40 competitors from across the Midlands and further afield made their way through the nightmare that was Birmingham City Centre, navigating their way through roadwork diversions and road closures due to the Birmingham Marathon (World Event) that was taking place.
Creation Climbing Centre had recently extended their main climbing facilities so there was lots of space and lots to go at!
The routesetters had had their work cut out not only accommodating for the MY Climbing Series but also hosting a round of the BMC Leading Ladder at the same time!
The event was held up slightly to allow the competitors and volunteers that had got caught up in the mayhem trying to get to the centre.
The categories were male and female; 8 – 10, 11 – 13, 14 – 16 and 17 – 19.
The Tower, Leicester, had 6 competitors enter, Alex Norton (Boys 8-10), Alice Killington (Girls 11-13), Tara Hayes (Girls 11-13), Marley Emms (Boys 11-13), Emily Fell (Girls 14-16), Orrin Coley (Boys 14-16), Will Smith (Boys 14-16) and Hana White (Girls 14-16).
Alex Norton, who had only ever entered one other competition finished in 2nd place after having a climb off after finishing in joint 1st place with Dominic Vincent, considering Alex’s size and experience he did an amazing job proving how much he has come on both technically and mentally.
In the Girls 11 – 13 Category there were some very talented climbers, so much so it was evident early on that there was not much splitting the group, the Judges decided that the only thing to do was to put the group on a final route that was graded at 7a in an attempt to split the pack. Split the pack it did! Alice Killington slipped early on, somewhat of a surprise and ended up finishing in 4th place.
In Marley Mees first competition in a very competitive age bracket he finished in a respectful 6th place, he must have been enjoying himself as he had a smile all day!
Gracie Martin (Nottingham Team) however, stepped upto the mark and pushed all the way to the top with ease leaving the rest of the group looking on in disbelief. Tara Hayes (Tower Team) rose to the challenge and followed suite leaving nothing splitting the two girls.
After some deliberation the Chief Judge (Dave Terris) made a decision to put the girls on the 16-19 final route, it was up and graded at 7b+, a quick discussion took place and it was agreed that Gracie would climb first, Tara was escorted off to isolation. Gracie started well and came unstuck at the midway point. Tara had no idea what the task was ahead of her, as she approached the hold that Gracie fell off from she attacked it and flew straight through the move, that then lead Tara all the way to the top and victory.
The 14 – 16 was the strongest group, in both genders, Emily Fell rose to the task of having very strong and experienced competitors to climb against and finished in 1st place with Orrin Coley 1st and Will Smith (Joint 2nd) battling it out in the male category with a very strong group of Juniors.
Hana White had no other competitors in her age bracket so she was easily placesd in 1st place, however, rather that letting her climb the competition on her own it was decided that she could climb in the 14-16 age bracket but her scores would count towards her own category.
A big thank you to all the volunteers that helped out, to Creation for hosting the event, to Chief Judge Dave Terris who had some big calls to make on the day, to Iain Blance for running the event and a massive well done to all the members of the Tower Team!
Full results will be up shortly on http://www.myclimbingseries.co.uk/
