The fifth annual National Capital Bouldering Series has begun and the second of three competitions will take place on Feb. 26 at Centretown’s Vertical Reality.
The tournament is a friendly competition organized by Ottawa’s three rock climbing gyms: Vertical Reality, Altitude Gym, and Coyote Rock Gym.
In the winter months, each gym hosts a competition involving about 90 contestants from the different locations.
Bouldering is a form of rock climbing that doesn’t require ropes and harnesses. Indoor bouldering involves the use of climbing walls in cave-like rooms. Climbers are never far from the ground so crash mats are enough to protect anyone who falls.
The NCBS is a reincarnation of mini-competitions started in 2003 by Jody Miall, co-owner of Coyote Rock Gym and Adrian Das, technical director and head coach at Altitude Gym.
At the time, Das was working at Vertical Reality. These smaller competitions run by Vertical Reality and Coyote Rock Gym eventually faded away, says Das, but when Altitude Gym opened in 2010 they decided to recreate the event with all three gyms under the name the National Capital Bouldering Series.
All three organizers stress the friendliness of the series and say they consider it more of a community gathering than a formal competition.
“I find that the word competition scares some people,” says Petra Slivka-Flagg, owner of Vertical Reality, “but we have some people who come in for the day not realizing there’s a competition and then they choose to participate anyway.”
Carleton student Noah Latchem says bouldering helped him regain his strength last year after a near-death experience with Leptospirosis, a water-spread bacterial infection.
“It was one of the best ways to get strong again because I don’t like gyms or most indoor training, and I couldn’t do proper cardio. It was a great way to get strong through bodyweight workout but also have a lot of fun while doing it,” says Latchem.
All forms of climbing require great muscle strength throughout the body, including in less commonly trained areas such as the hands and fingers.
Each contest consists of 25 “problems”– set routes to be completed – that participants attempt to climb in two-and-a-half hours. Competitors keep track of their own progress on a score sheet, but every climb has to have a witness . Points are based on the number of climbs and the difficulty of those completed. There are also bonus points for a “flash” climb when someone completes the problem on the first try.
At Vertical Reality, most of the problems are mapped out specifically for the event, but are left marked after the competition for other climbers to attempt.
The gym has three designated bouldering “caves,” but for the competition some routes are also set low down on the 54-ft.walls usually used for lead climbing and toproping.
The competitions offer open and recreational categories. The open category is for more experienced climbers and recreational is aimed at those who don’t train as often.
There’s also a youth category for those aged 13-17 and for the first time this year, a 12 and under group. Each category is further subdivided into men’s and women’s sections.