners had rigged up “maillons” through which to thread the rappel rope at the second anchor. I had practiced (a lot!) using a locked carabiner at the anchor, which offers more interior space. When I loaded the rope to rappel (both my client and I were on the rope; we were tandem rapping), the rap rope trapped the ‘biner I had used for my releasable tether in the bottom curve of the maillon (maillons are maybe 1-1.5cm across, rather than several cm’s across, as with a ‘biner). I wasted a minute fighting to get the ‘biner untrapped, because the rules dictate you must retrieve all your gear (this is to encourage the guide to conserve gear, in case she had to rap 10 pitches with an injured/scared/incapacitated client) during the exercise. You can only leave a single carabiner at the top anchor.
My final time was 32 minutes–13 minutes to spare…phew! I might’ve gone a few minutes faster if I’d really rushed things, but I wanted to be damn sure I didn’t blow it! Good time, but certainly not blazing fast. Mikey Arnold went 28 minutes and I’ve heard rumors of a candidate doing the whole deal in under 20! I gotta check out his techniques sometime…
I was psyched and relieved. I completed the “knot pass” in 3:30 (you have 5 minutes) for the second part of my rescue exam…and was surprised when two dudes (both really solid climbers) failed it! They both said they just didn’t realize the time, which is completely understandable. Once the clock starts and you’re focusing on being thorough, it’s easy to let the seconds slip by and “cruise” the exercise, but miss the time cut! Anyway, they’ll have to hire an examiner for a day and redo it–no big deal.
The knot pass is a quick procedure, but one that’s important for guides (and really any climber interested in saving his bacon should the merde hit the fan). It involves “passing” a knot in the rope (through your belay device, which really means unweighting the rope temporarily, then putting your belay device/munter hitch behind the knot) when lowering a client down the cliff. You might do this because you’ve tied two ropes together (imagine being 300 ft up a route and you have to get down quickly due to lightning, illness, etc., so you knot two 200-foot ropes together) or because your rope’s damaged (you can tie a knot in the rope, isolating the damaged part, making it safe to rappel, but requiring you to “pass” the knot through your belay device at some point during your descent).
There’s a long-winded account of the first two components of the aspirant exam–the rescue drill and the knot pass. Another element of the testing process is the “movement” exam (they make sure you can climb 5.10+ comfortably, or 5.11 if you’re clipping bolts) and two days of assessment at the end, during which you simply (“simply”!) guide routes and you’re evaluated in nine major categories. I’ll post something on those down the road…for now, phew, I made it!
