Lead Climbing Course in North Wales

Leading your own climbs will allow you to choose the routes you want to do. More importantly, you will become an independent and self reliant climber.
What you will learn - Overview-:
  • safety principles & skills needed to lead your own climbs safely
  • how to use the technical climbing equipmentcorrectly
  • how to build and manage safe anchors
  • how to get back down at the end of the climb or when you need to retreat
Who is it for:

individuals, couples & small groups with previous climbing experience. The focus of this course can be customised. Climbing many routes, learning about rope work & safety or a mixture of both.

Course duration:

For this course, we offer the following options:

Full day & multiple days: meet at 9:00 - back at 16:00

Half days: morning: meet at 9:00 - back at 12:30 / afternoon: meet at 13:00 - back at 16:30 / evening: meet 16:30 - back at 20:00

Locations:

Snowdonia & the coast of North Wales: Colwyn Bay, Betws-y-Coed, Tremadog, Llanberis, Holyhead and Owen Valley. We will choose the best venue according to your location, the weather and your time availability.

You will need to bring:
Learning to lead course
  • Course content details:
    • Choosing routes and understanding grades and guidebook terminology
    • Getting ready to lead the climb - the importance of choosing thetechnical climbing equipment, 'racking' your gear correctly on your harness and evaluating the climb. The 'rack' is the collection of climbing hardware carried on your harness or bandolier (wide sling across your shoulders) that you use to protect the climb.
    • Communication - ensuring that both members of the team can communicate effectively, even in adverse conditions.
    • Clipping the rope efficiently and safely into carabiners and quickdraws.
    • Anticipating problems and avoiding them.
    • Building and managing safe top anchors.
    • Principles of falling safely and in control.
    • Retreating down a crag: abseils, lowering, down climbing and basic problem solving.
    • Reading the route - looking ahead, checking out possible clipping places, planning which footholds you will use, consider the various sequence options, look for the resting positions and move confidently between them.
Traditional Climbing:

If you wish to learn how to climb with traditional protection (nuts, hexes and cams) we can teach you the skills you need.

Learning to trad lead placing your own protection involves a relatively big jump in terms of climbing skills but, once mastered, allows you to climb independently on many classic routes throughout the UK.

It is also quite possible to mix together parts of the Climbing Outdoors course with parts of a Learn to Lead Climb course for those who have a good indoor grounding and want a fast, thorough introduction to climbing in a traditional environment outside.

On the course itself, we will normally spend a lot of time looking at the practical side of lead climbing: placing bomb proof gear, constructing safe top anchors and managing rope systems. However, we also try to cover the tactical and psychological aspects of leading - so we look at planning the route, choosing the rack, reducing rope drag, resting and relaxing so that you can move fluidly with safety and confidence.

We normally base our trad climbing courses in the Snowdonia mountains, the sea cliffs at Gogarth or Holyhead Mountain on Anglesey - we use these dramatic settings to make your first leads as memorable as possible.

We can teach lead climbing on any style of route - bolted sports climbs, single pitch traditional routes where you place your own protection and multi pitch trad climbs.

This is a relatively advanced course. In order to get the most from it, you should ideally have experience of roped climbing outside and know how to belay a climbing partner in both top-roping and bottom-roping situations.

If you are not sure whether this is the right course for you, simply contact us with your enquiry.

Outdoor climbing course in Betws y Coed
More info:

The Learn to Lead Climb course will get you leading your own rock climbs independently and safely. It normally lasts between 2 and 4 days depending on your personal level of experience and on whether you wish to learn to lead sport climbs, trad climbs or both disciplines.

This climbing course is best run on a ratio of 1:2. However, it is perfectly feasible to run it at 1:1 and 1:3 ratio. Sometimes, it can be also run with a ratio of 1:4 for example on sport climbing courses.

This instructor/client ratio is used because the climbing instructor often needs to be ascending on a static rope alongside the leader, advising them on the options available, checking the correct rope work and gear placements and be ready to step in if the leader finds the route too difficult. This means that, ideally, the leader should have a separate, competent belayer looking after his/her ropes.

We have bases in the Snowdonia National park near Betws Y Coed and Tremadog and we can run this course at a variety of venues depending on the weather and the type of climbing and routes you want to do - the North Wales coast, the Ogwen Valley, the the Llanberis Pass, Moelwyns, Tremadog and Holyhead Mountain are all great climbing areas.

Rates per person

The course price depends on the ratio of clients to instructor.

Half Day

Ratio 1:1

£150 per 1/2 day

Ratio 2:1

£95 per 1/2 day

Ratio 3:1

£75 per 1/2 day

Ratio >6:1

£60 per 1/2 day

Full Day

Ratio 1:1

£220 per day

Ratio 2:1

£120 per day

Ratio 3:1

£95 per day

Ratio >6:1

£75 per day

Need more information? Check FAQs

Booking

We run open & private courses. Simply contact us with your enquiry.

To make a booking please click here.