Photos by: Susanica Tam

This past weekend the Spot bouldering gym in conjunction with USA Climbing put on one of the best bouldering comps in recent history.

This event was the proving ground for who will be chosen to represent the USA at the upcoming Vail Teva Games World Cup.

Chris Sharma made his second American comp appearance in as many months, coming off his win at SCS Adult Nationals a few weeks ago in Salt Lake City. Sharma was the clear favorite at ABS Nat’s but World Cup fever has infected more than the usual crushers and he was up against a stacked field.

Canada sent powerhouse comp climber Sean McColl and Japan sent three of their strongest climbers to compete against the likes of Sharma, Rands, Robinson, Harrington and Puccio. These international competitors definitely showcased what the Americans will be up against at the Vail World Cup.

The Open Event

Qualifiers are rarely a historic event but this National qualifiers was something special. After the dust settled on the quali problems there were zero ties. That means that from a setting perspective every competitor was completely separated in only one round! This feat has never been achieved in the history of American National comps.

The quali problems were all very distinct and refreshingly different from each other. This tested the climbers overall skill set and dropped any competitor that didn’t have the whole package.

Kynan Waggoner, Chief Open Setter said that it was due to the experience of his crew. “Jamie [Emerson] has incredible finger strength, Matt [Segal] is very gymnastic with a lot of competitor experience and Scott [Mechler] has the ability to put up showy problems that get the job done and my technical style, we all came together to form like Voltron.”

Alex Puccio was overheard saying that these qualifiers were some of the hardest quali’s she’s ever had to do; harder even then previous finals problems.

Indeed, the setters didn’t coddle the climbers and made them work right out of the gate on problem #1 with only 7 out of the 80 climbers grabbing the finish jug.

After that the competitors were falling all over the place, especially on Women’s #4 which was only sent by Puccio and Men’s #3 which went unsent.

Prime-Time Finals

On finals night almost 800 spectators packed the Spot bouldering gym to its Fire Marshal limits, with hundreds still left out in the Colorado cold.

After such a successful qualifiers the pressure was off the setters. They didn’t have to break any ties or worry about putting together a super final. What they did have to do was put on a good show for the huge crowd. Chief Waggoner told Routesetter.com that the only thing he wanted his crew to do was to get one person up every route.

That in it self is still a hard and very specific task. A task that didn’t quite materialize. On the Mens side all but the last problem, which clocked in around V12, was sent. The other problems were sent several times.

The Women’s problems were about the same with the slopers of problem #3, shutting down all attempts. Throughout finals it looked like problem #4 would not be sent until Alex Johnson brought the thunder.

But ironically Johnson’s lone send of #4 was not enough to take the win away from Puccio who got three holds further than Johnson on #3, which was worth more points.

This scoring idiosyncrasy was confusing to the crowd and to the visiting IFSC President Marco Scolaris. Scolaris was in town to take in the show prior to the Vail Wold Cup. We might just see a shake up as to how the scoring is managed in the future.
All in all this was arguably the best bouldering comp held on American soil and it will take a heroic effort on the part of the World Cup setters and climbers to top this event.

Men 1. Paul Robinson 2. Chris Sharma 3. Sean McColl (Non-USA) 4. Mark Hobson

Women 1. Alex Puccio 2. Alex Johnson 3. Paige Claassen

Youth

But this event was not just a he-man show. Taking place during the same weekend on the same walls was the ABS Youth National. This portion of the comp was the culmination of a seasons worth of effort on the part of three hundred 9 – 18 year olds from around the country.

The six setters of the Youth crew had three days to set 28 national level problems for five different age categories. They also had to coordinate with the Open crew for the limited wall space that the Spot offered.

There was a lot of prior speculation as to how this space restriction would work out, but even though the Youth crew got much less sleep (three hours some nights) than the Open crew, they didn’t have a problem fitting in the requisite number of problems into the allotted space and time.

The relatively young Youth setting crew brought distinctly grown up problems to the kids. Several of the problems featured powerful moves that tested the new breed of young, burly climber. One problem even had a big (but kid-sized) jump-start and down campus sequence.

It should also be noted that at the end of finals there were no ties which meant no super final. And to a setter, that’s the mark of a successful event.

Forerunners

Not to be left out was the very import role of the forerunners during the setting of both the Open and Youth comps.

Holding a comp in Colorado certainly has it’s benefits and one is the large pool of super strong forerunners to chose from. V15 boulderer Ty Landman, indefatigable Spot setter Johny Hork and even old time setter Jimmy Redo came in to give the Open problems a run.

Vertical World Assistant Coach and competition climber Sidney McNair and coach & Spot head setter Justen Sjong helped the Youth setters perfect their problems.

Check out an awesome slide show of the comp from photographer Susanica Tam at Climbing.com. Coming soon, Susanica will have a time lapse slide show from two days of setting at ABS Nationals. Look for it soon!

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