Archive
World Cup Round Ups for 2015 Season
Well, sorry to say I didn’t manage to write anything about any of the IFSCWC Bouldering events this season. It was a short but quite exciting season, and I did watch all the comps and do podcast roundups with John Blomquist of Chalk Talk Climbing Podcast. If you are interested in our rambling about the events, check out the podcast here:
#5 Munich (World Championship)
John and I will probably do this next season as well and we want to talk about what you want to hear about, so let us know at chalktalk@mantlepressmedia.com
IFSC Bouldering World Cup 2015 #1 – Toronto + CWA Dyno Comp & Stuff…
Toronto happened last weekend and my climbing hold company Kilter was proud to be the hold sponsor. I didn’t get to watch it on time (watched it later) so no full coverage here but my friend John over at Mantle Press Media and I had a conversation about the event for his podcast Chalk Talk. You can listen to it (and find other great podcasts with a variety of climbers and industry folks) on iTunes or over at his site http://www.mantlepressmedia.com. Listen to our conversation and rewatch semis and finals here:
I was busy with the Climbing Wall Association Conference and Setter Showdown at Earth Treks Golden all weekend. We threw a big after party for the CWA at The Spot on Saturday and had another crazy dyno comp with tons of holds from Enix, Element, Kingdom, Nicros, Kilter, UP, Enterprises, Rock Candy, and Metolius. We’re taking some of the dynos down to make some wall space and preserve the problems we had up before cramming so many holds on that wall but don’t worry, some will stay up.
The Setter Showdown was a setting competition in Golden where 24 setters from different gyms came to test themselves in 3 rounds. When the day was over each setter had set 3 problems–two individual and one coset–on pre-assigned walls with pre-assigned holds and pre-assigned grades. The judges, who were Louie Anderson, Mike Helt, and myself, had to watch the setters and give scores for how functional and creative the problems were and how technically adept the setters were. It was a long two days and fairly difficult to judge but everyone had a good time I think and lots of friendships were formed. There should be a video coming soon and I’ll post it.
That’s all for now, sorry there aren’t more photos. Scour Facebook and I’ll post more soon.
Psychedelia 2014 – Alien Abduction!
The theme for SBS X Psychedelia is Alien Abduction!
Hunter Damiani created this awesome SBSX art around our Psychedelia theme. Don’t forget to get your limited-edition t-shirt before we sell out. T-shirts are free with a SBSX Season package or you can get one for $25 at the front desk.
Part of what makes Psychedelia amazing is all the tape art and props and special performers, and part of it is all the amazing glowing costumes! We’ve been hard at work getting the gym ready, and we hope you’ve been finding creative ways to make yourself glowingly amazing.
Every year we get tons of questions about what glows and what doesn’t. To help clear things up, last year we made a long post about all kinds of costume fluorescents. Read it here: Psychedelia – What Glows and What Doesn’t?. Remember, this year’s theme is ALIEN ABDUCTION!
Be an alien, be a UFO, be an abductee! We love seeing how creative everyone gets with their glowing costumes and we can’t wait to see what everyone comes up with this year!
Oh yeah, and if you haven’t been before or don’t know, every year Psychedelia puts the gym at capacity, so if you want to come (and you do, trust us) we recommend pre-registration for spectators and climbers. Click here to pre-register for Psychedelia.
See you at The Spot!
SBS X Parkour Jam Rundown + Open Final Results!
Paul flipping out the window at the start of the Parkour course.
Parkour Jam was pretty amazing. We’d never done a comp quite like this before and it took a little longer with setting and forerunning to incorporate the parkour course elements but when all was said and done we ended up with 52 new boulder problems and 2 parkour courses.
The first six hours of Saturday were staggered groups of youth climbers. Teams from all over the place came to compete and we had over 250 kids!
Colin Duffy working hard on O3.
The adult session was from 5-8 and it was cool to see the rest of the problems get sent, even O10 got done! After the adult session scorecards were in we quickly shifted to the parkour demo race.
Our partners at Apex Parkour jumped out our office windows, jumped from boulders to I-beams and back again, ran up walls, and cleared huge gaps. The end of the first course was a jump to double downward dyno to wall run to jump and grab a swinging bone. Only Paul was able to stick the last move for the win. The second course ended with the guys clearing the huge entryway gap by jumping from the railing by the Font boulder to the railing by the Beach. The courses were crazy to watch and the Apex guys went all out, with more than one of ’em taking a big fall while trying their hardest.
After the Parkour course wrapped up we jumped back to the Open Final. The top 6 men and women from the redpoint round were the open finalists.
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Kilter Women Finals
The Kilter Women’s final was set almost entirely with 2 sets of Kilter’s newest holds, the Teagan Kaiju 1-3.
Teagan Kaiju 1-3 in purple.
These holds aren’t even on the website yet, but you can order them by emailing sales@kiltergrips.com. There were also three Sandstone medium 2 slots at the top, the same set that was used in the Toronto World Cup.
The female finalists were all from Team ABC as athletes or coaches so we got several nice shots of the group. Here’s me showing ’em off:
Lillian Friefeld, Megan Mascarenas, Margo Hayes, Brooke Raboutou, Nina Williams, and Stella Noble. Jackie presenting.
Qualification order:
1. Megan Mascarenas
2. Nina Williams
3. Stella Noble
4. Margo Hayes
5. Lillian Friefeld (first Spot final!)
6. Brooke Raboutou
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Here’s how finals went. All photos from JoAnne. Thanks JoAnne!
Brooke wrestling the 2nd Kaiju hold on the Kilter Women’s final.
Brooke came out first and we were worried cause she’s so short but she quickly perched up on the start Teagan Kaiju horn and made her way to the next. The 2nd big move required flipping your right hand and Brooke didn’t flip but she did give a few really solid jumps for the 3rd Kaiju and she almost stuck it. Good effort Brooke!
Lillian giving it her best shot.
Lillian is a new face in finals for us and she gave a great effort, getting up under the roof before falling off.
Margo staying tight to move off the Kaiju to the Sandstone slots.
Margo looked like she was trying hard but she made good choices and managed to flash the final!
Margo sizing up the final Kaiju. She stuck it and won!
Since there were still 3 competitors to go everyone was wondering if the final was too easy, but Margo is one of those strong climbers who will come out of the middle of a field and win (she’s done it at SBS before) so I wasn’t too worried.
Stella on the final.
Next up was Stella, who is another strong small climber. Stella amazed everybody several times with the crazy moves she was doing to make her way up the Kaiju. I really hope someone got video. I’ll share it if I find it, because at one point both hands came off but she had a heel-toe cam and a foot press and stayed on long enough to recover her hands. The entire crowd was enraptured with her efforts. She made it quite far, falling off the final Kaiju before the crimps. Amazing job Stella!
The last two up, Nina and Megan, are always neck-in-neck for first at SBS comps and came into this final separated by one fall. Nina knew Margo had flashed so she knew she had to flash too and it looked like she got quite pumped trying to figure out the boulder as she was climbing on it. She put a lot of effort into going out the roof upside down, which didn’t work and probably made her very tired.
Nina under the roof.
She finally figured out to go hands first but didn’t have enough gas to finish. Next go she did a bit better but the sandstone crimps at the end proved too much and she fell. Good goes Nina!
Megan Mascarenas setting off through the sea of Kaiju
Finally Megan came out. She knew that Margo had flashed so she’d have to flash to maintain her 1st place. She gave a good effort but in the end it took her several goes to figure out the Teagan Kaiju before sending the problem for 2nd place. Good job Meagan! Want to see a video? Megan Mascarenas sending the Kilter Women’s Final at SBS X Parkour Jam.
Women’s Final Results
1. Margo Hayes
2. Megan Mascarenas
3. Nina Williams
4. Stella Noble
5. Lillian Friefeld
6. Brooke Raboutou
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Urban Plastix Men’s Finals
We got a bunch of new UP to compliment our older UP and Jake put together a problem that he said “might be too easy or might be too hard, so probably it’s just right.” He used two of one of our favorite shapes, the Big Font Jug, some brand new Tremors (Tremor 3 and Tremors XL), El Fin, The Squeeze Set 2, an Epicenter jug for the undercling finish, and the Beanes ball slopers.
The male finalists were, in order of redpoint qualification:
1. Shawn Raboutou. We all know Shawn, and in this comp Shawn was the only climber to climb O10 for his first ever first-place qualification into finals.
Shawn laid out on the Urban Plastix Men’s Open Final.
2. Will Anglin is our buddy who moved to Golden Colorado to set and coach at Earth Treks. Will started shaping with Kilter and his Lost Slots were the challenging holds on the Open 3 problem on the Beach (in the pic of Colin Duffy above). Will flashed up to O9 but couldn’t quite do O10, falling repeatedly at the last move and ending up just behind Shawn going into finals.
Will showing off his first hold set, the Lost Slots.
3. Remi Arata is strong young climber and a regular at Spot finals and we were glad to see him back.
4. Nicholas Milburn has a history of 2nd places in SBS finals and we always expect great things from him.
5. Andrew Lee is a new face for us. Originally from Anchorage, Andrew now lives in Fort Collins where he runs a huge college climbing team.
6. Derek Anderson is also new for us and all I know about him is that when he got into finals (he was originally in 7th but one of the qualifiers, Tristan Chen, left before finals) all the Earth Treks guys went crazy. I’m assuming he’s a Golden boy then. Will update as I know more.
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Men’s final rundown
Shawn at the top.
Derek and Andrew both gave good efforts but had trouble establishing on and moving off the Squeeze pinches.
Nicholas Milburn came out next and did some work, sending the problem 3rd try after falling twice on the cross to the first UP Font hold. Again, some were concerned the final was too easy if the 3rd person to try it sent it, but Nicholas is a strongman and a wildcard and we know he can do well on any final we set.
Remi Arata came out next. I thought there was a good chance Remi would send as well and he gave some solid efforts but couldn’t quite finish the problem, falling near the top on his final go.
Will Anglin looked super strong and after slipping on his first try re-calibrated himself and sent the problem 2nd go in good style.
Shawn knew he’d have to send quickly to keep his first place and he flashed the problem in good style for the win.
I will find pictures of everybody soon when more pics are posted. Til then, here’s a video of Shawn’s flash
Check out Urban Plastix holds here: Urban Plastix
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Men’s Final Results
1. Shawn Raboutou
2. Will Anglin
3. Nicholas Milburn
4. Remi Arata
5. Derek Anderson
6. Andrew Lee
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Unofficial results for the redpoint round in these links. Please let us know if we got anything wrong by emailing events@thespotgym.com.
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Thanks for coming out. See everyone at Psychedelia next month. Better start on your alien abduction themed costumes!!!
SBSX Comp 1 – Parkour Jam – TODAY!
Visiting World Cup crushers Jorg Verhoeven and Katharina Saurwein helping set Parkour Jam.
After a long few days of setting SBSX Parkour Jam is all ready to go! In addition to the normal 42 boulders (10 Recreational, 10 Intermediate, 10 Advanced, 10 Open, and 2 Open Finals) we’ve got 10 Youth problems (it’s an ABS comp so we have to set youth boulders though, as you probably know, all Spot comps are youth climber friendly) and two crazy courses for the Parkour race demonstration that will be put on after the comp and before finals by the professionals from our partners at Apex Parkour.
Here are a few photos. See you today at The Spot!
Jorg forerunning one of the Open boulders he and Katha set.
Urban Plastix holds on the men’s final.
Kevin setting an Open problem with some new Noah Kaiju Huecos
Lance jumping out the window to text the Parkour course at SBS X Parkour Jam.
See you at The Spot!
Help with SBS X Comps, get a membership!
Want to earn a membership at the Spot and help us put on our massive comps this season? How about a comp entry fee?
The Spot Setting Crew needs volunteers to help us strip walls and wash holds. There are shifts available for each comp on a first-come, first-served basis. 6 hours of work = 1 free month of membership or 3 hours = 1 free comp entry, and you can save hours to use in the future. Having setting volunteers to help us with these tasks lets us set faster and more efficiently and we really appreciate everyone who helps us out.
Interested? Shoot us an email at routesetting@thespotgym.com and we’ll get you signed up.
Thanks!
SBS X – Spot Bouldering Series 10 – Comp 1 is coming!
Competition #1 of the 10th season of the Spot Bouldering Series is almost upon us! ABS Sanctioned Parkour Jam will feature all your favorite aspects of Spot comps – food, beer, lemonade, a huge raffle, music, a special event, and 52 new boulder problems (10 for each category: youth, rec, int, advanced, and open) plus 2 open finals where you can watch the top 6 men and women battle it out.
At Parkour Jam the special event is going to be a Parkour contest put on by the professionals at our neighbor Apex Parkour. These guys are some of the best in the world and they’re sure to put on a fantastic show for us. Someone might even get defenestrated.
Thanks to Scott Rennak and our generous partners we’ve got tons of sponsors for the season meaning huge raffles and giveaways. We’ve also got eight hold sponsors who are providing special holds for each comp and will each have one final problem during the season. The finals hold sponsors for Parkour Jam are two of our favorite companies–Urban Plastix and Kilter Grips.
Urban Plastix!!!
Kilter!!!
If you’re going to be around (or even if you’re only around for 3 comps) the best deal is to buy the season! It’s only $125 and you get preregistered for all four comps (and we’re gonna have even faster pre-reg lines this year) plus you save $5 over the regular price, and you get a special gift bag with over $100 value worth of stuff and coupons and one of our custom SBSX Alien Abduction shirts designed by local artist Hunter Damiani. You may remember Hunter from the cool art pieces he does at Psychedelia each year, like this one:
Hunter’s Skull at Psychedelia SBS 9
So pre-register for the season (or comp by comp) and learn more about the prizes and sponsors here: SBS X Pre-Reg
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Want to earn a free membership?
Finally, we have some volunteer opportunities available in the setting department, so if you’re interested in earning a free membership by helping us out, please email routesetting@thespotgym.com. For Parkour Jam we need help Wednesday, Sept 24th, from 10pm to midnight, Thursday Sept 25th all day in 2 hour shifts and again at 10pm – midnight, and Friday September 26th all day in two hour shifts.
That’s it for now. See you at Parkour Jam!
Michael O’Rourke at Psicocomp!
Mike and Carlo about 1/2 way up the wall.
We didn’t get to watch or cover Psicocomp this year, but luckily LT11 was on the scene and they’ll have highlights soon. Til then, they posted all the head-to-heads on their youtube. You can see Mike vs Carlo as the 8th video on the full men’s bracket playlist here:
Here’s the women’s rounds:
2014 IFSC Bouldering World Cup #8 – Laval, France – Semi Results + Finals Live Feed
UPDATE: Here are the Semi Results with how everyone did on each problem:
Finals start around noon on Saturday, Boulder time. Watch the top 6 men and women battle it out. Overall season winners will also be decided. Jan Hojer has already won the overall for the men as Dmitrii Sharafutdinov missed semis. For the women it’s a tight race with Shauna Coxsey and Akiyo Noguchi so close that whoever beats the other in this comp will take first. Exciting!!!
CWA Dyno Comp 2014 + Mini Hold Reviews
So Ill Dyno Holds
This post is from May but I forgot to post it so here it is now!
For the 2014 Climbing Wall Association after party we had climbing, a food truck, beer, an Urban Plastix and Kilter hold showcase, and a dyno comp! The dyno comp had two formats–team and individual. For the team competition, everyone from the same gym or company sent as many prelim dynos as they could (there were 26 to choose from) and we added up the total scores. The highest scoring individual dyno-ers were taken to an individual finals on the Beach where we’d set up stations for all the CWA exhibiting hold companies. Here are some pictures of the holds we used from each company:
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So Ill
So Ill
So Ill was the title sponsor of this year’s CWA and they hooked it up with a huge baby head, a logo hold, a giant positive pinch that we can’t wait to use on the dojo, and the double fat smooth edges. We also got one of their newest Jason Kehl holds at the show and used it as a launch hold (it’s the one that looks like an octopus, above). I have to admit, I was skeptical about the Baby Supreme, but it ended up being a really cool hold. Ian Powell set a jump where you hit the logo hold as a gaston and kicked the baby head to stay on. Unfortunately some of the tallest competitors were able to semi-static the dyno, doing a deadpoint to the gaston and a very tensiony stand match. The other So Ill dyno was a jump to the large pinch, and it was really fun and several competitors stuck it.
Check out the So Ill holds: Baby Supreme Vaccine (the big pinch, every gym needs two of these) Pharmaceutical (logo hold – very cool, now on the river wall) Nausea (double edges, my favorites from this batch, very fun holds, now on the river) I don’t have a link to the octopus yet as it’s brand new.
As usual So Ill is producing quality shapes and their big shapes are super fun to climb on. There are several other newer holds and sets in their lineup that we have our eye on for the future. Keep innovating guys!
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Kingdom
Big pink and big (darker) green are Kingdom Holds
Kingdom is a fairly new company and we’d never seen anything from them in person before, but we were impressed. They sent us several Dragon Balls and several Love Handles, as well as some green feet from the Cobbles set.
Kingdom Dragon Balls
The Dragon Balls are these big lumpy things with dual-tex bases. The huge one is HEAVY, and we used it to set the most popular dyno of the evening–a jump off two smaller cobbles to try and hang it as a stalactite. It’s was hanging straight down from the middle of the Beach bulge and the deskies told me they loved watching people try to stick it. Nobody managed to hang it during the finals, but right afterwards several of the finalists stuck it. We also set other Dragon Ball catches off the same launch holds that weren’t super far but were quite challenging to stick.
Overall the Dragon Balls have been extremely popular with our customers. They’re cool shapes and the fact that they’re bright pink certainly helps as well.
The Love Handles are also super fun to climb on. For the comp we had a double-dyno to squeeze two of them on the Dojo roof and another Dyno to catch the big one on the Left Dojo. We moved them to the River where you have one of the biggest as a drop-down on the Left River and one you slap into and mantle on mid-Right-River. The Left River one we had to flip over from its original position as it has kind of a thin wall for how huge it is and it wouldn’t stop flexing (and we can’t use screws so we couldn’t reinforce it that way). The Right River one is the end of one of my favorite things I’ve set in a long time, and Lily’s brown problem on it is also awesome.
The weird thing about the holds is that they are imperfect. The shapes are far from symmetrical and sometimes, especially with the Dragon Balls, it doesn’t really feel like they did it on purpose because the shapes are a bit atypical. There were mold scars on a couple of holds. Despite these things that we picky setters noticed, the holds are fantastic to set with, they climb really well, and our customers love them. Overall we are very psyched and impressed with the new Kingdom holds and definitely recommend everyone get some.
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Element
These guys really went above and beyond for this event. They created custom light-up holds and then came in to set up the dynos and wire them themselves.
Stan from Element setting up the glowing holds for the CWA Dyno Comp.
Thanks for all the help guys!
The holds they used were several from the Spawn series–The Spawn Mega Ledge was the highest catch and nobody even got close. Two of the Spawn Incuts were the next down, but they were easier to catch than the slightly lower Spawn Pinches. The launch holds was the third Spawn incut and there were some smaller Spawn Slopers for feet.
The lights looked great and we’re definitely talking about using them again for this year’s Psychedelia. The holds are really fun to climb on and the sandstone texture works surprisingly well. Now the holds are on a popular white-taped 4 spot on the Left River. The Spawn set comes highly recommended from us at The Spot, and we can’t wait to get the rest of the set!
Here’s a Facebook video of someone dynoing on the lit-up Element Dynos.
See more from Element Climbing Holds
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Rock Candy
We were thrilled to get several of the Blockus pinches from Rock Candy. These are big, blocky, comfortable, fun pinches that we’ve had our eye on for a long time. Kevin used them to set some good & challenging straight up dynos at the comp. The fattest pinch (bottom of the photo) was really hard to stick!
Rock Candy Blockus pinches
We got the Blockus Feature and the Blockus 3xL. We also got the excellent Blockus smalls (5 little pinches to match) that we used as feet for this event but will be hands from here on out. They sent some cool Rock Candy Logo Tape, a nice printed white gaffer’s tape, to tape the dynos with as well.
Now that we reset the Beach we’ve spread the holds around. Two of the big ones are in the middle face of the Hueco right now on Ian Dory’s excellent purple 4 spot. Overall this set is really cool and I think it will always be up on one of our walls cause as soon as they’re clean someone puts them on a problem. I should say that we don’t have much Rock Candy but everything I’ve seen from them lately is quite impressive and I’m looking forward to ordering from them when I can. They’re poured at Aragon so the material is right for us, I saw most of their line recently at the Boulder Rock Club and they looked great, and Brent Ng (their head setter) said his team really likes them. Check out their line here: Rock Candy Holds
Thanks for participating RC!
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Enterprises
Enterprises is known for their walls, but they have completely reworked their hold line this year as well. We saw some incredible huge volumes at the CWA show and the jugs and feet they sent us for the Dyno comp are nice shapes, plus they have a big edge radius so they are comfortable and fun to grab.
Enterprises holds!
I set all the Enterprises dynos on the right side of the Beach and the jump to the bottom big hold in the picture above (The Portaledge) provided some of the most exciting moments of the night. The two Beast holds (top two in the photo) made a nice double catch, and the giant Phat Lip was the launch. The Micro Jugs set they sent us to use as feet were great as well, though we did break one. The material is a urethane, not elastomeric like Aragon but similar to the other urethanes out there that aren’t elastomerics (Habit, et al).
The Phat Lip is still on the right Beach only now it’s an undercling and is the start to several problems including Joel’s 3-ending journey across the wall. The others are being moved elsewhere for our next sets. We can’t wait to get ’em on the Dojo!
There are some really cool shapes in their new line and I’m glad to see them taking the time and spending the money to make their holds a force again. See ’em all: Enterprises Handholds
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Holdtopia
Holdtopia holds
Holdtopia sent us some really cool features. The blue hold is the Bakudan from Godhand, and it a unique and very interesting hold. Here’s another angle of a white one:
The feature is a big dish, but there are also some balls you can grab at the top. I originally envisioned it as a catch hold, but Jake ended up using it as the start for several dynos on the right Beach. You had to hold the top and balance into the dish and then jump out of it. The hardest dyno was a straight-up to match both hands on the purple feature. There was also a left jumping and a big step-across right jumping dyno from this hold, both to one of those big green pinches. The green jugs are the Cheeta Alba Jug L1 and other Cheeta Alba jugs and were used a launch hands for the sideways dynos. The catch pinches are the Cheeta Kaly Swell MEGA set which were also used in one of the World Cups this season.
Holdtopia also gave us a few Godhand Tengu screw-ons but we weren’t able to use them for feet for the comp as we don’t put screw-ons on our walls. They are awesome shapes but the European material doesn’t flex like elastomerics and so they would crack if tightened onto an uneven surface. We’re saving them to use on our wood volumes!
Originally instead of the purple feature we had a large purple HRT Dino Spine hold that is really cool but unfortunately got damaged in shipping so Alfred of Holdtopia gave us the other purple hold instead for the comp. The new purple hold is an Expression hold and I couldn’t find a link to it on the site. Right now you can see it on the front Font–several problems climb through it and there is a great dyno to it as well.
Holdtopia is importing many large European brands and it’s cool to see this kind of variety in the US market now. Our favorites so far are the Godhand line. Check ’em out!
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Volx
Volx holds
Volx is a French company that is now being imported into the US by MadRock. We got a big screw-on hold, the Giga Guru, that we had to build a base for (1″ thick plywood plate cut to match the bottom of the hold, we bolt it to the wall and screw the volume onto it). The other two are pinches from the V-Pure 2.0 Euphoria set with simple single-bolt attachment points. All are comfortable and have a fine texture that is different from most holds on the American market. The volume has a weird dimple in the back of it that is about two-fingers big and feels machined to be perfectly round. It’s a bit strange but it works, and the hold overall is quite fun to use. I’m excited to see what else they come out with.
I can’t find a link to the Volx USA site but if you get in touch with Madrock I imagine they will sort you out: Mad Rock Climbing. To see the holds: Volx Climbing
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E-Grips
E-Grips gave us two of their newest jug, the Giant Caterpillar. They are pretty neat, shallower than I expected but fun to set with. The jug part has several divot areas to use so it’s more complicated than it looks from the front. For the comp we did a 1-2 dyno off them using another e-Grips hold as the finish. Many competitors said they had never seen a dyno like that before. Now both holds are set as facing gastons on Joel’s across-the-Beach journey route that starts on the Enterprises Phat Lip as noted above. We’ve always been big e-Grips fans, and we bet you are too. See their site: e-grips holds
E-Grips new caterpillar jugs.
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So that’s it. Thanks to everyone who participated in the CWA Dyno Comp and thanks to the companies who sent holds. The party was a blast and our customers and members were psyched to have brand new dynos to play with. See you next year!
The Spot Route Setting Blog 