Last weekend was the final Dark Horse comp. It was amazing, as expected. It was great to be back home again and competing with so many people I haven’t seen in a while, including a bunch of people new to the Dark Horse competitions. Both the women and men categories were totally stacked- Angie Payne, Daniel Woods, Kashia Pietras, Rob D., Isabelle Faus, and Alex David Johnson just to name a few.
The day started out with a ridiculously crowded red point. It seemed like every climber in Boston and some more were trying to climb at one time. Luckily, open climbers got a little over an hour to climb without the rest of the competitors. Even with the crowd though, it was awesome projecting stuff with so many strong climbers. The red point ended with everyone really close. There were a few ties for some or a difference of just one or two climbs, but these results soon didn’t matter, because it was time for finals.
I went into finals in second place after Angie, who is climbing ridiculously strong (as expected). After me was Annalisa Flinn, who was competing in her first Dark Horse Finals at just 14 years old. I was pretty tired in iso from the comp in the morning, but I was so psyched that I totally forgot about my raw hands aching muscles when I started climbing. The first climb, out of four was awesome- one of the most interesting climbs I’ve been on in a while. After a big cross and a campus move, you had to hang and drop down to a big feature without any holds. It wasn’t exactly hard, but all of my instincts tell me to never just let go, especially when I don’t have my feet on. I sent the problem on my second go, after a silly foot slip on the next move, where there still weren’t any holds except for another big foothold around a corner.
The second problem was another interesting one. It was super technical with some awkward high feet and mantle-like moves. I flashed it, after being on the wall for about three minutes. The third problem was much more straightforward with just some hard moves and a very high heel hook. The fourth was also relatively straightforward, but extremely long. My arms were sore the next day solely from that climb. Angie and Kashia had both sent the first three problems, so it all came down to the fourth one for us three. I messed up the sequence on my first go, but sent it on my second. Angie got super close to finishing it on her first go, and Kashia wasn’t far behind.
After I climbed, we got to watch the guys climb, which I always really enjoy. My boyfriend, Trevor, flew up with me, and it was great to see how in awe he was of their climbing. Both the guys and girls all climbed really well, and the comp was an obvious success. Can’t wait for next year!