[IFRider]

Formerly a climbing bum who spent most of my 20's around the Gunks. In the early '80s we picked up those new-fangled mountain bikes in order to get to the Sky Top climbs (now closed to climbing) before others and at that time, there were no people riding and we could even ride the hiking trails on the back of the cliffs.

That climber is on "Horseman", a classic first multi-pitch outing for many people. First pitch leads out over a really nice roof and the horizontal holds are plentiful. A cold November day back then, I was walking under Horseman and heard a scream and loud bang and some dude cratered a few feet away. To our amazement, he got up holding his head. We had to rescue his belayer who had taken him off belay before he clipped into the belay anchor at the end of the first pitch and suffered severe rope burn in both hands. Turns out they had smoked a big fat one before heading up and the guy that fell got vertigo and lost balance. He only had a concussion according to the EMT who was nearby, wicked lucky.

Warren