"Hugh started the elaborate process of taping up. You could go through a lot of skin on a big wall. Lewis would be using cow-hide work gloves with the fingers cut off. But Hugh, the better free climber of the two of them, and the one who would be handling the bulk of the leading, needed more freedom than gloves would allow.

First he painted a sticky tincture onto the bottom knuckles and the web of his hand. Then he taped each individual knuckle in special configurations to distribute the stress on each joint, and at the same time protect the flesh. Finally he joined it together across the back of his hands and palms. The finished product loooked like a boxer's fist, and would last for days. At the end of the climb, he would use a knife cut away the shell of tape."