Mad Rock UltraLight Quickdraw Review

The Mad Rock Ultra Light Wire quickdraw comes with two hot-forged carabiners (which helps cut out some material and keep it lighter), and there is a straight-gate wire carabiner on the top and a bent-gate wire carabiner on the bottom. The sling is only 10 mm wide and comes in only one length (5 inches). The whole thing weighs in at 2.4 ounces.

Performance Comparison

Climbing and clipping on the Ultra Light Wires. The carabiners were noticeably more difficult to clip than other models, but we appreciated the light weight and budget-friendly price.

Ease of Clipping

We didn't find this quickdraw that easy to clip. Usually, it was splitting hairs when it came to scoring this metric, but watching our friends climb on these draws we noticed that everyone found it a little more challenging to get the rope into the bottom biner. The gate tension feels a little stiff, which could contribute to the problem.

Of all the models that we tested, this was one of the more challenging ones for us to clip. A stiff gate and a slightly smaller carabiner no doubt contributed to our many missed clips with this draw.

Ease of Unclipping

This draw wasn't that easy to unclip either. Like all of the wiregate carabiners in this review that have an unprotected notch, there's plenty of things that it can snag on, like the bolt, your rope, or other gear. Only the Trango Phase Quickdraw was more difficult, as those carabiners are even smaller than these. If you hate snags, look for a keylocking quickdraw, like the Black Diamond Positron.

The exposed notch and the shape of the carabiner made this one more likely than most to get hung up when unclipping.

Portability

This draw is highly portable at 2.4 ounces. The Black Diamond Oz is a hair lighter at 2.3 ounces, but we could barely tell the difference in hand. If you're heading up a long route or hiking in for miles to your objective, you'll appreciate a light draw like this one.

Ease of Handling

The Ultra Lights are pretty standard when it comes to handling. Like other draws with wiregates on top, they occasionally cross-clipped on our harness, particularly when we were laden down with gear trad climbing. The carabiners are not too thick and rack well together, but they are a little on the small side and our testers with large hands didn't always find them easy to operate.

Ease of Grabbing

This draw is not easy to grab. Like all of the other 10 mm wide dogbones, there is no good way to grab it without also slotting a finger or two through the top carabiner — which you really shouldn't do! If you're gonna be yarding on your draws regularly, the Petzl Spirit Express or DMM Alpha Sport have wide slings that are made for grabbing.

A thin sling like this one is so hard to grab! Better to just take the whip...

Best Applications

The Ultra Light Wire is best used for trad or alpine climbing, and potentially also for onsight sport attempts where you want the lightest possible options on your harness. We wouldn't buy them if all we were going to do is sport climb, and would instead look to the CAMP USA Orbit Wire Express KS for a lightweight and economical sport climbing quickdraw.

While sport climbing was not our first choice for this draw, we did appreciate the lighter weight on harder climbs.

Value

This draw retails for $14.55, which is a great price for a hot-forged, lightweight option. There are some even cheaper draws out there, including the $11.50 Cypher Firefly II, our Best Buy for Lightweight, and Mad Rock's Concorde draw, which is also only $11.50, or $10 if you buy them in bulk! While we preferred the Ultra Light over the Concorde, the Firefly II is a great draw for the price and an even better value.

Conclusion

The Mad Rock Ultra Light Wire Draw does a great job of balancing price, weight, and functionality. It is not the lightest model out there, but it is pretty darn light. It is not the most functional either, but it gets the job done.