ABS 14 open nationals was this weekend, and the whole event was very well organized and a lot of fun! In qualifiers, I flashed the first two climbs – both were fairly straightforward and gymnastic. I had a bit more trouble with the next two – there was a big move on the third one, which I tried to static, and in hindsight I probably should have just gone for it. The fourth climb was a technical problem, on which I got about halfway. When I turned to face the last qualifier, I found that it was essentially what I had expected – a tough slab climb. I had gotten shut down last year on a very similar problem, and I remember being so frustrated when the time ran out. I resolved to train slab intensely over this past year, and it paid off! I ended up topping the last qualifier. I placed 30th, though just a few holds away from semifinals. As always, finals were super exciting to watch! It still impresses me that Daniel Woods and Alex Puccio can win so consistently, even with a few mistakes here and there.

Over the past month, I’ve been spending a lot of time coaching and climbing with the Stanford Climbing Team. We’ve been working hard to get prepared for the CCS competitions. Since getting approved as an official club sports team, we’ve received quite a bit of publicity. The team was featured on the cover of the Stanford Daily newspaper just last week – the article can be found here: http://www.stanforddaily.com/2013/02/20/competitive-climbing-becomes-newest-club-sport/. Climbers all over the world picked up on it. I was contacted by other collegiate climbing teams, and the article was shared on Facebook by Sport Climbing 2020. At nationals, I was pleasantly surprised to find that many of my friends there had already read the article or had heard that the team had formed. I’m hoping that the team will not only inspire other universities to start their own climbing teams in the future, but will also attract more potential climbers to the sport.