Scottish Tooling Series 2009
Report_______________________


What a FANTASTIC Series!!! Five venues managed to create unique styles of competition that appealed to the young, old, short, tall and everything in the middle. Here is an outline of each event with a review of the prize giving at the end.

Round 1 – Avertical World, Dundee
Round 1 and what a way to start the series! There was a great turnout from young to old and everything in between.

The guys at Avertical had worked really hard in the run up to the comp and had created some fantastic problems ranging from the relatively easy right through to the almost impossible! The problems were a mixture of low level, technical bouldering routes and pumpy top roped routes.

There was a great atmosphere throughout the day and it all built up to the final in which the top three competitors from each category battled it out for the win. The final route started in the bouldering cave and involved several strenuous moves before pulling out over the lip onto the steep upper wall and finally moving onto a free-hanging horizontal log and onto glory at the final lower off clip. The route stretched the already tired climbers to breaking point and only one competitor managed to complete the route; Robbie Phillips.

Round 2 – Ratho, Edinburgh
The competition headed to Edinburgh for the second round at Ratho, the largest indoor climbing arena in Europe!

The route setters went for a unique approach of re-creating moves found on actual winter routes. There was a thrutchy chimney just like Stirling Bomber and a delicate rock slab like White Magic to name just a couple.

Round 3 – Extreme Dream, Aviemore
Extreme Dream is the original veterans of dry tooling competitions and as such the expectations for a first class competition were high. True to form the guys created some brilliant problems and the atmosphere was electric! Although a smaller venue, the steepness factor cannot be overstated and the guys had gone fully over the top with more crazy obstacles and wooden mayhem than ever... We had the “Jungle Gym” in the cave, “The Diving Board” plus numerous strikeable panels which meant that a wide variety of skills were tested. Well set problems ensured that everyone went away having got plenty done but for the top guns in the final as always The Roof beckoned.....


Round 4 – Glenmore Lodge, Aviemore
What a turn out! What nearly great weather! What a great final display by Steve Johnstone! What an inspiring lecture by Andy Turner! All in all a great day was had by all.

Mark Chadwick and Scott Webster set the problems. They managed to really stretch the top climbers while allowing the new comers to get some points on the board and enjoy the challenge. The final was a traverse followed by a steep and technical overhang onto a hanging log. They thought they had over cooked it as all the other finalists failed to get past the ¾ point. Then the last to come out of isolation was Steve Johnson who managed to almost make it look easy and the crowd let him know it as they cheered and chanted him onto the last move.

Andy Turner ran beginner workshops and a master class and then presented a totally awesome lecture on his past year of activities which included Nepal, the Alps and Scotland. The images and chat really captured the audience and left them chomping at the bit for winter conditions. A wee dram of Balvenie from one of the event sponsors also helped people to round off a great Scottish climbing day - sun, rain and then a dram. Perfect.


Round 5 – Ice Factor, Kinlochleven

Is there a better venue to host the final event of the series and the Grand Prize Giving? I would have to answer no. The Ice Factor maybe a challenge to get to compared to most but that is nothing new for climbers. We travel miles to get a good days climbing in and that is exactly what we got at the Ice Factor. Well done to Jamie and his team and guest celebrity route setter Andy Turner.

5 hours of climbing flew by but left most of us with arms a bit longer than we started with. There were 2 routes on the outside of the building, 3 in the ice room and then a variety of top roped and bouldering problems. As has always been the case, the Series has encouraged the route setters to fulfil the needs of novice intermediate and super talented climbers. This is not an easy task but time and again we walk away feeling amazed that the whole cross-section of the competitors feel they got exactly what they came for. Brilliant!

THE SCOTTISH TOOLING SERIES PRIZE GIVING & ROUND UP REPORT

There were prizes, trophies and cheers galore! We have built a really strong group of people around this Series. We are all already talking about next year and the youth are off to tell their friends at school how much fun axes can be!

We all know that these events can not happen without the support of sponsors. Lyon Equipment (distributors for Petzl, Sportiva and Beal) has sponsored the Scottish Tooling Series from the start. Martin Bergerud attended and took part on Saturday and it was fantastic to have him there. He witnessed first hand what a tremendous atmosphere there is among events like this and he said he was proud that they could support such grass routes events. He was also so impressed the age and gender range of the participants. The youngest is 10 years old (Sophie) and the oldest is 62 (Tony). The crowd showed their appreciation when I introduced him so he left in no doubt that is a group of people who love the Series and really appreciate how it needs their kind of support. I would also like to thank our others sponsor at this point; Marmot, The Balvenie, Wigwam and Dream Climbing Holds. The prizes have been superb and really add so much value to each event.

This Series was also given tremendous support from the MC of S for the youth side. Although the junior female numbers have not increased, the junior males have and there is a strong support for the feeling that we some Olympic champions in the making ready for 2016.

Each venue takes a risk by running an event. They are closing down for normal business in the hope there are enough entrants to cover the days expenses. As the Series grows in popularity this is becoming less of an issue, but they need thanks for taking the risk in the first place. They also have to put in so much hard work route setting as it is never as straight forward as just putting holds on the wall…..tooling without hanging logs doesn’t exist any more!

Glenmore Lodge has been very proud to co-ordinate the first two Scottish Tooling Series. As a National Centre we were told there was a need for such an event. There obviously is and with the support of the venues and sponsors we are really proud we have been able to help it on its way. I will be leaving the Lodge in February and it seems the perfect time to hand over the role to the group of people who have made the Series their own. Pete Hill has offered to lead the co-ordination for 2010 along with Neil Silver who did the website for this year completely in his own time. They are hoping that all participants give them feedback from this year good and bad so they can keep the momentum going for many years to come. Pete’s website is www.drytoolinguk.com and the Neil’s Series website www.scottishtoolingseries.co.uk. I am not sure how they will manage to upstage the hand made trophies designed and made by Scott Webster and Graeme Hepburn. Petzl ice picks in oak plinths – now is that stylish or what?!

I have had an amazing time over the past two years and look forward to taking part in the coming events except I will no longer have an excuse to shout at everybody!

Thanks to everybody for making the Series such a fun event to be part of.

Big thanks to Neil Silver for his brilliant work on the Series website and Lukasz Warzecha (www.LWimages.co.uk) for the fantastic photos he has allowed us to use.

FOR THE FULL RESULTS AT EACH EVENT GO TO NEIL'S WEBSITE AT WWW.SCOTTIHSTOOLING SERIES.CO.UK

posted by glenmore @ 5:37 pm