The Junior BLCC has been my favourite competition for many
years, it really is the prestigious National event that you want to win. Its great fun competing on home soil, and it’s
been mine now for 5 years in a row, in my age category!
I first won it in 2011 as a Youth B. This was way back in
the days competing against Brendan Gallagher and Dom Burns (on lead!), Billy
Ridal and Alex Waterhouse were there too.
Roll on to 2012 as Youth A, I find myself the champion against names
such as Luke Dawson, Buster Martin, Johnny White, etc and again as Youth A in
2013 with the usual strong names. Then
I’m in Juniors and at Uni and I still compete and want to make it 4 times in a
row – the Junior field was smaller but still with Luke, Orrin Coley and Ellis
Butler –Barker I had to stay focused. Yes four in a row! Finally the last year as a Junior and its really
important to me to make it 5 consecutive Championships in a row. Success is sweet.
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| BLCC 2015 Junior |
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| BLCC 2011 Youth B |
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| In action at the 2015 Junior BLCC |
My last year as a Junior saw me win the other two events
that make up the Youth Cup – so I am the Champion in that too. Sweet way to
finish in the Juniors.
The second day at the BLCCs was the Senior competition, the
field now has many talented climbers but I intended to make the final. However, I got my arm tangled in the rope making
the penultimate clip on my first route which I was intending to top. I managed to stay focused on the second
route, the slab, but was unlucky to miss the finals by one place.
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| Going well on the first qualifier of senior BLCC |
The following week I decided to enter the Leeds Depot Battle
of Britain, just for fun, and had a really good day qualifying in 3rd
place for the finals! The 3 final
problems were evil, with a distinct lack of holds, but it was really good fun working
out how to use the volumes. I was a little disappointed to end up 4th,
but not surprised. It was a great day
and proved to me that I’m no couch potato at bouldering comps!
