The End of January is already a blur in the distant past but it was also the start of our winter bouldering series that has finally come to an end.  Over three rounds we have seen climbers from all over South Wales come and take part in a hugely successful event that has given us some great moments. The competition was a new format for us, 3hours, 30 boulder problems see how many you can do. It seems a simple formula but it is a lot of hard work to set for, so I would like to thank all of the tireless work that the route setters put in getting the room reset for each comp.

The scoring was also a bit simpler than past events with your best two scores carrying through, to give you a series total, this allowed for competitors that had prior commitments and could only compete in two rounds. So at the final event on Sunday it was all evenly poised with many climbers capable of taking the crown of winter bouldering champion.

Emily Slade showing great talent finishing an impressive 3rd in the under 18s

With just over 30 climbers competing in the final event it was the juniors who started first with huge amounts of enthusiasm they attacked the problems, they showed good technique and cruised up lots of the problems.Do not forget that some of these competitors are under 13years of age and are competing in a under 18 category it is very impressive indeed! of note Owen Jones completing the Yellow route on the steep training wall shows his ever increasing strength reserves,  Richard Marrota's ability to keep throwing himself at problems after hours of effort also impressed massively. Morgan and Ashleigh continued there battle from the previous day with some strong efforts on many of the hard problems. I could list all the young climbers involved as they all performed brilliantly. but just look at there scores to see for yourself how well they did, they competed on the same routes as the adults!

The Adult climbers were all very close leading into this final event with many competitors capable of winning it was always going to take something special to seal victory overall. And this event Paul Walters returned with massive power reserves and simply blew the competition apart! His final round score of 277 (out of a possible 300) was incredible and well deserved with some brilliant climbing that if not for a slip on the white problem would have delivered an even bigger final result. with this Paul takes the overall crown and should surely be some one to watch for in the summers bigger comps (BBC at Sheffield ? watch this space)

Paul Walters overall men's winner

For the ladies it was also very tight between the top two, with Donna and Jackie both capable of taking the top spot.  Jackie had won the previous two rounds but only just and Donna had closed the gap massively in round two, so it was great to see that they climbed together and on the day they could not be separated with both scoring massive scores of 177. This gave Jackie the title on count back and after a win in last years leading comps shows her great all round ability.

Donna Carless Reaching 2nd place overall

And a big well done to Lewis for showing many slightly younger climbers how to do it keep up the training it is paying of big time for you! and see you on the craggs this year

Lastly a thank you to all that took part this has been a big event for me and to see it so well received has made it all worth while I'm now of for a holiday so see you all soon

happy climbing

simon