Challenge of the Week #14

The latest challenge of the week is pretty cheesy, but here it is. Think of your greatest fear climbing related or just a general fear, set a route inspired by that fear and send it. So if you are afraid of bats, maybe do a bathang. If you are afraid of public speaking set a route where you must "face the crowd*." If you are afraid of failure set something you suck at and send it or deal with it. We all fail at some point. Face your fears, set epic routes and climb on!

Hopefully by the end of this week, I'll have a post about my interview at Rock Spot.

*Face the crowd is when the climber must face completely away from the wall (back to the wall). It probably has other names, but that's what I call it. 

Challenge of the Week #13

I was really excited about finally posting a Challenge of the Week on time and then I realized that I didn't have internet. So now I'm back and I have internet which really helps make blogging much easier.

The challenge of the week is to set a route based on a dance move or set of moves. I've got dibs on the Macarena, but there's plenty of other options like the YMCA, the Chicken Dance or Gangnam Style. Pull ideas from all sorts of styles, maybe the waltz reminds you of backsteps and drop knees.  Definitely post videos of this one! I'm really excited for this challenge.

In case you forgot how the macarena goes, here's a tutorial.
http://www.wikihow.com/Do-the-Macarena

Challenge of the Week #12

This is slightly different from most Challenge of the Week posts. You'll need some extra supplies for this one:

• A bucket, bowl, hat or something else that you can put a bunch of index cards in
• Colored Index cards cut in half
• Markers, crayons, pens, or pencils

Once you've got those things start making some lists:

Setting Restrictions

• No Slopers
• No Jugs
• No Pinches
• For kids
• For inflexible people
• No Crimps
• Static Only
• Dynamic
• Single Color

Moves

• Heel Hook
• Toe Hook
• Match
• Hand Foot Match
• Downpull
• Undercling
• Side Pull 
• Gaston
• Mantle 
• Dyno
• Knee Bar
• Face the Crowd
• Bicycle
• Toe Cam
• Rose Move
• Thumbdercling
• 360
• campus
• compression
• bat hang
• drop
• etc

Write those kinds of things on two different colors for index cards and put them in the hat. Whenever you need your own setting challenge, you can just pick one or two restrictions and one or two moves you need to force. 

Shane Messer

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Shane Doing a Heel Hook by GKWANPHOTO

I was lucky enough to have been able to interview Shane Messer the director of Route Setting and Climbing Team Operations at the Central Rock Gyms. He is very accomplished as a setter and as a coach having set as well as coached for National Competitions. During his almost eight years of Route Setting Shane has set thousands of routes and while talking to him, you can tell how he managed to do that - it's something he loves.

Shane held a clinic a CRG Watertown on May 24th and it was something I definitely had to attend. The clinic which was organized a little last minute brought in four participants including me. Shane's wife Melanie also joined in. If you've met Shane before, you know that in addition to being a great setter and a great coach, he is also an incredibly strong climber. In the first route, I set a crux much harder than I'd planned. If other people hadn't attempted it before him, I would have been convinced that it really was a V3 when I saw him climb it. He makes it look so easy. As a strong climber, Shane is planning to compete in the World Championship this October, but he's not just going for himself. As a dedicated coach, Shane is competing in order to be able to relate the competition and the pressure to the kids on the national team when they compete at the World Competition. In addition, he hopes to learn what the setting style is like since there is some overlap between setters and this could give the team a huge advantage.

Shane coaching CRG Nationals Training Camp by E. Varisco

After the clinic, I asked him a few questions, some pretty serious ones and one not so serious. Because I was cool and took notes with a pen and paper, below are the questions I asked with a summary of what Shane told me.

Q: What kinds of routes do you like?

A: Lately, steep walls with pretty good holds. Shane also expressed a great interest in slopers.

Q: How does setting for Competitions differ from the everyday setting at the gym?

A: Competitions are where climbers use their training. In addition, competitions bring a bigger audience and therefore it is important to set an exciting route. People want to see an exciting show during comps. It's really important to analyze the route that is being set and get as close to perfection as you can. You don't want everyone to top the route especially for finals. As an example, Shane had mentioned the finals for the Ring of Fire. The night before, a competitor had texted him telling to make the route really really hard, so Shane changed one of the last holds to a not great sloper and we didn't get to see anyone top the route. For everyday setting, people are here to climb and here to train, so you have to keep that in mind.

Q: What is a common mistake that setters make and should really try to avoid?

A: Shane emphasized this during the setting clinic and it is very important. There is a difference between holds for your right hand and holds for your left hand. Some holds can be comfortably used in either hand, but the asymmetrical holds are probably more comfortable in one hand or the other. Some people will argue that outside you have no choice, but since you do have a choice inside, you should set to make people climb comfortably because it will reduce the risk of injury by properly loading your fingers.

One more thing that setters should avoid is overthinking it. Don't constantly question if your route will work as you go along. Set the route, forerun the route and then tweak it as necessary.

Q: If you were to set a route based on a movie premise or plot what movie would it be and what would the route be like?

Shane looked like he was stumped on this one but he finally came up with a cool idea.

A: The route would be based on any of the Harry Potter movies. It would start out really fun, have an evil crux and a happy ending, but still be very consistent. A route based on the epic fight between Harry and Voldemort would be great.

So those were the questions and answers. I'll definitely come up with wackier, more exciting questions for next time I interview Shane. Loads of thanks to Shane for the awesome clinics as well as the interview and also to Melanie for the great restaurant suggestion. "There's dessert?" I asked, wide eyed. They had blondies drizzled with chocolate sauce and caramel sauce with whipped cream on top.

If you'd like to help send Shane to the World Competition you can follow this link: http://www.gofundme.com/90tpas

Thanks!