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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Feb 12, 2013 - 06:14pm PT
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Climbing in the Olympics could be really cool...
Imagine deep water solo on massive wickedly overhanging artificial walls.
The men would have to don speedos, as well as the women (one piece suits c'mon, not topless).
Then they have to do a spectacular platform dive from the top if they make it.
Double the spectator pleasure. Climbing and platform diving. The falls could be spectacularly fun to watch. :-))
I think it would work. Pure climbing at its essence.
You know you want to watch this. Admit it.
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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Feb 12, 2013 - 06:43pm PT
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as well as the women (one piece suits c'mon, not topless).
I hear ya, high end sport climbing women are so voluptuous and sexy....oh wait....maybe not a good idea
why dont we just have a sport that revolves around the Olympic beach volleyball cheerleaders they have had in 2004,2008 and 2012
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bjj
climber
beyond the sun
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Feb 12, 2013 - 08:48pm PT
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Sad about wrestling, but I would venture to guess humans have been climbing things since the dawn of time. Not for sport or recreation in the beginning most likely, but they were still doing it all the same.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Feb 12, 2013 - 09:17pm PT
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+1 for Mojede. Watching wrestling is very exciting, climbing is quite boring. Wrestling is one of the ultimate olympic sports. Maybew the x-games will pick it up.
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Erik
Trad climber
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Feb 12, 2013 - 09:21pm PT
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Excellent post, Al Smith.
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limpingcrab
Trad climber
the middle of CA
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Feb 12, 2013 - 09:54pm PT
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I still don't get how climbing competitions work since grades are height dependent. But I like climbing and the olympics, so it sounds good to me.
Sucks about wrestling, that sport is about as olympics as it gets.
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Vitaliy M.
Mountain climber
San Francisco
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Feb 12, 2013 - 10:21pm PT
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Sucks about wrestling, that sport is about as olympics as it gets.
+1
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limpingcrab
Trad climber
the middle of CA
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Feb 12, 2013 - 11:01pm PT
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+1
+1
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ionlyski
Trad climber
Kalispell, Montana
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Feb 12, 2013 - 11:39pm PT
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What about Waterboarding? U.S. could have a good team ready by 2020.
Arne
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Feb 12, 2013 - 11:47pm PT
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Time to separate out competitive gym climbing and not let it become the core of the sport. Then the Olympics can have it and do what they will with it.
;>|
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Al_Smith
climber
San Francisco, CA
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Feb 13, 2013 - 02:33pm PT
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Thanks Erik and others.
I was awfully heartbroken yesterday. I wrestled Division I in college and spent most of my young life devoting myself to training for wrestling.
The lessons the sport taught me are almost impossible to equivocate. In an effort to do so though, I've recently started coaching at a small private high school in San Francisco. It has been the most emotionally and spiritually remunerative work I've ever done in my life. To see kids who would otherwise be playing video games, watching TV, or staring at screens face the almost never ending challenges of trying to wrestle (and wrestle well!) has been awe inspiring. The delight they take in overcoming their various shortcomings. To have pride in their efforts. To strive to constantly be better not just as athletes but as men has been nothing short of extraordinary.
Not only is it an obviously terrible decision, it also seems so abstract/bizarre that 14 people can vote behind closed doors, using secret ballot, to destroy the hopes and dreams of millions of kids and virtually end a tradition that began in 776 B.C. It was an especially huge drag coming yesterday as our league championship takes place this Friday. My wrestlers have been super pumped for Friday for several weeks now and yesterday they definitely seemed to have lost a step. A sort of pervasive sadness invaded our normally upbeat practice. I know they'll bounce back, but its no fun telling a bunch of kids that their dreams are no longer possible. So yesterday I thought long and hard about this and went to practice and told my guys what I believe: Wrestlers are some of the most determined winners on the planet. I know that we will do whatever we have to do to reverse this decision. We are highly motivated, disciplined people, used to facing adversity, and coming out on top. We certainly won't stop wrestling this decision until the final whistle blows. And even then, we'll probably keep pushing, because its just what we have come to learn to do.
I hope the IOC takes another long look at their decision. If any one of them had to come in to my wrestling room yesterday and explain their rationale to my kids, I'm sure they'd think twice...
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California now Ireland
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Feb 13, 2013 - 02:43pm PT
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Hey I wrestled in JHigh, Fairview Intermediate in Lafayette. I was okay, in fact won a couple of titles. But then climbing took over.
Back around, I think, 1971, Summit magazine ran an article on Russian Speed Climbing (I may still have it, somewhere), and the pundits at the time RR, YC and others lambasted the idea. But now, it is being mooted as an Olympic 'Sport'.
Now, climbing/bouldering/ice climbing competitions are, well, sort of dime a dozen. To each their own. But I could never want climbing to be a competitive sport like it is now. Just my opinion. And of course, if others want to participate, who am I to judge?
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Feb 13, 2013 - 03:14pm PT
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Speed climbing champion of the CCCP, Sergei Efimov, getting a new one ripped
by a KGB officer for trying to sweet talk him into letting Ben into the
Evil Empire without a visa. Wasn't gonna happen, even for a Master of Sport.
Dood could play a mean guitar and sang well too. One hell of a nice guy.
Did I mention he could crank? Yeah, he laughed his way up the Cassin.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Feb 21, 2019 - 02:16pm PT
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Bruce, ya stole my thunda, bra! Olympics are a sad joke now.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Feb 21, 2019 - 02:40pm PT
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Haha, no pool or chess though.
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Feb 21, 2019 - 03:29pm PT
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I just watched the bouldering finals on ESPN2.
Fifty years ago Pat Ament and I would joke about rock climbing and bouldering becoming women's gymnastics. And if that were so, the fluid graceful moves the ladies would execute might be a pleasure to watch. Not so much so in climbing comps with the emphasis purely on exclusion (I won't use the word "difficulty"), with desperate lunges and quivering limbs. No points for form, although I didn't pay that much attention.
I thought the comps might be as entertaining as American Ninja and similar venues. But they weren't for me. Maybe for others.
Pay no attention to me. A grumpy old man who barely made it midway into Verm's scale BITD.
Back in the 1950s national gymnastic meets would have compulsories and optional routines. The compulsories were fun to watch, for the levels of difficulty were fairly mild; the emphasis was on form and grace. The optionals were difficulty + form.
Rope climbing was in the Olympics until 1936 and in the NCAA until the early 1960s, and, although speed to the top was the only criterion, the climbers flew up the rope fluidly. Fun to watch.
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