Gladiator Finals Pictures #1 – Redpoint Round by Keith North + Results!!!

Gladiator Finals Photos!!!
We were excited to use many of the hold review holds along with our normal arsenal in setting the 4o redpoint and 2 open finals problems for the Gladiator Finals.  If there is a hold company mentioned in the photo caption of the pictures below, then clicking on the photo will take you to the company’s site where you will be able to check out the rest of their line and see what they’re all about.  Cool?  Cool!

Redpoint Round

Jesse Youngwerth sending O5 at Gladiator Finals 2011 | Keith North

Staring down the mouth of a brand new Atomik pocket on A6 | Keith North

Dallas Milburn using the brand new Element slopers on O7 | Keith North

 

Women's Overall Redpoint winner and Team ABC member Megan Mascarenas topping out the tricky Climb-it pinches on A7 | Keith North

 

Brett Merlin's iron grip on that black dual-tex DRCC pinch isn't enough to keep him from slipping off O6 | Keith North

Team BRC's Dallas Milburn also tried his luck with the pinch. The big orange feature he's moving off is Asana's giant pinch. | Keith North

 

Speaking of Asana, here's a sweet shot of Tyler Youngwerth sticking a dyno to their new, 100% unique Toadstool roof feature. | Keith North

A9 out the Dojo. A tough problem involving much body tension and tricky toe-hookery. | Keith North

 

Daniel Woods climbing O2 | Keith North

Grabbing the big 3 Ball Font Feature on the front of the Font | Keith North

Spot setter Garrett Gregor using the new E-Grips Bubble Wrap Sloper on O9 | Keith North

 

Team ABC's Stefan Lavender showing off his Verve Xeno pants on O6 | Keith North

 

Daniel Woods holding a ridiculous foot cut on O10 | Keith North

And then falling off the last move... Between this and last year's World Cup photos, it's clear we need to start a "pics of Daniel falling" section on the blog. I think he takes good falls because he always tries so hard to hang on (and it usually works). | Keith North

Shawn Raboutou O2 | Keith North

Redpoint Round Results:

Click HERE for The Spot Gladiator Finals page, HERE for adult results, and HERE for youth results.  For Open Finals results check out THIS POST from earlier in the week.

Check in tomorrow for Finals photos and hopefully some video.  Thanks Keith for all the great photos!!!

Coming soon — Battle in the Bubble!

The Spot Bouldering Gym is proud to announce Boulder’s first outdoor pro invitational!!!

This event is the first of it’s kind to be held in Boulder.  Climbing will begin with an indoor redpoint style pro/am where a few lucky folks will win the chance to compete against the best of the best in the pro semis.  From there the top competitors will try their luck  on a brand new wall being built on the shore of the Boulder Reservoir!  More info to come soon, stay tuned…

Highline Slackline Madness!!!

The Highball Highline comp last night was amazing! The weather here in Boulder lately has been unfriendly for climbing outside (to say the least–snow and 0* temps anyone?) and the result was a huge crowd at this ABS sanctioned comp. All in all over 300 climbers came to test their mettle on the 50 new boulder problems. As usual, the crowd consumed a massive amount of fish tacos in record time, and the Avery kegs were flowing for spectators as DJ Dirt Monkey kept the climbers crushing.

Said Parirokh | photo by Keith North

All pictures courtesy Keith North. More pics from Keith

Gauging Open Finals
Of the setters, Jonny, Carlo, Jon, Alex Puccio (guest setter), Nick Sherman (long time Spot comp setter) and I were in attendance for most of the evening. Because the Spot comps have a single final problem for men’s and women’s open, the setters watch the regular comp to try to see who might make finals and how they’re climbing. From this we decide if we need to tweak the finals problems to make them more or less difficult.

Tyler Youngwerth on Women's O11 | photo by Keith North

Setting up the Highline
At eight pm scorecards for the adult session were called in and the highline was quickly set up. On Friday while we were setting Josh Paton (our facilities and safety manager), Adam Broadbent (climbing school) and the slackliners set up the padding and anchor points and tested the leash length and line tightness so it would be ready to go as soon as climbing ended. They also padded the heating duct and taped an “ariel zone” on the line so slackliners wouldn’t get too close to the boulders or hit the duct while doing in-air tricks. The preparation was worthwhile, and the line was ready to go by 8:30 or so.

Jeremy Louis stretching out | photo by Keith North

Tweaking Open Finals
While they were setting the line up Alex and I tweaked up our women’s problem and Carlo, Jonny, Nick and Jon tweaked up the men’s. There was a great debate amongst the crew about whether the women’s would be hard enough, but because the holds were big slopey pinches and the moves were powerful we decided the problem would be okay if we just turned a couple of holds up (i.e. made them harder to hold) and changed out a big pinch at the top for a more precise crimp. We figured the problem should be about 4 Spot +, as the climbers would be tired and two comps ago the 4 Spot + final was about the right grade. The female finalists were: Chauncenia Cox, Gabi Masse, Tyler Youngwerth, Kristin Felix, Audrey Gawrych, Alexis Miller, and Kara Caputo. The men’s problem was also tweaked up a little, and the male finalists were: Paul Robinson, Adam Markert, Gabor Szekely, Ryan Roden, Andre DiFelice, Sebastian Drissi, and Matt Wilder.

Matt Wilder on Men's O11 | photo by Keith North

Highline History
The highline event at the Spot is still relatively young, and up until last year the event was the first time that many of the competitors had even walked a highline.  Michael Payton won last year’s event, though Greg Kalfa’s dramatic backflip that threw him off the line in a huge cartwheel may have been the most memorable moment. Most of the other competitors were happy to just get across the line, though highline master Scott Rogers finished off the evening by walking the line while the crowd threw dodgeballs at him. On our facebook page there is a link to a video of the highline exhibition a few years ago: http://www.facebook.com/posted.php?id=189362658840

Anthony Menzor | photo by Keith North

Highline Madness!!!
This year the ante was upped considerably, with most of the walkers being semi-professional slackliners who are well versed in tricks. Adam started the evening off by testing the line and taking a few leash whippers. From there, one by one, the slackliners got a few minutes on the line to show their stuff. Some seemed hindered by the leash, but all managed a few cool tricks, including Said Parirokh’s jump to the I beam, Michael Payton’s bounce and balance tricks, and a pressed out handstand from Jeremy Louis. Several of the guys tried to land both front and back flips, with a few pretty amazing whippers resulting. Expect video to start showing up on the internet today and tomorrow.

Andy Lewis dive bombing the crowd. | photo by Keith North

The highlight of the evening was when Andy Lewis, a noted slackliner from Humbolt, California, got on the line to finish things off. Andy came out and immediately did an ariel 360, much to the crowd’s delight. From there he did several other cool tricks, throwing t-shirts and stickers as he went. It seemed he’d already won the comp when he did his final trick, a backflip that he LANDED ON THE LINE!!! The crowd went completely nuts. Completely. Nuts. He finished off the evening by doing a bouncing swan dive straight over the crowd (as seen above), swinging dramatically back around and grazing the gigantic Spot Bouldering Series banner that hangs in the center of the gym before grabbing back onto the line and mantling back up so he could exit the line via the top of the Font boulder. It was pretty incredible to watch, and everyone in the crowd was extremely psyched.
video from Michael Payton and Scott Rogers of the flip:

update: more videos are showing up on facebook, including This one by Zack Smith of Andy’s crowd dive.

update 2: Here is a video of Andy doing his first ever highline backflip a few years ago.  When he did it he was the first known person in the entire world to ever land the trick.  Though he has done backflips on low lines in the interim, he didn’t land the highline backflip again until Saturday, Dec 5, during the highline contest at the Spot.

Click here for more on slacklining.

Men’s Open Finals–front of the Hueco
The slackline was quickly dropped and lights were put into place for the Open finals. The men’s proceeded well, with the first few competitors falling all over the place. On his turn Andre Difelice established a new high point, then fell off on a dramatic attempt to dyno to the top. Ryan Roden met the same fate, but Gabor Szekely dispatched the problem handily. Adam Markert cruised as well, going so far as to stop and dance on the last hold before casually mantling over the top. Paul qualified in first, so he climbed last, and he flashed the problem easily–winning the comp.
1. Paul Robinson
2. Adam Markert
3. Gabor Szekely
full results at www.thespotgym.com

Adam Markert flashing Men's O11 | photo by Keith North

Women’s Open Finals–front of the Font
The first woman out, Kara Caputo, hiked her final and Alex and I were thrown into a panic. Kara is a very strong climber, but she made the pinches look like such jugs that we were sure everyone else would hike it as well. We were mostly right, though the two shortest competitors (Kristen Felix and Tyler Youngwerth) met some difficulty with a hop move on the top of the arete. We were assured by all the competitors that the problem was very enjoyable to climb, which was nice, but overall the problem was still a failure, as it was too easy for the competitors and not exciting for the crowd. We learned from the experience, mostly that the girls are much stronger than they used to be, and they’re still capable of pulling hard after 3 hours of climbing, and we need to challenge them much better next time. Unfortunately we had to count back to qualifiers for the finals results.
1. Chauncenia Cox
2. Gabi Masse
3. Audrey Gawrych

Alexis Miller flashing Women's O11 | photo by Keith North

Final thoughts on the Setting
Despite the finals problems not being ideal, overall I think the comp went well. Several of the women finalists were able to complete several Open category problems in the main comp–an improvement from their normal performance. Also, because Alex set instead of competing, the women’s finals was anybody’s game and therefore should have been more exciting. For the men, we made the hardest Open category climbs all around the same grade to encourage the climbers to battle it out instead of deciding O10 was impossible and knowing they made finals so not bothering to climb it. This time everyone had to try to send the top O problems to earn a spot in finals.

A note on setting for kids:
Part of the reason setters come to comps, despite their exhaustion from the long nights of setting, is to watch their problems get climbed and try to learn from them. I particularly enjoy watching the kids climb because it’s always interesting to see what move you think will be easy for kids that they just cannot reach through, and which moves you think will be impossible for kids that they will figure out a way to get through. Our goal is to make the problems doable for all sizes, but you can’t set every problem, especially in the advanced and open categories, for people of extremely diminutive stature. I heard from some that the kids in the youth session found the problems reachy. I’m not sure about this, as I spent part of the evening with Brooke Raboutou, who climbed in the adult session as she had a gymnastics meet earlier in the day. Brooke is 8, and small for her age, but she is an extremely talented climber, and though some of the problems were too reachy for her she managed to climb more in the advanced category then she ever has before. Sasha, a Spot youth team member who is bigger than Brooke but still much smaller than the adults, managed to climb extremely well, sending most of the problems up to A8. Robyn Erbesfield-Raboutou, who is also relatively small, climbed during the adult session and said that she did not find the problems to be particularly reachy. I suppose the jump starts on two of the A problems probably gave some folks trouble, but besides that it should have been fairly equal opportunity. If you came to the comp and felt that a problem or a part of a problem was reachy, or cruxy in some other specific way, and you want to tell us about it please email us (setting@thespotgym.com) or add a comment telling us specifically what and where so we will be able to look at the problems and have an idea how we could make them better next time. We always strive for excellence, after all. Excellence and fun.

Thanks for coming everyone!!!

Highball highline Comp Almost Ready!!!

We’ve been hard at work for the past two days and I’m happy to say that we’ve almost got all the problems up for the comp tomorrow. Of course, we still have to clean up the floor and forerun, but things are coming along.

Perhaps more exciting news–the highline guys have the line set up for practice and are testing tricks, taking huge whippers, and making sure the line is safe. A few slackliners even travelled here from Europe to walk the line!!!

Back to setting news, we have several new DRCC holds to check out as well as the Climb-its we got last month. Come and see us tomorrow–it’s sure to be a good time!

Fill-In Update

Hey Spot patrons! So as Jackie mentioned earlier the setting crew will be a little scattered surrounding Thanksgiving. However, that hasn’t stopped us from doing our best to give you some new routes! This Tuesday Jon, JJ and I set on the front of Hueco, putting up some killer 3’s, 4’s and 5 spots. On Wednesday I was joined by Eric Harrison (EZ) and Gabi Masse. While both are new to setting at the Spot, they did great job and I really appreciated their help. We put up 14 new problems on the Font and Left River Granite, Mostly in the 3-4 spot range . You might start to see EZ initials more frequently in the future…

We also got really cool new holds from DRCC, a company that I’m excited about for their great shapes, awesome marbling colors and super slick duel-tex. You can check them out on the  front and right side of the Font boulder. I hope you enjoy climbing on them.

Finally, I would like to get some feedback form you guys! What would you like to see on this blog? What would you like to see in the gym(setting related)? The Routes? From the Setters? Please Please leave a comment!!!

Thanks, happy climbing!

Fill-in update November 10th and 11th

We put many of the awesome new Climb it holds to work this week, with new problems on the back and small scoop of the Hueco, the entire River Granite wall, and the right side of the Font boulder. Carlo is out of town so there were only four of us on Tuesday and three on Wednesday, but we still managed to set 35 new problems for your climbing pleasure. Enjoy!

Fill-in Update

We spent most of both days this week filling in the Dojo, with some light fill on the back of the Hueco as well. You’ll notice some unfamiliar initials–those are from a couple of guest setters who are helping us out a little bit. (Jackie will be leaving mid-November for a while, so there’ll be more guests to come.)

Setter Initials:
CT = Carlo Traversi
jG = Jon Glassberg
JPH = Jackie Hueftle
JH = Jonny Hork
JJ or J2 = Jay Jay Jeffrey

Guest Setter Initials:
AP = Alex Puccio
GM = Gabi Masse
DR = Dev Ranjan

We also have a new hold washer, Jeff Lambert. If you are interested in washing holds for a trade membership (1 month of membership for every 6 hours of work) shoot us an email or get in touch on our facebook page.

Sweet!

Update on the Psychedelia re-set

This week we did a moderate fill-in on both sides of the River, the entire Font, and the front of the Hueco. Next week we will finish the Hueco and start adding to the Dojo. It’s snowing outside, so come to the Spot and enjoy!

Psychedelia – Aftershock

Psychedelia turned out amazing this year, with some truly next-generation tape art by many talented volunteers and some hold paintings that qualified as works of art. The gym was packed for both the youth session (12-4) and the adult session (5-8) and all the Avery Beer and Wahoo’s tacos were consumed as climbers and spectators alike hung out for the exciting pro finals and large raffle. DJ Dirt Monkey did us right, increasing the tempo of his music to fit perfectly with the excitement of finals as the top 7 men and 6 women gave their all on the pumpy wide-pinch pvc pipes we bolted to the walls of the Dojo.

The view from above at Psychedelia 2009, photo courtesy UCMag

In the end, Paul Robinson won the men’s open finals with a confident flash of a powerful problem that bouted all other comers.  Adam Markert, climbing in his spiderman suit, got second after pumping out on the headwall.  Matt Wilder misread the beta at the top of the pipe, and after doing a committing move to a small crimp (i.e. foothold) he ran out of time and was forced to accept third place.  Other finalists for men were visiting Frenchman Sebastien Drissi, Chase Cazedeseuss, Dev Ranjan, and Geoff Sluyter.

The Women’s finals were perhaps more exciting, as first climber (and last comp’s 3rd place winner) Anne Tedesco campused out the women’s angling pvc pipe first try.  After getting her wrong heel up she fell off the next move, and was so worked she was unable to reach her previous high point in the remainder of her four minutes.  Kristen Felix went next, and having missed a rule was called off on her first go.  Her next few goes she got to the middle of the pipe, but was unable to reach Anne’s highpoint.  Gabi Masse came next, and to the crowd’s delight pulled onto the headwall and made a new highpoint on her second go.  Chelsea Rude matched Gabi’s highpoint on her flash attempt, and was able to reach the next hold as well before falling to the mats.  The last two competitors, World Cup Champions Alex Johnson and Alex Puccio, looked extremely strong on the pipe, with Alex Johnson crushing four holds past Chelsea (and only two holds from the top) before succumbing to a foot slip.  Alex Puccio did slightly better, with her foot staying on the volume long enough for her to grab the next hold before falling.

The monster on the front of the Hueco boulder, photo courtesy UCMag

Some highlights of the citizen’s comp were the mouth problem, in which competitors climbed out the sharp teeth of the huge monster on the front of the Hueco boulder, and the coffin problem, where you had to climb in and close the door on yourself to complete the problem–scary!!

The costume contest was a hit as well, with everything from 50’s swingers to two giant sharpies to a guy dressed like poop and twins painted with graffiti battling it out for first place.  After much applause, chief judge Annika Heid declared the winner to be a girl dressed like a giant chicken, since her luminescent white feathered wings and body and bright orange mohawk seemed to win the crowd over.  At the youth comp most of the teams came dressed in theme, with the ABC/BRC kids in tutus (yes, even the boys) and team Sik Bird from Movement painted with wings.

Photos are slowly showing up on Facebook, and we should have some soon here as well.  Results will be posted sometime early this week.  Thanks everyone for coming and helping make this the best Psychedelia yet!!!

(Oh yeah, and if you missed it the comp but want to see the blacklights we’ll be leaving them on all day today, Sunday, October 25th, as well, for open blacklight climbing.)

Psychedelia!

Hello Spot boulderers!  Psychedelia is here this week and its gonna be nuts.  Here is a video from last year to give you an idea of what is to come if you have not experienced a true Psychedelia yet…

The route setters at The Spot take costumes very seriously.  We would like to offer some tips on what might be a good costume and what might be a seriously bad choice this Psychedelia. 

First we will start off with some very bad choices and why they are such aweful decisions…

Sunny and Sher do not belog at Psychedelia and not only will this not glow under black light but seriously, this couple looks absolutly stupid.

Although this costume is totally rad and would almost certainly light up like a Christmas tree under the black lights, the functionaluity of this suit is less then desireable.  Remember, you are going to have to climb, drink free beer, and hug your friends when you send hard routes, so keep the hand weapons to a minimum…

So now that you have an idea of what not to wear, we have decided to give you a few ideas for your costume this year that will really knock your socks off.

This is a great example of black light paint usage, you can get really detailed and you get to paint on your friends and then come to the Spot and get Psychedelic.

This is a great example of a spectator costume that might be the best costume ever, black light or not, and it will almost certainly get some attention in the costume contest.

We could learn a lot from “Tron Guy”.  His costume has all the essentials for Psychedelia.  Skin tight, glowing, original, and slightly awkward.  The perfect costume for Psychedelia…

We are looking forward to the biggest comp of the season and if you are not there you are truly going to be missing one of the best partys / comps of the year.

See you on Saturday!