Get To Grips With Climbing

Recently announced as a new sport for the next Olympic Games, climbing is a must-try activity for mind and body gains, says Hannah Ebelthite.

- Hannah Ebelthite

Looking for a new way to stay fit and have fun? Climbing – and mountaineering in general – is enjoying a boom in popularity. The number of climbing walls around the UK has doubled since the ’90s – there are now more than 400 to pick from and twice that in schools. A recent Sport England Active People Survey found that 301,300 people in England aged 14 and over go ‘mountaineering’ at least once a month (this covers activities such as hill walking, mountaineering, indoor climbing or rock climbing) – a big increase on the 2013 figure of 256,100.

WHY CLIMBING?

Because you’ve got just enough time to get good enough for Tokyo! Earlier this summer in Rio, the International Olympic Committee officially declared Sport Climbing a new Olympic sport that will feature in the 2020 games.

Thanks to a campaign from the International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC), the British Mountaineering Council (BMC) and Mountaineering Scotland, Team GB climbers will be among 20 female and 20 male competitors from around the world. And they will each need skills in three specific disciplines: Lead, where you climb a planned route with ropes using pre-placed 'quickdraws" (two metal carabiners connected by a textile sling) in a certain time frame; Speed, where you climb a known slightly overhanging vertical route using ropes as fast as you can; and Bouldering, which is done with no ropes on short, overhanging routes that the climber can choose – again within a certain time.