Adventure
Spidermen & spiderwomen of sport climbing
Yana Bey

A rag-tag crowd of 20-odd autorickshaw drivers, chaprasis and passersby with time on their hands lined up like crows along the fence separating Bangalore's Sree Kanteerava Stadium campus from the road, constituted the only spectators from outside the climbing fraternity at the ninth national sport climbing championship held recently.

Sadly, though this was the most spectator-friendly edition of the nationals so far, as a result of the introduction of the exciting speed-climbing event, the lack of prior publicity by the organisers saw only the Bangaloreans actively involved with sport climbing turning up to watch the country's most prestigious sport climbing event. The opportunity to give the lay public and corporate circles exposure to the event remained unutilised.

Umesh Malhotra, who runs adventure courses for youngsters at the imaginatively named Hippocampus Experience Centre (www.thehippocampus.com), heard about the event by sheer chance.

The first edition of the championship to be held in Bangalore, and the second to be held outside Delhi, it was conducted jointly by the Delhi-based Indian Mountaineering Foundation (IMF), the apex body of climbing in India, and Bangalore's GETHNAA (General Thimayya National Academy of Adventure). The Academy's artificial climbing wall is arguably the best in India with one of its three faces moulded to simulate the humps and bulges of natural rock while other walls around the country simply have plain surfaces. This wall is also the only one in India to have a roof or 180-degree overhang.

Of the 128 young Indian sport climbers who participated, the south zone was clearly ahead, ending up with 18 of the 24 medals and the championship trophy for the fifth time. "It's a case of better facilities. They practise on this wall, which improves their technique and power so much," pointed out Delhi climber Nagendra Prasad.

"The other zones' climbers obviously want to practise on a roof, too. The IMF wall in Delhi is the only wall in India that has panels whose angles can be changed to increase the degree of overhang. But, since the wall was built in 1994, the angles have not been

changed even once," added Ram Khajuria, who runs the Tawi Trekkers Institute in Jammu and was one of the judges at the championship.

"Besides, there are no charges for using the GETHNAA wall. In Delhi, we have to cough up Rs 30 each time we want to use the IMF wall plus there is the cost of travel to and fro," said Delhi's Paras Ram, who was competing in his eighth nationals. "It isn't much. A child spends Rs 100 easily every time he goes to MacDonald's," countered Col Ravinder Nath, IMF director. "What rot! We don't have the money to go to MacDonald's. And just bring those kids who go. They won't be able to climb three feet," was the retort of an incensed group of climbers when told of this comment.

A diet chart developed by a nutritionist adds to the Bangaloreans' advantage while climbers from other parts of the country put together their own feeding and training regimens to the best of their ability. The vast majority are hampered by lack of money. "My best climber is a girl whose family income is from agriculture in a village far from Imphal," pointed out north-east zone coach S. Jiten Mangang. Yet, the 15-year-old Devola Devi was the championship's star athlete, winning two golds - in the difficulty as well as speed competitions.

The introduction of the speed competition from this year makes Indian sport climbing meets more spectator-friendly. Sport climbing, during which those on the ground watch the "spidermen and spiderwomen" on the wall with tensed stomach muscles and bated breath, is the public face of the varied types of climbing practised on rock, ice and snow. It has gained in popularity round the country and India sends participants to Asian and European meets.

The speed competition saw participants competing against the clock and subsequently against each other on parallel routes on the 5 m-wide wall. "We introduced it as we have to keep pace internationally," said veteran mountaineer Brig D.K. Khullar, president of the championship organising committee.

The extra dose of excitement and glamour infused by speed climbing should ideally be used to give the sport a higher profile. This, in turn, would evoke corporate interest. "All the climbers who have gone abroad have raised money on their own. There are kids who don't have their own climbing shoes, they practise in sneakers and try to borrow for competitions. Being financially handicapped affects performance. Corporate sponsorship would help so much," Balaji S.R., championship technical adviser, added.

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