Learn to Lead Ice

If you are an experienced ice climber who is confident in your technique here is what you can expect to learn during this ice climbing course:

• The proper way to stage your belayer and provide a solid lead belay yourself..
• How to place ice screws based on the ice quality.
• Build quality climbing and rappel anchors using ice screws and threads.
• How to manage the rack and other climbing equipment while on lead and when building anchors.
• Techniques for managing anxiety and safety while on the sharp end.
• Outdoor climbing etiquette and ethics for new outdoor leaders.
• After taking this climbing course participants should feel comfortable leading beginner ice climb and assessing ice quality.

Climbers should have previous experience toproping for a few seasons. Leading ice is significantly more hazardous than toproping ice or leading rock and participants should feel confident in their movement abilities and should be dialed in with their equipment.

Lake City Ice Park
With so many ice routes to choose from this is an excellent location for a day or a weekend to really dive deep into the basics of ice climbing and learn everything to climb ice on your own.

Clear Creek Canyon
There are several easier ice climbs that generally form in the canyon and with short approaches they can make an excellent climbing venue for beginners to learn ice climbing skills.

North Cheyenne Canyon
With a couple good areas with moderate ice this is an excellent location to work on technique and for beginner climbers to learn the basics.

Best Places to Learn Basic Ice Climbing Skills
There are several locations that work well for this course due to reliable, high quality ice with minimal approaches. The venues we recommend are:

Like many skills it can take minutes to learn and years to master. Learning to lead ice is no different. It takes years to learn to recognize the qualities of ice and how they'll affect the security of ice screw placements and anchors. The head space for leading ice is also something that can be difficult to learn. But without the skill there are many climbs that are just off limits for those without the ability to lead ice climbs.