Slacking Off

By Julie Trescott '08

Chris Creech ’10 started slacklining last year, and since then has pursued his recreational obsession everywhere from Marston Quad to the Great Wall of China. His fondness for the activity, which utilizes rock-climbing gear and bears a resemblance to tightrope walking, has landed him a job offer from a circus camp and provided hours of entertainment—not to mention skinned knees and a bruise or two.

“It fits well in the SoCal environment,” says Creech, an English and philosophy major who often brings books to Marston Quad and anchors a slackline on two nearby trees, using cardboard runners as needed to protect the trunks. “When I get bored of reading, I’ll go jump on the slackline and then go back to reading.”

The sport originated among climbers in the early 1980s and lately has gained popularity on campus, where it’s not unusual to encounter stretches of nylon webbing strung several feet off the ground between sturdy trunks. “People will approach us and say, ‘What are you doing? Can I try?’ I meet a lot of people that way,” says Lizz Cady ’10.

Getting started is easy. The webbing and tensioning system can be bought from an outdoors store for less than $40. You’ll also need to learn a few knots. Then, with a companion who knows the ropes, you’re ready to start slacklining:

1. Hold a friend’s hand, place your dominant foot lengthwise in the middle of the slackline and put all your weight on that foot. As the line wobbles back and forth, try to maintain your balance—even if you have to wave your arms around.

2. Once you can balance on one foot, place your other foot in front so that it’s barely touching the line. Slowly transfer your weight from your back foot to your front foot. Then repeat. “If you can walk three steps, you can walk five, 10, hundreds,” Creech says.

3. When you reach the end of the line, turn your front foot so that it is perpendicular to the line. Then rotate your back foot 180 degrees to turn around.

After mastering the basics, you can move on to tricks such as jumping, skipping and even flipping on the line. Creech also suggests experimenting with different locations, though you may not want to go as far as he has in the quest for novelty. He once convinced a lifeguard to let him set up a line over Pendleton Pool. “Every time you messed up and fell, you took a little dip,” he says.

And when Creech visited the Great Wall of China last summer on a Freeman Grant to study Chinese ghost stories, he and a friend tied webbing to a block on the wall and a nearby pole. While walking along the line, the duo accidentally uprooted the pole. They quickly packed up their gear and took off.