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General Climbing Discussion

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Anyone go to the Comp on Sunday? 18-May-2004 At 4:04:35 PM dodgy

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Yep, lots of fun for all...And it was nice to see the kids get on all their routes without tears
but,
the route setting needs to improve, I feel the same mistakes were made as last year when the routes were way too easy, again.

If two guys top out on two out of three of their B grade routes, then the first heat of the womens A, then come equal fourth in the mens A grade 2nd heat (on the third last hold) there is something wrong. (Please everybody, I am not knocking the climbers!!!)Comps aren't endurance events, but after doing four comp routes climbers shouldn't be able to nearly finish an A grade route! And this sort of thing happened in too many categories. As a judge I felt that the routes didn't increase in difficulty (either at all, or enough) from start to finish. I believe the audience response to watching a comp should not be "I wonder if this climber will make it to the top", but "I wonder where this climber will be spat off". If you have (for example) James competing (nice work BTW), the route should TEST him. And if he is better than the other climbers, they should not be topping out with him (all the competitors in the 2nd heat, including the B graders where within two holds).
Lets give the climbers a 'nice' route to start, build a bit of confidence, shake out the body and nerves. But then they have to start working...
My thoughts are that there should be at least a six to ten grade increase over the range of a comp route. So if the Mens B grade 2nd heat starts at 18 let it top out at say 24,
then the final at 26...
The A grade 2nd heat should maybe start at 22, finish at 28
Then the final 24-30ish...
Let's make it interesting