Archive
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!!!
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!
Big Hold Company List Updates
It’s that time again. This industry is growing like crazy. Please continue sending me updates. Here’s what I added (or finally added) today:
Bloc Syndicate is the European distributor for all the fantastic brands listed above. To see their online catalog (no website yet) click here: Bloc Syndicate Digital Catalog 2014
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Speaking of Kilter, somehow in my bid to avoid favoritism I’d completely neglected to put Kilter on this list at all. Now it’s added:
kiltergrips.com ~ sales@kiltergrips.com ~ Boulder, CO USA
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Also from the USA is Kingdom Climbing:
kingdomclimbing.com ~ orders@kingdomclimbing.com ~ So Cal USA
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And distributing many European brands in the US including Artline, Cheeta, Holdz, God Hand, HRT, and Expression, we have Holdtopia:
holdtopia.com ~ contact via website ~ Pennsylvania/Salt Lake, USA
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Speaking of Cheeta, they’ve been added to the Europe list as well:
cheeta-holds.com ~ France
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And God Hand has been added to the Asia/Australia/New Zealand list:
godhandhold.com ~ info@godhandhold.com ~ Asia
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Update: Also Squadra:
squadraholds.com
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I think that’s it for now. More on the way!
Hold Review – Escape Climbing Holds
Escape is a small company out of Minneapolis, Minnesota, that sells custom climbing holds and a small variety of clothing and training and gym accessories. We’d seen a sample hold from them a few years ago and we thought it looked like a copy of a bubble wrap. Then someone accidentally dropped it on the concrete floor and it promptly broke. We weren’t even trying to break it, which is a standard part of our hold reviews, and it broke, so we kinda wrote them off. We continued not paying much attention to what they offered until this year when a mutual friend reached out to tell us that Escape had grown and changed and asked if we’d be interested in doing a review. After looking over their website it became clear that Escape climbing is serious about becoming a mature hold company and that their small but worthy selection of holds looked quite fun to climb on. We said we’d be happy to do a review, and here’s what we got:
What we got
From the top left picture you can tell they did a nice job packaging their holds for shipping. They chose a variety of styles to send us. Everything arrived in great shape, and we were very excited to unpack it all and put it up on the Dojo.
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About
Escape is a small operation. The owner and main shaper is Ryan Angelo, and his wife Karen is the other half of the business. Occasionally they have interns or get extra help for big orders, but most of the time it’s a two-pony show. According to their honorable mention on CBJ’s 2014 Grip List, Escape will stay small because Ryan will only produce the best of the best. “My goal is to have a very refined line of holds,” he says. “I won’t ever have a huge selection because I retire/replace sets that I don’t like or don’t receive good reviews from routesetters.” (Read the article: CBJ 2014 Grip List.)
Ryan has stayed true to his statement and perusing their offering we saw more “I’d buy that” than “meh”. They’re still selling the bubble-wrap-like holds, aka Nemesis series, but they’re not really bubbles, instead they’re tiny hexagons, and apparently they’re quite popular and as now texture sharing seems to be much more common we won’t hold it against them. Ryan’s also come up with his own texture–a cool-looking all-over design of different sized octopus suckers he calls Craters. We got a Crater sloper to review.
Close-up of the Crater texture.
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Mix & Molding
Escape pours their own holds. The mix is urethane, similar to what Element produces (vs the Aragon elastomeric or the Habit urethane). All the holds we got were this green color (below) and the color was consistent. We didn’t try hard to break any yet but they did well when we set with them through several cycles on our uneven walls and did not seem brittle at all. So far we haven’t had any polishing issues.
The bigger holds are hollow-backs and they are nicely done and seem stable (photos below).
The dual-tex is more matte than shiny, but it’s a really nice smooth matte that is effective as a dual-tex and looks good.
The logos didn’t bother us at all on any of the holds.
The bolt hole edges aren’t rounded out at all which is ok but makes a sharp mono if you can get a finger in it.
Detail on the dual-tex edges with the thumb ball. There’s a scrape on this one, but it’s no big deal.
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Dot Crimps
Dot Crimps
A nice little set of six flat to slightly incut edges with dual-tex faces and a small textured ball for the thumb.
The Yay
Nice matte dual tex. Feels smooth and looks good.
Handholds are good full pad edges and are comfortable to grab.
Nice hand positions.
Textured ball thumb catches are nice.
Pre-cut set screw hole.
Great little set.
$32
The Nay
Sharp edged bolt holes (but you can’t get your fingers in ’em so no biggie).
Not elastomeric so could crack on an uneven surface. No issues with that so far though at all. I will update if we do break one. Besides that, nothing. We loved these.
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XL Chicken Head
Escape Climbing XL Chicken Head
One big stalactite.
The Yay
Really cool looking.
Texture is comfortable sandstone style with nice rounded contours.
Good enough to use on a roof on harder climbs. Would be a good mini-mantle hold on vertical.
Everyone wants to grab it when they look at it so great customer awe value.
Pre-drilled set screw hole.
We want 3 more.
XL Chicken Head on a volume
The Nay
Too hard to use on the roof on easy or moderate climbs.
Sharp edged bolt hole.
Again, overall pretty solid material though we have had a few edge chips. Not worried about the whole thing cracking though (ala resin) and even some elastomerics have been chipping lately so with good handling shouldn’t be an issue.
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XL Crater Sloper
Unique octopus sucker texture, like collapsed bubbles. You can buy this as a single hold or in a set with four other Crater slopers.
The Yay
Nice brick shape.
Cool looking texture.
Interesting grip positions.
Sometimes your fingers fit right in the dots, which makes this somehow more fun than your normal hold to grab.
The Nay
Some people don’t fit in the suckers very well.
Sticks out from the wall far at the top so you can ham-hock it. That can be a plus or a minus depending on what you’re trying to set.
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Conclusions
Overall the holds looked good and were fun to set with and climb on. The material is my only concern, as it isn’t an elastomeric like Kilter/Urban Plastix/E-Grips, but again, our walls are more challenging than most everyone else’s and so far the material has held up fairly well with only a few slight edge chips against it. I will update if that changes.
Escape has clearly transitioned into a professional company worthy of attention from setters and orders from gyms. Though they are small, all the holds we’ve seen are worth having multiple copies of and Ryan says they are capable of filling big orders. Ryan said a few more things I’d like to share, but read the next part first:
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Bonus
We liked the test holds so much that before we finished reviewing them we ordered more from Escape. We got the Disc Sloper, the Ball Sloper (the dual-tex ones at the top), the Large Ledges, the Crater Mini-Jugs, the Crater Pinches, and two more Crater Slopers.
Our newest Escape Holds
We actually had more issues with our follow-up order than our hold test order in terms of quality. One of the follow-ups arrived with a chipped edge and the color isn’t consistent across the holds. They’re all red, but some are a lighter or dustier red than the others. Specifically the bottom middle pinch in the picture above is different than the rest, and the little jugs are lighter than the big craters and big slopers.
Edge chip.
The color difference. The left pinch is much lighter than the rest.
The Crater jugs are definitely mini-jugs and are good enough for V2 and up on vertical. As soon as you get even a little steep they’re V5+ holds though.
The dual-tex sloper ball is awesome and very challenging. You can rotate it to give more or less textured surface to grab, which is neat because otherwise the hold would be similarly usable no matter how you rotated it. This way you can really dial it in to the difficulty you want. It’d be amazing to set a whole problem with a bunch of them, or the dual-tex balls + the dual-tex dishes.
Dual Tex Ball
The dual-tex dish (like the ball but dishy and with two thumb-catch blobs) is really hard to use and match on on less than vertical as it’s pretty hard to hold so you end up hogging it with one hand. Right now ours is on one of the hardest problems on the Hueco.
The thin Crater Pinches are cool and fun to use.
Nice hollow back on the bigger Crater Pinch
The large ledges are smaller than I thought they’d be and also thinner (top to bottom-wise) but so far are doing fine.
Nice hollow-back on the Large Ledge.
Finally, the other Crater (octopus sucker) slopers are cool and fun to climb on. Everything in the Crater series looks amazing when it gets chalked up because of the way the chalk sticks to the suckers.
Cool.
Dual-Tex Ledges and Slopers.
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What Ryan Said
I wrote to Ryan re: the color discrepancy and edge chip. Here is what he said:
Hey Jackie,
Sorry to hear about the chip and color inconsistencies. I alway stand behind my product and warranty things like this (exchange the holds, credit on new order, etc), so just let me know.
Cool. Good warranty. We’ve already got ’em up on the wall though and, as he says below, we do use tape at The Spot so it’s not a huge deal to us.
Gyms that are tapeless and order exact RAL colors I am very careful with. For whatever reason I thought you still used tape at the Spot and I just pulled red holds off the shelf for you…which can be from different red batches (Germany, Japan, USA, custom reds).
Ok, that makes sense. I still feel that any order of any single color from any company should be the same color across the board as even with tape it looks nice to have identically colored holds up on the wall if they’re on the same problem or are the same style. Maybe a further labeling system with Red1, Red2, Red3 would solve this issue so every gym gets a consistent color batch. I’m sure if you specify though he will send identical color sets.
Glad to hear he distributes in German and Japan as well!
In my email I’d asked if he hand mixes each batch, since that was a guess for the color inconsistency. He said:
I have switched to a dispensing machine which allows me to do large batches of single colors. It keeps my color batches consistent and the quality of my holds higher when compared to hand mixing.
Awesome.
Finally, here’s what he had to say about the development of his company:
I started making holds in my garage 8 years ago for fun, and it grew to the point where I quit the local gym and started doing it full time (3 years ago). Its pretty much a 2 person team with my wife Karen and I. However, this summer I have 2 interns helping out, and I also bring in help for the really large orders. We have refined the process quite a bit in the last few years, and Escape is at the point where large commercial gyms can take a more serious look at us.
I agree, from what we’ve seen Escape is ready and able to produce high quality, interesting climbing holds that your setters and customers will enjoy. We’ve been impressed with the Escape we have and will definitely be keeping an eye on them as they come out with more holds in the future.
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SUPER EXTRA BONUS
Ryan also included a set of Escape impact hex bits. They are longer than normal hex bits and we were really excited about them for those times when a regular bit is too long to be practical (i.e. can’t reach the bolt cause the bolt-hole is too deep). This long of a bit with a quick-chuck end used to be quite hard to find, and I’m glad to see a climbing company making them easily available. I should say that a longer bit like this takes a bit of getting used to for stripping most holds, so I’ll probably just keep it in a pocket for those times when we really need it. Very cool, thanks Ryan!
Check out Escape’s (very nice) website to see their line and get some of your own!
Setter Profile Update: Ian Powell
If you’re around the Spot much you probably know Ian Powell. He spends most of his time shaping holds for his company, Kilter Grips, but sometimes he sets a problem or two for us and they’re always interesting and creative. His initials are IP, check out his profile here: Ian Powell Setter Profile
On a side note, we’ve got the full Kilter line 2x over at The Spot and we love setting with them. Click here to check ’em out:
Prinz – The (Long Awaited) Hold Review
You may recognize the Prinz logo from Bomber Holds. Prinz bought the shapes and the logo from them and began shaping and pouring a bunch of new shapes as well. Owner Ryan came around Boulder with some samples for all the gyms to check out. He gave us a sample pack, plus I talked him into giving us a couple of edges and slopers and two bigger holds, a large blocky pinch and a mega sloper, to test.
A little bit of everything! The standard sample pack is 5 different holds and you can order one off the Prinz website to check Prinz out for yourself.
This review is in a slightly different format than the others as we started writing it a while ago. We really wanted to see how the holds held up over time and that is part of the reason for the delay. Thanks to Ryan for his patience in waiting for this review to come out!
In case you missed it, here’s the first half of our Prinz review: Prinz Initial Impressions
Prinz Review Part 2
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The Material
Prinz holds are made of urethane, and it’s the more resin-like urethane (semi-rigid) instead of super flexy urethane. Some gyms prefer this, some prefer the other, most that I know use both. We are skeptical of this type of urethane at The Spot because of our walls, but Ryan brought some in for us to try and break, and we were pleasantly surprised. Read on:
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Break Testing
Ryan knows how we break everything at The Spot and he was anxious to find out if his mix would break. Upon first glance I said yes, it definitely would break, but he challenged me to break one so we took one of the samples and proceeded to abuse it in all the ways we normally abuse holds here at The Spot.
1. The Concrete Floor
Ryan and I hurled the hold over and over at the concrete floor. It did not explode. Eventually a bit of the edge dented in and broke as you see here:
Shorn plastic. Not brittle-explody plastic. Pretty good break, didn’t interfere with the integrity of the hold, and it was easy to sand into a thumb catch. UPDATE: It’s now been broken like this for over a year and still works great.
2. The Uneven Wall
Sadly I can’t find a picture of this, but we took the hold and put it across the most concave section of wall we could find, then tightened it down. Surprisingly, the hold flexed into the concave without breaking. I loosened it and did it again. Same result. Impressive.
3. The Test of Time
Despite the strength of the holds I was concerned that over time they’d become more brittle and more prone to breaking. Not so. Our Prinz holds have held up great and I don’t think we’ve broken even one in the time we’ve had them. The edge of one has become a bit polished though:
The edge of this one has got a bit polished over time, but since we’ve got a vinyl-topped floor it seems all our holds are falling victim to this.
The hold still climbs fine and, again, we’ve got holds from every company doing this right now because the vinyl topped floor means more dust and people don’t clean their shoes. Sigh.
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Shapes
We definitely feel that Prinz is strongest in its larger shapes. Of the holds we have, the big yellow pinch is a joy to use and the huge purple feature is one of my top 10 favorite holds.
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Big Pinch #88
Big Pinch! Ours is yellow.
See it on their website – Prinz Big Pinch #88
The Big Pinch #88 is basically a large (comparatively, the size is between XL-3XL depending on the company) square cut pinch with a twist–it’s a bit of a sloper on one side and quite a jug on the other and it isn’t perfectly straight so you can use it in a variety of ways and it’s easy to tweak to make it harder or easier. The Pinch is quite comfortable and makes a good hold for any grade of route depending on how it is used. We’ve underclinged it, mantled it, jumped to it, flipped it, etc… A popular hold that we could easily use more of, and is definitely worth the $$.
10/10
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The Grip
Prinz Holds “The Grip” Feature
Our Grip is purple and we love it. The main feature is basically a big slopey edge that is pretty good once you get onto it but the large rounded bulge makes it hard to hit properly. Upside-down the volume makes a cool 3-angle sloper/pinch. It’s comfortable, fun to use, challenging, looks great, and has held up fantastically. A very solid hold. We keep finding new uses for this thing and we want about 3 more and think every other gym should get some too.
10/10
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We didn’t get any of Prinz’ other big features but he has several cool 5XL features and here are the three in particular that we are excited to check out next:
Prinz Mr. Slug
Prinz Half Moon
Big Pinch #86
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One more cool thing about Prinz–Ryan has this tattoo on his leg with all the places he’s been in the world filled in. He’s got a way to go still, but I think it’s pretty sweet!
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Other Yay:
You can get all holds with bolts or bolts + t-nuts if needed.
Large variety of weird small crimps and feet which are perfect for home walls and for mixing it up in a gym where customers are too used to a certain style of shape.
Potential spinners have pre-recessed screw points.
The features are really cool.
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The Nay:
The Prinz website shows most of their holds in 90’s multicolor. It makes it a little hard to tell what’s going on and we recommended using solid colors in the future, which it seems Prinz has been moving towards. For ordering, it’s no issue to get whatever color you want.
Some holds are martini or mixed bolts/screws.
We think their newer shapes are better than their old shapes and we can’t wait to see what other features and new holds they come out with next!
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Pricing
Prinz has recently lowered prices making them one of the more affordable brands on the market. Prinz offers gyms a 25% discount and offers free shipping to all domestic (in the continental US) customers–meaning gyms and retail customers can easily figure their total cost using the website.
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Conclusions:
Prinz makes some great big features and for their smaller holds you’ll want to pick and choose depending on your needs. Perfect for wood walls and surprisingly able to stand up to the abuse meted out at an uneven concrete-walled gym like The Spot. Ryan is a nice guy who cares about climbing, and it’s worth supporting this small company with an order.
So that’s it for now with the Prinz Review. Go check out their features and make sure to get yourself The Grip!
Kevin Climbs Big Worm!
Sorry for being the slowest blogger ever. Between Kilter and coaching and setting and trying to climb I’ve been quite busy. In any case, coming soon we’ll post reviews for Escape, ENIX, and PUR holds. Til then, enjoy this recently recovered video of Spot setter Kevin Cuckovich sending Big Worm (V14?) last summer at Mount Evans. Nice one Kevin!
[vimeo 91970108]Hold Review – Capital Climbing
Up and coming yet accomplished hold shaper Chris Neal has started his own company, Capital Climbing. From all the photos we’ve seen Capital’s initial offerings look pretty awesome, and a few months ago they sent us a few holds to try out. See packaging and initial impressions here:
Capital Climbing Initial Impressions
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Mix
The holds are poured by Element Climbing. Element has a solid mix with high-quality texture that has been holding up great with all the holds we’ve gotten that were poured by them (Element, Enix, and Capital) so we feel comfortable ordering from them. We haven’t had any polishing issues thus far. Their colors are great and this green in particular is a favorite–it really pops!
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Clasts
Close-up of the Capital Climbing Small Clasts
The Small Clasts are comfortable rounded edges.
The Yay
These little holds are some of my new favorites.
Nice, comfortable, slightly incut rounded edges that make good gastons and side pulls.
Side view.
Fun to climb on.
The artistic touches are well done and add visually to the shape.
The Nay
The smallest of the 10 is a little smaller than I’d like it to be in that you load 1-2 fingers instead of three or all four like the rest of the set. This is fine, probably good for creating options, but it just isn’t as comfortable as the others.
The edges of the holds are a tad soft so if you rub them together you can dent the edges a little, so we were worried at first. We got them in the late fall and six months later they are holding up great and we haven’t had any quality or breaking issues.
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Font Slopers
Large Font Slopers.
Fun blob slopers with Fontainebleau-style detailing.
The Yay
Good shapes, useful for pressing problems and good for pulling on as well.
Nice sloper and slopey pinch set.
Pretty to look at.
The Nay
Like the Clasts, these Font Slopers have soft edges. Also like the Clasts, it hasn’t been an issue in the 6+ months we’ve had them.
The cuts between the font texture are narrow and deep. I think it’d be nice if they were a bit smoother and shallower, like the actual rock, so the texture was a bit more useful for the climber. The sharp lines don’t affect your climbing experience negatively at all, but a bit smoother in the lines could give you more of the texture he was probably going for here.
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Striation Sloper
Side view. Can’t find my “on the wall” shot of this one. Will update when I find it.
One of a set of 3XL features.
The Yay
This thing is awesome.
A big, comfortable, moderate sloper feature with rounded edges.
Fantastic texture.
We love it.
The Nay
We’ve got nothing even slightly negative to say about this hold. It’s amazing. The other two probably are as well. Here’s a picture. Buy them.
Striations 3XL Sloper Set
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Conclusions
A very professional first offering from Capital. The holds are top quality in design, texture, and material, and we can’t wait to order his Barnacles and other sets.
Big Barnacle Feature
Chris Neal is constantly shaping, and he clearly is a foam whisperer. We are very excited to see what he will come up with next!
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More from Capital
Fracture Feature
This is a seconds pile. We don’t have any of these, but they all look great and we’re looking forward to getting some soon. The big Fonts look like he worked out the seams a bit more and they look like they’ll feel amazing. We can’t wait to get the rest of the Clast line! And check out those Barnacles!
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Capital is poured at Element, which now owns Cheap Holds as well. See what Capital has to offer on the Cheap Holds website here: Capital Climbing Holds
Email Chris with questions, ideas, orders, etc: capitalclimbingholds@gmail.com
Like Capital Climbing on Facebook to see all their newest shapes!
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