It was belaying-room only in Urban Rocks Gym as more than 80 high school students from across the region ascended gray-blue climbing walls patterned with colorful handholds for a Chattanooga Area Interscholastic Climbing League event.
Students traveled from as far as Sewanee to compete in the event, which requires them to complete five different climbs on top-roping climbing routes without falling or resting their weight on the rope. Points are given to students based on the rated difficulty of the climb, and students can compete individually or as part of their high school team of up to 10 players.
"We created this climbing league to get kids that weren't typically involved in these kinds of sports into them," said Zach Bopp, a recreation program specialist with Outdoor Chattanooga. To facilitate that, they have negotiated with local gyms to offer high school students in the program reduced membership rates and are even raising scholarship money for kids who have difficulty affording a membership.
John Cunningham, a counselor at Brainerd High School and the school's climbing coach, says he thinks the program does a lot to help get kids who might not otherwise start climbing into the sport.
"There's a really limited exposure and there's definitely a big intimidation factor. It's a costly sport to get into and it's hard to find access, so just having somebody who knows where you can go, gives them free time to go, and gives them equipment, breaks that barrier," Cunningham said.
The community of climbing is something that Bopp said is one of the goals of the league. Chattanooga has a growing network of climbers who began at young ages, and the league wants to keep that community growing and foster cooperation among students.
"We are getting them into this together, so it's not your school or my school, but they're kind of helping each other out," Bopp said.
Zack Brown, a 10th-grader at Brainerd High School, said he never would have gotten into climbing if it weren't for the league. "My teachers showed me pictures of them climbing, and I thought it was pretty cool," he said. As soon as the league was started, he began climbing, and two months later he can climb a 5.11 difficulty route, which is toward the top of the difficulty scale.
Brown said he keeps coming back because he likes the way climbing clears his mind.
"When you're climbing, all you can think about really is what hold to grab next and how to grab it, so it's really hard to think about anything else while climbing," he said.
Zack Brown, a 10th-grader at Brainerd High School, left, talks with his climbing coach, John Cunningham, about routes he plans to climb during a recent Chattanooga Area Interscholastic Climbing League event at Urban Rocks Gym.