2: Maya Witters, World Cup Judge

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Welcome to another episode of the That's Not Real Climbing podcast.

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I'm your host, Jinni, and I'm excited to introduce my guest for today, Maya Witters.

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As a volunteer, she has been up close and personal with everything

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IFSC behind the scenes related.

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She's volunteered as a judge at the Edinburgh World Cup

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and done athlete management at the Morioka and Hachioji World Cups.

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In this episode, we'll discuss what makes commentators,

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route setters, judges' jobs so difficult.

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We'll get some insight about Team Japan and we'll dive into all the IFSC

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controversies, including how she managed to get blocked by the IFSC on social media.

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This is a spicy one, so I hope you enjoy this conversation with Maya.

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How are you? How are you doing today?

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I'm good, thank you.

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I just moved to Tokyo literally three days ago.

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Oh, my gosh. That's a lot of moving effort.

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Yeah, I was in the north of Japan before that, so I've just moved down to Tokyo

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and I'm sitting on the floor of my new room in this really janky setup

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in order to avoid the noise of the aircon and stuff.

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But no, it's good.

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I've moved to Ogi-Kugo, which for people who know they're comp climbing,

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they'll realize that that's close to B-pump Ogi-Kugo,

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which is the world's most notorious training gym probably.

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So, yeah, I haven't been yet, but...

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Yeah, you've got to go.

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Yeah, that's my closest now.

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So I guess I'll become a regular.

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But yeah, that'll be interesting for my ego.

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I know some of the Japanese World Cup team struggle on what they call V4.

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So I don't know what I'm going to climb, minus V5 or something.

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But you're going to get so good.

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Or very demoralized.

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I think that's also an option, but let's hope for very strong.

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I'll strive for very strong.

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Yeah, mental training is part of it, too.

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Yeah, I think that's possibly what I need the most, to be honest.

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So it's probably a good thing.

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Yeah, it'll help there.

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Well, I hope it works out well.

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I would love to hear what your experience is like there once you've tried it out.

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I'll be sure to let you know.

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Yeah.

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And how long have you been climbing?

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I've been climbing about five years now,

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with the obvious COVID breaks in between.

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Climbing for me was kind of the first sport ever that I really, really got obsessed with.

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Before that, I was just not a very, like, exercisey person.

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Like, as a kid, I tried lots of different things,

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but I was always more of a sort of artsy kid rather than sporty.

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So I think it made climbing more challenging in some ways,

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because I didn't really have any base strength or endurance or anything.

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But I think what really caught me about it was the sort of puzzle aspect.

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That's why I really got into bouldering.

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I'm much more of a boulder than a, you know, lead or top rope climbing.

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I started off doing a top roping course to sort of challenge my fear of heights.

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And then I didn't know that bouldering was a thing.

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As far as I know, when I grew up, I'm from Belgium.

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And when I grew up, I don't think there was bouldering in my city, at least,

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because I remember doing, like, you know, some climbing at kids' parties and stuff like that.

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But I don't think there was bouldering.

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And so I did the top roping course and then discovered bouldering.

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I was like, oh, this is interesting.

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So you got into it in Belgium and then you eventually moved to the UK?

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No, I got into it in the UK.

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So before I lived in Japan, I was in the UK for seven years.

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And yeah, that's where I did the course and where I got all into bouldering.

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Yeah, and I guess that's also where you started your volunteering work for climbing.

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Yeah, I got really interested in comp climbing early on.

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I think comp climbing is part of the community aspect of climbing to an extent, right?

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That's also something that's really attractive about the sport.

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Like, it tends to be really supportive in the gyms.

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It's easy to talk to people. It's a really good way to make friends.

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And to me, I think comp climbing is to an extent an extension of that.

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I think sports, you know, televised sports, especially, it helps, you know,

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people come together and have something to discuss.

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So I got really interested in the movement of comp climbing as well

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and in the creativity and what I perceive as freedom of it.

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But I sort of missed that community aspect because, you know, it's on YouTube

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and you're not watching it with people.

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So it can be a bit isolating.

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And then if you're just, you know, discussing stuff in the YouTube comments.

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I think something that always surprised me about the YouTube section,

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the comment section of comp climbing is it's so supportive in real life.

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But then. Oh, God. Yeah.

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All the keyboard warriors come out, right?

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So it's interesting.

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And so I kind of missed that aspect of having, like,

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interesting level headed, you know, well thought out discussions

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with people about comp climbing.

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So I found some of that on a on a Discord group that I'm in.

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And then I just also got interested in maybe trying to get more involved directly.

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And I heard through some friends that,

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especially youth competition climbing, they always need judges.

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So I got in touch with GB Climbing when they had a comp in London.

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And I went there and I just rolled into judging for the first time.

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It was really fun. And I did a few comps like that.

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And then they were like, we're doing a World Cup in Edinburgh, do you want to come?

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And honestly, I thought they meant like, oh, you know,

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you can open the door or check people's tickets or something.

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It turned out they wanted a judge.

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And I was as surprised as anyone.

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So I ended up going to Edinburgh, becoming a World Cup judge for,

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you know, the lead World Cup there, which was a really interesting experience.

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And then literally about a week later, I was going to move to Japan.

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And so the person from GB Climbing got in touch with her counterpart in Japan.

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I was like, hey, you've got another World Cup coming up.

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You know, this person is a World Cup judge.

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Do you want to like invite her or whatever?

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And so I ended up volunteering at a bunch of the Japanese comps as well in the last year,

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not as a judge, but as in the role of athlete management,

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so much more backstage, guarding the isolation zone and making sure,

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you know, people go out onto the stage at the right time and things like that.

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And so I got to do that at the Morioka and Hachiochi World Cups,

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as well as at all of the Japanese local main comps.

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So the older Japan Cup, the Japan Cup and the combined cup.

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So, yeah, it's been a year of very interesting experiences.

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Yeah, so that is such like such a quick jump from like,

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oh, I started at a GB local youth comp to, oh, now I'm going directly to the World Cup.

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Was there anything else between that or was it just straight from one to the other?

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I think, well, local youth comp, I think the thing I judged before was the youth,

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the National Youth Boulder competition.

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So it was, you know, a fairly sort of orderly event,

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a fairly official thing, not like your local gym comp, but it was a fairly big jump.

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And yeah, it's really interesting.

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When I came to Japan, I was told I wasn't allowed to be a judge here,

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because actually in Japan, you have several levels of qualifications

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that you have to go through before you would be allowed to be a judge in UK.

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We don't have that system at the moment.

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So that was an interesting contrast as well.

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And even for the athlete management position, because it requires

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understanding the competition flow really well.

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They prefer having people in those positions who have a judging license.

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But because I had done World Cup judging, they were like, I guess you can do this.

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So they let me do that.

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But it's it's a big contrast between the two, for sure.

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Yeah, so one of the questions from the discord, someone named Sawika,

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was how are judges selected?

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Is there like a more regimented process than what you go through usually?

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Or especially in the Japan team, where you say that they have a bit more

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of a process for selecting judges?

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I think, you know, just like I was listening to your episode with Nikki

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from the other week, and just like he sort of explained that the roots

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root setter selection process is not superficial and quite vague.

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I think the same probably applies to judges.

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I think also one thing that people generally who watch Club Climbing

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maybe don't realize is to what extent the IFSC is or isn't involved

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in the actual organization of World Cups.

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So the World Cups aren't organized by the IFSC per se.

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They're organized by national federations.

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These national federations, they apply, they sort of have

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proposals of what, like, we want to host this kind of World Cup.

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We can do it here or there.

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The IFSC gets to do the decision making on the calendar and on what happens where.

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But it is ultimately the national federations that do the actual organizing on the ground.

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The IFSC only sends their media team, you know, MacGroom,

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who everyone knows, the commentator, but also their sort of behind the scenes team,

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media team, and then they send normally three people per competition,

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a jury president, a chief judge and a technical delegate.

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And those are licensed IFSC people.

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So I'm not entirely clear on how the licensing process for that works.

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I'm not saying it's not transparent. It might be.

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I just haven't actually tried to look into that.

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So there are people who are qualified as, you know, technical delegates,

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which means that they sort of run a lot of the, as the name says, technical aspects of the competition.

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They help make decisions in case that there's rain delays, like we saw in Seoul.

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And apparently they didn't have a technical delegate at that competition.

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I don't know why.

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But so that's that's unhelpful because your technical delegate would be pretty material

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in making those decisions.

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And they make sure, you know, all the rules are followed.

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And then there's a chief judge who sort of manages the team of judges

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and the team of judges will be national judges.

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So in Hachioji, we had a massive team of national judges, all Japanese people.

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And in Japan, those are all people who have the A qualification.

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So or the B qualification, but they're in training.

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So that's how it works in Japan.

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Everyone who gets to judge a World Cup has to have those qualifications,

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which is sort of, I guess, a way to standardize judgment.

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But if there's any appeals, if there's any problems, it goes to the jury president, essentially.

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And the jury president will discuss with the national judges and with the chief judge.

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And they'll come up, you know, they'll review video footage and they'll come up with a judgment together.

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But that's ultimately how that goes.

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So all the actual judging is done by the local federation.

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But obviously, it's done, you know, by multiple people per bolder or per brute

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to make sure that there's no, you know, no problems or no disagreements.

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If there's any issue whatsoever, it tends to go to the IFSC people.

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And the chief judge is usually also the person who sort of liaises with team coaches.

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The team coaches are up front right behind the judges.

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And so the chief judge will probably be rowing around.

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If someone wants to make an appeal, they'll go and have a discussion with that person

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and sort of, you know, guide them through the process if they need guidance.

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Obviously, the experienced teams don't really need guidance, but they might, you know.

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Emotions are high usually at these points.

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So the chief judge tends to then, you know, calm things down or say, OK, we'll review it or whatever.

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So that's how that goes in general.

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But on the national level, the way that those national judges are selected is obviously vastly different,

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as we've seen between, for example, Japan and the UK, because in the UK, we don't have a qualification system.

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A lot of the time, the people who judge youth competitions are just competitors' parents.

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So we have a lot of pretty experienced judges in the UK, but they're all parents of competitors.

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So obviously, if it's a World Cup, you're not going to have, you know, family relationship judging.

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But yeah, it's vastly different.

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Also in the UK at the World Cup, all the judges, we were basically allowed to cheer on competitors

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and to, you know, to just cheer them on and say, come on or whatever.

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In Japan, absolutely not allowed because it might be confusing for the competitors.

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So, you know, there is a difference in standard there.

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I don't want to say that, you know, the UK system is bad and I think everyone at the World Cup did a good job.

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And ultimately, you have the IFSC people there to resolve any dispute.

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So they would normally guarantee that, you know, judging is even across all World Cups.

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But there is no real standardisation across the world currently.

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And, you know, education for judges, for example.

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I learned everything from just, you know, watching competitions.

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And then I went to, you know, do some judging and the people from Chibi Climbing were like,

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yeah, you know what you're doing. Can you come to Edinburgh, please?

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So, yeah, it's a big difference.

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So you didn't feel like totally out of place judging in Edinburgh?

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I felt somewhat out of place also because all of these systems behind it,

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there doesn't tend to be someone who says, by the way, this is how it works.

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So you're going to have this and this and this happening.

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That doesn't happen. They just go, can you come?

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And then you're there and you just figure out what's going on and what to do.

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And so it's very, it's very experience based.

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But, you know, it was hugely interesting.

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There's just things where you think, why is this happening?

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Like I walked into the venue in Edinburgh, I walked into Rathow,

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and I looked at the lead wall and I went, where are the bald covers?

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Why are there no bald covers?

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And they just kind of went, oh, yeah, we don't have them here.

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And I said, we're going to have bald stepping incidents.

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I just know it. Whenever you don't have bald covers, you have incidents.

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Because, you know, it's such a stupid thing.

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Bald stepping, I understand why it's not allowed, but at the same time,

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as a climber, if you're just focusing on the sequence,

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it can be so difficult to see where your feet are at all time

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and making sure that you don't touch it.

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And of course, on the route that I judged in finals,

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we had that problem where Yoshiyuki touched a bald.

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I saw it happen. I said to the chief judge,

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you judged a bald, I can't judge if he used it,

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but you're going to get an appeal.

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And of course they got appeals.

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And they reviewed the footage like a hundred times over

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and he got downgraded for it and lost out on a medal.

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So it's one of those things.

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And I talked to the jury president for that competition and I said,

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can you please, please make bald covers mandatory from next season?

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And he said, yeah, yeah, we're looking into it.

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I think we're going to make it mandatory.

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And they're still not mandatory this season.

00:17:13,960 --> 00:17:16,960
So we had incidents this year as well.

00:17:16,960 --> 00:17:19,120
So it's one of those things that you think,

00:17:19,120 --> 00:17:23,560
this should be so simple, but it's not in place yet.

00:17:23,560 --> 00:17:27,400
I don't know if it's just that they're difficult to get in some places

00:17:27,400 --> 00:17:29,800
or what it is or if it's too expensive or whatever.

00:17:29,800 --> 00:17:31,840
I can't imagine them being that expensive, to be honest.

00:17:31,840 --> 00:17:36,960
But it's one of those things where you just think it should be so easy to solve.

00:17:36,960 --> 00:17:40,360
And it's heartbreaking as a judge, you don't ever want to demote someone

00:17:40,360 --> 00:17:41,440
for stepping on a bolt.

00:17:41,440 --> 00:17:46,840
Like, obviously it's really unpleasant thing to have to do.

00:17:46,840 --> 00:17:49,000
But yeah, it happened.

00:17:49,000 --> 00:17:51,680
So, yeah, and people get quite upset about it.

00:17:51,680 --> 00:17:54,160
People get understandably very upset about it.

00:17:54,160 --> 00:17:57,760
And I think Nikki touched upon this as well when he said,

00:17:57,760 --> 00:18:01,400
you know, one thing that's also lacking in climbing is context.

00:18:01,400 --> 00:18:05,920
Very often in competition climbing, like you have an appeal happen.

00:18:05,920 --> 00:18:08,040
And then at the end of the broadcast, you actually don't know

00:18:08,040 --> 00:18:09,880
if the appeals gone through or not.

00:18:09,880 --> 00:18:13,080
There usually isn't very good communication between the judges

00:18:13,080 --> 00:18:15,200
and the commentating team.

00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:19,480
Often they're not even necessarily within speaking distance of each other.

00:18:19,480 --> 00:18:22,760
They're often off to the side or in the back or even sometimes behind the wall

00:18:22,760 --> 00:18:23,920
and just watching the screens.

00:18:23,920 --> 00:18:27,080
So that communication tends to not be there.

00:18:27,080 --> 00:18:31,960
So, you know, people often complain, oh, the commentator doesn't even know

00:18:31,960 --> 00:18:33,480
what's going on, whatever.

00:18:33,480 --> 00:18:38,600
And, you know, again, keyboard warriors coming out to complain about something

00:18:38,600 --> 00:18:42,280
that they don't know the circumstances of, which is one of the reasons

00:18:42,280 --> 00:18:46,480
why I wanted to do this, to, you know, sort of clarify some of the circumstances

00:18:46,480 --> 00:18:48,400
that are there.

00:18:48,400 --> 00:18:49,600
But I think that is a problem.

00:18:49,600 --> 00:18:54,720
Like, if you don't have a way of giving that context to viewers,

00:18:54,720 --> 00:18:58,240
it makes sports very difficult to watch.

00:18:58,240 --> 00:19:02,480
So, you know, there's definitely improvements to be made there.

00:19:02,480 --> 00:19:06,800
Yeah, it's so hard to know, like, what's going on.

00:19:06,800 --> 00:19:11,280
And people get so much hate online for it, I think, especially like Matt

00:19:11,280 --> 00:19:12,960
Krum gets a lot of hate on it.

00:19:12,960 --> 00:19:17,320
I wish I could have him on the podcast one day to ask him what his thoughts are

00:19:17,320 --> 00:19:20,200
and what he's experiencing when he's actually commentating.

00:19:20,200 --> 00:19:24,520
Yeah, I feel bad for Matt, to be honest, because I think he's

00:19:24,520 --> 00:19:25,720
trying so hard.

00:19:25,720 --> 00:19:26,960
He has a really difficult job.

00:19:26,960 --> 00:19:29,920
He has to do a lot of traveling.

00:19:29,920 --> 00:19:31,720
It's very exhausting.

00:19:31,720 --> 00:19:36,560
And, you know, the thing people always get him on is his pronunciation

00:19:36,560 --> 00:19:40,040
of climbers names, especially, you know, foreign climbers.

00:19:40,040 --> 00:19:45,280
But honestly, you know, I've I've looked at lists of climbers names in one.

00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:47,920
I don't even know where to begin.

00:19:47,920 --> 00:19:50,040
And it's not like he doesn't try.

00:19:50,040 --> 00:19:52,080
I've spoken to him numerous times.

00:19:52,080 --> 00:19:55,000
I've actually sent him voice messages in the past, like teaching him the

00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:56,440
pronunciation of Japanese names.

00:19:56,440 --> 00:19:57,400
That's so funny.

00:19:57,400 --> 00:19:57,880
Yeah.

00:19:57,880 --> 00:20:02,120
So he really tries, but he's dyslexic and it's just and he's British.

00:20:02,120 --> 00:20:05,360
You know, that doesn't help either, I think.

00:20:05,360 --> 00:20:09,960
So it's really, really hard to get all of them perfectly correct.

00:20:09,960 --> 00:20:14,600
And I think, you know, there are obvious points where he could improve,

00:20:14,600 --> 00:20:21,200
but he also has improved a lot in his few years now as a commentator on the circuit,

00:20:21,200 --> 00:20:25,800
I think there's been vast improvements in the way he commentates.

00:20:25,800 --> 00:20:29,560
And, you know, that's hopefully that'll just continue.

00:20:29,560 --> 00:20:30,480
And he brings the psych.

00:20:30,480 --> 00:20:34,320
He's, you know, he's psyched about talking to climbers or watching climbing.

00:20:34,320 --> 00:20:38,960
So I think that's important as well, especially now with a climber,

00:20:38,960 --> 00:20:42,960
usually as a co-commentator, I think it works quite well.

00:20:42,960 --> 00:20:48,200
So, yeah, but there are obvious aspects that can be improved.

00:20:48,200 --> 00:20:53,320
And some of that is just down to him, you know, people not communicating to him.

00:20:53,320 --> 00:20:57,880
He told me last time in Hachioji that, you know, he tries to always go to the technical delegate

00:20:57,880 --> 00:21:02,160
before the comp and say, oh, you know, can you please, if something happens,

00:21:02,160 --> 00:21:08,640
can you write me a little note or, you know, come to me or, you know, whatever it is,

00:21:08,640 --> 00:21:12,200
but do something so that I can tell the viewers.

00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:15,360
And obviously, in some competitions, that's easier than in others

00:21:15,360 --> 00:21:17,800
because the technical delegate is really busy, you know.

00:21:17,800 --> 00:21:23,600
They're busy with those judgments and with appeasing coaches and climbers.

00:21:23,600 --> 00:21:29,160
And so, you know, communicating with the commentator doesn't always come first.

00:21:29,160 --> 00:21:33,040
And at the same time, you know, that commentator has to do so many things at once.

00:21:33,040 --> 00:21:39,000
He has to watch the climbing, but also often they don't see the whole life.

00:21:39,000 --> 00:21:42,680
So they also only have the footage that gets fed through to YouTube,

00:21:42,680 --> 00:21:46,840
which isn't, as we know, always the best footage.

00:21:46,840 --> 00:21:50,120
He has to, sometimes if there's a moment where he wants a replay,

00:21:50,120 --> 00:21:53,880
he needs to signal that to his team so that they can set up the replay.

00:21:53,880 --> 00:21:57,840
He has to try and, you know, get people's attention if he needs experience on anything.

00:21:57,840 --> 00:21:59,720
So it's a very difficult job.

00:21:59,720 --> 00:22:02,720
And I think, you know, people don't appreciate it enough.

00:22:02,720 --> 00:22:07,800
And it's very easy to get angry about things online.

00:22:07,800 --> 00:22:12,600
And I understand because I think I used to, to an extent, be one of those people.

00:22:12,600 --> 00:22:15,280
I don't think I was ever like a horrible keyboard warrior.

00:22:15,280 --> 00:22:20,960
I like to think that I try to be nuanced whenever I talk about things even online.

00:22:20,960 --> 00:22:27,160
But I used to just, you know, get mad at the IFSC for whatever,

00:22:27,160 --> 00:22:31,120
in my opinion, idiotic judgment that they made or whatever.

00:22:31,120 --> 00:22:32,520
But then once you get in...

00:22:32,520 --> 00:22:33,880
Lack of organization.

00:22:33,880 --> 00:22:39,120
Yeah, lack of organization or, you know, it's actually funny.

00:22:39,120 --> 00:22:43,520
I once got blocked off of all social media by the IFSC.

00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:46,000
Right, I wanted to touch on that.

00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:50,000
Because I've been critical of the Eurosport deal, you know,

00:22:50,000 --> 00:22:57,800
the deal where in Europe it's now impossible without a VPN to watch the broadcasts for free

00:22:57,800 --> 00:23:01,120
because it's being broadcast on Eurosport.

00:23:01,120 --> 00:23:04,320
And they announced this as like, you know, an amazing thing for the sport

00:23:04,320 --> 00:23:06,840
that was going to grow with the viewership and stuff.

00:23:06,840 --> 00:23:12,960
And a lot of people were angry about it just for reasons of not being able to watch it for free anymore.

00:23:12,960 --> 00:23:17,520
But I think, you know, there's also a huge discussion point of, is this actually a good deal?

00:23:17,520 --> 00:23:19,960
Is this going to grow the viewership?

00:23:19,960 --> 00:23:25,280
Because Eurosport, first of all, had commentators who knew nothing about climbing.

00:23:25,280 --> 00:23:27,880
So it was horrible to watch.

00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:36,160
And they ended up usually not broadcasting semifinals at all, or maybe online only.

00:23:36,160 --> 00:23:42,040
And even finals, you know, it was very low down the list for them in terms of priority.

00:23:42,040 --> 00:23:46,320
If there was any other sports that might attract more viewers, they would broadcast that instead.

00:23:46,320 --> 00:23:50,640
So even finals weren't always broadcast live.

00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:54,520
And obviously, if you're having them in Asia, the time zone is weird anyway.

00:23:54,520 --> 00:23:58,880
So there were lots of discussion points about, is this actually good for the sport?

00:23:58,880 --> 00:24:01,920
And also, what are you doing with the money that comes in?

00:24:01,920 --> 00:24:03,080
I think that's a fair point.

00:24:03,080 --> 00:24:07,600
Like, as the IFSC, you're getting broadcasting money.

00:24:07,600 --> 00:24:08,600
What are you doing with it?

00:24:08,600 --> 00:24:10,760
Are you investing it back into the sports?

00:24:10,760 --> 00:24:15,880
Is it going into the professionalization of this sport?

00:24:15,880 --> 00:24:18,320
Is it going into development of route setters?

00:24:18,320 --> 00:24:20,320
Is it going into prize money?

00:24:20,320 --> 00:24:21,320
Spoiler alert, it's not.

00:24:21,320 --> 00:24:24,240
But they didn't communicate anything about this.

00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:26,320
So I was quite critical of this.

00:24:26,320 --> 00:24:32,800
And I put a few platforms because I'm on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook and all those things.

00:24:32,800 --> 00:24:39,720
So on a few of those platforms, I posted a response to them saying, you know, I don't

00:24:39,720 --> 00:24:40,920
think this is good for the sport.

00:24:40,920 --> 00:24:44,000
And they ended up blocking me off of all social media.

00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:47,200
And I just, I was like, what is happening?

00:24:47,200 --> 00:24:48,200
This is crazy.

00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:51,580
This is like some weird dictatorship level censorship.

00:24:51,580 --> 00:24:58,440
So I sent them an email as nicely as I could muster being like, excuse me, what the actual

00:24:58,440 --> 00:25:01,640
fuck are you doing?

00:25:01,640 --> 00:25:05,120
And they were like, oh, we thought you were spamming.

00:25:05,120 --> 00:25:08,160
But okay, we'll unblock you, I guess.

00:25:08,160 --> 00:25:11,200
And you know, that was like early last year.

00:25:11,200 --> 00:25:15,040
And then months later, I ended up being a judge at the World Cup.

00:25:15,040 --> 00:25:20,240
So it was this really weird, awkward, awkward thing.

00:25:20,240 --> 00:25:26,000
And it's sometimes very difficult to know who's making those decisions because the FSC

00:25:26,000 --> 00:25:33,240
also is a very, I don't know if decentralized is the right word, but you know, people are

00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:36,680
spread over various continents.

00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:41,240
So those, the technical delegate, the jury president, the chief judge, those people,

00:25:41,240 --> 00:25:45,680
they're different at every comp because those are just people who have normal day jobs who

00:25:45,680 --> 00:25:48,660
do this as like an extra thing.

00:25:48,660 --> 00:25:56,240
So they only go to like maybe three, four big comps a year in those capacities.

00:25:56,240 --> 00:25:59,960
So are they the IFSC?

00:25:59,960 --> 00:26:05,540
They're part of the IFSC, but they're not necessarily the part of the IFSC that makes those decisions.

00:26:05,540 --> 00:26:13,040
Because in Hachioji, I sort of ended up running around with the IFSC people quite a lot because

00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:18,680
you know, they needed a fair bit of interpreting between English and Japanese.

00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:22,240
So I ended up running around with them quite a lot and talking to them.

00:26:22,240 --> 00:26:28,600
And they were like, I told them this story and they found it very, very weird.

00:26:28,600 --> 00:26:31,920
And you know, they were like, okay, that's not good.

00:26:31,920 --> 00:26:34,040
So who is making these decisions?

00:26:34,040 --> 00:26:40,400
It's often quite difficult to know like who at the IFSC is actually deciding that, you

00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:44,600
know, blocking all discussion on social media is a good thing.

00:26:44,600 --> 00:26:48,080
It doesn't seem like there's a big sort of system behind it.

00:26:48,080 --> 00:26:54,240
And when I emailed their head of communications essentially to say, hey, can you please unblock

00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:57,360
me?

00:26:57,360 --> 00:27:03,940
We had a bit of discussion and I said, well, you know, I just think there needs to be discussion

00:27:03,940 --> 00:27:06,560
there needs to be an open discussion about these kinds of things.

00:27:06,560 --> 00:27:11,760
And if we if we as a community can't have discussions about, you know, what's good for

00:27:11,760 --> 00:27:19,200
this sport, then it's very much, you know, a sort of dictatorish point of view from which

00:27:19,200 --> 00:27:22,440
the IFSC is deciding all of this, because it doesn't seem like they're listening to

00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:23,440
their athletes very much.

00:27:23,440 --> 00:27:27,400
There was a lot of athletes who didn't like this at all.

00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:29,960
It doesn't seem like they're listening to their community because you're blocking them

00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:33,920
of social media when they try to bring up points.

00:27:33,920 --> 00:27:37,400
So what's going into this discussion?

00:27:37,400 --> 00:27:42,640
And guys sort of said, well, if you want to have discussions with the IFSC, social media

00:27:42,640 --> 00:27:49,280
isn't the right way to do it, because we just send like a report every three months to the

00:27:49,280 --> 00:27:53,000
top of the IFSC to tell them what's happening on social media.

00:27:53,000 --> 00:28:05,360
So, you know, I think obviously, again, people online, people who are just viewing from the

00:28:05,360 --> 00:28:10,520
other side of YouTube, they often don't know what's going on behind the scenes.

00:28:10,520 --> 00:28:16,640
So I'm not saying, you know, you should just listen to the majority opinion.

00:28:16,640 --> 00:28:19,440
But listening in some way might be a good thing.

00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:26,120
Posturing discussion might be a good thing, and it helps to engage viewers, because I

00:28:26,120 --> 00:28:30,720
think right now the IFSC really has a PR problem, basically.

00:28:30,720 --> 00:28:32,880
Oh, for sure.

00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:38,760
You know, everyone kind of hates them because they don't explain why they make decisions.

00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:42,160
It's very untransparent.

00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:44,800
Communication is just not very good, to be honest.

00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:49,080
And they never respond to points of criticism.

00:28:49,080 --> 00:28:54,520
They seem to like what they did with locking me off their social media accounts.

00:28:54,520 --> 00:28:57,080
They seem to do a lot of censoring.

00:28:57,080 --> 00:29:02,800
Recently this has come up around the BMI and Redes discussion.

00:29:02,800 --> 00:29:07,560
For those who don't know, at the beginning of the Innsbruck IFSC World Cup Finals live

00:29:07,560 --> 00:29:13,280
streams, they didn't know that the microphone was already recording, and the co-commentator

00:29:13,280 --> 00:29:18,360
Alana Yip asked Matt Groom if he could ask her a question about what she would like to

00:29:18,360 --> 00:29:24,760
see changed within the IFSC so that she could talk about the lack of BMI testing.

00:29:24,760 --> 00:29:32,040
They cut out Alana's message, and then recently, you know, the chief, two of the main medical

00:29:32,040 --> 00:29:37,400
doctors on the medical board of the IFSC resigned because they said, well, we've been bringing

00:29:37,400 --> 00:29:40,520
this up for years, there's no action being taken.

00:29:40,520 --> 00:29:47,520
And this obviously helped bring the message to come into attention again.

00:29:47,520 --> 00:29:50,400
So this was going around on social media quite a bit.

00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:59,480
And then apparently, a climber started this campaign making t-shirts that say, you know,

00:29:59,480 --> 00:30:05,000
IFSC please listen, and planning to have a lot of people wear those in Bern at the world

00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:07,680
championships next week.

00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:13,880
And from what I've seen on social media, it turns out that the IFSC threatened that person

00:30:13,880 --> 00:30:18,400
with a lawsuit and tried to shut them down.

00:30:18,400 --> 00:30:26,000
So a lot of weird stuff going on that I just don't think they're helping themselves really

00:30:26,000 --> 00:30:32,440
in the way they communicate or don't communicate to make this sport, you know, more enjoyable,

00:30:32,440 --> 00:30:37,600
more accessible for viewers and climbers.

00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:42,040
Because I think a lot of athletes also share this opinion saying that, you know, they don't

00:30:42,040 --> 00:30:48,000
just not listen to viewers, but they don't listen to athletes very well either.

00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:54,140
So you know, if as a sports body, you're not listening to anyone who's actually involved

00:30:54,140 --> 00:30:58,120
in doing your sports, what are you doing?

00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:00,720
And you know, I don't want to just be critical.

00:31:00,720 --> 00:31:05,480
I think there has been improvements in some of the communication in the last season.

00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:13,000
I think they're doing a bit better with posting on social media and with trying to engage

00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:15,080
and create a story to an extent.

00:31:15,080 --> 00:31:19,320
But if you suppress discussion every time something slightly controversial happens,

00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:21,840
then you know, you're undoing your own efforts, I think.

00:31:21,840 --> 00:31:22,840
Yeah.

00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:25,200
Do you know if they have like a social media team?

00:31:25,200 --> 00:31:31,320
Or is there like, I don't know, do they have any way of reaching out properly?

00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:36,840
I think their social media team is one person.

00:31:36,840 --> 00:31:44,440
I'm not sure, but I think that it's one person mostly running it.

00:31:44,440 --> 00:31:49,160
And yeah, I don't know if they have much of a policy behind it, to be honest.

00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:57,020
Or if they have a policy, it doesn't necessarily seem well informed or, you know, as someone

00:31:57,020 --> 00:32:05,040
who does communications myself, I don't think it's the best communication policy that they

00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:09,400
have in place for their own reputation, as well as for, you know, engaging people and

00:32:09,400 --> 00:32:10,400
engaging.

00:32:10,400 --> 00:32:11,400
Yeah, clearly.

00:32:11,400 --> 00:32:20,720
But going back to what you mentioned about the Eurosport deal and how athletes were responding

00:32:20,720 --> 00:32:27,360
to it, I guess, how does it affect athletes?

00:32:27,360 --> 00:32:35,160
Also after it's been like a year or so since this has happened, has there been any updates

00:32:35,160 --> 00:32:39,360
on whether it's been actually good for them or anyone?

00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:46,280
No, I think I had a brief discussion with Sasha Gale about this at one point where at

00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:50,480
the time she said, well, I don't really get why people are so upset about this.

00:32:50,480 --> 00:32:53,280
If we get to be on television, that's good for us, right?

00:32:53,280 --> 00:32:58,800
And you know, I tried to make the argument that it just depends if you're gaining or

00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:07,360
losing viewers essentially, because ultimately climbing is booming, it's getting much bigger,

00:33:07,360 --> 00:33:12,280
but it's not fully mainstream yet.

00:33:12,280 --> 00:33:15,760
And it's not always the easiest to understand.

00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:20,220
Like the rules aren't, the details of the rules aren't always easy to understand.

00:33:20,220 --> 00:33:25,320
And I think when you have a sport like that, it's very difficult to just get viewership

00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:28,160
from people randomly happening upon it.

00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:33,360
So the big question is, you know, if you put this on television right now, are you actually

00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:35,480
gaining viewers or are you losing them?

00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:39,520
Because you know, if you look at people, well, and again, communicating, that's a lot of

00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:43,880
them saying, well, I'm not watching anymore because I'm not paying for it.

00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:47,400
Especially because there are also repeated complaints even from the people who normally

00:33:47,400 --> 00:33:52,240
like to watch it that, you know, the footage isn't very good.

00:33:52,240 --> 00:33:57,960
The camera work, you know, often zooms in when we actually need to see the whole climber.

00:33:57,960 --> 00:34:00,680
It's not terribly well coordinated.

00:34:00,680 --> 00:34:02,600
Commentating isn't always the best.

00:34:02,600 --> 00:34:06,120
Again, there's this communication issue and when there's an appeal, we don't necessarily

00:34:06,120 --> 00:34:07,880
know what's going on.

00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:15,400
So those things are very difficult, I think, if you want to just attract viewers who happen

00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:16,840
upon your sport.

00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:22,480
I think that's unlikely to happen at this point, unless you, you know, manage to improve

00:34:22,480 --> 00:34:28,600
on a bunch of those points, but also manage to sort of have better PR for climbing in

00:34:28,600 --> 00:34:32,400
general as a federation, as a sport.

00:34:32,400 --> 00:34:38,960
You know, you need stories, I think, in sports in order for people to stay engaged and inspired.

00:34:38,960 --> 00:34:43,860
And that's one thing that's been really difficult, I think, this season is because we have the

00:34:43,860 --> 00:34:46,220
Olympic qualifying coming up.

00:34:46,220 --> 00:34:49,600
So many athletes have been skipping, skipping the World Cups.

00:34:49,600 --> 00:34:53,240
And it makes it really difficult to find the narrative line throughout the season.

00:34:53,240 --> 00:35:00,240
It's not like there's not really been a battle for the overall title.

00:35:00,240 --> 00:35:04,240
And I think that's just, you know, it makes it really, really difficult for people to

00:35:04,240 --> 00:35:05,760
stay interested, to stay engaged.

00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:12,000
Also, I think Nikki mentioned this in his interview about, you know, climbing personalities

00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:15,380
and who are the big personalities?

00:35:15,380 --> 00:35:20,880
Who would you trust to explain climbing to people who don't know climbing?

00:35:20,880 --> 00:35:25,320
And that's, I think, also a point where, you know, a federation can do so much work.

00:35:25,320 --> 00:35:28,400
And again, they've been sort of doing stuff this season.

00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:33,840
They've had like their golden moment for every comp where they've highlighted things on social

00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:39,240
media and, you know, they try to sort of bring out those things.

00:35:39,240 --> 00:35:43,880
They've tried to do some more interviews with people, which I think is an improvement.

00:35:43,880 --> 00:35:49,440
And I think it's a good evolution, but there's a lot more work to be done.

00:35:49,440 --> 00:35:53,800
And you know, I think realistically, if you want to do it well, you probably need a bigger

00:35:53,800 --> 00:35:54,800
social media team.

00:35:54,800 --> 00:35:57,320
You need more people involved.

00:35:57,320 --> 00:36:02,440
You need probably some good PR people who know, you know, where to help you.

00:36:02,440 --> 00:36:06,160
And you need to just be more transparent as a federation.

00:36:06,160 --> 00:36:12,400
I think that's why, you know, an initiative like this podcast is really great because

00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:18,000
it helps us spread some insight into behind the scenes of comp climbing.

00:36:18,000 --> 00:36:24,600
However limited, however limited to, you know, my experience or the things that I know, which

00:36:24,600 --> 00:36:27,120
isn't very much.

00:36:27,120 --> 00:36:33,000
But you know, why don't we get to see more of that from the IFSC?

00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:34,000
Yeah.

00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:35,000
Yeah.

00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:39,440
I'm really hoping to sort of fill that gap because I just wish that we could learn more

00:36:39,440 --> 00:36:43,720
about the athletes or learn more about behind the scenes, just like have footage that we

00:36:43,720 --> 00:36:45,640
can see.

00:36:45,640 --> 00:36:48,160
So I am really hoping to fill that gap.

00:36:48,160 --> 00:36:52,840
And maybe one day they'll be like, hey, do you want to interview people as part of the

00:36:52,840 --> 00:36:53,840
IFSC?

00:36:53,840 --> 00:36:55,840
No, that'd be amazing.

00:36:55,840 --> 00:36:56,840
Yeah.

00:36:56,840 --> 00:37:02,800
I think, you know, this sport, we're in the middle of an evolution of professionalization

00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:04,760
with this sport.

00:37:04,760 --> 00:37:09,320
And being in the middle of an evolution like that means it's a really interesting time.

00:37:09,320 --> 00:37:11,080
There's lots of change happening.

00:37:11,080 --> 00:37:13,680
There's lots of new things all the time.

00:37:13,680 --> 00:37:15,760
But it also has a lot of challenges.

00:37:15,760 --> 00:37:17,800
You know, it means that we'll run into problems.

00:37:17,800 --> 00:37:21,360
We'll run into issues where people disagree.

00:37:21,360 --> 00:37:27,680
And also one of the big problems, I think, is that the professionalization of the sport

00:37:27,680 --> 00:37:30,840
isn't happening at the same rate everywhere.

00:37:30,840 --> 00:37:34,520
So it's not happening at the same rate in different countries, within different national

00:37:34,520 --> 00:37:35,520
federations.

00:37:35,520 --> 00:37:39,280
It's not necessarily happening at the same rate within the different disciplines of the

00:37:39,280 --> 00:37:44,840
sport or within, you know, the management side and the route setting side and all of

00:37:44,840 --> 00:37:47,760
those different things.

00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:50,640
And that makes it really tricky because it means that there's different levels of money

00:37:50,640 --> 00:37:54,080
going around in different places in different countries.

00:37:54,080 --> 00:37:59,520
It means that it's really difficult to leave stuff up to national federations when national

00:37:59,520 --> 00:38:02,800
federations aren't really an established thing everywhere.

00:38:02,800 --> 00:38:07,640
So I think that brings along a lot of challenges.

00:38:07,640 --> 00:38:12,920
And again, that makes it interesting, but it means that, you know, you just run into

00:38:12,920 --> 00:38:17,240
issues and you can see it in so many different things.

00:38:17,240 --> 00:38:23,000
I think, you know, there's countries where there's a statute where athletes can be employed

00:38:23,000 --> 00:38:24,240
by the army.

00:38:24,240 --> 00:38:29,400
And that means that they just have an income that comes from the army and they don't have

00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:35,600
to, you know, have day jobs necessarily or rely on sponsors in order to...

00:38:35,600 --> 00:38:36,600
And what countries?

00:38:36,600 --> 00:38:37,720
What countries are those?

00:38:37,720 --> 00:38:41,880
I know that this is the case in France and Slovenia.

00:38:41,880 --> 00:38:46,120
I don't know in which other countries, but I know that this is a system that some countries

00:38:46,120 --> 00:38:47,120
have.

00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:50,120
And then there's some countries where there isn't such a support system.

00:38:50,120 --> 00:38:55,920
And so athletes really have to rely on prize money or on sponsorships.

00:38:55,920 --> 00:38:58,920
And that makes it really hard in a country like Japan.

00:38:58,920 --> 00:39:00,600
You know, you can see a vast difference.

00:39:00,600 --> 00:39:07,400
There are so many talented athletes, but there's a vast difference in sort of the security

00:39:07,400 --> 00:39:09,240
levels that they have.

00:39:09,240 --> 00:39:14,760
There's some big names like Mio Nanaka or, you know, Tomoe Narasaki or people like that

00:39:14,760 --> 00:39:17,520
who are very well established.

00:39:17,520 --> 00:39:20,480
They're, you know, they go on television here.

00:39:20,480 --> 00:39:26,080
They're pretty well-known faces by now, sponsored by really big brands, especially Miho, you

00:39:26,080 --> 00:39:31,160
know, with Adidas, Beats sponsorship, Big Yogurt brand sponsoring her.

00:39:31,160 --> 00:39:35,200
So, you know, she's very secure in that.

00:39:35,200 --> 00:39:41,720
And then there's lots of other really talented climbers who go to university and, you know,

00:39:41,720 --> 00:39:51,080
sort of have this student athlete statute, which I think kind of helps them sort of balancing

00:39:51,080 --> 00:39:55,200
both, but doesn't do much in terms of financial support.

00:39:55,200 --> 00:39:59,360
And so they all work at climbing gyms.

00:39:59,360 --> 00:40:00,440
They work as route setters.

00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:08,280
And so they have to somehow balance training, going to all these World Cups and their day

00:40:08,280 --> 00:40:10,760
job and studying.

00:40:10,760 --> 00:40:13,560
And it's just not a level playing field that way.

00:40:13,560 --> 00:40:18,960
So there is a big question there of, you know, where is the money?

00:40:18,960 --> 00:40:23,680
Is there money in the different countries for all the athletes?

00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:28,800
We have seen in the past, you know, athletes crowdfunding in order to be able to even go

00:40:28,800 --> 00:40:32,080
to the World Cups because it's expensive.

00:40:32,080 --> 00:40:37,240
And if your federation doesn't have the budget to send X amount of climbers to a World Cup,

00:40:37,240 --> 00:40:39,680
but you still want to go, then you have to sell fund.

00:40:39,680 --> 00:40:41,600
I think this is still the case.

00:40:41,600 --> 00:40:48,640
We saw it for, I think we saw it this season for some of the Indonesian boulders because

00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:52,540
their speed team is really well established, but their boulder and lead climbers aren't

00:40:52,540 --> 00:40:54,320
as well known yet.

00:40:54,320 --> 00:41:03,320
They have twins who compete and, you know, they've been crowdfunding to be able to go

00:41:03,320 --> 00:41:04,840
to the big events.

00:41:04,840 --> 00:41:10,520
I know the physio for Team Australia had to crowdfund because the federation didn't have

00:41:10,520 --> 00:41:12,360
budget to send a physio.

00:41:12,360 --> 00:41:14,280
Oh my God.

00:41:14,280 --> 00:41:21,540
So you know, these are things that are going to change and hopefully get better.

00:41:21,540 --> 00:41:26,760
But as we are in that process of evolution, there's lots of interesting little bits of

00:41:26,760 --> 00:41:29,760
friction, I guess you could call it.

00:41:29,760 --> 00:41:30,760
Yeah.

00:41:30,760 --> 00:41:37,360
I mean, money must be a pretty big problem to overcome in this sport.

00:41:37,360 --> 00:41:42,320
Because I mean, even if you win, the prize money is pretty small, isn't it?

00:41:42,320 --> 00:41:43,320
Oh, it's low.

00:41:43,320 --> 00:41:44,320
Yeah, it's really low.

00:41:44,320 --> 00:41:47,920
And I think it's been reduced recently as well.

00:41:47,920 --> 00:41:56,560
So you know, and I just think also just the fact looking at this past season of how many

00:41:56,560 --> 00:42:02,720
people have been skipping comps, I think that tells you how low worth the prize money is

00:42:02,720 --> 00:42:07,560
because they've all been sort of skipping those comps.

00:42:07,560 --> 00:42:12,360
And it also tells you that there isn't much prize money in gaining the overall title because

00:42:12,360 --> 00:42:14,680
no one's been competing for the overall title.

00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:16,820
It doesn't seem like anyone's been interested in it at all.

00:42:16,820 --> 00:42:21,480
So if the athletes aren't even interested in it, how can we as viewers ever be interested

00:42:21,480 --> 00:42:22,480
in it?

00:42:22,480 --> 00:42:25,600
Also, it doesn't really get mentioned throughout the season, right?

00:42:25,600 --> 00:42:27,280
It's the last comp of the season.

00:42:27,280 --> 00:42:31,040
Oh, by the way, we also have the overall podium and someone won.

00:42:31,040 --> 00:42:32,040
Right.

00:42:32,040 --> 00:42:34,040
Yeah, they never talk about it.

00:42:34,040 --> 00:42:35,040
No.

00:42:35,040 --> 00:42:40,400
So there's a lot of work to be done in developing storylines across seasons and keeping viewers

00:42:40,400 --> 00:42:41,400
engaged.

00:42:41,400 --> 00:42:46,120
And it is also tricky with things being in different time zones.

00:42:46,120 --> 00:42:49,160
You can't always watch everything live anyway.

00:42:49,160 --> 00:42:57,160
But giving people a reason to rewatch your comp and making them really want to see what

00:42:57,160 --> 00:43:01,200
happened, I think there's a lot of work to be done there.

00:43:01,200 --> 00:43:02,200
Yeah.

00:43:02,200 --> 00:43:07,300
Do you know what the prize money is for gold, silver, bronze?

00:43:07,300 --> 00:43:12,640
And is there a separate prize money for winning the overall season?

00:43:12,640 --> 00:43:14,120
I don't know.

00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:16,440
I don't know the actual amount.

00:43:16,440 --> 00:43:20,680
I know that it's not very high.

00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:26,000
But I don't think I've tried to look for it, but I don't think it's officially publicized

00:43:26,000 --> 00:43:30,760
at least publicly on the IFSC website at the moment.

00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:41,120
But yeah, I think it's, you know, not above $5,000 probably for winning a World Cup.

00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:44,680
I think it's possibly well below that.

00:43:44,680 --> 00:43:54,200
I guess in Japan at least, some athletes, you say make their money from rapsiding, sponsorships

00:43:54,200 --> 00:43:56,940
if you're really big, I guess.

00:43:56,940 --> 00:44:03,840
Is that part of the reason maybe why in Team Japan there's so much turbulence between who's

00:44:03,840 --> 00:44:09,920
rising and who just kind of falls out and we don't ever hear from them again?

00:44:09,920 --> 00:44:14,640
I think it's part of the reason why probably.

00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:22,280
I think there's a lot of, the level of professionalization in this country is quite high compared to

00:44:22,280 --> 00:44:26,320
most countries or especially compared, you know, the only other one that I have experience

00:44:26,320 --> 00:44:32,960
with is UK and Japan is much more professional in the way, you know, the comp system here

00:44:32,960 --> 00:44:33,960
is set up.

00:44:33,960 --> 00:44:40,200
There's way more regional competitions and local competitions that get official judges

00:44:40,200 --> 00:44:41,200
in.

00:44:41,200 --> 00:44:45,880
So actually people here who do the judging qualification, they often have judging duties

00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:51,160
every other weekend, basically going around to, you know, prefectural competitions, youth

00:44:51,160 --> 00:44:52,160
competitions.

00:44:52,160 --> 00:44:58,840
So there's a volume of comp climbing here that allows for that professionalization, but

00:44:58,840 --> 00:45:04,960
also that volume of comp climbing means you have a vast field of really strong climbers.

00:45:04,960 --> 00:45:12,920
And you know, the best way that Team Japan is found to select their international representatives

00:45:12,920 --> 00:45:16,880
every year is by a comp at the start of the season.

00:45:16,880 --> 00:45:22,120
That's the Boulder Japan Cup, the League Japan Cup, the combined cup, the speed cup.

00:45:22,120 --> 00:45:26,960
Normally their team for the year is selected at that competition, which means you have

00:45:26,960 --> 00:45:28,280
one shot.

00:45:28,280 --> 00:45:34,040
So unless you already have guaranteed representation because the top 10, world top 10 every year,

00:45:34,040 --> 00:45:37,720
they automatically get to go to all the world cups.

00:45:37,720 --> 00:45:43,440
So unless you're in the top 10 for this year with Team Japan, you have to basically, you

00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:48,040
know, do your best and try and get into finals for those competitions at the start of the

00:45:48,040 --> 00:45:49,480
season every year.

00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:53,220
And if you don't make it, then you're not in the selection for the year.

00:45:53,220 --> 00:45:57,200
And you have to, you know, just stick with national competitions.

00:45:57,200 --> 00:46:02,920
And so everything hinges on one competition, which is a tricky thing.

00:46:02,920 --> 00:46:09,400
For example, last year we saw that Tomoa had a bit of a disaster in his semi-finals for

00:46:09,400 --> 00:46:10,400
the League Cup.

00:46:10,400 --> 00:46:16,320
I think he slipped really no on one route and then on the other route he had a clipping

00:46:16,320 --> 00:46:17,320
problem.

00:46:17,320 --> 00:46:20,640
And this was in qualification because it was two routes.

00:46:20,640 --> 00:46:23,820
He skipped the first clip accidentally.

00:46:23,820 --> 00:46:26,440
And so he didn't even make it to semis.

00:46:26,440 --> 00:46:31,560
And so he wasn't in the lead team last year, which obviously, you know, for him was a big

00:46:31,560 --> 00:46:35,880
problem looking at, you know, combined training and stuff.

00:46:35,880 --> 00:46:41,560
And so he worked really hard to improve that this year.

00:46:41,560 --> 00:46:51,440
But yeah, it's obviously somewhat down to luck as well when it's all down to one competition

00:46:51,440 --> 00:46:53,080
for the team selection.

00:46:53,080 --> 00:46:57,160
And I think Japan is the only country that has this problem really at the moment.

00:46:57,160 --> 00:47:04,280
Maybe USA and France have big enough teams that they have to do some selecting as well.

00:47:04,280 --> 00:47:09,800
But Japan is the biggest one where, you know, you see people in one year and then out the

00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:12,560
next year.

00:47:12,560 --> 00:47:17,880
But there is obviously also, you know, a problem there of the people who are already at the

00:47:17,880 --> 00:47:23,920
top and who are self-sufficient, who can, you know, rely on sponsors and don't need

00:47:23,920 --> 00:47:25,200
to have day jobs.

00:47:25,200 --> 00:47:26,960
They have way more time to train.

00:47:26,960 --> 00:47:30,480
They probably have money for a coach.

00:47:30,480 --> 00:47:33,240
They have access to better training facilities.

00:47:33,240 --> 00:47:39,120
You know, I mean, Tomoa, Tomoa Narasaki and Akiyō Noguchi have their own gym that was

00:47:39,120 --> 00:47:42,080
funded by private money.

00:47:42,080 --> 00:47:46,660
That's like one of the best training facilities in the country, but, you know, it's private.

00:47:46,660 --> 00:47:49,440
So it's just down to who they invite.

00:47:49,440 --> 00:47:56,960
So access is a big problem and consistency is a big problem because if you need to constantly,

00:47:56,960 --> 00:48:01,520
you know, scramble to have enough money or to also focus on your studies or whatever,

00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:05,760
then I think it's much more difficult to put in a consistent performance.

00:48:05,760 --> 00:48:06,760
Definitely.

00:48:06,760 --> 00:48:07,760
Yeah.

00:48:07,760 --> 00:48:14,920
And so you've been pretty up close and personal with Team Japan now, even despite like whatever

00:48:14,920 --> 00:48:19,160
money issues there are.

00:48:19,160 --> 00:48:24,960
How do you think from their training regimen, what makes them so dominant in the sport compared

00:48:24,960 --> 00:48:26,840
to other countries?

00:48:26,840 --> 00:48:31,960
You know, the level of professionalization that we were talking about is a factor to

00:48:31,960 --> 00:48:34,360
an extent.

00:48:34,360 --> 00:48:38,140
They have a big history.

00:48:38,140 --> 00:48:45,460
They have a lot of depth of field, which means, you know, there's a lot of examples that young

00:48:45,460 --> 00:48:47,920
climbers could look up to.

00:48:47,920 --> 00:48:53,240
They have a history in the sport, which always helps.

00:48:53,240 --> 00:48:57,200
It's interesting sometimes because they don't necessarily have the best training facilities.

00:48:57,200 --> 00:48:59,760
Obviously, you know, I'm near B-Pump here.

00:48:59,760 --> 00:49:06,160
B-Pump is one of the, meant to be one of the world's best training gyms where also, you

00:49:06,160 --> 00:49:09,280
know, the grading has nothing to do with real life grading.

00:49:09,280 --> 00:49:14,720
And I don't know if that's just some sort of idea of, oh, if we make the grades insanely

00:49:14,720 --> 00:49:17,200
hard then people will want to chase them.

00:49:17,200 --> 00:49:20,040
I don't know if that's, you know, part of the reasoning.

00:49:20,040 --> 00:49:24,920
But for example, lead walls, there really aren't that many in the country.

00:49:24,920 --> 00:49:30,080
And there's a big access problem when it comes to training for lead climbing.

00:49:30,080 --> 00:49:33,360
Just because there is a lack of space, it's difficult to find buildings that are high

00:49:33,360 --> 00:49:35,800
enough.

00:49:35,800 --> 00:49:40,480
So there's a lot of bouldering gyms, but not that much lead climbing.

00:49:40,480 --> 00:49:44,600
So to an extent, it's surprising that, you know, Team Japan are that strong in lead as

00:49:44,600 --> 00:49:48,000
well even though there is that access problem.

00:49:48,000 --> 00:49:53,240
So sometimes it's really difficult to tell why they are so strong.

00:49:53,240 --> 00:49:56,920
They also tend to not train as a team because they have such a big team.

00:49:56,920 --> 00:49:58,240
Everyone lives different parts of the country.

00:49:58,240 --> 00:50:05,120
So unless there's a training camp organized somewhere, I think, you know, they'll do training

00:50:05,120 --> 00:50:10,880
camps maybe a few times a year, often abroad as well, for the representative team of that

00:50:10,880 --> 00:50:12,000
year.

00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:18,040
So I think they had a training camp a few weeks ago in Innsbruck, for example.

00:50:18,040 --> 00:50:21,720
So unless it's that kind of an event, they don't tend to train as a team.

00:50:21,720 --> 00:50:24,400
They all have their own local gyms.

00:50:24,400 --> 00:50:25,720
Some of them have their own coaches.

00:50:25,720 --> 00:50:32,600
So there are obviously team coaches for Team Japan, but they're mostly coaches, you know,

00:50:32,600 --> 00:50:39,240
during the competition and people will have their own, you know, private coaching separately

00:50:39,240 --> 00:50:40,240
from that.

00:50:40,240 --> 00:50:42,400
That's probably self-funded as well.

00:50:42,400 --> 00:50:47,040
So I can't tell you what the secret is really.

00:50:47,040 --> 00:50:54,400
They're just, you know, they're very motivated to train and they work really hard and they

00:50:54,400 --> 00:50:55,800
have a good history.

00:50:55,800 --> 00:51:03,400
They have a pretty professional, you know, organization.

00:51:03,400 --> 00:51:06,520
But other than that, I don't know where the magic is.

00:51:06,520 --> 00:51:13,400
Yeah, I mean, I would think even if you don't have a big, nice lead training facility, I

00:51:13,400 --> 00:51:18,440
hear a lot of athletes just kind of use the spray wall and do endurance training on that.

00:51:18,440 --> 00:51:20,700
But I'm sure it is a bit different.

00:51:20,700 --> 00:51:22,200
So not sure.

00:51:22,200 --> 00:51:26,600
Yeah, I'm sure there's plenty of ways to do endurance training, but I think one of the

00:51:26,600 --> 00:51:29,720
things that you see, for example, we saw it in Morioka.

00:51:29,720 --> 00:51:37,000
We had some athletes who it was their first time ever at a World Cup, but it was also

00:51:37,000 --> 00:51:41,320
the first time anyone from their country was at a World Cup.

00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:46,440
And even if, you know, you've been watching the sport and you might be the top in your

00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:53,560
country, if you've never been able to actually try out at that level, then it can be really,

00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:56,960
really difficult to actually judge it accurately.

00:51:56,960 --> 00:52:03,220
And we had a girl from Mongolia, Morioka, and I just felt really bad for her because

00:52:03,220 --> 00:52:08,200
she got zero on all of the boulders and then she fell off hold four on the lead wall or

00:52:08,200 --> 00:52:10,080
something.

00:52:10,080 --> 00:52:13,360
And that doesn't mean she's, you know, not a good climber.

00:52:13,360 --> 00:52:14,840
She's probably very strong in her country.

00:52:14,840 --> 00:52:18,680
And you know that these routes tend to be around what, 8b plus or something.

00:52:18,680 --> 00:52:20,000
So maybe she climbs 8b plus.

00:52:20,000 --> 00:52:25,080
It's well possible, but it's such a different style as well, right?

00:52:25,080 --> 00:52:28,740
Comp climbing, if there isn't really comp climbing in your country and there's no setting

00:52:28,740 --> 00:52:32,600
for comp climbing, then how are you going to practice your dynamic moves?

00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:36,320
And you might not be at all familiar with the hold sets.

00:52:36,320 --> 00:52:42,640
You know, the holds are so different, modern comp climbing holds, big macros, big volumes.

00:52:42,640 --> 00:52:49,880
It's hugely different from climbing on just, you know, little old fashioned crimps or whatever.

00:52:49,880 --> 00:52:54,440
So yeah, there's a big difference there.

00:52:54,440 --> 00:53:01,520
There's a big gap that I think unless you've experienced that level and you have some of

00:53:01,520 --> 00:53:06,120
that infrastructure in your country and you have it available, it's going to be very,

00:53:06,120 --> 00:53:09,320
very difficult to actually compete at that level.

00:53:09,320 --> 00:53:13,760
Maybe that's part of why Team Japan is so strong, at least in bouldering, because they

00:53:13,760 --> 00:53:14,760
have B-Pump.

00:53:14,760 --> 00:53:17,880
That's always challenging even their top athletes.

00:53:17,880 --> 00:53:19,480
I think that's part of it.

00:53:19,480 --> 00:53:25,840
Obviously B-Pump also isn't the only gym in the country that has that high level of

00:53:25,840 --> 00:53:26,840
setting.

00:53:26,840 --> 00:53:27,840
There's lots of gyms.

00:53:27,840 --> 00:53:37,680
Also, I think Japan has a fairly high number of IFSC qualified route setters, or at least

00:53:37,680 --> 00:53:47,180
a few that you see at a lot of the World Cups or other big international competitions.

00:53:47,180 --> 00:53:51,280
They have quite a lot of really, really good route setters who go and set internationally

00:53:51,280 --> 00:53:59,080
and then also set at local gyms and who will set specific events or training moves at B-Pump

00:53:59,080 --> 00:54:00,600
or even privately.

00:54:00,600 --> 00:54:06,680
I think, you know, Tomoa Narasaki often just invites good route setters to his gym to set

00:54:06,680 --> 00:54:07,680
for him.

00:54:07,680 --> 00:54:12,680
So if you have that access to a really high level of setting, as an athlete I think that

00:54:12,680 --> 00:54:19,240
is a huge boost for your training potential because then you know you can actually measure

00:54:19,240 --> 00:54:23,960
your strength on the sort of stuff that you're going to encounter at World Cups, at the world

00:54:23,960 --> 00:54:24,960
level.

00:54:24,960 --> 00:54:35,340
Whereas, you know, if you're just training in some old basement gym somewhere in a far

00:54:35,340 --> 00:54:39,120
away quarter of the country, it's just a little harder.

00:54:39,120 --> 00:54:40,520
You can get as strong as you like.

00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:46,320
But as we've seen, as Nikki also discussed, you know, climbing isn't just about being

00:54:46,320 --> 00:54:51,280
very strong because if it would be, it'd be impossible to distinguish levels, the level

00:54:51,280 --> 00:54:52,280
between people.

00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:58,480
And, you know, people in, again, in the comment sections always love to go, oh, this is not

00:54:58,480 --> 00:54:59,480
real climbing.

00:54:59,480 --> 00:55:00,480
It's parkour.

00:55:00,480 --> 00:55:01,480
People are jumping around.

00:55:01,480 --> 00:55:08,520
And it's just, you know, you try setting a boulder that doesn't have any of those elements,

00:55:08,520 --> 00:55:14,000
but that still lets you distinguish the level between the world's strongest climbers.

00:55:14,000 --> 00:55:19,560
Because I can tell you, on a strength level, they're all very close together.

00:55:19,560 --> 00:55:25,680
So if you don't have any learned, like, roofs that require learning on the spot, then you're

00:55:25,680 --> 00:55:30,880
just going to either get all flashes or all, you know, zeros across the board.

00:55:30,880 --> 00:55:35,720
And then everyone will just complain about the separation in the scores instead.

00:55:35,720 --> 00:55:36,720
Exactly.

00:55:36,720 --> 00:55:40,760
So you can't really win if you complain about one and the other.

00:55:40,760 --> 00:55:44,720
So I think, you know, it must be so hard for route setters.

00:55:44,720 --> 00:55:47,760
They get so much hate.

00:55:47,760 --> 00:55:50,720
Anytime they try anything new, they get hate.

00:55:50,720 --> 00:55:56,060
You know, in Hachioji, we had that really cool jump into a palm press that no one got

00:55:56,060 --> 00:56:03,440
in the finals, and then everyone was like, oh, bad setting in finals, like, no one got

00:56:03,440 --> 00:56:04,480
the boulder.

00:56:04,480 --> 00:56:07,880
And then, you know, it just turns out this is a move nobody had seen.

00:56:07,880 --> 00:56:13,920
And once Meiji was told the beta, he just got on it and did it in trainers.

00:56:13,920 --> 00:56:16,040
And so is that bad route setting?

00:56:16,040 --> 00:56:21,680
No, I don't think it is because you're setting a season opener, so you're trying to set stuff

00:56:21,680 --> 00:56:27,480
that's interesting, stuff that maybe they haven't seen before, stuff that's tricky.

00:56:27,480 --> 00:56:35,080
And you know, the margins between no one getting it and just one person getting it are really,

00:56:35,080 --> 00:56:36,520
really thin.

00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:42,120
And whether that's a route reading thing or just, you know, conditions play a big role,

00:56:42,120 --> 00:56:45,280
whether it's hot or cold.

00:56:45,280 --> 00:56:51,200
Sometimes, especially when you're setting outside, you know, a lot of the competitions

00:56:51,200 --> 00:56:54,240
happen outdoors.

00:56:54,240 --> 00:56:59,280
It's really difficult because temperatures can swing by like 20 degrees Celsius from

00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:02,240
one day to the next.

00:57:02,240 --> 00:57:09,640
And it does, it really does affect how easy or hard it is to climb something at that level.

00:57:09,640 --> 00:57:10,640
Yeah.

00:57:10,640 --> 00:57:19,280
So it's such a hard job, and they get so much hate and also very little sort of respect

00:57:19,280 --> 00:57:24,320
from people when they do it right or when things go their way.

00:57:24,320 --> 00:57:30,240
So you know, I'm honestly pretty much impressed that anyone still wants to do the job, given

00:57:30,240 --> 00:57:39,760
how as a community we sort of tend to vilify these people who are really, really essential

00:57:39,760 --> 00:57:42,840
to comp climbing and to climbing in general.

00:57:42,840 --> 00:57:47,640
Like, okay, unless you only climb outdoors, if you didn't have route setters, then you

00:57:47,640 --> 00:57:51,120
can't train, you know, you can't go to a gym, you can't.

00:57:51,120 --> 00:57:58,760
So these people are really essential and they deserve a lot more recognition and respect,

00:57:58,760 --> 00:57:59,760
I think.

00:57:59,760 --> 00:58:00,760
For sure.

00:58:00,760 --> 00:58:01,760
Yeah, well put.

00:58:01,760 --> 00:58:10,720
Going back to the Japanese team, someone on the Discord had a question about their experience

00:58:10,720 --> 00:58:12,400
with outdoor climbing.

00:58:12,400 --> 00:58:17,600
They asked, how much experience do the Japanese comp climbers have outdoors?

00:58:17,600 --> 00:58:22,200
From the West, we rarely hear about their outdoor achievements, despite Japan being

00:58:22,200 --> 00:58:24,760
quite famous for its outdoor climbing.

00:58:24,760 --> 00:58:30,880
Yeah, I think there's a lot of individual variety.

00:58:30,880 --> 00:58:36,480
I think there's quite a lot of climbers in Japan who don't maybe climb outdoors that

00:58:36,480 --> 00:58:40,800
much.

00:58:40,800 --> 00:58:49,040
So exclusive gym beasts like you, which might to an extent help with how specialized they

00:58:49,040 --> 00:58:51,220
are and how good they are at comp climbing.

00:58:51,220 --> 00:58:56,760
At the same time, there's people who climb at insane levels outdoors here, but they don't

00:58:56,760 --> 00:59:01,640
tend to be the same people who comp climb.

00:59:01,640 --> 00:59:10,360
So we have Sachi Ama, who is a former competition climber who now exclusively puts up new lines

00:59:10,360 --> 00:59:11,360
outdoors.

00:59:11,360 --> 00:59:12,520
He does a lot of lead and trad.

00:59:12,520 --> 00:59:14,100
He goes to bolt new places.

00:59:14,100 --> 00:59:19,240
So he climbs really hard.

00:59:19,240 --> 00:59:24,280
We have a few people like that who are former World Cup climbers who've now moved to outdoor

00:59:24,280 --> 00:59:26,200
climbing.

00:59:26,200 --> 00:59:34,840
And then of course we have Team Rockdoll, who are a sort of outfit of three or four

00:59:34,840 --> 00:59:38,080
really, really strong climbers who exclusively climb outdoors.

00:59:38,080 --> 00:59:42,520
Although, I mean, not exclusively, their big achievements are outdoors, but they're all

00:59:42,520 --> 00:59:45,080
all they're also all route setters, I think.

00:59:45,080 --> 00:59:47,680
So they do indoor setting as well.

00:59:47,680 --> 00:59:52,840
But they're boulders and they go and just put up insane lines outdoors.

00:59:52,840 --> 00:59:58,880
So we saw Floating last year, V17, is a line that one of them put up.

00:59:58,880 --> 01:00:04,000
And I think they've just got back from Rocklands in South Africa where they've crushed a whole

01:00:04,000 --> 01:00:06,060
bunch of really hard boulders.

01:00:06,060 --> 01:00:11,320
So you do have you have really good outdoor climbing in this country and you have people

01:00:11,320 --> 01:00:13,080
who are extremely strong.

01:00:13,080 --> 01:00:17,960
I think one thing that's tricky about outdoor climbing in this country is the season for

01:00:17,960 --> 01:00:20,000
it is quite short.

01:00:20,000 --> 01:00:22,600
It's completely impossible right now in summer.

01:00:22,600 --> 01:00:24,560
Like it's 35 degrees Celsius outside.

01:00:24,560 --> 01:00:26,760
I don't have any idea what that is in Fahrenheit.

01:00:26,760 --> 01:00:27,760
I'm sorry.

01:00:27,760 --> 01:00:31,740
But it's hot, but it's also extremely humid.

01:00:31,740 --> 01:00:35,720
Like humidity levels tend to go around 70%.

01:00:35,720 --> 01:00:39,160
So you just like slip straight off anything.

01:00:39,160 --> 01:00:42,160
There's no way you can climb outdoors right now.

01:00:42,160 --> 01:00:46,720
And so for high performance climbing, it almost has to be in winter, but then it can't snow

01:00:46,720 --> 01:00:48,440
and it can't rain.

01:00:48,440 --> 01:00:57,400
So it is pretty tricky to find the right conditions to do outdoor climbing in this country because

01:00:57,400 --> 01:01:05,260
spring and autumn are fairly warm and can be wet as well.

01:01:05,260 --> 01:01:08,160
So for high performance outdoor climbing, that also isn't ideal.

01:01:08,160 --> 01:01:10,760
You want it to be colder.

01:01:10,760 --> 01:01:16,480
So I think that's probably one of the reasons that makes it quite challenging in this country.

01:01:16,480 --> 01:01:23,760
It's not like Fontainebleau where you can have decent conditions, probably for three

01:01:23,760 --> 01:01:27,860
out of four seasons of the year.

01:01:27,860 --> 01:01:30,880
And also access, I guess, a lot of these areas.

01:01:30,880 --> 01:01:35,360
There's a fair few like reasonably developed areas, but I think a lot of them are inaccessible

01:01:35,360 --> 01:01:37,260
if you don't have a car.

01:01:37,260 --> 01:01:38,640
So that makes it tricky as well.

01:01:38,640 --> 01:01:45,960
Other than that, I had a few IFSC controversies that I wanted to touch on.

01:01:45,960 --> 01:01:48,200
I feel like I've already criticized them so much.

01:01:48,200 --> 01:01:49,200
A bit.

01:01:49,200 --> 01:01:55,720
But these aren't so much about the IFSC, just rather things that have happened and things

01:01:55,720 --> 01:01:58,400
that you might have mentioned earlier.

01:01:58,400 --> 01:02:03,120
So the first one was also a Discord question.

01:02:03,120 --> 01:02:04,120
Which one was this?

01:02:04,120 --> 01:02:12,240
So at the Chamonix comp, thoughts on Chaeyoung being DQ'd for miss clipping or skipping the

01:02:12,240 --> 01:02:13,240
clip.

01:02:13,240 --> 01:02:16,600
I think, yeah, you also mentioned Tomoa had done that.

01:02:16,600 --> 01:02:22,440
This person said, I might be misremembering, but I thought Sean McCall Z clipped in 2019

01:02:22,440 --> 01:02:25,440
but was able to keep climbing.

01:02:25,440 --> 01:02:29,320
I know it's not quite the same, but it feels weird if you can get disqualified for one

01:02:29,320 --> 01:02:31,880
clipping error, but not another.

01:02:31,880 --> 01:02:33,280
Do you know the rules on this?

01:02:33,280 --> 01:02:34,280
Yeah.

01:02:34,280 --> 01:02:43,920
So I was really taken aback by how militantly people were wrong in the governance.

01:02:43,920 --> 01:02:48,920
How militantly people were arguing for this really stupid, it needs to be changed, blah,

01:02:48,920 --> 01:02:49,920
blah, blah.

01:02:49,920 --> 01:02:51,320
The rule is there for safety.

01:02:51,320 --> 01:02:57,200
Because first and foremost safety, but also fairness.

01:02:57,200 --> 01:03:00,900
Fairness because if you skip a clip, clipping takes energy.

01:03:00,900 --> 01:03:06,760
So if you skip a clip and you can keep climbing, then that would incentivize people to skip

01:03:06,760 --> 01:03:09,600
clips which is dangerous.

01:03:09,600 --> 01:03:15,880
Because they're literally there to make sure people don't ground fall while they're putting

01:03:15,880 --> 01:03:18,600
up a real high level climbing performance on the wall.

01:03:18,600 --> 01:03:21,240
You prefer them not to die.

01:03:21,240 --> 01:03:31,000
Now in I would say 99% of cases if someone skipped a clip, going back to fix it would

01:03:31,000 --> 01:03:36,080
be dangerous because going back to fix it, even if you've already clipped a higher point

01:03:36,080 --> 01:03:40,520
so you're not going to ground fall, but it increases your chances of falling on your

01:03:40,520 --> 01:03:42,080
own rope.

01:03:42,080 --> 01:03:45,400
Also down climbing and 8b plus is insanely hard.

01:03:45,400 --> 01:03:49,400
So the chances of it going well are low anyway.

01:03:49,400 --> 01:03:54,280
But again it increases your chances of getting tangled in your own rope, of taking a difficult

01:03:54,280 --> 01:03:55,800
fall.

01:03:55,800 --> 01:03:58,760
It's hard for the b-layer to know what to do with the slack.

01:03:58,760 --> 01:04:04,280
And also if as a judge you would have to decide in the moment whether it's safe or not for

01:04:04,280 --> 01:04:12,440
the climber to down climb and go and re-clip, that puts a lot of strain on a judge because

01:04:12,440 --> 01:04:16,220
in this split second, you know, you can't make the climber weight all the wall.

01:04:16,220 --> 01:04:21,960
So it would be down to a judge's decision to decide whether or not it was safe to go

01:04:21,960 --> 01:04:25,160
and re-clip.

01:04:25,160 --> 01:04:28,920
So instead of that we have a very clear and simple rule which is clip all the clips in

01:04:28,920 --> 01:04:35,280
order and it means that you take away any confusion, you take away any personal opinion

01:04:35,280 --> 01:04:40,120
and you have a really clear and simple rule that tells climbers what to do and they're

01:04:40,120 --> 01:04:41,880
aware of this.

01:04:41,880 --> 01:04:49,320
Now in the specific case of Jaehyun Seo, you know, skipping that clip and immediately fixing

01:04:49,320 --> 01:04:53,920
it from the same position, there's no danger.

01:04:53,920 --> 01:04:59,820
But again, if you're gonna change the rule to make it more arbitrary, you're just opening

01:04:59,820 --> 01:05:04,800
the door to more discussion and to more fuzziness and more difficulty I think.

01:05:04,800 --> 01:05:07,920
So that rule is there for safety and for fairness.

01:05:07,920 --> 01:05:08,920
It's very clear.

01:05:08,920 --> 01:05:11,960
There are the clearest rules in climbing because we already have quite a lot of things that

01:05:11,960 --> 01:05:16,440
are down to the judge's opinion like did they get the plus or not, like did they control

01:05:16,440 --> 01:05:19,040
the zone or not, like legit starting positions.

01:05:19,040 --> 01:05:22,640
All of those things are already down to discussion.

01:05:22,640 --> 01:05:28,980
So why on earth would you want to make more rules down to people's personal judgment?

01:05:28,980 --> 01:05:35,920
I think it makes no sense at all and of course if your favorite, you know, in a moment of

01:05:35,920 --> 01:05:39,640
lack of focus or whatever or just bad luck skips a clip.

01:05:39,640 --> 01:05:41,040
I know it's heartbreaking.

01:05:41,040 --> 01:05:42,800
Like nobody wants to see it.

01:05:42,800 --> 01:05:45,080
That's why everyone got so angry.

01:05:45,080 --> 01:05:50,960
The incident that Nikki mentioned when, you know, Ondra stepped on the bolt and, you know,

01:05:50,960 --> 01:05:54,240
missed his Olympic ticket at that point.

01:05:54,240 --> 01:06:00,280
You know, that's exactly why we need bolt covers because that makes the rule much clearer.

01:06:00,280 --> 01:06:05,340
It doesn't make it down to the judge's decision of did they use it or not because if you just

01:06:05,340 --> 01:06:10,200
brush a bolt it's fine but the judge has to decide whether you use the bolt or not and

01:06:10,200 --> 01:06:12,440
whether you got any aid from it.

01:06:12,440 --> 01:06:17,400
And then, you know, so that again, it makes it down to people's decision.

01:06:17,400 --> 01:06:20,960
If we just have bolt covers then it's easy because anyone can step on the bolt cover

01:06:20,960 --> 01:06:24,680
and we've decided that that doesn't help them so they can step on it.

01:06:24,680 --> 01:06:29,800
So we need rules like that in climbing where it clarifies things rather than making it

01:06:29,800 --> 01:06:30,920
more difficult.

01:06:30,920 --> 01:06:35,500
So arguing that the rules are stupid and need to be changed just because your favorite,

01:06:35,500 --> 01:06:40,920
you know, lost out on maybe a chance of a gold medal in that competition.

01:06:40,920 --> 01:06:44,640
I just think people need to be a little bit more reasonable than that and kind of think

01:06:44,640 --> 01:06:48,040
about the actual consequences of what they're proposing.

01:06:48,040 --> 01:06:50,640
And so Z clipping is okay then?

01:06:50,640 --> 01:06:59,640
Z clipping is okay because it's not dangerous to fix essentially because you just need to

01:06:59,640 --> 01:07:05,520
clip the order of things that you did.

01:07:05,520 --> 01:07:08,840
And it was at this point that she realized she messed up.

01:07:08,840 --> 01:07:13,800
Right, dear viewers, I am just cutting in for myself because I realized I did a bad

01:07:13,800 --> 01:07:19,040
job explaining the difference between Z clipping and clipping out of sequence.

01:07:19,040 --> 01:07:23,000
So the big difference is when you're clipping out of sequence you need to down climb in

01:07:23,000 --> 01:07:26,120
order to fix the clip.

01:07:26,120 --> 01:07:31,880
As I said in 99% of cases, if you're Z clipping you don't need to down climb because all you

01:07:31,880 --> 01:07:36,280
need to do is unclip the top clip and reclip it with the correct end of the rope.

01:07:36,280 --> 01:07:41,160
So it's not the same situation and that's why one is deemed safe by the rules and the

01:07:41,160 --> 01:07:42,760
other isn't deemed safe.

01:07:42,760 --> 01:07:48,280
One involves down climbing which might involve falling on your own rope which is just really

01:07:48,280 --> 01:07:51,040
difficult to do on an 8b plus anyway.

01:07:51,040 --> 01:07:55,360
The other one doesn't involve any down climbing at all and can be fixed on the spot.

01:07:55,360 --> 01:07:58,280
So that's why you have that difference.

01:07:58,280 --> 01:08:02,000
And also it's not as much down to judgement then.

01:08:02,000 --> 01:08:04,360
It's immediately clear that you Z clipped in.

01:08:04,360 --> 01:08:06,680
So I think the rule makes sense.

01:08:06,680 --> 01:08:13,200
I think if you think oh Z clipping versus clipping in order, that's a weird rule, then

01:08:13,200 --> 01:08:18,440
I think the rule that needs to change is that Z clipping is allowed, not the other way around.

01:08:18,440 --> 01:08:23,840
I kind of think the weird rule in this case is the fact that you're allowed to go and

01:08:23,840 --> 01:08:26,440
correct Z clipping.

01:08:26,440 --> 01:08:35,600
So I just think if the rules are clear and easy to follow, keep them that way please.

01:08:35,600 --> 01:08:38,720
More confusing rules is the last thing we need in climbing.

01:08:38,720 --> 01:08:39,720
Yeah, okay.

01:08:39,720 --> 01:08:40,720
Totally fair.

01:08:40,720 --> 01:08:41,720
That makes sense.

01:08:41,720 --> 01:08:47,280
Okay, well let's try to end on a lighter note I guess.

01:08:47,280 --> 01:08:55,720
A few questions from the Discord and well first I was wondering if you have any like

01:08:55,720 --> 01:08:59,400
insights or anecdotes from Team Japan?

01:08:59,400 --> 01:09:04,080
Any like athlete quirks that you can think of?

01:09:04,080 --> 01:09:09,080
Or one time I think you had mentioned that there's this like pull up guy in Team Japan?

01:09:09,080 --> 01:09:14,360
I don't really know what that means but if you know what that means.

01:09:14,360 --> 01:09:15,920
No.

01:09:15,920 --> 01:09:23,760
I don't know, again everyone is different, everyone has different ways that they approach

01:09:23,760 --> 01:09:28,920
warming up and I think this is one for me is one of the interesting things of being

01:09:28,920 --> 01:09:34,720
in athlete management at these World Cups is you get to see what goes on behind the

01:09:34,720 --> 01:09:41,760
scenes, you get to see how an isolation zone works, you get to see how athletes warm up,

01:09:41,760 --> 01:09:46,600
how they mentally approach a competition, you know some of them are very boisterous

01:09:46,600 --> 01:09:51,000
and outgoing, some of them really sort of just sit in a corner.

01:09:51,000 --> 01:09:56,720
Aymori for example tends to read manga when, because usually she climbs last because she's

01:09:56,720 --> 01:10:00,800
you know the strongest so she has to wait in isolation for a very long time and very

01:10:00,800 --> 01:10:05,600
often she's in the corner reading manga because obviously in isolation you know athletes don't

01:10:05,600 --> 01:10:07,760
have access to the internet.

01:10:07,760 --> 01:10:13,880
So yeah, how do people keep themselves busy, stuff like that, that's quite interesting

01:10:13,880 --> 01:10:18,240
to see and you know some of them are surprisingly nervous.

01:10:18,240 --> 01:10:23,800
Tomo Narasaki is always surprisingly nervous even though he's so experienced and you know

01:10:23,800 --> 01:10:30,040
he sort of has this image of being you know tough guy maybe but he's always like pacing

01:10:30,040 --> 01:10:35,280
about in isolation zone and like if there's other Japanese athletes there sort of trying

01:10:35,280 --> 01:10:40,440
to make conversation and so those kinds of things are really interesting to watch.

01:10:40,440 --> 01:10:43,240
Obviously the downside of being in athlete management is you don't actually get to see

01:10:43,240 --> 01:10:51,720
the climbing because you're behind the stage but yeah it's fun to see people sort of and

01:10:51,720 --> 01:10:54,000
see how their personalities come out.

01:10:54,000 --> 01:11:01,840
For example as well Ayala Kurem from Team Israel, she's really really funny when she's

01:11:01,840 --> 01:11:09,360
in ISO so at the Hachioji finals she was constantly listening to music and she was like air drumming

01:11:09,360 --> 01:11:15,640
and dancing and just like rocking out which I guess is her way of channeling her nerves

01:11:15,640 --> 01:11:21,000
and you know right up until she would have to go out on stage she'd be like just vibing

01:11:21,000 --> 01:11:24,400
and then you know go on and come back and just start.

01:11:24,400 --> 01:11:31,560
So because with these things because especially in finals as athlete management you're guided

01:11:31,560 --> 01:11:37,000
by the broadcasting schedule so there'll be one person there with a radio who gets told

01:11:37,000 --> 01:11:41,640
the timing of when athletes have to go out they'll get like a 10 second warning and a

01:11:41,640 --> 01:11:46,680
five second warning things like that and so our job is to make sure athletes are ready

01:11:46,680 --> 01:11:54,080
at the right time and of course you don't want to be late you don't want to you know

01:11:54,080 --> 01:11:59,640
run the risk of getting behind schedule so you try to ask athletes to you know when the

01:11:59,640 --> 01:12:04,200
previous person goes out on stage please already put your shoes on and get yourself ready but

01:12:04,200 --> 01:12:08,720
there's like a balance and you know everyone has their own style and some people really

01:12:08,720 --> 01:12:11,960
want to stay in their own world.

01:12:11,960 --> 01:12:16,040
Natalia Grossman for example does the same she's just she has music on and she doesn't

01:12:16,040 --> 01:12:19,600
like she usually has her eyes closed so sometimes you have to go and tap her and be like sorry

01:12:19,600 --> 01:12:25,000
you need to come up and stand by the door for me but yeah with Ayala after a while I

01:12:25,000 --> 01:12:29,440
was like you know just keep your headphones on and right before you go on stage give them

01:12:29,440 --> 01:12:33,880
to me I'll make sure to put them with your luggage so you can keep vibing and so you

01:12:33,880 --> 01:12:39,280
do stuff like that and that's quite fun and then at the Hachioji sort of after party reception

01:12:39,280 --> 01:12:45,960
thing she came up to me and she was like did you like my airdropping so here is yeah it's

01:12:45,960 --> 01:12:46,960
just really funny.

01:12:46,960 --> 01:12:53,680
Oh that's cute yeah it's interesting to hear about how different athletes manage their

01:12:53,680 --> 01:13:01,280
nerves especially I mean I think for Tomoa like he has a lot riding on his performance

01:13:01,280 --> 01:13:04,000
people are always watching him no matter what.

01:13:04,000 --> 01:13:07,960
I think I also heard that Yoshiuki is also very nervous.

01:13:07,960 --> 01:13:16,280
Yeah I think I don't think I've experienced him in a in a World Cup final recently but

01:13:16,280 --> 01:13:26,200
yeah I think he's a bit nervous but not quite as sort of excited nervous as Tomoa.

01:13:26,200 --> 01:13:30,640
Tomoa really he like walks around like this with his arms folded across his chest and

01:13:30,640 --> 01:13:33,160
like I could see that yeah yeah yeah.

01:13:33,160 --> 01:13:39,840
Awesome and so a couple discord questions just quick ones who's your favorite climber?

01:13:39,840 --> 01:13:48,840
Boom I'm Maurice definitely up there I've really enjoyed watching Toby Roberts this

01:13:48,840 --> 01:13:55,760
season for sure just absolutely crush it and I think you know part of what helps with Toby

01:13:55,760 --> 01:14:01,160
is you can see his personality come out and he has his YouTube channel which you know

01:14:01,160 --> 01:14:08,480
helps people have some insight into how he trains and how he thinks so I think things

01:14:08,480 --> 01:14:16,480
like that are really helpful as a viewer to have more of a relationship with the climbers

01:14:16,480 --> 01:14:22,680
as well so again that's where there's work to be done by the IFSC also I think by national

01:14:22,680 --> 01:14:28,400
federations I feel like this season we've seen a lot more national federations get on

01:14:28,400 --> 01:14:34,800
Instagram for example there's a fair few more national federations now that have Instagram

01:14:34,800 --> 01:14:40,480
accounts that post about their climbers I think that also helps with this sort of creating

01:14:40,480 --> 01:14:45,040
a story I think with Aymori she doesn't have to create a story for herself she's so strong

01:14:45,040 --> 01:14:51,360
that and and she always seems slightly like the underdog you know people like supporting

01:14:51,360 --> 01:15:00,280
the underdog because she's so small and and you know I think that just inspires people

01:15:00,280 --> 01:15:07,720
to want to root for her so that's always helpful as well but yeah again I think I think it's

01:15:07,720 --> 01:15:14,400
just easier to get inspired by climbers where there's a bit of a story to be had and I think

01:15:14,400 --> 01:15:21,280
this season you know one of the things that could have been played out a lot more is like

01:15:21,280 --> 01:15:30,440
Toby Roberts and Sorato and Raku both young guns both super strong like it could have

01:15:30,440 --> 01:15:36,560
you know played around a lot more with you know not necessarily rivalry but sort of comparing

01:15:36,560 --> 01:15:42,360
them and seeing how how you know they view each other whether they view each other as

01:15:42,360 --> 01:15:49,440
you know direct competition or so that kind of stuff I think would be good and interesting

01:15:49,440 --> 01:15:53,400
to from a communication standpoint.

01:15:53,400 --> 01:15:58,960
Yeah I wish we could hear more from them I've I've just heard that they talked to each other

01:15:58,960 --> 01:16:04,520
a bit they competed together in the youth cups as well but would love to learn more

01:16:04,520 --> 01:16:06,160
about that.

01:16:06,160 --> 01:16:13,440
Yeah that's always also with you know non-english speaking climbers there's always that point

01:16:13,440 --> 01:16:20,160
of how do we communicate and I've actually just been doing some English interview training

01:16:20,160 --> 01:16:27,440
with the Japanese youth team so they're they're on a training camp at the moment and I've

01:16:27,440 --> 01:16:35,640
been kind of testing how well they do in an English interview after their simulation competition

01:16:35,640 --> 01:16:40,240
so that you know the coaches know who they need to interpret for and who they can even

01:16:40,240 --> 01:16:46,040
know when they go to the youth world championships next month basically so I think you know there's

01:16:46,040 --> 01:16:52,280
there's a lot of room for stuff like that as well I think team Japan can do with some

01:16:52,280 --> 01:16:57,480
English communication training also the adult team to be honest but it's always a question

01:16:57,480 --> 01:17:02,840
of you know is there a budget like within the federation almost everything is volunteer

01:17:02,840 --> 01:17:08,880
run so you have the coaches obviously are paid the physios for the team are paid but

01:17:08,880 --> 01:17:13,640
other than that there seems to be very very little budget even in a highly professionalized

01:17:13,640 --> 01:17:21,160
federation like the Japanese one to pay anyone so the judges as well they don't get paid

01:17:21,160 --> 01:17:25,800
for what they do but at least they get like transport and hotel costs when they go to

01:17:25,800 --> 01:17:32,600
competitions everyone else it's just you know pay out of your own pocket except for obviously

01:17:32,600 --> 01:17:36,800
like you know the competition manager you know the local technical delegate they they

01:17:36,800 --> 01:17:42,520
all have their costs paid but almost everything is just volunteer run there is just isn't

01:17:42,520 --> 01:17:52,000
money within federations for stuff like this so that's another thing you know with professionalization

01:17:52,000 --> 01:17:56,280
you have to at some point also be able to make more money so there's a question of how

01:17:56,280 --> 01:18:01,980
do we do that how do we attract bigger sponsorship to climbing how do we you know manage those

01:18:01,980 --> 01:18:13,000
budgets where does the money need to go

01:18:13,000 --> 01:18:18,320
it's impossible to organize events like this you know without a substantial amount of money

01:18:18,320 --> 01:18:25,640
and you know if you want sport to be professional then people need to be able to sustain themselves

01:18:25,640 --> 01:18:34,120
from it so if it runs entirely on volunteers that doesn't necessarily need to mean the

01:18:34,120 --> 01:18:39,840
quality is not good because again we've seen that Japan is very good at organizing these

01:18:39,840 --> 01:18:49,200
things and they do it all volunteer run but you know you need some level of investment

01:18:49,200 --> 01:18:54,820
in order to grow yeah all right okay one more light question

01:18:54,820 --> 01:19:02,240
um I actually I don't know if you'll know this one because I'm not super familiar but

01:19:02,240 --> 01:19:08,120
one person asked where's Kai Harada he was my favorite I miss seeing him compete with

01:19:08,120 --> 01:19:16,600
his flowy effortless climbing style yeah he I think maybe already before the Olympics

01:19:16,600 --> 01:19:24,160
or right after the Olympics he got sick and I have no details on the nature of this but

01:19:24,160 --> 01:19:29,800
it seems to be some sort of chronic thing that he's been really struggling with and

01:19:29,800 --> 01:19:36,520
he's from the communication I've heard which is basically only his own social media you

01:19:36,520 --> 01:19:41,260
know he had a he tried to come back this year at the Boulder Japan Cup and he had a an awful

01:19:41,260 --> 01:19:47,160
performance unfortunately so I don't think that inspired confidence but yeah lately what

01:19:47,160 --> 01:19:52,480
I've heard is that he's training hard and and like working hard to you know get on top

01:19:52,480 --> 01:19:57,480
of whatever the medical issue is and you know hoping to make that come back in the next

01:19:57,480 --> 01:20:02,240
season okay damn it well that was not a light question

01:20:02,240 --> 01:20:09,440
um I hope I hope he can get better I hope that um he can overcome whatever illness he's

01:20:09,440 --> 01:20:15,680
going through um you know I don't I don't want this to feel like it's all been you know

01:20:15,680 --> 01:20:21,120
disaster talk and and and just criticism as I've said I do think the IFC has been improving

01:20:21,120 --> 01:20:27,400
on on certain points um including some of their you know social media communication

01:20:27,400 --> 01:20:34,360
in this past season um and you know we we are a sport that's growing and with that is

01:20:34,360 --> 01:20:41,760
gonna come you know friction and and issues and I just hope that you know through initiatives

01:20:41,760 --> 01:20:47,800
like this podcast and and other things we can open up that discussion and hopefully

01:20:47,800 --> 01:20:53,480
get people to have more insights into how comp climbing works and you know ultimately

01:20:53,480 --> 01:21:00,800
have that sort of permeate through to the top and to the IFC and and you know maybe

01:21:00,800 --> 01:21:06,260
this isn't something that's gonna be anywhere near perfect in the next you know five or

01:21:06,260 --> 01:21:12,600
ten years or whatever but as long as we can keep that development going and hopefully

01:21:12,600 --> 01:21:16,080
you know keep the discussions open rather than just everyone criticizing each other

01:21:16,080 --> 01:21:23,760
and and shutting down discussions then I think you know this sport is going to go to really

01:21:23,760 --> 01:21:28,080
interesting places and and I hope to be part of it and I hope you know everyone who enjoys

01:21:28,080 --> 01:21:34,280
watching it now is going to continue to enjoy that and I would really encourage people if

01:21:34,280 --> 01:21:39,360
you know they like watching comp climbing to see if you can maybe volunteer at a local

01:21:39,360 --> 01:21:44,580
comp um it you know it doesn't have to be a massive national or international thing

01:21:44,580 --> 01:21:49,960
but just start you know with your local climbing gyms competition see if they need any help

01:21:49,960 --> 01:21:55,580
running it if they need any judges and and just you know see how things are organized

01:21:55,580 --> 01:22:00,360
for yourself and I think for me it's been really interesting and eye-opening and I hope

01:22:00,360 --> 01:22:06,380
to be able to continue to also develop in this world and and you know get to go to many

01:22:06,380 --> 01:22:15,440
more comps and you know if if you feel like something is not going well I think or if

01:22:15,440 --> 01:22:19,960
you feel like you know there's problems with sport climbing or whatever the best thing

01:22:19,960 --> 01:22:27,440
you can do is get involved and see what little impact you can have by getting involved and

01:22:27,440 --> 01:22:33,240
by putting in some effort and and you know you'll get to know people you'll get to see

01:22:33,240 --> 01:22:39,520
places you didn't know existed maybe and um I think that's just the best way to go about

01:22:39,520 --> 01:22:40,520
it.

01:22:40,520 --> 01:22:46,560
Well yeah I think that was a perfect amazing point to end on um and I think that was everything

01:22:46,560 --> 01:22:52,640
I wanted to cover so thanks for joining me today um would you like to let everyone know

01:22:52,640 --> 01:22:56,800
yeah um do you want to let everyone know where they can find you if they want to learn more

01:22:56,800 --> 01:23:02,520
about behind the scenes of world cups or if maybe they have complaints yeah unfortunately

01:23:02,520 --> 01:23:07,960
it's things like everything just comes down to the money okay that's what we've kept coming

01:23:07,960 --> 01:23:08,960
back to today.

01:23:08,960 --> 01:23:12,000
If you're watching on YouTube I'm sure I'll be in in the YouTube comments as well I'll

01:23:12,000 --> 01:23:16,480
be happy to answer more questions there so if anyone has any maybe you know head to um

01:23:16,480 --> 01:23:21,440
that's not real climbing YouTube channel and I'll respond to some stuff there and you can

01:23:21,440 --> 01:23:24,520
also find me on Instagram it's at Maya Sounds.

01:23:24,520 --> 01:23:29,000
Awesome well thank you again it was amazing to talk to you.

01:23:29,000 --> 01:23:31,200
Yeah thank you so much for having me.

01:23:31,200 --> 01:23:34,440
Thank you so much for making it to the end of the podcast.

01:23:34,440 --> 01:23:39,360
If you're watching on YouTube I would love to hear your discussion and thoughts in the

01:23:39,360 --> 01:23:44,080
comments below and don't forget to like and subscribe if you enjoyed.

01:23:44,080 --> 01:23:49,920
If you're listening through a podcasting platform I'd appreciate if you rated it five stars

01:23:49,920 --> 01:23:54,720
and you can continue the discussion through my competition climbing discord server linked

01:23:54,720 --> 01:23:58,720
in the description through all of the podcasting platforms.

01:23:58,720 --> 01:24:03,200
Thanks again for listening.