Elegance
Does it matter in canyoneering?
Recently I was part of a group testing a new canyoneering piece of gear: The Raven
A piece of gear that combines rigging concepts into one: Ghosting, Releasability and Rappelling.
The beta testing group developed a great collaboration dynamic sharing ideas on how to rig the Raven in different variations. At some point it became clear that all the suggestions worked, but as the collaboration pushed forward it also became clear that it was a pursuit for Elegance:
the quality of being pleasingly ingenious and simple; neatness.
“the simplicity and elegance of the solution”.
Is Less More?
In canyoneering, sometimes the elegance is in the brevity of gear, and sometimes in the brevity of steps to accomplish a task. And a few times, brevity in both:
Less gear & less steps
No Compromises
Other times, elegance in canyoneering manifest itself in creating new variations for known solution that have a downside, drawback that users have accepted to live with. Like rigging a simple static system, with the drawback of a cumbersome rescue conversion if needed.
Just Beautiful
And sometimes, it comes down to aesthetics appreciation. Some solutions, just look beautiful, once you understand them.
The downside of elegance
And speaking of understanding, this may be the downside of elegant solutions, if a particular user barely grasps the scope of a problem to be solved, and can not rig their way out of a paper bag, the elegant solution may be more cryptic than a familiar inefficient memorized method.
So, Elegance, Important or Not?
I think that for a large percentage of canyoneers, Elegance is not important.
But for the focused and obsessed with problem solving with a nonconformist attitude, this is often the dive or inspiration behind advances in rigging systems and gear refinement. Some ideas flounder, and other flourish.
If you are in the in the large percentage where elegance does not matter, enjoy your current gear, and learn the Rules and strive to understand Best Practices.
If your are in the minority where elegance matters, master the basics, understand the problems and trade-offs, consider the paths: More education? Different Gear? Better rappel stations? seek inspiration, and push forward.
SEP: Safe, Efficient & Preference
Use SEP to establish some objective framework to select from available rigging variations, or explore new solutions.
SEP: Safety, Efficiency & Preference
During the latest Canyon Guides International assessment, the perennial subject of what knot, what gear, what rope technique is best for a given canyoneering task, came up again.
Happy and safe canyoneering! 😎