Pete Dawson gets fourth ascent of The Bastard at Rubicon

• Wednesday 28th August 2024

Pete Dawson has made a coveted ascent of the test piece The Bastard at Rubicon in the Peak District.

Many of the Rubicon routes like The Sissy (F8a), Caviar (F8a+), Zeke the Freek (F8b) that were originally climbed back in the day are hard, fingery testpieces. All however are overshadowed by John Welford’s 1995 addition, The Bastard. Originally an aid route, John pulled out all the stops to climb the route; since John’s first ascent, the route has gained a phenomenal reputation as a fierce, bouldery route.

Steve McClure got the second ascent of The Bastard in the late 90s but then the route repelled all subsequent attempts until Felix Wilkins got the third ascent last year – click here for that report.

After Pete made the fourth ascent, Climber got in touch with him for his thoughts. He’s compared the route to nearby Raven Tor's Hubble and has his thoughts on the grade too; read all about it in the short Q&A with Pete below.

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Great work on the fourth ascent of The Bastard – that’s a legendary testpiece from John Welford. You’ve been close before so it’s made you work hard for it then?

The Bastard has been so much work for me! I first tried it in 2020 and got to the last hard move on a few sessions but didn't manage it. I would normally give it a few sessions each year with varying amounts of success. Last year I put a good few sessions into it and fell on the last hard move four times in one day. This year it was on the top of my list and I went in April but it was still soaking wet so I just cleaned it with a towel and tried the moves that I could. Then I've had to wait for it to properly dry out. Once it was dry I knew it was on and I just needed the shape so I smashed the training.

Did you do any specific training to tip the scales in your favour?

Because the crux holds are only good for two fingers I focussed my training, especially on two-finger campusing and hangs. Once it dried, I just went as often as I could to try and relearn the moves and get the specific strength.

The Bastard gained a heck of a reputation over the years. Can you describe the moves and perhaps compare them to board-type climbing that you do?

The moves on The Bastard aren't very big but the holds are bad so you can't move between them statically. The crux is on a wall that overhangs roughly 40 degrees so there is no getting weight onto your feet. It's actually quite similar to a training board because the crux starts off a slopey ledge that you then stand on later and I dubbed this the kickboard. Taking my feet off 'the kickboard' is actually one of the hardest parts as I had to keep a lot of body tension and have the holds very well. The crux move was a dynamic stab to a two-finger gaston followed by locking off the gaston to reach a "good" four-finger crimp. The next move to the two-finger pocket is easy to fumble but not as hard. I had nightmares of this easier but accuracy-dependent move. However, it turned out to be ok.

The other similar super short and hard testpiece from back-in-the-day of course was Hubble. How would you compare the two in terms of difficulty and execution necessary?

The two are very comparable, to be honest, both are boulder problem routes of the highest level. The Bastard has worse holds than Hubble however might be slightly less physical. It's more difficult to execute because you actually have to clip twice in the middle of the hard climbing whereas on Hubble you don't have to clip anything and just sprint through. I think they both have Font 8B or maybe Font 8B+ boulders on them. I remember one weekend, I did Superman on the Saturday and then went to try The Bastard on the Sunday and wasn't even that close, I thought that it was really hard.

After his FA back in 1995 John didn’t give The Bastard F8c+ as it is now but only F8c! What’s your take on the grade and on a wider point, the route in general?

Given that Hubble has been given F9a it seems that The Bastard should be F9a as well. It's mad that it was done back in 1995, it was a great effort by John! I think British climbing was undergrading by a grade at that point and then John decided it couldn't be as hard as Hubble so undergraded it again!

It's such a cool route. Rubicon is one of the classic peak lime venues and everyone knows it and it really epitomises Peak lime climbing. I'm really psyched to tick the hardest route at the crag!