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Stirling Spiders

Wow! The 3rd and final round of the YCS has come and gone already... Time surely does fly. This years Youth Climbing Series in Scotland has certainly been a rollercoaster of emotions for a lot of kids! I can talk from experience in the South Scotland as I have been coaching many of the kids entering these competitions and all I can say is that all these kids deserve medals for the dedication, training and continual pressure they put themselves under. 

As much as the YCS is meant to be a relaxed kids competition, it gets beefed up by the fact that only the top 3 in each category can make it through to the finals! This years regional rounds have witnessed the most competetive categories ever seen in Scotland. In Youth D and above, to make finals, you actually have to be at the top of your game! This is only a good thing for improving the standard to which our young climbers can achieve - it's survival of the fittest at work.

Anyway, the night before the final round, Iain Sneddon, Mike Mullins and myself were hard at work setting boulders and routes at "The Pleasance" climbing gym at the Edinburgh University Centre for Sporting Excellence. We set a variety of styles across a range of grades that would hopefully challenge the best of the bunch the following day. It ended up being the latest I have ever had to set for a YCS. We were there until 21:30 (closing time), something I had never thought would happen and also hope never to repeat again. 

On the day of the competition the centre was packed to breaking point! It was quite unbelievable that 75 kids and their parents/family members could all fit into such a small space, but somehow we managed it. The climbing I saw that day was nothing short of inspiring. Across ten categories, I don't think I saw one kid in any of them not giving it their all!

Youth E and D girls where the smallest category with only 3 entrants in each, but despite this the fight for 1st place was fierce. In Youth E, Katie Moore and Stephanie Millar have been neck on neck throughout every round, with Katie tipping Stephanie in the two previous. Round 3 proved no different, but with only 1 point separating them! I am proud to say I coach Katie, but she'll have to watch her back if she wants to keep ahead of the very inspiring Stephanie.

Youth D had a similar fight between some very talented climbers, Lisa Kean and Caitlin Storie. In the end Lisa came out on top by what was only 1 point (a slap and touch of a hold) - it must be pay back for Glasgow when Caitlin had tipped Lisa to 1st place :D

Youth E Boys on the other hand was a bigger category. The winner was the crowd favourite, Leo Harland-Sendra, last years podium 2nd in the Series Finals! Young Thomas Miedzybrodski came 2nd with Caitlin's (from Youth D) brother Andrew coming a close 3rd!

Youth D Boys had another strong bunch of climbers with Matthew Fall, Rory Whyte and Evan Davis battling it for top positions. Their finalist positions had more or less been secured as they where all consistent podium placed in every round, but the question on everyones minds was who would take the final round first place. Matthew had been unstoppable the last two rounds but Rory was determined to take his place. Rory's determination was apparent after a phenomenol climb in a super final against Matthew for first place! Matthew had fallen from the last move, but Rory had only just held the second last hold before making a wild jump and catching (not dropping) the final hold! I think George (Rory's Dad) might have had a mild seizure...

The competition is only getting hotter as we move up the categories. Entering into the Youth C's the number of participants increases as does the standard of all those competing. Youth C Girls was Rhiannon Freireich's for the taking, before she went and broke her arm during training the folowing week! So stepping up to the pedestal was Emma Davidson and Holly Davis who would go onto a super final to see who would take the South Scotland Series Crown... Emma was victorious!

Youth C Boys was in fact the most competetive category so far with 6 boys all with a chance at making finals. David Miedzybrodski had been an unstoppable force in the two previous rounds with flawless perfromances and an almost pristine score card with practically all tops across each round. Round 3 was no different, once again he demolished routes and boulders in his very focussed, quick and strong style. 2nd and 3rd was up for grabs with Sam Harland-Sendra, Rory Schoehuys, Connor Moore, Euan Farmer and Robert Davidson all with an equal opportunity to get that podium. There was impressive performances from all - but in the end it was Sam and Rory who ended up taking the places. I would like to say though that Euan Farmer and Connor Moore were both the youngest and still managed to get 5th and 4th place respectively... Effort!

The Youth B Girls was probably the next most competetive category. Eilidh Vass Payne had pretty much got this sowed up with a string of 1st places in the rounds previous and she made a hat trick of it with a third 1st place at the Pleasance. Kirsten Gray was favourite for 2nd but surprisingly dropped the last route a bit lower than expected, though she still managed to retain her 2nd place in the overall rankings. The real competition was for 3rd place with Gabriella Stewart and Keira Farmer eager for a chance to prove themselves worthy for the finals. In the end, Keira only just nabbed 3rd place with an epic performance on the final route that got her 2nd place in the 3rd round! A special mention as well to Jodie Brown (5th) and Claudia Charlwood (4th) who both did amazing across the whole competition.

Youth B Boys was a surprisingly big category overall and with some very strong contendors as well. Euan McFadyen, Ivan Bialy and Ian Bownes all represented themselves well across each round, but in the final it was Euan that took gold in a strong super final performance - the super final was a traverse I had to make up last minute when Ivan and Euan cruised up their final with apparent ease...

Finally, the Youth A categories! The oldest category in the competition was well represented in both the males and females. In the girls, it was Eleanor Hopkins who took first place overall with a hat trick of 1st places across all the rounds - not surprising from a current Irish Team member. 2nd was Beth Scott who was biting at Eleanors heels and missed out on a joint 1st placing by only 1 point!!! And in third was Megan Saunders.

The boys category was pretty big with 12 competitors in total. The top 3 contendors were Alexander Bosi, Fraser Mcllwraith and Euan King. All of these lads are long time competitors in the YCS. Alexander tipped Fraser to 1st place overall but was 2nd in the final round to the boulder beast. Euan King was 3rd place overall and 4th in the final round.

And that pretty much sums up the 2013 Regional Series of the YCS in South Scotland. It has been a fantastic set of rounds this year with an amazing glimpse into the developing and very promising talent coming out of Scotlands Climbing walls. Speaking as a very proud coach representing EICA, two thirds of the podium places belonged to kids training at EICA! That is a pretty good result :D 

Nice on guys! Looking forward to our Scottish Team in the finals and seeing everyone giving it their all - CRUSH!

Last Saturday was the first round of the YCS for many regions round the country including both North and South Scotland. In the North it was held at Inverness Leisure Centre and in the South it was at Stirling's "The Peak"!A host of competitors and coaches checking out myself and Jonny's creations (Photo By Rachel Carr)

This year was set to be the biggest one yet with 75 kids participating in total! This is massive for our regional rounds and it really shows just how Climbing as a sport is growing year after year. Rock Climbing is now considered to be the fastest growing sport in the world taking over from Skateboarding which has been number one for the last 20 years. I believe that the growth of the sport relies heavily on the regional work put into getting more kids into the sport such as events like this - if we can keep up the hard work going into these events, then the future for Climbing is going to be getting brighter for sure!

Our leader, Area Youth Co-ordinator Scott Forsyth (Photo by Rachel Carr)This years YCS is not only the biggest it's ever been, but its probably also looking at being the most competetive in each category we've ever had. There are so many kids in our Southern region that deserve a podium place and thus an opportunity to go to the YCS Finals in June, but the categories are so dense with strong climbers all operating at a high level that it becomes a real fight for the opportunity to go. This of course makes my job as setter and coach very tough indeed.

The day before I have to set the boulders and routes to a level that wil:

1. Split the field of strong candidates in a fair unbiased way (i.e. no big reachy moves and in a variety of styles and technical skills so that the most developed don't have advantages i.e.only the most skilled will get through)
2. Be enjoyable for the majority of the groups and not just acting as a splitter for the top guys and girls.
3. Hopefully split everyone without a need for a superfinal as it becomes a long day if this happens.

These are my main parameters as a Routesetter for the YCS Rounds.

This of course becomes very difficult when you set 3 x Routes and 3 x Boulders and in order for the meat of the climbers to enjoy it, they have to top the first 2 of each! This makes things harder as the pressure is all put on one route and one boulder which if not set perfectly, could lead to a lot of joint 1st places in the more competetive categories.A YCS Competitor cranking it out on one of Stockings yaldi test pieces! (Photo by Rachel Carr)

Saturday's competition in Stirling was set by myself and a good friend of mine, Jonny Stocking (Junior British Champion). We arrived at "The Peak" around 8am and got together a plan of where the routes and boulders would be set. Because I am the Scottish Coach and heavily involved with the top climbers in each category either through 1:1 coaching or training events, I know pretty well the right grade to set the routes at and what will hopefully split each category... saying that... it is still hard work getting it right and we all make mistakes :P

Working with Jonny was great fun, we have a good laugh together and he is as hard a worker as any so the job gets done quickly and efficiently. By the end of the day, i felt that we had set together a quality selection of routes and boulder problems that the kids would both enjoy and be challenged on. 

On the day, I was nervous for the kids I coach, but also nervous for myself and Jonny as I knew we had set to split the competition and if we had not done our job well enough, the competition could have been a flop! 

Ian of the Stirling Spiders starting out on the gnarly V6 I set for Youth C, B and A Boys! (Photo by Rachel Carr)As the day progressed, we saw some amazing climbing skills, fantatsic displays of courage, fight, determinataion and effort on all fronts! It was good to see as well the comraderie amongst our young climbers, working together as if in a team but also against each other at the same time. This is something I don't think you see in other sports... yet another reason why climbing is the greatest sport on earth! :D

By the end of the day, there was of course a few tears amongst the crowds of children... but mostly they where happy faces with smiles. And the tears never last long because children always bounce back higher after they have fallen. I was proud of every single kid I saw climb that day - from those who have been training a year for another chance to make finals to those who had only been climbing 3 weeks and had come along just to see what a competition is like. 

I am happy to say that we didn't require a superfinal and each category was split despite a few close calls in the more competetive categories :D

Looking forward to Glasgow Round 2 in a week and a halfs time! 

PSYCHED!

What a day it's been. I've been at EICA: Ratho all day manning the Evolv boot demo stand whilst simultaneously coaching my kids taking part in the finals of the YCS. It's been pretty hectic and I can't quite put into words just how tired I am, it's a miracle I still have energy to write blogs and post pictures (although I just did down 8 Oreos with a glass of milk, that might have given me something extra :P ).

So, today is the day that 330 kids around the country have been looking forward to since the regional rounds finished. For Scotland that was earlier in the year (back in February) so for them it has been a longer wait. All the kids that I coach regularly have been training really hard for this day and I can say without a doubt that the rewards have more than certainly been reaped from their hard work.

I got to the wall with Nat early in the morning to set up the stall for the boot demo. Most of the kids had arrived even by then for registration and warm up. I quickly got set up and then began my hunt for as many of my padawans as possible. Everyone seemed fired up and raring to go, there were a few signs of nervous excitement but nothing that posed too much of a worry. Everyone just seemed really happy to be at the final and to be competing with friends in such a fun and motivating environment. The atmosphere of Ratho was exhilarating to say the least, when you bring together so many psyched young climbers the aura of the place really blossoms.

The kids that I coach regularly who were competing today included boys and girls in most of the Youth categories. To save writing a post of epic proportions of every detail from today I will put the end results below followed by a few key moments from the day:

E (2003-2004)

• Leo Harland-Sendra (Boys - 2nd)


• Ben Milne (Boys - 8th)


• Emma Davidson (Girls - 5th)

D (2001-2002)

• Matthew Fall (Boys - 13th)


• Thomas Ryan (Boys - 20th)


• Ben Findlay (Boys - 32nd)

C (1999-2000)

• Sam Harland-Sendra (Boys - 4th)


• Max Milne (Boys - 11th)


• Rory Cargill (Boys - 15th)


• Ewan Davidson (Boys - 21st)


• Rebecca Kinghorn (Girls - 1st)


• Rosie Mackley (Girls - 23rd)

A (1995-1996)

• Scott Keirr (Boys - 1st)


• Jack Gomersall (Boys - 16th)

 

In Youth E, young Leo was attending his first ever YCS final. I coach Leo and his brother Sam at Ratho most weeks and I can say without a doubt that the pair of them certainly have it in their genes. Their dad is french (which I reckon is where their awesome technique comes from) and they have a brilliant head for comps (apart from when Sam goes in a huff :P ). Leo did fantastically well placing 2nd and considering this is his first ever YCS Final, it's some achievement! It was really inspiring watching Leo flash all the boulder problems and do so well in all the routes. His style is very similar to that of top european competition climbers i.e. fast, strong, efficient. He doesn't waste any time and was probably the fastest of all the competitors on the field.

Spot The Difference :D

Sam in Youth C beat his previous result from last year (24th) by coming 4th! He wasn't just 4th, he was 1 point of 3rd place podium finish which is an excellent improvement from last year. The most impressive part of this was his comeback after fluffing up his second qualifier route, something which he was more than capable of flashing but made some little errors that cost him the top that would have placed him strongly in 3rd position.