Montreal
I’ve just returned home from North American Championships. If you didnt already know, the competition was held in Montreal at a gym called <blank>. Truthfully, after seeing a couple of pictures of the gym, I was a little worried that the walls were going to be too short. Now that the competition is over and I had a chance to climb 4 routes I would like to say that this gym is probably the best gym to hold a lead event in Canada. While some of the routes had to to up the sides of the headwall, the longer finals routes were the closest I’ve felt to a European competition. Great job <blank> and route setting staff! Full results of the comp should be up the ifsc-climbing.org site soon. I managed to walk away with first place finish in open men. Along with this title was a cool 2000$ For me, this money will be funding my trip to the World Championships in China this summer. Aside from competing, at the comp, I was also nominated one of the assistant coaches for the Junior National team. While I was at the comp, I was trying to help the team as well as warm up and compete myself. There with me were head coach Andrew Wilson and fellow assistant coach Stacey Weldon. The hardest part about coaching this weekend was the amount of kids from Canada at the competition. With 73 juniors competing across 10 categories, it was impossible to individually warm up every kid. This comp was much different than Worlds for example because instead of 4 competitors in a category of 60 there were 8-10 in a category of 20. I think some people had unreasonable expectations of the coaches and were then a little disappointed. That aside, I felt like every kid got a good warmup and I think team Canada climbed well as a group. During the 3 day event I had to be in isolation at 730 every morning. With the time change I didnt sleep much this weekend. Last night, I got back to Vancouver at 11:00pm only to go home, pack, sleep and them catch a 10:00 bus from downtown. Since I didnt have time to get onto my computer, I’ve done this whole post through wifi on my new iPod touch. Sorry if there are tons of writing errors, I’m still getting used to the digital keyboard. By 11:00 tonight, I’ll be reunited with Jamie Chong and Simon Parton for 11 days of bouldering in Hueco Tanks, Texas.Trackback from your site.
Jamie Chong
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Hey Sean,
Congratulations. It’s great to hear that Canada is able to host large events like this. Hopefully one day we can hold an international competition like Youth Worlds or a World Cup.
I guess you’re probably in the air right now. Si and I are sitting in the coffee shop waiting to pick you up at the airport tonight. It’s raining right now, but the weather should be good for us to climb tomorrow. Can’t wait to climb with ya!
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Climbing Narcissist
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Not bad! That keyboard is a bitch for long writing!
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Benjamin
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Hey there!
I just stumbled upon this blog after reading a post from http://climbingnarc.com/ and was surprised to recognize you from the competition this weekend.
Congratulations on your win! It was a fun event. I had the chance to be there for the second day of the competition; you made that last route look almost like a 5.8.
I wish you luck for the World Championships and of course, with your blog. Have fun in Texas!
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