Photos by: Bob Lockhart and Mike Helt

Silicon Valley may seem like a strange place to find the Americas best youth climbers, but this weekend in Sunnyvale California that’s where 450 ridiculously strong kids flocked to for USA Climbing’s 2008 SCS Youth National Championships.

No other comp on the planet is bigger than the US Youth Nationals so what better place to hold the event than at the huge Planet Granite in Sunnyvale. With walls toping out at around 55 feet and big air potential the national routesetting crew had one of the best venues to take this event to the next level.

And did they ever! The routesetting crew led by Chief Molly Beard put up some of the best routes this country has ever seen. 10 pro-setters from across the country spent a week setting 24 routes ranging from 5.10b to 5.13b that showed this event is no longer a simple national comp.

The routes pushed the so-called limits of what previously has been expected of our youth climbers and the kids responded by crushing those stereotypes. The tiny “D’s” were expected to mantle and to figure out a 100 move route; “B” girls were given a route that forced them to lock it off on the steeps and huck, something that they were previously never exposed to while on a rope; “B” boys were given a jaw dropping route with possibly the craziest finish ever seen at a US comp (no-hold arête griping and dyno for the finish jug or take the big whip); the big boys “A” and “Jr” had to show they had what it takes to get through a wild route which featured knee-bar no-hands rests, dynos, long draws, big falls and gnarly mental exposure.

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