CommRow Grand Opening and Tahoe Climbing

photo: Boone Speed

This past weekend I traveled up to Reno, Nevada to attend the grand opening of a new gym called CommRow. Boasting one of the best bouldering areas in the country, (thanks to our good friends over at Vertical Solutions) the only official 15 meter speed climbing wall in North America, and the tallest climbing wall in the world, (over 165 feet of vertical climbing) this gym definitely lives up to its expectations as one of the top climbing gyms in the world.

IFSC Speed wall at night!
photo: Boone Speed

The bouldering area
photo: Alex Johnson

CommRow is actually part of a larger “Urban Adventure Destination”, consisting of the two-pitch outdoor climbing wall, the indoor bouldering area, two live entertainment venues, a 136-room hotel, and dozens of small tapa-style restaurants scattered throughout the venue. I first heard about the wall about six months ago, after seeing blueprints for the wall online. Over the summer, I was officially invited to the grand opening by one of the event coordinators, Johnny Blomquist, which I immediately confirmed.

The whole day was INCREDIBLE. I drove up with my parents and friend Hannah Donnelly (a member of Zero Gravity Climbing Team) to Tahoe the night before the big day, and drove the rest of the way to Reno the next morning. When I first set my eyes on the wall, I could barely believe it.

Situated right in the middle of downtown, CommRow is visible from all directions you could possibly think of. Silhouetted against the beautiful morning sky, the wall curves surreally up into the atmosphere and towers above the other buildings adjacent to it.

photo: Rod Grossman

I spent the whole day hanging out around CommRow. Alex Johnson, Jon Cardwell, Emily Harrington, and Dave Graham also showed up to the event, and we spent the day climbing on the new bouldering walls, teaching clinics, and eating the bar food from downstairs (the taquito stand was probably the best).

photo: Hannah Donnelly

photo: Rod Grossman

photo: Hannah Donnelly

Running the Speed Climbing Clinic
photo: Rod Grossman

photo: Rod Grossman

photo: Rod Grossman

Brian Sweeney trying out the 15m IFSC wall
photo: Rod Grossman

Team 5.10 autograph signing (with Eric Wang)
photo: Rod Grossman

At the end of the day, “Spiderman” Dan Goodwin got to officially open the wall by climbing up to the top of the multipitch wall and cutting the giant 20-foot ribbon and setting off fireworks that lit up Reno’s night sky. It was quite a sight to see.

Yes, that small speck on the right wall is a person.
photo: Alex Johnson

The next day, I headed out to a climbing area called Big Chief for a day of sport climbing with Hannah and some friends from Reno including Lucas Larson, Eric and Jenna Wang, and Hanna Grossman. Lucas and I both sent Totally Chawsome (12c) on our first go, and All Guns Blazing (13a) on our second go! It was great to go outdoors with those guys, can’t wait to get back up to Tahoe and try some harder climbs up there. Steep Climb hopefully soon?

Big Chief
photo: Hannah Donnelly

Getting the beta on All Guns Blazing
photo: Eric Wang

Working the first moves of All Guns Blazing (13a)

photo: Eric Wang

Next weekend, I will head out to Boulder, Colorado for the IFSC World Cup. It will be the first sport climbing world cup held in the US in over 20 years, and I’m pretty excited to be a part of it! Stay tuned, the competition will be broadcast online at http://www.ifsc.tv/ next Saturday and Sunday. Psyched!

Castle Rock/Indian Rock Clean Up Day

What a week it's been. I am writing this post from the cozy home of Claudiu Videscelu, one of the coaches I've been working with in preparation for the Youth National Championships in Atlanta, Georgia. I just left California on Monday for the rest of the summer, only having spent a total of 6 days of it at home.

Part 1 of my summer trip: Atlanta!
During that time, I took a short break from training after the SCS Division 1 Championships (after taking 1st in Sport and Speed). I hung out with some of my friends and prepared for a community service day at Castle and Indian Rock, the two local bouldering crags closest to where I live.

I had been planning doing a community service cleanup at Castle for over two months with my friend David Cordero, after originally coming up with the idea about a year previously. My goal for the day was to coordinate cleaning up trash around the crag while getting people involved in the climbing community and getting them out in nature at a beautiful state park.

However, about a month ago, I learned that Castle Rock State Park was slated to close in the fall due to state budget cuts. Thankfully, it received federal grants from the US government, allowing it to stay open. This turn of events made me realize how significant these places are, and made it all the more important that our project succeed.

Before the event, I coordinated a raffle for the participants of the cleanup to offer an incentive to show up. I would like to give a huge thanks to all of the sponsors involved, including Marmot, Evolv, and REI, who all donated backpacks, t-shirts, water bottles, and even playing cards. Planet Granite donated rental climbing shoes and some shirts for the raffle, Orchard Supply Hardware donated trash bags, and Noah's Bagels contributed over 15 pounds of bagels for lunch. Thank you so much for helping out!

Raffle Prizes!

The day started out well with 14 people showing up at Fremont High School and carpooling over to my friend Kevin Ott's house to pick up crash pads for bouldering later on. We then drove up to the Indian Rock parking lot, arriving at around 9:30AM. At 10 we started cleaning up trash (mostly glass) around the base of Indian Rock for a good two hours, using the bags and gloves provided by Orchard Supply.

All photos: Cole Carter

We started by walking up the hill on the Indian Rock side, only finding minor trash fragments, but cleaning up as many pieces we could find. It wasn't until we got to the main Indian Rock boulder that we really found a lot of broken glass. It seemed like people had been throwing glass bottles off the main rock for a long time; we found countless shards of glass all over the ground in that area, shining on the ground in a rainbow of colors.

The cleanup crew at work:
All photos: Cole Carter

It was sad to see so much trash in such a beautiful area, but it felt good that we were helping bring it back to its natural state. We stayed around there the most, although we did make it down the hill behind the main rock a little ways, finishing around noon.

In the end, we picked up over 67 pounds of trash! Some of the more interesting things we picked up included full cans of juice, tennis balls, empty wrappers, intact glass bottles, empty shotgun shells, and even a cell phone battery. The area around Indian Rock was much more clean than when we started, but there is still a lot of trash left over that we didn't have time to get. Definitely coming back next year!

All photos: Cole Carter

Empty shotgun shell

Tennis ball!

After we finished our cleanup, the group hiked back to the parking lot for the raffle and bagels Noah's Bagels provided for lunch. Around this time, Ranger Edward pulled up and collected our volunteer paperwork and even hung out with us during lunch and participated in the raffle.

All photos: Cole Carter

Starting the raffle!

Calling off playing cards, which we used as raffle tickets. Thanks, Marmot!

Group photo!
Left to right: Chris Swanson, Josh Levin, Ranger Edward, Stacey Collver, Ricardo Gomez, Ryan Kashi, Omer Hit, Mona Nguyen, Brett Ashton, Vishesh Jaggi, Roy Barnea, Rich Kaercher, Matthew Salmanpour, Jason McCrorie, David Dobervich.

When everybody had finished with the bagels, we all went across the street to Castle Rock State Park for some bouldering. Everyone had a great time and got to the top of at least one boulder problem. Brett entertained all of us near the end with his pad-on send of The Spoon (v1), and even Mr. Dobervich (my calculus teacher) sent it after him using similar beta.

Hiking up to Castle.

Working a v0 at the Magoo's.

Matthew and Ricardo checking out the moves.
photo: Cole Carter

Matthew sticking the crux.

Roy post-send on another of the classic v0's at the Magoo's.

The Crew chillin' in a cave at Castle Rock.
photo: Cole Carter

When we finally returned back to the parking lots to make our way home, I had a moment of reflection on the day as a whole. As a group, we cleaned up almost 70 pounds of trash, had a hugely successful raffle (thanks to all of our sponsors!) and got to eat a great lunch and get kids climbing in a beautiful environment. I am very satisfied with the final result, and can't wait to come back next year!

I would like to take one last time to thank all of our sponsors (Planet Granite, Marmot, Evolv, REI, Orchard Supply, and Noah's Bagels) and everyone for coming out and supporting such a great event. We couldn't have done it without you!

The rest of my summer is ahead, with one part done. Next stop, US Nationals in Atlanta next week, followed by my trip to Europe for the rest of the summer! On the list are Italy, France, Spain, and Austria for an adult World Cup, the Youth and adult World Championships, and lots of climbing outdoors. Keep posted and thanks for reading!

Update: Adult Nationals, Spring Break, and lots of Comps

So… if you haven’t noticed, it’s been a while since my last post. I have been so caught up in school for the past three months I’ve barely noticed how long it’s been since I’ve posted any of my recent adventures in the climbing world. Now that I’m done with AP testing, prom, and a significant portion of my finals already, I can finally put down everything that’s happened in the last couple months. Bear with me here. I promise I’ll keep the reading light.

Back in March, (seems like so long ago now) I traveled out to Boulder, Colorado for the SCS US Open National Championships. I had a really good time with my friends who I stayed with on the trip, including Alex, Michaela, Joe, Shane, and a bunch of other kids who made the trip out to compete. I ended up placing 2nd in speed climbing and 9th in difficulty, putting me on the US Adult National Team for the second year in a row! This year, I earned an invitation to the 2011 Adult World Championships in Arco, Italy for difficulty and speed. I also received an invite for bouldering through a second-round invitation. Congrats to Dana Riddle, Sasha DiGiulian, Carlo Traversi and Alex David Johnson for winning Nationals this year!

Finals Crew
photo: Dane Cronin

Getting psyched for Finals.
photo: Tiffany Hensley

Finals
photo: Dane Cronin

Magnus Midtbø on Q2

Matty Hong in Finals

Carlo Traversi on Q2

The World Championships are without a doubt the largest climbing competition in the world, with over 700 of the best athletes in the world coming in for the event. Unless climbing becomes an Olympic sport, this will without a doubt be the biggest competition of my career. I will also be one of only three Americans competing in all 5 different categories: Sport Climbing, Speed Climbing, Bouldering, Team Speed Relay, and All-Around. PSYCHED.



Speed Finals
Video: Michaela Kiersch
I also got to compete at the Planet Granite Friction Series in April, which was a fantastic event this year with an added onsight final at the end. The routes and the atmosphere were great, and there was lots of pizza for the after-comp party. I made it to finals with Mike Kerzhner and Brett Ashton, and won the comp by getting to the last clip on a sick arch climb that the PG setters put on for the comp. Thanks PG for putting on such an amazing event! Can't wait for next year for sure. Also, thank you James and Katie for coming to support!

Andrea Szekely winning the Women's category
photo: Stephanie Ko Pound

Finals
photos: Stephanie Ko Pound

Spring Break consisted of visiting my best friend Charlie down in LA for a weekend of touring college campuses and climbing at his local crag, Echo Cliffs. We both ended up sending State of Grace (.13c) third try, which was probably the most productive I’ve ever been on a hard climb that could’ve easily been project status for either of us. The fact that we were both working on the same thing and could give each other beta worked out amazingly well, which is why it’s always fun whenever I go on trips with him. Can’t wait for this summer, bro!

Charlie post-send on State of Grace 5.13c

PCH at sunset

More recently, I competed in my first and only local comp of the season at Rocksport (which I always try to get out to every year) in Reno, Nevada. Charlie came up for this comp as well, and we had a great time competing in the comp and in finals afterwards. I won the comp this year by topping out one of the coolest problems they’ve ever put up at the gym. I then competed at the Youth Regional Championships at Rocksport two weeks later and won my category for difficulty and speed, which earned me an invitation to the Youth Divisional Championships in two weeks in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Q2 at Regionals
photo: Rod Grossman

Finals route at Regionals
photo: Rod Grossman

Regionals Finals Route
Video: Richard Levin
Phew. That was a lot of stuff crammed into one post. Definitely blaming AP testing for this one. I will be posting more over the summer about Nationals and my Europe adventures, so keep posted and thanks for reading!