Skymasters Climbing Competition Report
The Skymasters Climbing Competition took place at the Birmingham NEC last weekend as part of Ordnance Survey Outdoors show. The competition was the centre piece of the event and did not disappoint as climbers battled it out in amazing gladiator style speed climbing.
The competition wall made by Walltopia consisted of almost entirely free hanging and horizontal sections. Many of the features moved and one of them even spun! The competition was organised so that two climbers would climb identical routes at the same time. This made for great viewing as climbers raced in a straight knock out with the winner going on to qualify for the next round. There were some dramatic whippers and some impressive dynamic climbing to be seen.
Percy Bishton and Steve McClure were the route setters this year. Before the comp Steve commented that, "For the setters this year [it] is a real challenge, to make two identical routes is difficult enough, but to ensure they are hard enough providing a real technical challenge to some of the best climbers in the world - without them being too hard to climb at speed - is a fine line. This will be the ultimate 'speedificulty' competition”.
In the end an incredible effort was made by 17 year old newcomer James Garden to win the men’s final. James just beat Adrian Berry on a pumpy 7c route to snatch the £1000 cash prize in one minute forty four seconds. This is not the first time the Skymasters has unseated older more experienced competition climbers. In 2008 Dave Barrens surprised many people to win whilst comp veterans Gaz Parry and Adrian Baxter failed to reach qualifying holds. In the women’s event there was an even younger winner with 16 year old Shauna Coxey coming in first and knocking Leah Crane into second place.
The future for British competition climbing looks better than ever with these two cranking so hard so young.
For the complete story of The Skymasters Climbing competition pick up the June issue of Climb Magazine. Steve McClure will be taking an in depth look into what was a great day for competitors, spectators and route setters alike.
Final Competition Positions
Men
1st James Garden
2nd Adrian Berry
3rd Adam Watson
4th Rob Lamey
5th Jordan Buys
6th Dave Barrans
7th Mark Croxall
8th Drew Haigh
Women
1st Shauna Coxey
2nd Leah Crane
3rd Natalie Berry
4th Hazel Findlay
5th Beth Monks
6th Kitty Wallace
7th Audrey Seguy
8th Becki Hall
The Skymasters competition was sponsored by
Berghaus
DMM
X1 Sports Insurance
Walltopia
Climb Magazine
Back to home page >>
|