15: Tyler Norton, Comp Climbing Podcaster
Tyler is a fellow competition climbing nerd and podcaster, who has been involved in the space much longer than I have, and you may be familiar with his channel, Plastic Weekly! In this episode, we’ll talk about what it’s like MCing at a world cup, commiserate on the hardships that come with climbing podcasting, go over some climbing HOT TAKES, and talk about the upcoming 2024 season!
Timestamps
Timestamps of discussion topics
0:00 - Introduction
1:15 - Gym experience
7:16 - MCing and commentating at world cups
13:35 - Beginnings of Plastic Weekly Podcast
17:31 - Starting The Debrief series with John Burgman
20:52 - Commiserating on highlights and lowlights of podcasting
30:36 - Competition hot take: GOAT is overused
42:09 - Hot take: Get rid of isolation?
48:29 - People don't care about the overall title anymore?
55:00 - NEOM games environmental impact
1:01:35 - IFSC's new RED-S Policy
1:05:54 - 2024 season predictions
1:13:14 - Olympic favorites
1:18:54 - Discord Q: Is there an absence of climbing media?
1:24:19 - Discord Q: Are gyms are good place to start climbing careers?
1:29:04 - Where to find Tyler
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MCing is really, you're trying to like, you're being a conductor. If the crowd is a symphony,
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you're trying to be the conductor to some extent. There are two things that I remember saying
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that I regret and that I should apologize for. Who have a terrible record of killing journalists,
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jailing people for tweeting, and just an awful human rights record. If Janja was American,
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she would be a superstar. She would be Simone Biles.
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Welcome to another episode of the That's Not Real Climbing podcast. I'm your host,
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Jinni, and I'm excited to introduce my guest, Tyler Norton. Tyler is a fellow competition
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climbing nerd and podcaster who has been involved in the space much longer than I have. And you may
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be familiar with his channel, Plastic Weekly. In this episode, we'll talk about what it's like
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MCing at a World Cup. We'll commiserate on the hardships that come with climbing podcasting,
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go over some climbing hot takes, and talk about the upcoming 2024 season. If you end up enjoying
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this style of comp climbing podcast, be sure to check out the debrief, which is Tyler's podcast
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on Plastic Weekly. And for now, hope you enjoy this episode with Tyler.
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Okay, but yeah, let's get right into it. So sounds good. I know you're not a huge fan of
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describing yourself, but I think people need a little bit of an introduction of how you got
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into climbing, how you got into competitions, and I guess your knowledge on the history of climbing.
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Yeah. Well, I think I started climbing like most people. It's just you get dragged to a gym,
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whether it's your idea or somebody else's, but had a great time. At this point, I've been working
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in it for about 15 years almost, and been really fortunate to do a lot of things in all different
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parts of the sport. So aside from setting and coaching and customer experience at climbing
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gyms here in Canada, also getting to organize a lot of competitions through our provincial bodies.
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Got to MC a World Cup one time, got to go to a bunch of World Cups, either dragging behind
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some of the Canadian kids and just watching them do their thing. But yeah, just a lot of
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little bits of exposure here and there through the time working in gyms got me really interested.
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About I guess six or seven years ago, started up Plastic Weekly as a sort of expression of
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wanting to contribute to the conversation and wanting to talk to people who, in my professional
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life, I didn't have a reason to. And yeah, that's kind of the story. So I've just been really
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fortunate to get to experience lots of different parts of climbing. Most people, I don't think,
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get a chance to do that. Or most people don't last long enough in climbing before they find
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better pay and then whatever somewhere else. But yeah, that's just the reality of climbing,
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I guess. Yeah, unfortunately. How long after you started climbing, did you start working at the
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gym and doing everything else? Also, you never told me that you MC'd at a World Cup. That's pretty fun.
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Yeah. Yeah, it was 2015, a Toronto Boulder World Cup. It's the deep lore of me and Pete Woods.
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Toronto hosted a World Cup 2013, 2014, 2015. And in the first two years, it was Pete Woods and a
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Toronto local, Dave Voltan, I think. They were the duo for MCing it. Not commentating it, just
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MCing it. And then the last year, I think Pete had a personal engagement somewhere in Europe.
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He couldn't make it. And I had been MCing a bunch of local comps in the area and I got asked to do
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it, which was very kind. And yeah, it was a wild experience. But yeah, I started climbing at a time
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where I didn't really have a strong career path. I had dropped out a couple of times with different
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programs and stuff. So it was probably about a year and a half, properly. But right away,
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and it may have been the same thing for you, was you get into climbing as a climber and very
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quickly you have lots of questions and you're fascinated by how does this gym work? How do
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these comps work? And all this curiosity led me to volunteering in different things. And it was a
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small new gym at the time. The community was just starting to build out. And so I kind of,
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by benefit of being one of the few familiar faces around through volunteering and so on,
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got a job and just kept kind of going up the tree just because I stuck around, I guess. But yeah,
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so not very long.
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Interesting. No, I mean, yeah, I do not have the similar experience at all. It took me several
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years before I feel like I actually got into climbing, even though I was climbing on a regular
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basis. Yeah, I feel like I followed the path where it was like I had never done any sports before
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and I wasn't particularly good. I just liked climbing for fun. And then I plateaued at like
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V3, V4-ish, as people do. And then I didn't really have that passion because I plateaued for so long.
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And it wasn't until COVID happened that I kind of got out of that funk.
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Oh, interesting. So I'm similar to you in that I wasn't into any sports before climbing.
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And I think that's part of why I loved it so much was it was the first time I felt remotely like a
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well-rounded person. Because as a kid, I had never been told I was like an athlete or, you know,
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sporty or anything like that. So I really appreciated that. But for me, and it may be
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different for you, was the climbing was fun, but I was really curious how the industry worked very
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quickly. It was like, who puts up all those questions that you get from people that you
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probably talk to like, is there a map for the holds and who makes the holds and who makes the
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walls and is it fastest to the top in a competition? All those questions was what got me the most psyched,
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I guess, really early on. So very quickly, I stopped caring about getting good at climbing
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for whatever reason. And it was just all about like, oh, I want to be behind the scenes in this.
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Oh, interesting. Yeah, no, I didn't care at all. I didn't care. And then I wanted to get good.
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And then to get good, I wanted to learn about all of that.
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Gotcha. Have you done stuff in your life where you start something and you're immediately like,
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I need to master this? Is that something in your personality or what?
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No, never. Yeah, I'm not a perfectionist. I do things and then I'm pretty half-hearted about it
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until I reach that certain point that's like, oh, I'm good at this and now I can actually,
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I've unlocked the fun parts and now I'm really into it.
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Gotcha.
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So I think that's what happened.
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Okay.
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But yeah, I wanted to learn about all the behind the scenes because I think that'll help me
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get better myself as well.
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That's cool. Yeah.
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Yeah. Back to, well, I wanted to get more into about you and seeing stuff because that sounds
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like a lot of fun. And you also did like commentating as well, right?
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Yeah. I think, I don't know where it started, but probably just having a bit of like a music
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background means I'm not, I don't really deal with stuff that I'm not really into.
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I'm not, I don't really deal with stage fright at all. And I'm pretty comfortable being in front
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of like a large crowd of people. So just some local cops at, you know, starting out at the gym
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that I worked at at the time. The famous Canadian bouldering tour is called the Tour de Bloque up
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here. And it's kind of, it's slowly fizzled out over time, but that was, you know, every gym in
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Canada wanted to host a stop on the Tour de Bloque. And of course we did for a bunch of years and I
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were just MC for the finals, you know, I, and I did that for a few years. And I guess at some point
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that transitioned to commentating when the gyms were starting to feel more comfortable about like,
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Hey, let's splurge for a live stream. Wouldn't that be a cool, like fun thing to do? But yeah,
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the MCing was, was just, I was willing to do it. Whereas a lot of people aren't, they might not be
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interested in, in, you know, having a lot of eyes on you and having to talk for a long period of
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time. But I've always felt pretty confident in my ability to like fake it on a microphone and so on.
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Yeah. I've had a lot of good role models when it comes to like stagecraft. So, so even if I'm not
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great, I'm still comfortable with it. But yeah, the, the, the world cup one was, was wild because
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at that point I would have only like live witnessed maybe two world cups, like a speed world cup in
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2013 and a boulder world cup in 2014. And I'd watched a bunch and I'd been to a bunch of like,
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well, I guess the other big ones would be like ABS nationals, like the American boulder series.
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And I had always thought like, Oh, what a cool job it is to be the guy with the microphone and
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have to introduce everybody and have to create that hype. So I had a few influences, but something
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about the world cup with just like how long the days are. And maybe the fact that it was in a
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hockey arena that this world cup was in something about the acoustics, the crowd was really loud.
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And it was a ton of fun. I remember, I think it was Tsukuruhori maybe gashed open his finger.
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And for whatever reason, I thought it would be appropriate to like commentate everything that
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was happening, like with the medics and him dealing with all the blood and the event organizer had to
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come over and just be like, you can stop, you can stop talking about the finger injury now. So I was
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like, okay. But yeah, ended that comp, I guess the Sunday night after finals, like super worn out.
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I just like felt like I was about to black out. I was a little bit dizzy and I was just like,
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you're just exerting yourself for a couple of days. And yeah, it was a pretty like strenuous
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experience of trying to maintain hype for like two days straight. It was wild, but like a really
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cool opportunity. And I haven't had it since and that's okay. I don't know if I want it again.
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It was really long, but very cool. Very cool to see it like all up front. And that was actually
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like my favorite climber Anna Sturr's very last gold medal event was that one. So there's this,
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I have this crazy memory that I get to keep for the rest of my life of being the person that gets
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to say, and in first place, blah, blah, blah, Anna Sturr for the last time of her career.
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And so like, if I've got a handful of like best memories ever in climbing, that's definitely one
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of them. That's not super exciting. I so I've never been to a World Cup in person. So I didn't even
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think about there being an MC there because you obviously don't hear that during the live streams.
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Since you've done both MCing and commentating, what do you feel like are the differences there
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and which one do you prefer? Yeah, I certainly prefer commentating because you're allowed to
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talk about more and you don't have to yell as much. And also I might not have been a great MC. I may
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have done like too much yelling, but MCing is really, you're trying to like, you're being a
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conductor. If like, if the crowd is a symphony, you're trying to be the conductor to some extent.
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You're trying to help lead them towards big moments and you try to cue it all up. So everybody's like
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amped up right when somebody gets a top and that's cool by itself. But commentary is nice because
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it's usually a bit more conversational and you can actually talk about beta for instance. Or, you know,
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if Jakob Schubert is climbing a boulder, you would be permitted to say to the stream like, well, this
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is what Mejdi did and this is what Adam did. Whereas obviously as an MC, you're not allowed
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to just yell into a loudspeaker microphone what just happened that breaks all the rules of isolation
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and you know, beta sharing and stuff like that. So I certainly prefer the commentary. I wish MCs got
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to, it got to do a little bit more of what, of what commentators do. I think audiences at events
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could, could be a little more in the know and, and maybe have a better experience if somebody
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was giving a bit more actual information and context to what was happening rather than just
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screaming platitudes, trying to get people psyched up, you know, make some noise and stuff.
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But yeah, I, I certainly prefer commentary. That's definitely the place to be if you're going to do
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either of them, I think. Yeah, that's super interesting. I feel like MCs need more credit.
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It's a, it's really, it's a skill for sure. It's a kind of, can be kind of embarrassing, I bet.
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Yeah. I think like all these things, if you just put yourself out there into a microphone,
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there's a lot of, you know, if you're, if you're too self-aware, you can really bottle yourself up.
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I think you have to just be willing to kind of like go with the moment and hope you don't come
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off as insincere. That's, that's always my biggest worry is that people are going to be like, who the
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hell is this guy? Like, why, why is he talking into a microphone? That's my like, you know,
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what, what gets me all nervous. But yeah, it's long days and you're just like kind of yelling
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the whole time. It's not the most fun thing in the world for sure. Yeah, I could never,
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I bring much more of like a calming nervous energy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, of course. Yeah.
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But okay. And so you've done all that. How did you get started on the podcast?
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The gym I worked at at the time was a pretty big commute from where I lived. So I was listening
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to a lot of podcasts for the first time in my life. And I think a bunch of different
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podcasts made me think, oh, there's room for this in climbing. At the time, the only climbing
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podcast that was like focused on competitive and indoor climbing was called, uh, shock talk,
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by a guy named John Blomquist. And sadly, I think they're all gone. I think like, I don't know what
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host he used, but I think they're just erased from the internet, which really sucks. Cause he had a
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bunch of great interviews with, you know, hold shapers and gym people and competitive climbers
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and gym owners and stuff. Him and Jackie Huffley, who's involved with Kilter grips now,
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they would do after every world cup, they would do kind of a roundup, kind of like what plastic
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weekly does. It was a shorter format and it talked kind of about different things.
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But that was really cool. So there wasn't a whole lot of content at the time. And I thought, you
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know, wouldn't it be neat if somebody was talking about issues in Canadian gyms or Canadian comp
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climbing and then, well, there's only so much to talk about in Canada. So let's do some American
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stuff. So, you know, I just bought a, you know, bought one of those little audio interfaces for
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microphones and, um, yeah, I went around to places just recording with people for the most part. I
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think I recorded all of them like face to face, um, just with a Mac book and a couple crappy little
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sure mics. And then over time started using like a digital interface or like online interfaces,
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like the one we're using right now. Uh, and that kind of led to where the podcast is a video
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product came up. Um, yeah, just kind of that evolution from audio to video, I guess.
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Yeah. So I guess you managed to do a lot of interviews with, um, I guess through working
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at the gym and going to competitions that way. Yeah. If you're a coach and you travel to a lot
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of competitions, you do meet a lot of people. You meet a lot of other coaches, you meet a lot of
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like comp organizers, you meet gym owners and stuff like that. And so after coaching for like five-ish
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years, you start to feel like you really know everybody in Canada that's involved with comps.
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Um, so within Canada, it was pretty easy to talk to people. Um, if I wanted to speak to Americans,
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it was more of like, hi, I'm a random dude, you know, can I bother you for an hour or something
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like that? But within Canada, it's a pretty small community ultimately. So it wasn't too hard.
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Did you mention that you were a coach or did I just totally miss that? I did not know that you
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were a coach. I might've buzzed over it. Yeah. I was just coaching kids. Um, and, uh, uh, um,
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yeah, it was, it was just, you start as a rec coach and you kind of follow your kids up and a couple
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of them ended up at a world youth championship in 2015. So that was like another big moment getting
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to meet lots of like international people. Um, yeah, I got to go to the one of the ARCO ones,
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which at the time I was aware that ARCO is a, I knew factually that it was like a historic place,
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but until, you know, years later, when I started the podcast and started doing more historical
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research, did I realize like, Oh, I was in a really, in a really special place, like one of
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the very like foundational competitions in, in like Western competition history. Um, yeah. So
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a little bit of coaching, I wouldn't say I'm like, uh, coaching is something I'll probably never do
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again. I don't have the drive for it. I don't have a personal like competitive background.
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So I think I was pretty good at working with kids, keeping them happy, making sure they have a good
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time, keep them safe. But when it comes to like trying to build a competitive drive, um, I don't
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have that myself. I can't really relate to that part of the human condition. So, so I kind of
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maxed out how much I could do in coaching, I guess. Yeah. Okay. And so, um, with the podcast,
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it seems like now you're more so doing debrief with, um, John and instead of doing interviews.
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Um, yeah. Why did you sort of pivot away from, from the interview? Yeah. Anybody that's followed
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plastic weekly for a long time. First of all, like the name has become a joke by itself. Um,
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and I've kept it because it's a good reminder to stay humble about your ambitions and what you're
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capable of. I thought it was going to be a weekly podcast. I would publish every week. I thought I
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was going to do an audio thing with like two or three interviews every single week in one episode.
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And between that being like way too much work, I just, the way my life works, the way my
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personality works, I started having these months where nothing would come out. And over the seven
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years of the podcast, that's a recurring pattern, right? There will be content for a bunch of months
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and then I'll just disappear for a couple. And, and I'm starting to learn to live with that,
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especially because it's not the thing that pays my bills. And the other big part of my life is
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still climbing, right? Like I spend almost all of my time in the week talking about climbing and
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thinking about climbing and worrying about it. And so it is a little hard to get home and want to
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dive right back in sometimes, especially during the winter time when it is kind of busy season
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for gyms in, uh, in the Northern hemisphere. Um, so it's, it's had lots of ups and downs,
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but the thing about John that was great was I had wanted to try this format possibly since John
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Blomquist stopped doing his on shock talk. And so I was thinking like, wouldn't it be cool if we
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could do this kind of thing? Like the kind of content that's really at the time was really
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popular in like e-sports circles where it is just two guys on Skype talking for a couple hours.
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And I was digging around trying to find like, okay, who's actually writing about competitions?
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Who's, who's the person covering this stuff? And it's a really short list, but John was right there
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at the time writing for climbing magazine. And so I shot him a message and we're like,
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Hey, can we do this? And of course he was great. He's a sports nerd in general. It's not just
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climbing. He just loves sports and he's fluent in that kind of discussion, uh, which was a good
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counter to me where I don't have a lot of history of being a sports fan. Um, so he brings this great
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experience as somebody that understands like fundamentally the experience of being a sports
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fan, of being a sports journalist and me coming from a different angle. That's a little bit more
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naive about those things and more of kinda, I'm used to working in the background. I'm used to,
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you know, maybe being involved with the organization of events. So it was a really
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cool dynamic, but the real key thing is it's where I discovered that having a partner to do one of
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these introduced a new level of accountability to make sure it gets done. Because now it's not just
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me failing myself. If I don't put out a piece of content now I'm failing John. If I don't reach out
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to him and say, Hey, we got to do this Tuesday. I've got a guest and all that kind of stuff.
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So it made it much easier to do things because there was somebody that I was going to disappoint
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directly and somebody that I like love deeply and I don't want to disappoint him or leave him
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hanging. So that's the key to the longevity so far of the debrief is that he's just there.
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He adds that extra layer.
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No, that's awesome. And seven years doing this is, I mean, quite a feat. I kind of wanted to,
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I guess, commiserate on highlights and like biggest struggles of dealing with the podcast.
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Yeah. What have been your highlights?
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That's a good question, man. Highlights of the podcast. That's like, honestly, maybe like the
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first time somebody like wrote me a letter, like sent me like actual mail. That was sick.
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I used to have this really lame way of ending the podcast. I think I said something like,
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you know, if you enjoyed this, like shoot me a message, just let me know you're out there
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somewhere. And for whatever reason, some people would occasionally like write a letter, which
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is amazing. And that was really gratifying. Highlights otherwise was maybe starting to feel
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like I'm becoming friends with the other people who are covering climbing, like really struggling
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to keep the tabs on this stuff. Like it's a very small group of people, especially in English,
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that are actually trying to keep track of the evolution of the sport. It's people like, you
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know, John, obviously Delaney Miller as well over at climbing, Natalie Berry, of course.
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And then some names that are fading out, like Eddie Fouke. He did five incredible years as the
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official IFC photographer and things really went south, unfortunately, around the pandemic. But
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that guy is, the amount of institutional memory in that one person is wild and he needs to write a
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book like as soon as possible, because for five years he was living on athletes' couches and
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shooting the comps and flying with the athletes and taking all of their pictures, making sure to
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take a picture of every single face at the comp and qualifiers. Like from, what was it for him,
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2014 to 2019 or something? He is the memory of record for the athlete experience. And sadly,
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he's kind of phasing out. I think he's found other things that he loves and he's definitely
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earned the ability to move on. But getting to meet these people has been amazing. And the one or two
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of them that I might talk to outside of an interview is really rewarding. Yeah, I don't know.
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The low points, I'm trying to think of the lowest point. Have you ever had somebody,
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have you ever published an interview and then the subject messages you and says,
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like, hey, can you take it down within the day that you've put it up or anything like that?
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What's your, do you have any disaster stories? No, holy crap, if that happened to me, I might just
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shut everything down. Yeah, for real. It's silly. Yeah. I don't know. I had, it was somebody involved
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in like hold shaping back when it was an audio podcast and we recorded it and it was great.
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And there was nothing that I thought was like remotely troubling. But yeah, it was up for maybe
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like 12 hours. And then I got an email while I was just like out of the house saying like,
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hey, can you edit this out? And I was like, I can't edit it out like right now. It's kind of busy.
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So I ended up taking an episode down and republishing it later after having clipped some
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stuff out. But that was like really frustrating. Okay. I thought you meant like you just couldn't
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publish the entire episode. No, it was a particular, yeah, it was just one particular area, but it was
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like it kind of ruined an entire line of questioning because we kind of started talking about I think
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like quality control and liability and stuff. I think that's what it was about. But yeah,
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that does make it difficult. But no, I thought it was more of like a personal thing. Like, hey,
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this went up and now I hate you and I don't want to go ahead. I want to hear it's like what some of
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your highlights are low points. Low points are honestly more fun, frankly, but it's not even
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like nothing bad has really happened. It's just my fear of bad things happening that just gives
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me this constant anxiety about it. Sure. Like, um, I don't know if you see if you're like on
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TikTok or anything, but I see a lot of videos, um, talking about, uh, like anxious attachment styles.
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And I think in my personal life, I don't have an anxious attachment style, but in like podcast
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guests, it's like, you need this like constant, uh, communication or like you need to always
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be in the interview or like in the, in the like lead up to it, lead up, I think, or that's like
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what anxious attachment is. Like you need to be constantly reassured that you're like, okay. Or
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like the person is so this explains like the nine reminder emails I've gotten like in the last day.
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Okay. Gotcha. I understand now. See, I didn't know that it sends that actually. I haven't been
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sending anything that might be like the calendar invite. You've, you've programmed the system well
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to do what you internally want it to do. Good job. No one's told me that that happens.
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But yeah, that like doesn't happen to me in my personal life, but since starting this podcast,
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I get so worried when someone does not like respond to me or if like I had them on and then
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they're like busy after, um, and they like, don't respond to my message. I'm like, oh my God, they
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hated the podcast. They hate the interview. They don't like me. They don't want it to go up. They
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don't want to post it. They're like not happy with the conversation. And so that, that's the biggest,
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that's probably the biggest low light for me. I like, don't know how people feel after.
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How do you feel like you've had a real blunder though? Cause like there are two, there are two
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things that I remember saying that I regret and that I should apologize for. They weren't necessarily
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like mean or offensive, but I felt like, Oh, that didn't come across the way I wanted it to,
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to that person. And I feel like I may have possibly hurt them. And I'm almost certainly
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overthinking it, but there are two people in the universe who I really need to just message at some
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point and be like, Hey, I haven't heard from you since we spoke years ago. I just wanted to make
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sure you don't think that I think you're a total idiot or something like that. I don't know. There's
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just a couple of things like that. I don't know if you've, if you felt that way. No, that I don't
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think that's happened. At least if I think I say something stupid, I can edit that out. To the
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person, I think I tend to err on like the safe side, but do you want to go into what stupid things
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you said, or is that too haunting for you? I feel like I should apologize to them personally, but one,
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one was, I just made a, I made a quip. I think it was a conversation about like, you know, talking
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about who our candidates would be for maybe like best boulders ever some, like some like fairly
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just like hypothetical conversation. And I think I, when they gave their answer, I suggested like,
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Oh, I'm surprised you didn't say this person, which kind of suggested that I thought they had
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a really basic outlook on like climbing, like, Oh, I assumed you would have picked this name
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because you're dumb or whatever. Like that's how I was afraid it would be read. And then the other
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one, I'll just say this out loud, cause it's so, so stupid, but just like off the cuff. And this is
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where you really forget some of these climbers are young, but I forgot Colin Duffy was like 16 at the
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time. And I just made a joke that he has big ears, which normally just in general, I wouldn't be too
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harsh about that. Like my, like where I come from, people make fun of each other's looks to our faces
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all the time. And you're just like busting each other's balls. But like right after I said it,
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I was like, Oh, this guy's a child. Like I think of him as a, as a climber that's been on the scene
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for like as long as I have, even though he was only 16. But instantly I was like, you know what?
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That was too far. Yeah. There's just like little, little blunders that come up and you're like,
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okay, at least I'm going to learn from that. I'm going to remember when I'm talking about these
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young athletes like, you know, Cheyenne So or I am more like, especially if I'm making jokes that
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I would consider appropriate for adults, I have to remember, even though they're like pro athletes,
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that is a kid. And I do need to like dial in a certain amount of restraint when it comes to,
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you know, you know, for all the talk about red S, which is kind of like code for a lot of,
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it's not quite the same, but it kind of falls in the same stream as like body image issues.
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And especially when we're dealing with kids, that's like, absolutely not stuff that some dumb,
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like at the time 27 year old should be tripping in on like the looks of a 16 year old kid. Right?
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So that's a mistake I am doing my best to not make ever again. Fortunately, I don't think anybody
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ever like watched that episode. So, I mean, it wasn't like in front of them. No, it wasn't.
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It was just one of those things that you're just like, oh, I'm an idiot. And why did I say that in
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front of a microphone? Like that was recording, right? Well, I mean, the nice thing is that you
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could just edit it out. I don't know if that was on my show that might've been on somebody else's.
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I think, yeah. But anyway, I mean, you can always ask them to edit it out, but yeah, I guess that's
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kind of the good part of having the show. Cause then you can make yourself look however you want.
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Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that doesn't happen to me too often because
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my podcast is focused a lot more on, I guess, like me learning about the competition space.
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And I thought your whole brand was roasting teenagers. I mistook your podcast. I thought
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that was the whole thing. No, I would love to have like a young climber on. I think that would be
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really interesting, but yeah, if that becomes my brand, maybe, maybe I shouldn't do that.
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They would get clicks. It would, but yeah, I think one of your greatest like strength,
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strengths and abilities with your podcast is your ability to open up discussion and discourse on
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things that happen with Incomps, whereas mine is more just like interviewing and learning about
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the person and what they do within the competition space. But yeah, since that's kind of more of your
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focus and you talk about what happens within Incomps, what are some of your competition hot
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takes? If you were to ask like the plastic weekly crowd, like the, the regular viewers and like
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people that might make memes about this stuff, it's probably that I am pretty,
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pretty cautious about using words like greatest of all time and like legend and all those kind
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of things, which is funny. I don't know if you watched the IFSC debuted their,
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their podcast just like yesterday or something. And within the first 10 seconds, Matt, who is
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excellent at his job, Matt starts by lamenting like the overuse of the term legend and then proceeds
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to call Sean McCall like the goat, which just made me want to blow my brains out. Because I think,
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especially with my concern about like the history of climbing, I think it's really important that we
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kind of hold back on being too generous with our compliments and the titles we give people,
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lest we forget how important it actually is when those real people show up, when we have those
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incredible highs. If you've been calling everybody a legend for the last 10 years, and then an actual
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legend shows up, what's this new viewer going to be able to tell the difference, right? If we call
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every of the six, like, you know, finalists at a Boulder World Cup, for instance, a legend, like
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every fricking kid, every 16 year old kid, Mejdi is a legend already or something like that. And
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then a genuine legend, somebody that competed for forever and won a ton of golds, you know,
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like Killian Fishuber comes on stage to maybe hand them a medal. And then you then try to call
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Killian Fishuber a legend after using the exact same word for some 15 year old punk that like,
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maybe bluff their way into their first ever finals. What does it even matter? Like, what do,
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like, it's just like an arms race to the most superlative title for athletes. So that does
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require like a certain amount of awareness of the history of climbing, which just due to my own
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personal interests, I happened to delve into that. And I don't expect everybody to do that.
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It's not, you know, it's not everyone's responsibility to do all the research
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themselves, especially, you know, for something as like unrewarding as this. But yeah, I think
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my biggest hot take was like, especially like 2019, when everybody was like, oh, I'm going to
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call it the goat. I was like, hold off a second. Like if you're going to declare somebody the goat,
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here's the mental exercise I need you to do before you drop that title. Okay. If Yanya is
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the new goat as of June 2019, whenever it was that she won Vail and swept a boulder season,
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if that made her the goat, who was the goat until that happened? Who was the goat before Yanya?
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And not many people could even suggest another name in that category. And that was really
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disturbing. I don't think that title, because I can't think of a higher title, what is the
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better compliment to give an athlete aside from like greatest of all time, time, time.
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That's a really big thing to put on somebody. And so in my like hot take world, that's really
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disrespectful to drop titles like that. If you can't even think of like, who was the goat right
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before Yanya or you can't name some other candidates. I think that's like, that's way
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too close to hyperbole for a title that important. I think that's like an inappropriate use of it.
366
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And I should just clarify all that by saying, I'm not saying Yanya isn't one of the best athletes
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that climbing has ever seen, or that she may become or maybe she is, but I think that's
368
00:34:16,720 --> 00:34:21,760
she may become or maybe she is the greatest climber we've ever seen. I just think you have
369
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to actually understand what you're saying when you give somebody that title. Because in my opinion,
370
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there is no bigger title that is the ultimate achievement for anybody that touches climbing.
371
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And so that really frustrated me. So anyway, now you've got angry Tyler on the podcast now.
372
00:34:38,240 --> 00:34:42,160
But yeah, that's probably, that's probably like the biggest hot take that I can think of. I don't
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know. There might be some other ones out there, but yeah, get rid of isolation. That's another one.
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Please excuse this brief intermission. But I would just like to remind you that if you are
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enjoying this podcast, please follow and rate it on your preferred listening platform. If you're
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watching on YouTube, I would love to hear your discussion and thoughts in the comments below.
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Anything helps to push this podcast out to more people and get even more amazing guests on.
378
00:35:06,320 --> 00:35:13,520
Back to the show. I guess first of all, what you mentioned about Yanya, they're not being a previous
379
00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:22,720
goat before Yanya. Doesn't that kind of make it more meaningful that people like are starting
380
00:35:22,720 --> 00:35:27,120
to call her a goat? Because like, if there was already a previous one, and they're just like
381
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jumping between people. So this is this is my my question is, I so climbing like bouldering has
382
00:35:35,280 --> 00:35:43,760
been going on at a World Cup level since like officially 1999. But technically like 97, let's say.
383
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:49,280
So for all of those years, and again, people just refer to Yanya as like the goat without
384
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any qualifiers. I don't know if they're talking about lead climbing or bouldering or both. I have
385
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no idea. But for all of those years, say again, I mean, kind of like both is the point like,
386
00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:07,680
sure. Yeah, fair enough. My concern there is that there are other female athletes who have excelled
387
00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:14,640
in both lead and bouldering. So before Yanya hit the scene, even though that discussion was not
388
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taking place on YouTube or taking place on audio podcasts, there was somebody who in different
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people's opinions was the best of all time. Right. And maybe it just came up, you know, in
390
00:36:26,320 --> 00:36:33,680
live journal feeds, or on somebody's blog, on somebody's flash website that is now defunct
391
00:36:33,680 --> 00:36:40,320
and broken and lost to time. But before Yanya, there was a previous best climber. And just
392
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because current viewers might not know who those people are, it's not good enough to just be willing
393
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to drop that title on somebody, right? Like, maybe the conversation hasn't happened for for all these
394
00:36:53,040 --> 00:36:58,080
for all these new viewers, maybe they weren't aware of who came before. But it's really important
395
00:36:58,080 --> 00:37:03,280
before you grant somebody like the greatest, like, let's say, let's say somebody granted you or me
396
00:37:03,280 --> 00:37:09,440
the greatest competition podcast of all time, but they have never heard any other competition
397
00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:15,920
podcasts aside from ours. That isn't a relevant title to give to either of us, right? I don't know
398
00:37:15,920 --> 00:37:20,640
if they knew about shock talk. I don't know if they are aware that podcasts have only been around
399
00:37:20,640 --> 00:37:27,120
for so long and you have to look back to like the, the, like the spot setting blog, or all these
400
00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:31,760
different old, you know, blogs and websites that covered that stuff. I think the important thing
401
00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:35,840
to realize is that there were climbers that came before Yanya that did incredible things. And just
402
00:37:35,840 --> 00:37:40,640
because we don't know their name, it doesn't mean we can just forget about them and skip over them.
403
00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:46,880
I think to call Yanya the goat, I think it's only appropriate to give somebody a title that big.
404
00:37:46,880 --> 00:37:51,600
If we can look back at those before her and say, yes, she has actually earned that when you compare
405
00:37:51,600 --> 00:38:00,480
Yanya to, for example, a Sandrine Lavey, who was dominating from like 2001 to 2006, or even further
406
00:38:00,480 --> 00:38:09,760
to like a Liv Sansos, like let's say 90, 99 to like 2001, 97, I guess. Those are other names.
407
00:38:09,760 --> 00:38:14,720
Those are like before Yanya, those are the people you would have considered as the best of all time
408
00:38:14,720 --> 00:38:18,880
that were like interdisciplinary that did both bouldering and lead at a very high level.
409
00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:24,880
And those names are pretty much forgotten. So it just hurts when Yanya gets called the goat,
410
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:28,960
but the people dropping that title aren't aware of the people that came before her.
411
00:38:28,960 --> 00:38:36,880
So that was my only real grift with the, with the goat discussion was that I think that's a huge
412
00:38:36,880 --> 00:38:41,680
title to give to somebody. And it's really important to reflect on who she's overtaking,
413
00:38:41,680 --> 00:38:47,920
you know, for dropping her that, that honorific. But yeah. And now I've gone too far in this discussion.
414
00:38:48,480 --> 00:38:54,080
Well, that makes sense. Cause I mean, I would say I'm more of like a newer viewer. So I don't
415
00:38:54,080 --> 00:39:03,520
like those previous people. So that's good to know. Do you think it's still like too early for the title?
416
00:39:03,520 --> 00:39:12,240
No, I don't think like I, my same, the same things I say now are important. So let's say Yanya ends up
417
00:39:12,240 --> 00:39:16,960
with a hundred gold medals, right? More gold medals than anybody in history. Like that's like
418
00:39:16,960 --> 00:39:23,440
many times more than anyone else. I still think it's worth being able to name the people that came
419
00:39:23,440 --> 00:39:29,040
before you. Right? Like if somebody says, Oh, Yanya won a hundred gold medals. No one's ever done that
420
00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:34,240
before. It's still worth knowing, okay, who's in second place and how many medals do they have?
421
00:39:34,240 --> 00:39:39,440
Right? Like that's a basic answer that I think you should be able to find before, before dropping the
422
00:39:39,440 --> 00:39:48,080
title. But in general, I do think Yanya is probably the greatest female lead and Boulder athlete we've
423
00:39:48,080 --> 00:39:53,520
ever seen. The hard part is there's very few people in history that have done that. And it might
424
00:39:53,520 --> 00:40:00,160
actually be a historical anomaly in climbing to have athletes doing both. So prolifically,
425
00:40:00,960 --> 00:40:05,360
when the Olympics goes to individual disciplines, which we're all quite certain at will at this
426
00:40:05,360 --> 00:40:10,720
point, and as the fields get bigger and there's more serious competitors, I can totally see a
427
00:40:10,720 --> 00:40:16,320
world where you have to focus on just lead or you have to focus on just Boulder in order to
428
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:22,960
be among the best. Setting has changed over the decades, the nature of competitions and
429
00:40:22,960 --> 00:40:27,440
the incentives for doing one discipline or another, they have all changed. So it's possible we're in
430
00:40:27,440 --> 00:40:33,120
this unique little pocket of time where we have all these talents who do both, right? This may
431
00:40:33,120 --> 00:40:38,800
not last forever. It hasn't been a very common thing to see repeat finalists in both lead and
432
00:40:38,800 --> 00:40:44,400
Boulder in a season. That's kind of pretty out there. And maybe that'll stop again. Who knows?
433
00:40:44,400 --> 00:40:48,000
Well, I think that might mean like a future goat would be someone who
434
00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:52,960
can do all of that despite not having to. Maybe. Yeah. And that's the, you know,
435
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:57,360
with these kinds of like subjective titles we give people, that's the hard part is comparing
436
00:40:57,360 --> 00:41:02,240
someone in the future who's in a totally different situation than those today, right?
437
00:41:02,240 --> 00:41:08,160
The two names I mentioned, Sandrine Lave and Liv Sensos, there was a very different time of climbing
438
00:41:08,160 --> 00:41:13,440
for, for Sandrine, the format was entirely different, right? For both disciplines was a
439
00:41:13,440 --> 00:41:18,080
totally different way of competing. The field was very different and there were different amounts
440
00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:22,800
of competitions each year. There were generally more comps for most of her years each year.
441
00:41:22,800 --> 00:41:27,120
So it was easier to rack up a higher medal count than someone like Yanya, for instance.
442
00:41:28,000 --> 00:41:35,680
And for Liv Sensos, her bouldering wins when she swept, it was a 97 or 98, those competitions were
443
00:41:35,680 --> 00:41:41,600
entirely within like France and Switzerland. It was a much more, you know, Eurocentric
444
00:41:41,600 --> 00:41:47,200
comp scene. The field was much smaller, but she won all those medals in the same way that Yanya
445
00:41:47,200 --> 00:41:51,200
did. So yeah, the context is really different and that's where it's hard to parse, right?
446
00:41:51,200 --> 00:41:58,640
If it was as simple as just Yanya has X number of medals, Sandrine has Y and Liv has Z, it would be
447
00:41:58,640 --> 00:42:03,520
a simple conversation, but yeah, just the nature of the way it's all evolved, it is much harder.
448
00:42:03,520 --> 00:42:09,120
Yeah. Yeah. And then also what you were mentioning about getting rid of isolation. Why?
449
00:42:09,120 --> 00:42:16,240
Yeah, that's like where me as a comp organizer is the driving factor for sure. It was interesting
450
00:42:16,240 --> 00:42:22,240
and Sean and Matt did their podcast yesterday and that was something Sean mentioned to a similar
451
00:42:22,240 --> 00:42:30,720
question. For me, one of my goals with bouldering specifically, although it's relevant to lead as
452
00:42:30,720 --> 00:42:36,800
well, is to make the competitions a kind of format that requires less formal organization.
453
00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:44,000
And ISO requires a little bit more space and it also requires more separation between athletes.
454
00:42:44,000 --> 00:42:49,760
It puts restrictions on who's allowed in certain spaces. So like if you just kind of imagine
455
00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:55,680
maybe your home gym or gyms nowadays are like bigger and bigger, so it's maybe not as much of
456
00:42:55,680 --> 00:43:00,880
an issue, but the idea of having to like close off an entire wall so nobody can see it often
457
00:43:00,880 --> 00:43:04,720
means for different gyms that the venue is just closed and that they're not allowed to be in
458
00:43:04,720 --> 00:43:10,240
gyms that the venue is just closed and nobody's allowed inside. So being able to open up
459
00:43:11,680 --> 00:43:16,000
settings so that people can watch the setting or the setting isn't necessarily blocked off
460
00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:21,680
would be great. Not having to store athletes who are warming up in a separate room, in a
461
00:43:21,680 --> 00:43:28,000
separate building, like the Salt Lake City World Cups, the climbers warm up at the USA training
462
00:43:28,000 --> 00:43:33,040
center and then they get put in a car and driven to the venue where they have a secondary warm up.
463
00:43:33,040 --> 00:43:37,920
That's a huge logistical just like waste of time that also costs money, right?
464
00:43:39,280 --> 00:43:43,520
And then lastly, just from like a crowd and spectator perspective, honestly, I really like
465
00:43:43,520 --> 00:43:49,200
the idea of the crowd being able to yell beta at climbers who are on the wall. That sounds
466
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:54,240
like a blast to me because most people give shit beta in the first place, but I think that would
467
00:43:54,240 --> 00:44:00,240
be a lot of fun. Now I don't think there is a comp format necessarily where the only change you make
468
00:44:00,240 --> 00:44:06,160
is just like cross out the isolation part and just use the current World Cup format. That's just like
469
00:44:06,160 --> 00:44:11,280
an element to a bouldering competition that I think would be really interesting. And the formats
470
00:44:11,280 --> 00:44:14,320
would probably have to be different and there's a bunch of different options for that.
471
00:44:16,160 --> 00:44:19,920
Garrett Greger has played around with some of those options. He had a Portland boulder rally
472
00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:26,800
a couple of years ago with that kind of concept. I think the guys at the boulder fields did the
473
00:44:26,800 --> 00:44:32,160
same, but I think that would be an interesting like kind of shift. Yeah, I think one time I saw
474
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:38,800
this competition. Maybe it was like the World Games or something where they didn't have isolation and
475
00:44:38,800 --> 00:44:45,680
it was just it was on it. Yeah, possibly. So you like literally just want that because of the
476
00:44:45,680 --> 00:44:51,360
logistical. Yeah, logistical and I think it opens up I think it makes you think differently about
477
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:57,360
what a boulder comp is. I think right now where it is very much like the athletes are only competing
478
00:44:57,360 --> 00:45:02,560
against the wall. They don't get to see each other. They don't get to climb in response to each other.
479
00:45:03,120 --> 00:45:07,440
I don't really love that. And I think if you get rid of ISO, it gives you more options to how
480
00:45:07,440 --> 00:45:12,560
a boulder competition for instance would run. So that's just one element, I guess. Yeah.
481
00:45:12,560 --> 00:45:16,800
You don't think it'd be like harder for route setters to create separation
482
00:45:16,800 --> 00:45:22,960
if they could all see each other climb. I think that's a super relevant concern if you use the
483
00:45:22,960 --> 00:45:28,720
current format. Yeah. So if let's say you are forced to climb a boulder for five minutes,
484
00:45:28,720 --> 00:45:33,120
and I just get to watch you for five minutes and then I go after, yeah, I'm gonna have a way better
485
00:45:33,120 --> 00:45:37,760
chance of topping thanks to watching you, you know, run some run some attempts on that thing.
486
00:45:38,720 --> 00:45:44,400
That's totally true. And that's like one of those reasons why it's probably not compatible with just
487
00:45:44,400 --> 00:45:48,000
like a regular World Cup format. You would probably have to make some other changes.
488
00:45:48,960 --> 00:45:52,320
But yeah, I think that's something when people talk about comp formats, it's kind of important
489
00:45:52,320 --> 00:46:01,360
to consider like, don't necessarily start with the current format. I think a lot of people's
490
00:46:01,360 --> 00:46:06,000
habits are to take the existing World Cup format and want to change individual lines
491
00:46:06,000 --> 00:46:11,200
and just make these little adjustments. I think those can really stack up and create problems.
492
00:46:11,200 --> 00:46:16,160
It's often just easier to say, what do I want the experience of the climber to be like? What do I
493
00:46:16,160 --> 00:46:21,200
want the experience of the route setter to be like, or the audience member to be like, and start
494
00:46:21,200 --> 00:46:26,080
building honestly from scratch. And that's a really fun mental exercise to think about, okay, what do
495
00:46:26,080 --> 00:46:31,440
I want scoring to look like? What is the best boulder and how do we get them to demonstrate it
496
00:46:31,440 --> 00:46:36,400
in an hour? Yeah. Yeah, I don't know what that would be like. I've also seen some like flash
497
00:46:36,400 --> 00:46:42,240
competitions. Like one attempt comps, you mean? Yeah. Yeah, I think that's a great idea. I love
498
00:46:42,240 --> 00:46:48,800
that. That's super fun. Yeah. Now, so long as I guess the one thing I'll say is I don't enjoy
499
00:46:49,520 --> 00:46:54,720
the competitions where they get to try the boulders before the comp. I super, super hate that.
500
00:46:55,760 --> 00:47:01,280
But yeah, like a comp format we thought would be really fun one time was just to just imagine
501
00:47:01,280 --> 00:47:07,440
this as an experiment, okay? A boulder wall with let's say nine boulders on it. And every competitor
502
00:47:07,440 --> 00:47:12,560
gets exactly nine attempts total. And which boulders they get to use those on is up to them.
503
00:47:12,560 --> 00:47:17,280
You can use one attempt on every boulder, or you can use some of those on just boulder number one,
504
00:47:17,280 --> 00:47:20,960
some of those on boulder number two and boulder number three, and you ignore the next six, right?
505
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:25,200
So now obviously there are like lots of different considerations about how you're going to route set
506
00:47:25,200 --> 00:47:30,240
for this, but it's really interesting if you start just like pulling apart comp formats,
507
00:47:30,240 --> 00:47:35,520
completely and just start from fresh. Like you and me, you and me, nine boulders in front of us.
508
00:47:35,520 --> 00:47:39,840
We both have nine attempts. Are you going to climb first? Are you going to wait for me to climb first?
509
00:47:40,400 --> 00:47:44,160
Which boulder are you going to choose if you're allowed to choose, right? Maybe we just say there's
510
00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:48,720
no running order. You just get to start on whichever one you want and you don't have to go in a
511
00:47:48,720 --> 00:47:53,760
particular direction. And you can just watch Tyler climb for 30 minutes before you try your attempts.
512
00:47:53,760 --> 00:47:58,000
Like, yeah, I think it's really fun when you start thinking about this stuff. And you also start to
513
00:47:58,000 --> 00:48:03,520
realize like, oh, there's a lot of comp format ideas I can try just with me and my friends at the gym.
514
00:48:04,240 --> 00:48:08,560
You're just like, Hey guys, there's a new set on the wall. Let's try this thing. We get nine attempts
515
00:48:08,560 --> 00:48:13,360
tonight and we see how many tops we can all get, but you just get nine attempts. So I think that's
516
00:48:13,360 --> 00:48:16,640
something people should try out is just like, try a new game with you and your friends and see what's fun.
517
00:48:16,640 --> 00:48:22,480
Well, I mean, you are the one who organizes competitions and works at a gym. So I think
518
00:48:22,480 --> 00:48:26,320
you're the one who should take that on in my own little way. Yeah, yeah, I try to.
519
00:48:26,320 --> 00:48:36,960
Yeah. Okay. Some other hot takes I wanted to see if you had opinions on. A lot of people talk about
520
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:44,160
not caring about the overall title anymore, I guess, like the season title or like not caring
521
00:48:44,160 --> 00:48:50,320
about world champs, other than it being an Olympic qualifier. Do you have any thoughts on that?
522
00:48:50,320 --> 00:48:56,560
Yeah, I guess I do. Like starting with world championships, it's one of those things you wish
523
00:48:56,560 --> 00:49:03,120
you could do every year, right? That's the one sad thing is it certainly feels structured at this
524
00:49:03,120 --> 00:49:12,240
point to be a qualifying event for an Olympic games, which is a little frustrating. I would love
525
00:49:12,240 --> 00:49:16,320
it if every year we could have a culminating event where we get to see the best climbers in the world.
526
00:49:16,320 --> 00:49:21,760
I think that would be a lot more fun than having it every two years. For the overall,
527
00:49:23,200 --> 00:49:29,200
this is a hard one because in climbing our circuit has like relatively few events.
528
00:49:30,720 --> 00:49:36,160
And I think a lot of the awareness of this topic, it's curious, maybe it's not a coincidence that
529
00:49:36,160 --> 00:49:41,440
this conversation has come up when F1 has become this new sport that so many of us now have a much
530
00:49:41,440 --> 00:49:46,960
better understanding of than we did before. And that sport has a very clear, very important season
531
00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:52,640
ranking across the entire year, but they're dealing with something like 20 to 25 races,
532
00:49:52,640 --> 00:50:00,080
I think, every year. And the way it's structured out is there are some drivers in F1 who they might
533
00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:06,320
get no score for a bunch of these races because they crash or they come too low in the placings,
534
00:50:06,320 --> 00:50:10,080
but you're still able to be competitive even though you miss a few events.
535
00:50:10,080 --> 00:50:15,200
In climbing where lately we're pretty much averaging about six events per year for each
536
00:50:15,200 --> 00:50:24,000
discipline, if you miss two events and then you have a abnormally low event in one of the other
537
00:50:24,000 --> 00:50:30,800
stops, you're pretty much out. So having an overall season with this number of events is
538
00:50:30,800 --> 00:50:37,680
actually functionally really difficult to make it genuinely competitive.
539
00:50:37,680 --> 00:50:42,320
So you're going to end up with a lot of situations where because there's so few events and you earn
540
00:50:42,320 --> 00:50:48,400
so many points for each one, you can be in the final event of the year and there could be like
541
00:50:48,400 --> 00:50:53,680
10 different people that could win, right? Conversely, you can get to the end of the year
542
00:50:53,680 --> 00:50:58,560
and Yanya Garmbrat is at the event and she can be miles ahead of everybody else, but because she
543
00:50:58,560 --> 00:51:05,280
missed two events in the season, she is just not in consideration, right? Two events, just two events,
544
00:51:05,280 --> 00:51:11,280
and that puts her out. So I think our overall season has some work that needs to be done before
545
00:51:11,280 --> 00:51:19,440
it could be considered a really clean kind of spectator product to understand. I think more
546
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:24,960
focus does need to be put on it because generally the top three people each season had really great
547
00:51:24,960 --> 00:51:35,760
seasons and we should laud those people for a great performance. And the basics of this are we
548
00:51:35,760 --> 00:51:41,200
should show that overall season podium at the end of the year, right? We should actually see it. I
549
00:51:41,200 --> 00:51:45,360
think it was last year or the year before where we didn't even get to see them award the bouldering
550
00:51:46,080 --> 00:51:52,080
podium for the overall season. That's too crappy a way to end a year, right? So we at least got to
551
00:51:52,080 --> 00:52:00,640
show those performances. But I think one cool thing that's happening this year, and it probably
552
00:52:00,640 --> 00:52:06,400
won't happen every year in the future, but this year ends with an event that is all three
553
00:52:06,400 --> 00:52:12,320
disciplines. The final event of the year is going to be speed and bouldering and lead. So this really
554
00:52:12,320 --> 00:52:17,200
cool thing is happening where all of those storylines for all three disciplines are going to end at
555
00:52:17,200 --> 00:52:23,440
the same time. And I think that is also a nice improvement where even though technically it's
556
00:52:23,440 --> 00:52:28,960
not a world championship, depending on how the year plays out and depending on who's too tired
557
00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:33,200
from the Olympics and decides they don't want to show up and depending on who's got the points,
558
00:52:34,000 --> 00:52:38,800
you could end up with that final comp of the year having like all the big stars in attendance
559
00:52:38,800 --> 00:52:43,760
fighting for those overall points and having all three disciplines doing it. And it kind of becomes
560
00:52:43,760 --> 00:52:50,880
this quasi world championship unofficially. So I'm a little scared. The other two things are kind
561
00:52:50,880 --> 00:52:56,000
of tough to talk about because there's just these practical problems with them. But that's one thing
562
00:52:56,000 --> 00:53:00,720
I'm really psyched about this season for is ending it with a speed boulder and lead World Cup. It's
563
00:53:00,720 --> 00:53:05,760
been since I think 2015, Haiyang in China was the last time there was a World Cup that had all three
564
00:53:05,760 --> 00:53:10,960
disciplines in it. So it's really rare. It's really, really rare. But we get one. So I'm psyched.
565
00:53:10,960 --> 00:53:14,000
Yeah. Do you know why they decide to do that this year?
566
00:53:14,000 --> 00:53:21,280
So if I remember right, the last World Cup is going to be in South Korea. They are the hosts of
567
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:28,000
the 2025 World Championships, right? So I think what it is, is if you're going to host a world
568
00:53:28,000 --> 00:53:34,320
championship, you must, the country that's hosting the World Championship must have hosted events,
569
00:53:34,320 --> 00:53:39,520
I believe in all three disciplines in the year before. So it's a really, really rare event.
570
00:53:39,520 --> 00:53:43,360
In the year before. So it's basically written into the book that if you're going to host a
571
00:53:43,360 --> 00:53:48,640
world championship, you need to prove that you are capable of running a speed event and a boulder
572
00:53:48,640 --> 00:53:55,520
event and a lead event in the year leading up to that. So I'm pretty sure that's probably why it's
573
00:53:55,520 --> 00:54:01,840
all happening that way. Korea hasn't held a lead event in I think about 10 years as well, like
574
00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:07,360
maybe 2014 or something. We know they can do boulder and speed because we've seen it the last
575
00:54:07,360 --> 00:54:12,240
couple of seasons, I think, but they need to prove it on lead. And so for whatever reason,
576
00:54:12,240 --> 00:54:17,040
in terms of like when in the year it is, I don't know why necessarily the IFSC put it at the end
577
00:54:17,040 --> 00:54:21,200
of the year, but I believe that's why you're seeing all three happen at one event.
578
00:54:21,200 --> 00:54:29,840
LSW Yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah, when you were talking about the F1 stuff and having like a bunch
579
00:54:29,840 --> 00:54:40,000
of competitions, I didn't know they did that many. That's like an insane amount. I can't imagine
580
00:54:40,000 --> 00:54:45,360
at the state competition climbing is in right now that that would be feasible at all considering
581
00:54:46,080 --> 00:54:51,440
how expensive it would be for athletes to attend these and then like not even win much money from
582
00:54:51,440 --> 00:54:54,400
them, especially given their current budgets. So.
583
00:54:54,400 --> 00:54:59,040
CB And there's also not a lot of countries that are able to host world cups. Like hosting world
584
00:54:59,040 --> 00:55:03,840
cups is very expensive. So it's just simply not an option for the most part.
585
00:55:03,840 --> 00:55:10,000
LSW And I think that also reminds me of like the environmental impact that people are talking
586
00:55:10,000 --> 00:55:16,960
about when it comes to going to competitions. I think that was a big thing with the like
587
00:55:16,960 --> 00:55:24,240
Neom games in like Saudi Arabia. Yeah. Any thoughts on that one?
588
00:55:24,240 --> 00:55:30,720
CB I was just really surprised that the environmental angle was the one that everybody
589
00:55:30,720 --> 00:55:34,480
had a problem with for that event. I shouldn't say everybody because I know like within my
590
00:55:34,480 --> 00:55:40,320
discord, possibly within your discord on the maybe the comp climbing subreddit,
591
00:55:40,320 --> 00:55:46,400
people mentioned the facts that like, oh, hey, this competition is entirely paid for by the
592
00:55:46,400 --> 00:55:52,160
Saudi Royals who have a terrible record of killing journalists, jailing people for tweeting,
593
00:55:52,160 --> 00:55:57,040
and just an awful human rights record and are diving into all of these different sports right
594
00:55:57,040 --> 00:56:02,560
now because they're in this genuinely unfortunate position where their economy is driven entirely
595
00:56:02,560 --> 00:56:06,800
by oil, which the entire world is trying to get away from. And they're realizing, oh,
596
00:56:06,800 --> 00:56:12,000
shit, we've got this giant country full of people that need jobs and we can't rely on oil. We have
597
00:56:12,000 --> 00:56:17,680
to diversify, which is like a fair objective for any country, right? But the way they're doing that
598
00:56:17,680 --> 00:56:22,720
is we're taking our oil money and us as a, you know, a Royal family, we're going to buy up
599
00:56:22,720 --> 00:56:27,920
as many sports properties. I shouldn't just say it's everything. It's technology, it's business.
600
00:56:27,920 --> 00:56:33,280
They are trying to just like take these different parts of the world's economy
601
00:56:33,280 --> 00:56:38,400
and take it into their kingdom so that they can basically treat it as their own and kind of
602
00:56:38,400 --> 00:56:45,920
sustain their country, which is fair. The frustrating part is, you know, in my opinion,
603
00:56:45,920 --> 00:56:53,200
the IFSC is a sport organization that is desperate for funding, which is true for the most part.
604
00:56:53,200 --> 00:56:56,480
It doesn't have the funding like a lot of other sports that will change with the Olympics, but
605
00:56:57,760 --> 00:57:01,600
most sports money like always seems to be a problem for whatever reason.
606
00:57:02,640 --> 00:57:06,560
So we are exactly the kind of people that would be like, yes, absolutely. Please, please give us
607
00:57:06,560 --> 00:57:12,160
whatever money you can take and we'll absolutely host this competition. And I think that same
608
00:57:12,160 --> 00:57:20,160
instinct among climbing fans, which may trend towards a more like, like liberal worldview,
609
00:57:20,160 --> 00:57:24,240
where we would care about the environmental impact of our sport, even though, you know,
610
00:57:24,800 --> 00:57:32,240
every sport out there from the NFL to F1, most of these sports have ginormous environmental impacts.
611
00:57:32,240 --> 00:57:38,800
It's interesting that that, that, that instinct in us to worry about the environment and to care
612
00:57:38,800 --> 00:57:47,360
about things like that also was a little drastic, like surprisingly silent when we took a call up
613
00:57:47,360 --> 00:57:53,200
and basically white labeled the world cup in Saudi Arabia. There are trans climbers, there are gay
614
00:57:53,200 --> 00:58:01,520
climbers, there are climbers who in the last couple of years have been, well, we can take Iran,
615
00:58:01,520 --> 00:58:06,480
for example, we've had climbers that have been deeply oppressed by their governments. We have
616
00:58:06,480 --> 00:58:12,960
climbers who have been punished because Russia, for example, you know, Russia does a crazy thing
617
00:58:12,960 --> 00:58:19,040
by invading a neighbor. And now those climbers are punished because of that action. It's surprising
618
00:58:19,040 --> 00:58:24,160
that we were okay with going to Saudi Arabia and thinking like, yeah, this is a good thing. Hashtag
619
00:58:24,160 --> 00:58:30,160
discover neon everybody. We're psyched to be here. That was a little surprising. I thought there would
620
00:58:30,160 --> 00:58:38,400
be a bit more noise from everybody. Yeah. In talking to athletes and talking to people involved,
621
00:58:40,880 --> 00:58:48,080
there is a, the word is, is, is lost to me right now. It's on the tip of my tongue.
622
00:58:48,080 --> 00:58:53,840
So I'm just going to use the word acceptance. It seems like there is a reluctant acceptance
623
00:58:53,840 --> 00:58:59,760
that this is what pro sports is, especially if you're involved in like the Olympic world,
624
00:59:00,640 --> 00:59:05,520
where for whatever reason we decide we want everyone involved and we claim it's about peace.
625
00:59:06,160 --> 00:59:11,440
But, you know, we ejected Russia for what, two years and now, now they're back.
626
00:59:12,960 --> 00:59:16,720
We're willing to have all of these national partners that have, you know, objectionable
627
00:59:18,240 --> 00:59:22,640
human rights records from Saudi Arabia, the China to whoever you want. You get out a ton of people
628
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:26,800
on this. You get out the United States that list at different parts in their history, right? Like
629
00:59:26,800 --> 00:59:32,400
that's, that's not a stretch. So it's, it's interesting to watch the climbing community,
630
00:59:32,400 --> 00:59:39,040
not just the athletes or the organizers, but also just the fans have to think about that and decide
631
00:59:39,040 --> 00:59:43,360
whether these things are important to us or not, whether you're not, you're going to watch neon.
632
00:59:44,560 --> 00:59:50,640
Yeah, it's interesting. The environmental impact is a totally fair question. I would just say,
633
00:59:50,640 --> 00:59:54,960
um, and maybe there are people suggesting an alternative and I just haven't seen it,
634
00:59:54,960 --> 01:00:00,560
but I think you do have to ask a practical question like, okay, do you want international
635
01:00:00,560 --> 01:00:04,480
competitive climbing? Well, we need climbers from different parts of the world to meet up
636
01:00:04,480 --> 01:00:10,240
in the same spot to do this, right? Um, so that's just a practical limitation that has to be like,
637
01:00:10,240 --> 01:00:14,960
honestly discussed. Yeah, I don't really know how we would get around that, but, um, yeah,
638
01:00:14,960 --> 01:00:19,280
I definitely was surprised that it was the environmental issues and not like the,
639
01:00:19,280 --> 01:00:24,960
the political issues that people were discussing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for elaborating on that.
640
01:00:24,960 --> 01:00:30,400
I feel like I didn't even know that's like the reason why they started to create the games. I
641
01:00:30,400 --> 01:00:37,600
just thought they were like, oh, it's fun to host sports. Yeah. I won't like, I'm not going to like
642
01:00:37,600 --> 01:00:42,480
retread it or go too deep in it, but yeah, Saudi Arabia just economically has a really big question
643
01:00:42,480 --> 01:00:48,000
that they're having to deal with. Um, and, and there's nothing wrong with trying to rejuvenate
644
01:00:48,000 --> 01:00:55,520
your economy. Um, but it means for a lot of us, uh, Saudi Arabia has tons and tons and tons of
645
01:00:55,520 --> 01:00:59,920
money, like so much money, and it is all controlled directly by their government.
646
01:01:00,560 --> 01:01:06,640
So when an event is held by a government company, you're saying, okay, we're, we want to team up
647
01:01:06,640 --> 01:01:13,280
with the government directly. Right? So this isn't just a competition being held, you know, by, by a
648
01:01:13,280 --> 01:01:17,920
gym in the Netherlands or a gym in the USA. This is a gym being held in the Netherlands that is
649
01:01:17,920 --> 01:01:23,840
paid for by the government of the Netherlands or the government of the USA. And it's up to us
650
01:01:23,840 --> 01:01:29,040
whether or not we want to take that money. Cause that paycheck came basically directly from the
651
01:01:29,040 --> 01:01:34,800
kingdom of Saudi Arabia straight to the IFSC. Um, and we got to decide if we want to work with a
652
01:01:34,800 --> 01:01:42,720
government like that. Yeah. Very interesting food for thought. Um, okay. Last, uh, competition hot
653
01:01:42,720 --> 01:01:50,080
take the new red S policy that came out. Yeah. Did you get a chance to look at that? Uh, so
654
01:01:50,080 --> 01:01:56,320
months ago, I looked at the IOCs, um, policy that they put out. I can't remember what it's called,
655
01:01:56,320 --> 01:02:02,000
but they did like kind of a recent, uh, rewrite of their red S policy. Um, interest, and I can't
656
01:02:02,000 --> 01:02:06,000
remember her name, but one of the big doctors in this is actually from down the road at McMaster
657
01:02:06,000 --> 01:02:12,000
university in Hamilton nearby. I think her last name is Mount joy. Um, so it was cool seeing like
658
01:02:12,000 --> 01:02:19,280
a local connection to, to this stuff. Um, yeah, I'm really excited that we have a much more specific
659
01:02:19,280 --> 01:02:27,200
policy that lays out quite concrete steps for how it's supposed to work. Um, like any policy, the,
660
01:02:28,800 --> 01:02:32,480
what we're going to have to judge them on is how it is implemented. Um,
661
01:02:34,000 --> 01:02:40,560
federations get to perform most of these tests on their own. Uh, so we have to see if federations
662
01:02:40,560 --> 01:02:47,120
are keeping their athletes interests in mind, or if, uh, if they're going to fudge some numbers or,
663
01:02:47,120 --> 01:02:53,120
or be a little less than truthful for the sake of maybe keeping some of their best athletes in play,
664
01:02:53,120 --> 01:02:58,160
which earns those federations money. So that's something to be wary of is if you have your best
665
01:02:58,160 --> 01:03:03,760
athlete winning all these goals and they're an Olympic hopeful, you might get a ton of money
666
01:03:03,760 --> 01:03:09,120
from your country's government because you have an Olympic metal hopeful. Um, whereas if you take
667
01:03:09,120 --> 01:03:13,440
them out of play because they're unhealthy, you lose a lot of money. And that's, that's just like
668
01:03:13,440 --> 01:03:18,960
a genuine conflict of interest that we have to be aware of. Uh, and then lastly is how the random
669
01:03:18,960 --> 01:03:23,200
tests work. Um, who's going to be performing those, how often they're going to, they're going to be
670
01:03:23,200 --> 01:03:27,920
performed. How is that stuff going to be enforced? So I'm really optimistic that we have an improved
671
01:03:27,920 --> 01:03:34,000
policy. I'm really excited that the athletes were so involved in it. That is awesome. Um, but now
672
01:03:34,000 --> 01:03:38,800
we have to judge it on how it's implemented. And that was really the weakness of the last one was
673
01:03:38,800 --> 01:03:44,480
there was a policy, but all of a sudden it stopped being enforced. And that's when all the trouble
674
01:03:44,480 --> 01:03:50,080
happened was when nobody was enforcing it anymore. So over the next year, the next couple of years,
675
01:03:50,080 --> 01:03:55,280
let's see how it goes. So cautiously optimistic, I guess, is what I would say. Maybe I misread it,
676
01:03:55,280 --> 01:04:01,360
but I thought that this was done this like testing and everything was going to be done at the IFSC
677
01:04:01,360 --> 01:04:10,320
level. Yeah. So on the second page, um, national federation responsibilities. So step one is
678
01:04:10,320 --> 01:04:17,840
basically you guys do the tests. Um, and then, uh, all that stuff kind of gets sent to the IFSC
679
01:04:17,840 --> 01:04:24,080
basically just saying, Hey, this athlete is good or this athlete is not. Um, the random testing is,
680
01:04:24,080 --> 01:04:30,560
is monitored by the IFSC. Um, but yeah, so, so there's still some national federation
681
01:04:30,560 --> 01:04:35,200
involvement and stuff. I just thought, I also just thought like a questionnaire was kind of funny
682
01:04:35,200 --> 01:04:41,120
because you could just lie, right? It's like pretty obvious what they're looking for. So,
683
01:04:41,120 --> 01:04:46,080
yeah, yeah. And that's, that's where that random testing is really important. We, you know,
684
01:04:46,080 --> 01:04:50,880
is that random testing going to be frequent? Is it going to be impartial? Uh, and, and is it going
685
01:04:50,880 --> 01:04:55,200
to be enforced or is it going to be the kind of thing that athletes can just appeal to the ends
686
01:04:55,200 --> 01:05:00,720
of the earth and, and, and effectively like nullify it? Like, yeah, they tested me and they said I was
687
01:05:00,720 --> 01:05:06,880
in the orange zone or the red zone, but I'm just going to take it up with every, every judge and
688
01:05:06,880 --> 01:05:13,680
every court of arbitration possible and basically just get away with it for, for years, like don't
689
01:05:13,680 --> 01:05:18,400
really know. So we kind of got to see it play out. We'll see how it goes in the upcoming season.
690
01:05:18,400 --> 01:05:24,720
And speaking of the upcoming season, I'm sure you have a lot of season predictions.
691
01:05:26,000 --> 01:05:31,760
I'm terrible at this. Like if I participated in like sports betting, I would be out so much
692
01:05:31,760 --> 01:05:41,120
money at this point, just based on what already happened in terms of Olympic selection. So I
693
01:05:41,120 --> 01:05:47,520
guess, first of all, I'm not sure if you have any insight on this. I'm wondering if a lot of athletes
694
01:05:47,520 --> 01:05:54,480
will be pulling out of competitions leading up to the Olympics and after, and what, like how that
695
01:05:54,480 --> 01:05:57,040
would change the season if people aren't present.
696
01:05:57,840 --> 01:06:05,520
Yeah, I don't have any insight. And I also, all I can really talk about is kind of what we saw in
697
01:06:05,520 --> 01:06:15,200
29 or sorry, in 2020. In 2020, I think Alberto Ginez Lopez was the only Olympic athlete to attend
698
01:06:15,200 --> 01:06:21,840
like almost every comp before the Olympics itself. And so the joke was he tired himself out and was
699
01:06:21,840 --> 01:06:28,240
going to perform like shit. And then of course he becomes the gold medalist somehow at 2020,
700
01:06:28,240 --> 01:06:36,320
of course, a year later. I don't know, but I'm sure most of them will take some time off. The
701
01:06:36,320 --> 01:06:40,160
early part of the season is going to be interesting depending on when athletes want to peak,
702
01:06:40,160 --> 01:06:46,720
obviously. So some athletes may postpone their season up to the OQS events, but I guess most of
703
01:06:46,720 --> 01:06:51,440
them are going to compete just as a warmup, see where they are as some like basic testing, get
704
01:06:51,440 --> 01:06:56,160
back in the flow of competing. It's going to be the events around the Olympics where I would expect
705
01:06:56,160 --> 01:07:01,040
you start to see more and more names drop off. Whatever the last world cup is before the Olympics,
706
01:07:02,320 --> 01:07:06,720
there's that if you want to place a bet on like, oh, at this comp, you'll see somebody win a gold
707
01:07:06,720 --> 01:07:11,280
medal who's never won a gold medal before. Whatever comp that is, that's probably a pretty good bet
708
01:07:11,280 --> 01:07:17,200
that you're going to see a first time gold medalist at that last event before the Olympics as they
709
01:07:17,200 --> 01:07:22,720
start to transition. Now I say that and some differences from last time. I don't know what
710
01:07:22,720 --> 01:07:32,080
Paris is like in the summer, but for Tokyo, there was a lot of concern that it was going to be very
711
01:07:32,080 --> 01:07:39,040
hot and we were going to have to do a lot of travel to get used to that. And so maybe since
712
01:07:39,040 --> 01:07:43,120
most of our athletes are European, maybe you're going to see more competitors since they're in
713
01:07:43,120 --> 01:07:48,800
Europe already. It might not be as big a deal. I don't know. We'll see what happens because the
714
01:07:48,800 --> 01:07:53,360
circuit still does travel around quite a lot beforehand. So they might skip some continents,
715
01:07:53,360 --> 01:07:58,000
but that's always been something that a lot of athletes have done is skip a leg here and there
716
01:07:58,000 --> 01:08:03,040
based on their own personal condition. But yeah, we'll see what happens. I think attendance will be
717
01:08:03,040 --> 01:08:08,560
cut off a little more than usual though. Do you like watching a competition where there's
718
01:08:08,560 --> 01:08:15,760
lesser known competitors? No, not really. I think I'm definitely a bit of an elitist when it comes
719
01:08:15,760 --> 01:08:20,160
to watching comp climbing. I really do just want to see the best six climbers over and over.
720
01:08:20,160 --> 01:08:27,760
Honestly, if you just gave me a women's final, just Yanya, I, Chayun, Brooke, Natalia, and Jesse
721
01:08:27,760 --> 01:08:33,040
Pills or pick your six, Laura or something like that, I could watch that 10 times, 10 times a
722
01:08:33,040 --> 01:08:38,160
row. I don't care. I don't need to see new names coming up just pipping up for a single final.
723
01:08:38,160 --> 01:08:43,840
I forgot Orienne, I guess. Sorry, Orienne. Yeah, that's a harsh one to miss, especially
724
01:08:43,840 --> 01:08:47,840
because she just won the French national bouldering champs today. She's a great athlete.
725
01:08:47,840 --> 01:08:53,760
The French national bouldering champs today. Yeah, I would happily just watch that field climb over
726
01:08:53,760 --> 01:09:01,600
and over and over. I don't care too much about new faces. When they show up and start being
727
01:09:01,600 --> 01:09:10,640
regulars, that's awesome. But I don't watch a ton of national comps. A lot of people seem to enjoy
728
01:09:10,640 --> 01:09:15,760
the story of, wow, isn't it cool that this person is having the best comp day of their life and they
729
01:09:15,760 --> 01:09:21,120
made it to finals. I don't really care about that. I much prefer to talk about these are the best
730
01:09:21,120 --> 01:09:28,240
climbers of this generation and let's find all the little differences between them. Let's see who
731
01:09:28,240 --> 01:09:32,080
needs three attempts on this kind of move and only one attempt on that kind of move. That's the stuff
732
01:09:32,080 --> 01:09:37,840
I love is the very best climbers. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I think a lot of people would agree with that.
733
01:09:38,480 --> 01:09:44,560
I think that's one of the reasons why I really want there to be a newish climber who just suddenly
734
01:09:44,560 --> 01:09:49,600
explodes on the scene and then can stay there for a really long time. Because I think that would
735
01:09:50,160 --> 01:09:57,040
garner a lot of interest and talk within the climbing community, but also maybe outside of
736
01:09:57,040 --> 01:10:06,800
the climbing community and grow the sport. I just really want Serato to go really far or totally.
737
01:10:06,800 --> 01:10:14,480
Yeah, I think that's super fair. The athletes that I will always have a special place in
738
01:10:14,480 --> 01:10:19,440
my heart were the ones who debuted in 2019 because that was the first year that John and I did the
739
01:10:19,440 --> 01:10:26,720
debrief. Specifically, I, Maury and Chy-Yan Suh both came out of nowhere that year. I, Maury,
740
01:10:26,720 --> 01:10:33,680
not so much. She only got one bronze medal or something like that, but Chy-Yan Suh, never seen
741
01:10:33,680 --> 01:10:40,160
her before. Yanni Garnbret just won the entire World Cup boulder season and she's a lead climber
742
01:10:40,160 --> 01:10:43,920
at the time. You're a lead climber. You just won the whole boulder season. Now you're coming to
743
01:10:43,920 --> 01:10:48,480
lead. You're obviously going to win it all. Then this little kid from Korea absolutely destroys.
744
01:10:49,200 --> 01:10:53,680
Getting to witness that was amazing. I think you may find, I don't know which year was your
745
01:10:53,680 --> 01:10:59,040
first if it was last season, but my guess is you may end up developing a connection with somebody
746
01:10:59,040 --> 01:11:04,400
like Serato the same way that I feel for Chy-Yan where it's like, oh, you came up the same year
747
01:11:04,400 --> 01:11:10,320
I did. For that reason, you're like, you mean a little bit more to me. But yeah, there will
748
01:11:10,320 --> 01:11:15,280
always be those new people. They'll come and it'll be a shock when they show up and it'll be amazing.
749
01:11:15,280 --> 01:11:21,600
Well, the thing is they have to stay because especially with the Olympics, I guess I'm just
750
01:11:21,600 --> 01:11:26,960
thinking about how Michael Phelps is huge and he stayed in the scene for so many years and
751
01:11:26,960 --> 01:11:35,040
got so many medals. I feel like that's what we need to grow the sport and for people here.
752
01:11:35,040 --> 01:11:40,080
Because who watches swimming? Yeah, nobody. I think that's something we should be really
753
01:11:40,080 --> 01:11:44,160
conscious of is like not a lot of people watch climbing. And so I think like going back to the
754
01:11:44,160 --> 01:11:48,960
format thing, it's worth rethinking our format. Maybe we don't have to feel married to this. We
755
01:11:48,960 --> 01:11:54,400
have room to experiment. It's really important to grow viewership. But yeah, I think having Yanya is
756
01:11:55,200 --> 01:12:01,600
exceptional. The only thing more you could ask for her is that she would be American.
757
01:12:02,480 --> 01:12:07,200
There is just like an American bump in media coverage and like, yo, the US media,
758
01:12:07,200 --> 01:12:11,680
if they have an incredible athlete, they will blow them up on every billboard and they will
759
01:12:11,680 --> 01:12:16,480
become like international names regardless of what sport they're in. If Yanya was American,
760
01:12:16,480 --> 01:12:21,600
she would be a superstar. She would be Simone Biles. It would be unbelievable.
761
01:12:22,480 --> 01:12:29,440
But I think Yanya is that person. Yanya is a generational talent for sure. So I think
762
01:12:29,440 --> 01:12:35,280
we're really lucky we have her and I expect the next like kind of five or 10 years is probably
763
01:12:35,280 --> 01:12:41,200
going to be more like, you know, the way climbing history, especially in women's field is you usually
764
01:12:41,200 --> 01:12:45,840
have like two or three athletes that are all right at the top together and no one is necessarily
765
01:12:45,840 --> 01:12:54,240
dominant. So I think this Yanya period will slowly trickle off and you'll have a couple names.
766
01:12:54,240 --> 01:12:58,960
But I think enjoy Yanya while she lasts as being like the singular dominant athlete,
767
01:12:58,960 --> 01:13:01,600
because it may be a long time before we get somebody else like that.
768
01:13:01,600 --> 01:13:05,680
Yeah, I guess the only issue is that she's not American.
769
01:13:05,680 --> 01:13:10,960
Yeah, exactly. Maybe we can convince her to, yo, get her to marry an American guy, get over there
770
01:13:10,960 --> 01:13:13,760
and yeah, we'll do whatever we have to. Yeah.
771
01:13:13,760 --> 01:13:14,800
Be good for the sport.
772
01:13:15,520 --> 01:13:16,020
Yeah.
773
01:13:16,880 --> 01:13:18,640
Who are your favorites for the Olympics?
774
01:13:21,520 --> 01:13:28,320
It's much harder on the men's side. For the women's, I would, there are caveats to all these
775
01:13:28,320 --> 01:13:33,600
things always, so I'm not even going to bother. Yanya Garbritt is my pick for women's lead.
776
01:13:34,640 --> 01:13:39,120
I think it would be silly to pick anybody other than Alexandra Miroslav for women's speed.
777
01:13:39,840 --> 01:13:45,200
For men's lead in Boulder, bro, I don't even like, that's such a crap shoot and that's the
778
01:13:45,200 --> 01:13:49,600
beauty of the men's field is like, you can make a list of seven names and they've all got a chance.
779
01:13:50,480 --> 01:13:54,400
I think Serato and Rakuh is looking like an excellent choice though.
780
01:13:54,400 --> 01:14:03,840
And then for the men's speed, I love that. I love having,
781
01:14:07,520 --> 01:14:12,560
it's hard for me because the two Indonesian guys, I think of them as a duo. I'm not sure I want
782
01:14:12,560 --> 01:14:20,800
Kiramel or Vedrik to become like way, way, way better than the other. I love having them as this
783
01:14:20,800 --> 01:14:24,880
duo that are kind of neck and neck and win for their own different reasons and have different
784
01:14:24,880 --> 01:14:29,360
personalities. So I don't, I would really like it if it was an Indonesian one too. And of course,
785
01:14:29,360 --> 01:14:36,960
we already know that that's not going to happen because they're not both going to be at the Olympic
786
01:14:36,960 --> 01:14:42,160
Games. For men's speed, yeah, that's a tough one. I'm not really sure who I want to go with for that
787
01:14:42,160 --> 01:14:47,920
one. Okay. I'll pander for my men's pick and speed. This one goes out to those in the know,
788
01:14:47,920 --> 01:14:53,440
but yeah, I'll pick Sam Watson for it because you Americans could really use a win.
789
01:14:54,960 --> 01:15:00,080
That would help us a lot, frankly, as a sport. So you're my pick. Okay. Yeah.
790
01:15:01,680 --> 01:15:10,160
Yeah. I mean, I guess it's less likely on the lead and bolder side. Actually, that reminds me,
791
01:15:10,160 --> 01:15:17,760
one of the surprises for me qualifying for the Olympics was, I think, the fact that I was
792
01:15:17,760 --> 01:15:23,920
calling so early. I mean, eventually, sure, but I didn't know he was having, I mean, he wasn't
793
01:15:23,920 --> 01:15:29,840
having like a super great season. No, this was a terrible season for the American men, like, yeah,
794
01:15:29,840 --> 01:15:35,520
for, well, American men in Boulder and lead specifically, not so much speed, but yeah.
795
01:15:36,240 --> 01:15:40,480
Yeah. Was there any other athlete that you were like surprised about qualifying?
796
01:15:41,040 --> 01:15:47,680
I think I would probably say like for the lead and stuff, I think really just Jesse Pills being
797
01:15:47,680 --> 01:15:51,680
right at the top. That's probably the one name that I didn't quite expect. Like I thought that
798
01:15:51,680 --> 01:15:59,600
top three would be more along the lines of like Yanya I. Brooke or Yanya Brooke or Yan or something
799
01:15:59,600 --> 01:16:05,040
like that. So Jesse is always like right there on the edge. And of course she's always relevant
800
01:16:05,040 --> 01:16:11,040
whenever she's in a final, but I think she would have been like, like fourth, fifth or sixth for me.
801
01:16:11,760 --> 01:16:14,560
But yeah, I think with a lot of these events, like especially in the combined,
802
01:16:14,560 --> 01:16:19,840
I don't feel too surprised anymore at most of the results. Yeah. I don't know.
803
01:16:19,840 --> 01:16:27,840
Okay. Yeah. I think for me, as a newish viewer, I know Jacob is super decorated,
804
01:16:29,040 --> 01:16:35,840
but I just like haven't seen him compete that much the past couple of years. And so I did not know
805
01:16:35,840 --> 01:16:39,840
he was going to, yeah, I didn't know he was going to qualify so early.
806
01:16:39,840 --> 01:16:45,120
Yeah. I think Jacob is, is one of the unsung heroes and the, I think the time you should,
807
01:16:45,760 --> 01:16:53,200
like, I don't think there's any content around this, but he did, he won seven lead world cups
808
01:16:53,200 --> 01:16:59,840
in a row in 2011. He would have been 21 years old and he was competing against guys that were like,
809
01:17:00,480 --> 01:17:06,240
kind of like six to 10 years older than him. And he absolutely dominated that season. He didn't
810
01:17:06,240 --> 01:17:10,320
win the world championships because it was like Ramon, like one of the Spanish guys that won that.
811
01:17:10,880 --> 01:17:19,120
But if, you know, like if Yanya's, if Yanya six in a row was impressive in 2019, like Jacob is
812
01:17:19,120 --> 01:17:24,880
right up there winning seven out of seven in a row, but I think it was like a 10 world cup season
813
01:17:24,880 --> 01:17:29,040
in 2011. Like there used to be like way more world cups. A lot of these years you would like fit in
814
01:17:29,040 --> 01:17:36,160
10, 10 lead world cups in one year plus a world championships. Yeah. And I think he's, I think
815
01:17:36,160 --> 01:17:40,720
that's what was kind of messed up is Jacob Schubert's peak. His like peak in terms of
816
01:17:40,720 --> 01:17:47,760
metal count per season was 13 years ago. Yeah, that's crazy. And he's going in a still as an
817
01:17:47,760 --> 01:17:56,320
Olympic favorite at this time, right? Like there he's not, he's, it's not worth underestimating him
818
01:17:56,320 --> 01:18:01,360
like at any corner. He can turn up whenever. And I'm not necessarily saying he's consistent
819
01:18:01,360 --> 01:18:07,600
because he isn't, but Charlie Bosco like kind of mentioned leading up to the last Olympics that,
820
01:18:10,800 --> 01:18:16,800
that Jacob just has like a big game player mentality. He suits up for the big moments.
821
01:18:16,800 --> 01:18:22,560
And when it comes to world championships, he is ready on those days. I think you have to go back
822
01:18:22,560 --> 01:18:27,760
like over like 12 years before you find a lead world championship where Jacob wasn't first or
823
01:18:27,760 --> 01:18:34,160
second, the guy shows up. He is unbelievable. So I wouldn't necessarily put them as my bet to win the
824
01:18:34,160 --> 01:18:39,280
world cup. I just said it would be probably Serato and Raku, right? But not going to be shocked to
825
01:18:39,280 --> 01:18:45,760
become second or third or first. You never know, man. He's, he's incredible. Okay. Yeah. Really
826
01:18:45,760 --> 01:18:51,600
good to learn about the, the history of competitions. I feel like you were a great person to ask about
827
01:18:51,600 --> 01:18:58,880
all these things. So yeah, going into the discord questions, we have a couple here.
828
01:18:59,840 --> 01:19:05,360
So do you think there is an absence of professional climbing media and our non-professional
829
01:19:05,360 --> 01:19:10,320
channels doing an adequate job at filling that space? What do we need to do to get content to
830
01:19:10,320 --> 01:19:15,680
the next level? I don't think there's a lack of climbing media. I think there's a lot of like
831
01:19:15,680 --> 01:19:24,560
really good climbing media. I think as much as like the, you know, us being like a fashion item
832
01:19:24,560 --> 01:19:29,440
is kind of annoying. And I know that will die off and like Gucci and whatever, they're not going to
833
01:19:29,440 --> 01:19:33,680
do climbing stuff in a couple of years. This is a fad and we're not going to matter to them anymore.
834
01:19:33,680 --> 01:19:39,200
I think the public is generally interested in like climbing media. I think climbing outside is
835
01:19:39,200 --> 01:19:45,840
beautiful and the personalities are incredible. And that kind of adventure content is standout.
836
01:19:45,840 --> 01:19:53,120
And we have so many good people involved in, in climbing media in general. But if it is narrowed
837
01:19:53,120 --> 01:19:58,640
to competition, the climbing media, then it's obviously a really different question.
838
01:20:02,160 --> 01:20:07,600
The hard part is like, there's not a lot of people doing it. I'm really glad you're here doing some
839
01:20:07,600 --> 01:20:13,760
of it. Like we need everybody we can get for real, right? Like every voice matters. But the hard part
840
01:20:13,760 --> 01:20:20,160
is like how many of us are doing it as a living, right? You know, John Bergman, he has his,
841
01:20:22,160 --> 01:20:28,560
he's in a lot of different types of climbing media, not all competition to try and make things work.
842
01:20:29,600 --> 01:20:34,320
You know, Delaney Miller also is not just competition climbing. When she does comp stuff,
843
01:20:34,320 --> 01:20:38,800
it's unreal. But she has to do a lot of like outdoor stuff as well. And I'm sure she enjoys
844
01:20:38,800 --> 01:20:42,880
it actually. I shouldn't make it sound like she, she's like just a comp person. Same thing with
845
01:20:42,880 --> 01:20:47,040
Natalie Berry. Like she has to straddle both worlds. Like, you know, she's doing the hill
846
01:20:47,040 --> 01:20:54,080
climbing stuff in the UK, which sounds to be just awful. But she's also possibly right now,
847
01:20:54,080 --> 01:21:01,040
like the journalist of records when it comes to competitive climbing media in English at least.
848
01:21:01,040 --> 01:21:04,960
So yeah, there's not a lot of people doing it. Most of us are casuals. Like I do this in my part
849
01:21:04,960 --> 01:21:10,560
time, like for half a year at a time. And again, this isn't your living either at the moment,
850
01:21:10,560 --> 01:21:19,200
right? So I think, and just to go back to what I said to you earlier, like I used to be really
851
01:21:19,200 --> 01:21:24,800
critical of lots of different commentators in climbing. Almost every single commentator that
852
01:21:24,800 --> 01:21:31,440
there has been in like the last 15 years, I've had different problems with them. And then eventually
853
01:21:31,440 --> 01:21:38,480
you come to realize that this one person is the only commentator for like world cup climbing.
854
01:21:39,200 --> 01:21:45,600
And it is totally unreasonable for me to expect Matt Groom or Charlie Bosco or whoever
855
01:21:47,200 --> 01:21:53,600
to be exactly the kind of commentator that I want. There's lots of different styles of commentary.
856
01:21:53,600 --> 01:21:57,200
There are lots of different voices that people might like. Some people like talking about
857
01:21:57,200 --> 01:22:00,640
history. Some people like talking about movements. Some people like the personal stories.
858
01:22:01,440 --> 01:22:06,000
Some people just have different inflection. And so long as our sport has a single commentator,
859
01:22:06,800 --> 01:22:10,880
there's always going to be people that think there's someone better than Matt Groom or whoever
860
01:22:10,880 --> 01:22:16,080
else is doing it, but it is just one guy and he is burdened with having to be the best he possibly
861
01:22:16,080 --> 01:22:23,280
can be for all of the people watching. And I think that's just like an important reminder that
862
01:22:23,280 --> 01:22:29,360
the more people like you or like me who are willing to add their voice and create content
863
01:22:29,360 --> 01:22:34,320
in competitive climbing, there are people that were waiting for your voice and waiting for your
864
01:22:34,320 --> 01:22:38,160
interviews. They didn't like my stuff. They didn't like somebody else's stuff, but your stuff is
865
01:22:38,160 --> 01:22:42,400
exactly what they wanted. Right. And the same thing could be said for some people for my stuff
866
01:22:42,400 --> 01:22:48,480
and so on. And so I think if anybody is interested in any way of creating any media around
867
01:22:48,480 --> 01:22:53,440
competition climbing, absolutely do it. Whether it's like, whether you want to do like data
868
01:22:53,440 --> 01:22:59,040
journalism and visualizing stuff like Rory is at Inside Climbing. If you want to do, you kind of
869
01:22:59,040 --> 01:23:04,320
mentioned like this, your angle is sort of, I'm new here. I want to know everything about what's
870
01:23:04,320 --> 01:23:09,920
going on. Like get me in the loop. To my thing, which is a lot more kind of lately, it's been
871
01:23:10,560 --> 01:23:16,400
commentary and analysis and criticism and stuff like that. Like we need everybody we can get. So
872
01:23:16,400 --> 01:23:21,680
even if you can do one YouTube video, you know, a year, or if you're writing a column for a blog,
873
01:23:21,680 --> 01:23:26,960
like hop in there, let us know that you're doing it. We'll share it. Like every single person makes
874
01:23:26,960 --> 01:23:33,200
a difference to, to making this the kind of sport that more people want to watch. So yeah,
875
01:23:33,200 --> 01:23:38,160
to answer the question, no, I don't think there is enough competition climbing media. And that's
876
01:23:38,160 --> 01:23:42,080
always going to be hard because there's no money in it. But if you've got the time and you got the
877
01:23:42,080 --> 01:23:47,600
time and you got the interest, please, please hop in. Cause yeah, every voice will have some people
878
01:23:47,600 --> 01:23:52,320
that want to hear it. So please do it. Yeah, that's really nice. I think that's a really
879
01:23:52,320 --> 01:23:59,360
good way of putting it. I don't think I thought of it in that way. I, I guess the way I felt
880
01:24:00,080 --> 01:24:07,360
was kind of like, especially with the, like the podcast coming out on the official IFSC channel,
881
01:24:07,360 --> 01:24:12,320
I was like, oh, well they're like doing this. Like maybe I don't need to do it anymore.
882
01:24:12,880 --> 01:24:19,120
No, don't, don't stop. Don't stop. Like, oh, I mean, Mac room, he's great to talk to. I'd love
883
01:24:19,120 --> 01:24:26,560
to listen and talk, but yeah, that's, that's a really good way of putting it. Um, next, uh,
884
01:24:26,560 --> 01:24:32,240
or I guess last discord question. Um, what do you think about the role of gyms as a place that
885
01:24:32,240 --> 01:24:38,240
people start careers and how do you see the role of that space for the next generation of teachers?
886
01:24:38,880 --> 01:24:43,840
I'm going to pull from Chris Danielson and I'm just going to go with something he, so there's a guy,
887
01:24:46,080 --> 01:24:49,600
if I'm being too pedantic, I apologize, but I'm just going to roll with the angle. There's a
888
01:24:49,600 --> 01:24:54,800
root setter in the U S named Chris Danielson. Um, he used to be a really big name in organizing
889
01:24:54,800 --> 01:25:00,160
the competitions in the U S he was really involved with USA climbing. And if I remember right, he was
890
01:25:00,160 --> 01:25:06,080
the guy that really started the root setting, uh, accreditation process in the USA, like being a
891
01:25:06,080 --> 01:25:13,120
level one root setter or a level four root setter or so on. And he wrote, was it like a gym? I can't
892
01:25:13,120 --> 01:25:21,200
remember if this was a blog post or like a, uh, uh, an introductory, like chapter to like a, how
893
01:25:21,200 --> 01:25:28,240
to root set book or something, but he made this great point that I hadn't thought of. Um, and
894
01:25:28,240 --> 01:25:33,200
it's really simple. He just said, like, if you want to start root setting, start root setting.
895
01:25:33,200 --> 01:25:39,520
And his point, which he fleshed out, I'm pretty sure was there's nothing stopping you from going
896
01:25:39,520 --> 01:25:45,760
up to a boulder wall at your gym, a spray wall or a set wall, whatever, and use the holds that are
897
01:25:45,760 --> 01:25:50,560
there to just make up a climb for yourself or for your friends. There's nothing stopping you from
898
01:25:50,560 --> 01:25:55,600
doing that. Um, as more and more gyms have spray walls and kilter boards and all that kind of stuff,
899
01:25:55,600 --> 01:26:00,480
it's even easier to have like a really dense area of holds. Right. But if you want to learn root
900
01:26:00,480 --> 01:26:06,400
setting, it's not so much about turning wrenches as it is being able to look at a wall and predict
901
01:26:06,400 --> 01:26:12,160
movement and see like, where do I need holds in order to make different moves happen? Um,
902
01:26:12,160 --> 01:26:16,720
and his point was, if you want to start root setting, don't wait to be hired. Don't wait for
903
01:26:16,720 --> 01:26:21,520
somebody to, to, you know, his root setting is really tough to get into professionally. There's
904
01:26:21,520 --> 01:26:25,440
not a lot of spots to do it. Just start root setting, start being the guy that's put out
905
01:26:25,440 --> 01:26:29,920
more boulder problems on your spray wall or your kilter wall than anyone else in your gym. Just
906
01:26:29,920 --> 01:26:36,160
start doing it. Um, and the same thing kind of goes for coaching. If you climb with friends,
907
01:26:36,880 --> 01:26:41,360
start paying attention to what feedback matters to you when you're climbing. Like when somebody
908
01:26:41,360 --> 01:26:45,760
gives you a really good tip or a really good hint, why didn't you see that? Why couldn't you,
909
01:26:45,760 --> 01:26:50,480
you know, uh, why hadn't that come to you before they said it? And what advice can you give to
910
01:26:50,480 --> 01:26:57,440
other people? Um, if you're bringing a friend to the gym for the first time, how are you going to
911
01:26:57,440 --> 01:27:02,080
cater to their experience to make them want to come back a second time? Are you going to be the
912
01:27:02,080 --> 01:27:06,880
person that walks up to like, you know, let's say, yeah, like, okay, you bring a friend into the gym.
913
01:27:06,880 --> 01:27:10,960
They've never climbed before. They're probably going to be climbing like VBs, V zeros, V ones.
914
01:27:10,960 --> 01:27:15,440
Are you going to go up and climb every VB V zero V one and flash it before they get a chance to
915
01:27:15,440 --> 01:27:20,160
get on it and they get on those and start falling? Is that going to be like how you present them to
916
01:27:20,160 --> 01:27:24,720
a climb or are you going to say, yeah, climbing is really fun. No matter how long you've done it,
917
01:27:24,720 --> 01:27:30,800
it's always hard and you'll let them climb the V zero and fall on it. And you will climb your V four
918
01:27:30,800 --> 01:27:36,000
or your V seven and you'll fall on it and you'll help them relate to the fact that like, yeah,
919
01:27:36,000 --> 01:27:40,720
I'm better than you. I've been doing this longer, but don't be embarrassed about falling. Right.
920
01:27:41,440 --> 01:27:46,800
I think the biggest thing with climbing gyms is that whatever thing about climbing you're interested
921
01:27:46,800 --> 01:27:52,720
in, the gym is just a big sandbox for the most part. And you can start exploring whatever pathway
922
01:27:52,720 --> 01:27:58,320
you're interested in without being hired, without, you know, calling yourself a coach or without
923
01:27:58,320 --> 01:28:03,120
calling yourself, you know, a gym owner or a root setter. You can just start paying attention to
924
01:28:03,120 --> 01:28:08,240
like what people's experience in gyms are and start paying attention to how you set boulders.
925
01:28:08,240 --> 01:28:12,000
And you can start your own career just by getting that practice and doing those things.
926
01:28:12,000 --> 01:28:16,640
So for people that are psyched about working in climbing, don't wait until you get a job
927
01:28:17,840 --> 01:28:23,440
to try being a root setter or try being a coach. Like just do that stuff with the people that you
928
01:28:23,440 --> 01:28:28,240
climb with anyways, and see if it's something you like, see if it's something you're good at,
929
01:28:29,200 --> 01:28:33,680
and just express yourself through being a climber at the gym rather than needing to be staff
930
01:28:33,680 --> 01:28:38,400
necessarily. And if you do love it, I hope you do get a job out of it. I hope you manage to get paid
931
01:28:38,400 --> 01:28:43,440
and get to do the stuff you love. I know that not many people get to do what I've had a chance to do
932
01:28:43,440 --> 01:28:48,640
just because there's not that many gyms and not that many jobs at each gym. Like that's hard.
933
01:28:49,920 --> 01:28:54,400
But do it anyways, if you're psyched, just do it anyways. Gyms are for you to play in. So
934
01:28:55,040 --> 01:28:57,520
do that, I guess. Yeah.
935
01:28:57,520 --> 01:29:04,480
Awesome. Well put. I think that's a great note to end on. Very inspiring. Thank you.
936
01:29:04,480 --> 01:29:10,880
Very inspiring. Thank you. But yeah, I think that's all the questions I had. Thank you so
937
01:29:10,880 --> 01:29:16,000
much for joining me. And anything you want to shout out or let people know where they can find you?
938
01:29:16,560 --> 01:29:22,720
I'll leave your podcast link below, of course. Yeah, you can. If you haven't seen Plastic Weekly
939
01:29:22,720 --> 01:29:29,760
on YouTube, subscribe to it and watch the videos that you like. Aside from that, if you watched
940
01:29:29,760 --> 01:29:35,520
Ginny's podcast, just keep watching it. Keep watching the comps. Enjoy it. If there's stuff
941
01:29:35,520 --> 01:29:39,360
you like, then tell people about it. Make sure people in climbing feel good about what they're
942
01:29:39,360 --> 01:29:43,840
doing. And if there's stuff you don't like, consider doing something yourself. Let's build
943
01:29:43,840 --> 01:29:48,800
this thing. Let's do it. Awesome. Okay, great. Thank you so much. And it was great to have this
944
01:29:48,800 --> 01:29:53,920
chat. Yeah, thanks Ginny. That was a lot of fun. Thank you so much for making it to the end of the
945
01:29:53,920 --> 01:30:00,560
podcast. Don't forget to like and subscribe if you enjoyed. Otherwise, you are a super fake climber.
946
01:30:00,560 --> 01:30:05,680
If you're listening on a podcasting platform, I'd appreciate if you rate it five stars and you can
947
01:30:05,680 --> 01:30:10,800
continue the discussion on the free competition climbing discord linked in the description.
948
01:30:10,800 --> 01:30:23,680
Thanks again for listening.
