Rating & Grade systemsEach country have different difficulty rating system of routs. We present some rating system comperative tables The Russian Federation, the Western European
|
RUS | EuA | LAT |
---|---|---|
1A | F | I |
1B | F+ | |
2A | PD | II |
2B | PD+ | III |
3A | AD | IV |
3B | AD+ | IV+ |
4A | D | V |
4B | D+ | V+/VI- |
5A | TD/TD+ | VI-/VI |
5B | TD+/ED1 | IV+ |
6A | ED1/ED2 | VI+/VII- |
6B | ED2/ED4 | VII-/VII+ |
The Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme (UIAA) rating scale, an ill-fated attempt at international standardazation, is used mostly in Western Germany and Austria.
In North America, grades denote the normal amount of time required to complete a route. This time is based on a team of average climbers using normal techniques.
Class I - Requires 1-2 hours Class II - Requires half a day Class III - Requires most of a day Class IV - Requires a very long day Class V - Requires an overnight stay on the route Class VI - Requires a few days Class VII - Expedition
The Yosemite Decimal System is the North American rating system. The
first number in the YDS designates the class of the climb (always "5" for free
climbs), the second number defines the difficulty.
Although the YDS is the most popular rating system in North America, other systems exist
(you may have that old guidebook that still lists them). Some may have the NCCS scale (see
below), others may have an old YDS that stops at "5.10" no matter how hard that
climb is (my old Carderock guidebook had one of those and the "5.10" in there
was corrected to a "5.12" when the new guide came out).
The French rating system is slowly becoming the international standard, at least for comparing really hard climbs. It's used in France (what a surprise), but also in Spain and Italy. Note that "+" but not "-" is used for further subdivisions.
The British rating system - had you expected anything else - is a bit more difficult and a little less comprehensible than the rating systems used in the rest of the world. The Brits have two different ratings (they say grades): an adjectival grading and a technical grading. The adjectival grading says something about the overall difficulty of the climb. The technical grading says something about the most difficult move of the climb. So, an easy climb with a difficult move would have a relatively low adjectival grading with a high technical rating (like E4/6c). A sustained climb with long runouts and poor pro - a real British climb - but no real difficult technical moves then has a high adjectival rating with a low technical rating (like E7/6b). If you also know that a "difficult" climb is easy, that there are no technical ratings for climbs less than severe (eqv. UIAA 5) and that the adjective Extreme was split up into E1-E9, you're all set. The table below should clarify it all...
|-----------------| |EASY | |-----------------| |MODERATE | |-----------------| |DIFFICULT | |-----------------| |VERY DIFFICULT | |-----------------| |4a | | | |---|SEVERE| |------| |4b | | HARD | | |---|------|SEVERE| VERY |------| |4c | | |SEVERE| HARD | |---| |------| | VERY |----| |5a | | |SEVERE| | |---| |------| | |----| |5b | |------| E1 | | |---| | | |----|----| |5c | | | E2 | | | |---| |----| | | |----| |6a | | | E3 | | | |---| |----| | E4 | |----| |6b | | | | E5 | | |---| |----| | | | |6c | | | | E6 | |---| |----|----| to | |7a | | E9 | |---| | | |7b | | | |---| |----|
Routes in the Western Alps are generally given an overall grade - in addition to a pitch-by-pitch rating. The overall grade says something about the general difficulty of the climb. It takes into account the technical difficulty, the quality of the belays, the nature of the rock, the exposure of the climb, the objective dangers, etc. The grading system uses letters (derived from the french words - in parenthesis) and sometimes uses "+" and "-" to indicate smaller differences.
F - Easy. (Facile) PD - Moderately difficult. (Peu Difficile) AD - Fairly difficult. (Assez Difficile) D - Difficult. (Difficile) TD - Very difficult. (Tr?s Difficile) ED - Extremely difficult. (Extr?mement Difficile) ABO - Horrible. (Abominable)
The Saxon Rating System, or the East German (ex GDR) rating system
as it was known before the Wall came down, is used in all of the former East Germany. This
includes the formidable climbing area of the Elbsandsteingebirge in the state of
Saxony.
The Saxon rating system, however, is not complete without the rating scale for Jumps.
For those of you not familiar with the Elbsandsteingebirge, some routes require
horizontal dynos. Most often, that means standing on one sandstone tower and lunging for a
hold on an adjacent tower - bridging the void between them. Those jumps are rated using
arabic numerals between I and IV, where I is easy and IV is a very difficult jump.
The German grading system considers the seriousness or Ernsthaftigkeitsgrad of a climb. This grading scale considers all aspects of the climb which have nothing to do with the technical difficulty: average runout distance, quality of the protection placements, objective dangers, quality of the rock, etc. The scale goes from E0 to E5. E0 is a normal route, with solid fixed pro and ample opportunities for placing pro. E5, at the other end of the scale, stands for a largely unprotected and unprotectable route with manky pitons and crummy rock. On an E5 climb, falling is generally a lethal idea. In most topos, routes with an Ernsthaftigkeitsgrad above E0 are marked as suc
UIAA | French | UK | USA | ex DDR |
---|---|---|---|---|
V | 4+ | 4b | 5.7 | VI |
V+ | 5a | 4c | 5.7 | VIIa |
VI- | 5b | 5a | 5.8 | VIIb |
VI | 5c | 5a/b | 5.9 | VIIb/c |
VI+ | 6a | 5b | 5.10a | VIIc |
VII- | 6a+ | 5b/c | 5.10b-c | VIIIa |
VII | 6b | 5c | 5.10c-d | VIIIb |
VII+ | 6b+ | 5c/6a | 5.11a | VIIIc/IXa |
VIII- | 6c/6c+ | 6a | 5.11b-c | IXa/b |
VIII | 7a | 6a/b | 5.11d | IXb/c |
VIII+ | 7a/7a+ | 6b | 5.12a-b | Xa |
IX- | 7b | 6b/c | 5.12c | Xb |
IX | 7b+/7c | 6c | 5.12d-5.13a | Xb/c |
IX+ | 7c/7c+ | 6c | 5.13b | Xc |
X- | 8a/8a+ | 7a | 5.13c | |
X | 8b | 7a | 5.13d | |
X+ | 8b+ | 7b | 5.14a | |
XI- | 8c/8c+ | 7b | 5.14b |
http://www.climbing.apollo.lv/dif_syse.htm