While the concentration of climbers in Boulder is obviously quite high, I’ve wondered on the sustainability of all the gyms.

I just read an interesting post from the BRC (which is located literally one block away from Movement) in which they describe their new pricing changes. The summary: they’ve reduced all their prices.

When Movement opened, the lowest monthly rate for the BRC was $60 while Movement was $62. Two dollars extra a month for a shiny new gym and all their extras (full fitness center, yoga classes) was an easy decision for me to check it out for a few months. Now, the BRC’s lowest monthly rate is $55, about 8% less. But comparing apples to apples, that rate is for a 12 month commitment. The comparable rate to Movement’s $62 is now $58. While officially lower, for most people that’s a wash. And while this was more expensive than The Spot, the added fitness center justifies the price in my opinion.

These moves were obviously made to counter the new gym’s presence. The question for the BRC is will it be enough? I’ve heard a few rumors (likely just pure speculation) that Movement’s goal is to put the BRC out of business and then raise their rates. Personally, I find this hard to believe as it wouldn’t necessarily be the best business idea.

My membership to The Spot is ending soon and I’ve decided to switch over to Movement for now mainly because I need to be climbing more routes with my finger injury. I felt quite limited at my rehab efforts in a bouldering-only gym (yes, I know, nice problem to have). But if Movement eventually raises their rates too high, I would quickly go back to The Spot no questions asked.

Competition in all industries in good – it promotes innovation, better service, and a competitive price structure. For Boulder climbers, let’s hope all the gyms can continue to coexist and thrive.

So far, I’ve enjoyed climbing at Movement, but I’ve been limited in my climbing due to the finger injury rehabbing. Peter Beal has a good review from the perspective of someone who can hit the hard stuff there.

If you’ve been to the new gym, what were your thoughts?

There are some amazing photos of climbers’ home gyms in this very long thread. If I ever get around to putting up a wall in my house, I’ll be using these for ideas.

The Movement gym’s blog has an update on the ongoing construction and I thought it was interesting to take a brief behind the scenes look at a climbing gym being constructed.

The money the park receives is part of the $750 million federal package to improve the national park system. A full list of the projects is located here.

I wonder if any of this work will be done for the summer alpine bouldering season?

(via Daily Camera and Denver Business Journal)

photo credit: ~ Phil Moore

UKClimbing.com offers up a comprehensive guide to bouldering at Fontainebleau, France complete with how to train, the local rating system, when to go, and where to stay.

It has been used as a bouldering area since the 1870s and has almost continuously remained at the centre of the world bouldering scene since the 1930s. Possibly as it is quite unique for one area to exhibit so many desirable characteristics: a large number of classic problems at all grades – including classic moderates, largely excellent soft and sandy landings, a positive and active local scene, historical interest (possibly the first or at least very early ascents of the first 4, 5, 6 and 7s in the world,) a strange and surreally beautiful locale, much potential for development and finally, the subtle nature of the problems, requiring footwork, body position and general trickery, often making success as much a mental as a physical workout and as a result it is supremely satisfying.

Another excellent resource for bouldering in Fontainebleau is Bleau.info

The following shots are from a pull-off above the main bouldering areas. They show the highly trafficked Monkey Traverse and someone top-roping a climb on the face to the right and down the hill from Monkey.

I was particularly pleased with the last two images as the setting sun was just right for the shot, nicely lighting up the climber on the face.

I recently stumbled on this site and was impressed by the depth of each review. Each has a video of their hold testing along with suggested uses for your climbing wall.

They have a great variety of reviews on many brands of holds you don’t often see in your local gyms like Sequence Climbing, Three Ball Climbing, Teknik, Climb It, Atomik, and Project Holds; but also some of the bigger players like Nicros, Metolius, and EntrePrises.

First off, Morrison is the kind of bouldering area where you will definitely need beta from the locals. I had a really hard time deciphering problems using the guidebooks (Colorado Bouldering and Bouldering Colorado).

As a frequently climbed area outside of Denver, the problems at Morrison appeared to be beta intensive as there were many variations and eliminates.

One of the more interesting problems I tried wasn’t even in the guidebooks. A local boulderer gave me beta on a problem they call the “Grand Traverse”. Basically you start as far right of the cliff line as possible (just below the Black Hole) and traverse left as far as possible. Not sure what grade this comes in at because of the many variations you could use to complete the traverse, but it’s a great workout nonetheless.

The problems in The Black Hole appeared to be the best quality with the most interesting moves. There were a few problems that I didn’t get to try that I look forward to working on next time I visit.

Additionally, there are intriguing boulders on the south side of the road that yield some good problems according to the guides.

Overall, I wasn’t too thrilled with the place. In addition to the beta issues, problems were on the polished side. Obviously, this is understandable due to the high traffic the place receives. I was there on a cold early afternoon day, mid-week and there were a bunch of climbers there. I can’t imagine what Morrison is like after work during the summer. I also prefer actual boulders with normal top outs and you don’t really have this at Morrison as it’s more of a short cliff line.

If anyone is familiar with Morrison bouldering and thinks I’ve misjudged the area, please let me know what I missed!

So guess what happened? Yep, I tweaked my index finger shortly after what I thought was enough of a warm-up. Lesson learned (I hope). Luckily, it’s feeling better and I should be climbing this weekend.

So while I didn’t get any pictures of actual bouldering (I was also the only climber there), I did take some scenery shots of the boulders and lake.

Instead of posting a few of the pics, I decided to try out the new Flickr embedded slideshows:

A few notes for the anyone visiting Carter Lake that doesn’t really get mentioned in the guidebook:

• Most boulders are on the west side facing the lake which means it was hot as hell in the afternoon (especially on an August day)
• The trail to the set of boulders where the Kahuna Boulder lies is hard to see. There’s mention of a cairn, but I only saw one close to the down climb and at that point I already knew where I was.
• If you’re not a resident of Larimer County, the annual pass for Carter and Horsetooth is $85 per year. Unfortunately, it runs on a calendar starting in January, so if you were to buy one right now, it would expire December 31, 2008. A day pass was $7.

Why is this news? There’s already three good sized gyms in Boulder already. But as I found out in my trip to Boulder a couple weeks ago, everyone you meet there is a climber. I’d love to see actual numbers on what percentage of the population in Boulder actually considers themselves a climber though.

It’s a safe bet that the founders of this new gym did their research and the demand is there. On a personal note, now that I’m moving out there, I welcome more indoor climbing gym opportunities!

To be honest, I’m having a hard time going to my local climbing gym with the prospect of having bigger and better gyms available in the very near future. Ahh, a tough problem to have, right?

There are a few local climbers cleaning problems and developing this mini-area so as I get more info I’ll post it. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera today so no pictures yet. I hope to get out there later this week and take some shots and clean some more nice problems.

The fact that they skied down a route I climbed up in the past (Standard Route, 5.5) blows my mind.

Climbing.com has additional coverage.

I’ve climbed several times at Rumney a few years back, but never had the chance to go bouldering at Pawtuckaway. From the pics, it looks like I need to get back up there sometime.

For more bouldering info on these areas, check out Lincoln Woods Bouldering and New England Bouldering.

Routesetter.com teaches how to stop climbers from using the bolt hole as a mono in the gym. At first I thought this was humorous, then I remembered how many times I’ve seen climbers try using them as pockets (especially those with tiny fingers).

1. Take a two-foot (or so) long piece of standard issue setting tape.
2. Loosely bundle the piece of tape into a cylinder-shaped ball that is longer than it is wide.
3. Stuff it. Shove that ball of tape into the offending bolthole. Be careful not to pack it in unless you never plan on moving the hold again.You may have to put more tape in the hole to fill it up. But using one single long piece will make it much easier when its time to get it out. Try to make the tape flush to the holds as best you can.

Check out the article for pictures on their steps. There’s also a nice follow-up discussion in the comments.

At about only 45 minutes away, Bozoo has been the local crag for Virginia Tech students and Blacksburg residents for years. Offering both routes and boulders, the rock is the same sandstone as the New River Gorge. During their time in Blacksburg, many climbers including Kenny Parker and Swiss Andy, left their mark on the crag.

The following are some pictures of Jon attempting a dyno on a V5/6 (French Tit?) across the stream near Savory Wall. The problem traverses left to right from the small flake/corner in the left of the picture to set up the dyno.

Setting up

Going for the dyno

Missing!

Here’s a shot of me on the classic Pocket Problem, V4

The entire set of pictures from our bouldering session at Bozoo can be found here.

As I’m originally from Western PA, I’ve climbed at Coopers numerous times over the years and can tell you that this guide was sorely needed. Using beta from fellow boulderers and hand-drawn guides on the web, I managed to enjoy myself on the nice gritstone. But a guide is a must for the maze-like array of boulders at Coopers.

Make the trip and pick up a guide before you go. It’s about 3-3.5 hours from the DC area and unfortunately 4 hours for me down here in Blacksburg.

A few of my comments were taken out of context (the gym does set routes and I most definitely did not call it “choose your own adventure”), but it’s an overall good article.

They took two short videos as well. Here is one of them. Feel the frustration of the first time climber:

Check out the full article here.

The Carolina Climbers Coalition reports that a new Rumbling Bald Bouldering guidebook will be available this fall at Southeast retailers.

Features include an full color format, nearly 900 boulder problems described, topos and photos of problems, and general area-specific information.

More info can be found here (PDF).