All You Need to Know About Speed Climbing Competition

Guest Writer – Brandon Villatoro (Travel Experta’s Son)

There are three disciplines of climbing: lead, boulder, and speed.

Speed climbing and competition speed climbing is what we are going to be talking about in this article.

In speed climbing competition

The only goal is getting to the top in the fastest time possible. There are two athletes climbing at the same time on two identical walls, side by side.

This is for every part of the world. The speed climbing walls have to be exactly the same.

The competitions take place on a 15-meter artificial wall. Competitors climb a slightly overhanging IFSC (International Federation of Sport Climbing) certified wall, with belaying from the top. Since 2007 the IFSC has created a standard wall for the world record.

Not many people practice speed climbing compared to boulder and lead because it is a newer discipline and style of climbing.

There are only two types of climbing holds on the speed climbing wall: the handholds and the footholds.

For kids under 15 years old, the judges add the red handholds because there is too much of a distance in between the handholds for the kids.

When I went to the National competitions in Guatemala I wasn’t very prepared, so I got disqualified in the first round.

There are three ways of being disqualified in speed climbing:

1. Being last place in classifying round
2. Starting before the timer
3. Losing against another opponent

I got disqualified in the first round because I started before the timer started.

Related Read: How to prepare for a climbing competition

This comes to shows that I need to prepare myself a lot more, especially mentally.

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