Leading Ladder Grand Final Report
The Grand Final of this year’s Leading Ladder Competition took place earlier this month at the Foundry Climbing Centre in
Over the last 6 months, 12 rounds have been run at various climbing centres around the
It was fab to see so many climbers from South Wales entering the competition series and when it came to the final I think of all those receiving invites across the
Despite frustrations caused by the rather late announcement of the date and venue of this final, which meant that a number of those invited were unable to attend due to holiday commitments, the weekend saw 8 of us travelling up for the event. Indeed our group actually accounted for over 10% of competitors attending the final, which must say something about the hard work and dedication currently being put in by the Dynamic Rock Team. It also made for a social weekend and added to the atmosphere, certainly as a competitor myself it helped immensely to see so many friendly faces and to hear the (very) vocal support!
The day started with a somewhat chaotic registration and the handing out of the blood red competition vests! This was followed by an introduction by Neil Bentley, manager of the Foundry and Rob Aide from the BMC. Most of us were familiar with the format as it was to follow that of the rounds. All were to complete 5 routes of increasing difficulty in our respective categories, within the time limit.
As we stood listening to the introduction, underneath the Foundry’s steep competition wall (it is 13metres high and overhangs by 7 metres at its steepest point!), I was relieved to hear that they had duplicated a number of the routes, so that you could either attempt, for example, a thuggish, steep route up the competition wall, or you could opt to complete a technical route of the same grade on their gently overhanging, featured wall in the Furnace Room. This also split the competitors and meant that there wasn’t too much queuing for routes.
Following a warm up we all cracked on and got our first routes out of the way and felt a lot better for doing so! The good thing about the format is that there is no isolation for competitors. You can go at your own pace and get plenty of beta by watching the other competitors attempt the routes. The most frustrating thing about the format is that you can attempt each route as many times as you want, providing each attempt is ground up, but it does mean that it is hard to know when to give up!
Robin deserves a mention here for sheer determination on his final route. A number of attempts had thrown Robin off on the first crux but he kept getting back on and brilliantly overcame his
Ashley competed excellently in his usual cool, calm style completing all of his routes and as per competition rules, going on to attempt the routes of the higher category, dispatching the 7a with little fuss and putting in a valiant effort on the 7b.
Everyone put in great performances and the day ended with 3 podium finishes for
The day finished with us getting lost in the
Well done again to everyone and thanks in particular to the parents who again dedicated their time.
For a full list of final results have a look at http://www.thebmc.co.uk/Feature.aspx?id=2869
