18 April 2019

Competition and Friction

Mic Rathke has published some concern in regards competition fairness in bouldering in Routesetter anonymous. 8a has talked about this issue for twelve years as it seems more favorable to be #6 in the semi, meaning that you start first with better friction in the final. "Competitions should be fair, but we (the climbing community) face an issue with fairness. Our issue at hand mostly deals with slopers, they get full of chalk, bodily fluids, skin, and most of all the original friction wears away like sandpaper. The difficulty (grade or rating) of a climb gets harder in the matter of one session. This is an issue for the later people that climb on the same holds in the same competition. Our current resolution is a brush and chalk, however this does not resolve the issue of replacing the original grip of a hold. With the Olympics coming up, how can we resolve this issue before 2020?" It should be noted that in the Olympics, there will be eight to the final, meaning the friction problem will be a bigger issue in Tokyo.
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