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Worlds Edinburgh Scotland 2010

-Photo Alex Fritz-

Worlds this year was amazing, it was held in Edinburgh, Scotland. I only made it for speed this time around and ended up taking 17th place. The venue in which the games held was amazing it was by far the biggest gym i have ever seen, it was built inside a quarry. I got a chance to explore the wonderful town of Edinburgh, with all of its castles and interesting scotish architecture. I had a really fun time meeting new people, climbing and cheering on all of the other competitors. Cannot wait for next year WORLDS!!

-Photo Alex Fritz-

Rifle!!

After the SLC ORSM, my friends and I decided to go to Rifle, Colorado. We crammed four people into a little Nissan Versa and away we went. We rolled into Rifle Mountain National Park around midnight. The following day we decided to check out Ruckman Craig. I had my eyes set on ‘Don’t point that thing at me’ a relatively short powerful 5.13c. It started off with about 45ft of a sustained 11d then transitioned into a pretty tough v9 boulder problem, into about 20ft of pretty easy flat wall climbing. By the time I had worked out the beta I had run out of steam for the day. After a good nights sleep, I went back to Ruckman and sent ‘Don’t point that thing at me’ first go. I was super stoked!! I then set my eyes on ‘Beer Run’ a super classic 5.13a. It was one of the longer routes that I got on while in Rifle at around 90ft. My first attempt on the route was spent trying to figure out the beta. After I was sure I had all the moves down, I went back up it later on in the day and sent. The next day we decided to check out Winchester Cave. I really wanted to try ‘7 PM Show’ which I read was a good 5.14a for young climbers, along with ‘American Prayer’ another 5.14a. I was able to get about half way up ‘7 PM Show’ and make some progress on ‘American Prayer’. I was really excited to get to work some 5.14’s. Even though I did not send, I feel trying the routes made me a stronger and more well rounded climber. I was also able to get ‘Bite the Bullet’ 5.13c down to one fall. I can’t wait to go back to try and send that route. The third day we went to Wicked Cave. I was really pumped to get on ‘Believe It’ another really short powerful 5.13c. My second attempt on it, I fell two moves two moves from the clipping jug. I was confused and tried to dyno to a non-existent hold. I was pretty bummed. I tried it again and got close to the top but was too tired to hang on. That night all I could think about was sending that route. I ran the sequence through my mind over and over again until I had that thing down. The next morning it was game time. After warming up, I got my game face on and sent ‘Believe It” first go. This route was really different than a lot of routes I had done because it had two knee bars, one right before the crux and one right before you clipped the anchors. It was really cool to be able to experience and learn a new style of climbing that I am not very used to. Shortly after, I Flashed ‘The Beast with two Backs’ 5.13a. Rifle is a very sick place to climb. I recommend if you have not gone, GO! The routes there are amazing and will challenge you in many different ways. I cannot wait to go back!!

Trade Show

August 31st 2010. I boarded my plane which was headed to Salt Lake City, Utah for the annual Outdoor Retail Show and Unified Bouldering Championship competition. This was my first OR competition in Utah. Unfortunately, I was not able to train as much as I had wanted to for the intense competition due to a recent ankle injury, however; I was as psyched as ever to climb with the Pro’s Daniel Woods, Chris Sharma, Dave Graham and many others. Qualifiers were intense; the route setters did a very good job of keeping you on your toes with their unique setting style. I qualified 19th, earning me a spot into semi-finals. Our shuttle from the warm up area to semi-finals was a pimped out SUV stretch limo. The limo ride was super fun. I also enjoyed getting to know the other climbers during the ride as well. For semi-finals we had three routes. I onsited the first problem, which was a technical flat wall problem. This left me plenty of time and energy for the second and third problems which were both long powerful moves on an overhanging wall. I did equally well on both problems, getting about half way up on each one, which bumped me up to 16th for my overall score. Unfortunately, this was not good enough though to make finals. UBC did a really good job of putting on a very exciting final. Next year I plan to come back even stronger and make finals, be a part of the Finale experience.

North Face Young Gun Award

I was awarded the North Face Young Gun Award this year at the 2010 SCS National Championships. I would just like to thank everyone who had a part in this, and a very big special thanks to my mom as well.

SCS Nationals 2010

This was by far the best Nationals!! It was held at the newly built Stone Summit Gym in Atlanta. You could tell that this gym was built for competitions. There was more than enough room for all the climbers and the spectators.

Qualifier 2
"Photo by - Jason Barnes"
This is by far the best rope gym I have ever been in. The first and second days were redpoint qualifiers. No matter how you did the first day, you got to climb the second day; then they calculated your points to see if you qualified for semi-finals. The first route wasn't too bad; easily made it to the top. The next day, however, I did not feel that I was climbing very smart and got pumped out earlier than I would have liked. I made it to next round, semi-finals, in around 8th place. I learned from my mistakes from the previous day and was able to climb a lot better, resting where I was supposed to and climbing smarter.

TEAM SPONGEBOB
"Photo By - Jason Barnes"
This route was definitely the best of the comp, I feel, for it had a really sick sideways dyno to a huge jug.


"Photo by - Jason Barnes"
I was very happy with my performance on the route; I ended up tying for 4th at the end of semi-finals. I felt really calm going into finals; I cruised the first half of the route, earning me a big rest right before the crux at the top. I milked the rest for as long as I could without being pushed for time. A few moves after the crux I realized that I had done the wrong beta, I tried for 30 seconds to somehow get out of it and recover to finish the route but alas, I could not. I ended up falling lower than I would have liked putting me in 9th overall. Obviously I was not very happy with my performance, but what can you do. From this though, I learned many things that I can again improve on for future competitions. Thankfully, my performance in speed climbing was better than my performance in sport this year. I took 3rd place!! earning me a spot on the U.S. team and a ticket to compete in Scotland for the Youth World Competitons this September.
I now am going home to train for the summer OR competition held in Salt Lake City, Utah.

SCS Divionals 2010

Divisionals this year was held in good ol state of Texas. I competed in the Junior division. The first day was a redpoint qualifiers where we had two routes to climb. I easily flashed the first one and tied for second on the second route. This qualified me for finals the next day. I had a little scare on the finals route with one of the clips because somehow I managed to get tangled up in it.




Photos by - Tom Kiefer

I was thankfully able to calmly get out of it and be the only one to make it to the top. Earning me first in the sport division :). After finals, was the speed qualifiers and finals. The gym that we were at had just finished building the official IFSC speed wall the other day which was cool because we got to train on that in preparation of Nationals and Worlds. I unleashed my inner speed demon and worked my way into the number one position for speed as well. I was very happy with my performance this year taking home the win for sport and speed in my category. Nationals here I come!!


Photo by - Tom Kiefer

2010 Teva Bouldering World Cup

"Photo by - Nicole Kirby"
The highly anticipated Bouldering World Cup held in Vail again this year was another huge success. With Daniel Woods from USA taking home the GOLD!! This was also my first year ever competing in an adult Bouldering World Cup. I was super excited to compete against some of the best climbers in the world. Seeing as this was my first World Cup I didn't really know what to expect in forms of how the problems were going to be for qualifiers. I knew they were going to be hard, but I did not expect them to be crazy hard and they were crazy hard!! I did, however, manage to get two bonus holds on the first problem and on the third problem which I was super happy about. Even though I did not do as well as I would have wanted to I still had a really fun time climbing and watching the pros do their stuff on the wall. It was a really good learning experience for me. I now know what I need to improve on and what to expect for next year. This gives me that much more motivation to go home and train to hopefully make podium in the near future.

Battle In The Bubble

On may 15th I had the pleasure of being invited by Kevin Jorgenson and the Spot Bouldering gym to be one of the 20 professional climbers to compete in the Spots first annual Battle In the Bubble competition. It started off with an on-sight qualifier round at the Spot. We had 5 different problems, all set with different climbing styles. The first problem was set on flat wall and was very technical. The second problem was super long and focused a lot on endurance. The third problem tested your problem reading skills and your pinch strength. The fourth problem was how long can you hang with no feet on bad holds. And the last problem was pure strength and lock-off ability. It had a wicked hand foot match move that was super exciting to do and see other climbers perform. Unfortunately, I missed finals by one hold :( ending up in 11th out of 40. Thankfully I was able to fore run the finals routes which were held at the boulder reservoir. They had built two sick!! brand new walls for the competition. I had a blast testing out the finals problems on the new walls and hanging out with other super strong climbers. The Spot gym did a great job with this competition; I hope that they will continue this one for years to come. The way they did finals was really cool and unique. It was elimination style, each finalist tried the problem for three minutes and the top climbers moved on the problem two, and then problem three until only the top two climbers were left. They traded attempts on the final problem until one of them sent or they had tried it three times. Also, which I thought was cool was they had a skydiver parachute down from a helicopter and hand the setters the start hold for one of the problems before they started the competition. Awesome job Spot gym and Kevin Jorgenson at putting together such a great comp!

SCS Regionals 2010

My regionals this year for SCS was held at Climb Iowa in Iowa. They did a really great job as always of holding a very well put together and organized competition. This years regionals was a relatively easy one seeing as there was only one other person in my category. lol The comp started really early in the morning (not a fan of these early starts lol). I think I got up around 5.30ish wayyyy too early for me. Our first route was a very relaxing 5.11; it got the blood flowing and muscles moving. The next route was a very well set 5.12. The last route was a hard 12. I was the only one of the comp to send the finale route :). Taking 1st in sport. I also took 1st in speed as well. Climb Iowa set some very good routes for regionals that got you thinking and evenly spread out the field. Now that regionals is over I am going to go home now and train my butt off for divisionals because I know the competition is going to be fierce down in Texas where it's being held. Later

Goofing Off at the Red

For my spring break, March 30^th – April 4^th, my buddy, Eric Monson, and I cruised on down to the Red River Gorge. We arrived Tuesday the 30^th of March around 5 o’clock. Since we had some time to kill, we decided to go to Drive by Craig. I hopped on the classic Ro-Shampo 5.12a. The next day, Wednesday, I headed on over to The Gallery. I warmed up on Mosaic 5.12c, a very cool route, and then went over to Calm like a Bomb 5.13b, which I on sighted. It was a tricky climb for me, just because the route followed a crack and that’s not really my style, but I was able to power through. After that, I worked on a 5.14 project. I really enjoyed being pushed to my limit on nearly every move. It really got me motivated to get stronger. Thursday, I went on over to Midnight Surf I warmed up on Cell Block Six 5.12c. This route was amazing, big moves to solid holds. I then went over to Tapeworm 5.12d, which also had big moves to solid holds. Finally, I was warm for Shiva 5.13b. The route starts off with chill 5.11 climbing to a killer lay down rest, which I enjoyed for a longtime. After the rest, though, comes the crux: a very hard boulder problem and dyno followed by 12 climbing. After I got some good beta from a local that stopped by, I made quick work of the route on my third go. On Friday, I headed on over to The Mother load, one of my favorite crags. I had my eyes set on The Madness 5.13c I had tried this route at the end of the day last year and loved it. I sent it on my first go. I then headed on over to my nemesis Golden Touch 5.13b, a short but super crimpy route. I finally laid the route to rest on my fourth go that day. I was very happy to be done with that route. The last day Saturday, I went to Drive by Crag. I really wanted to get on the very cool line Kaleidoscope 5.13c. I ended up flashing the route, and skipped the last clip making for a nice 25ft+ run out. After Kaleidoscope, I worked on my project Super Charger 5.13d/14a. This is probably my favorite route at the red, just big bouldery powerful moves on big openhanded pinches. I was able to get the route down to one fall. I had a super fun time at the Red climbing and hanging out with my friends at Miguel’s. I cannot wait to get down to the Red again.