Guest Writer – Brandon Villatoro (Travel Experta’s Son)
In this article, we will be talking about the lead category (discipline) of climbing competition. It is one of the three-sport climbing disciplines: boulder, lead and speed.
Lead climbing is the most common type of climbing. When someone thinks about climbing they immediately think of ropes, harnesses, and long routes and that’s exactly what lead climbing is.
Lead climbing is like bouldering, but the routes are not short, they are rather long. Lead climbing is climbing long routes and clipping in the rope in the quick-draws as you go up.
It is used a lot in rock climbing. Lead climbing is definitely more expensive than bouldering because in bouldering you only need climbing shoes and some chalk and in lead climbing, you need a rope, shoes, chalk, quick-draws, harness, and a sling (a small rope with a carabiner you can attach to your harness to anchor yourself to the wall to take the rope down).
Related Read: Preparing for a Climbing Competition
When you are rock climbing, you usually have to put the quick-draws in yourself. In the competitions of lead, the quick-draws are already put in, and to get to the top of the route you just need to clip in the last quick-draw.
When I went to compete in lead for the first time I was not as prepared as I should’ve been. I successfully qualified to finals, but in the last route I fell off in the first five holds.
Now I know that I have to train a lot more in lead and in not getting very nervous.
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