Olympic Climbing Live (Spoilers!)

Anyone watching the Olympic lead climbing today? I tuned in halfway through and can’t seem to find what the grade of the climb was. My guess was close to 13.

Most olympic mens climbing grades are going to be well into the 5.14 range - especially since there were no tops. So this one was probably 5.14b-ish? 5.13 would have most of the climbers topping. There's a difference between climbers trying to flash an outdoor route at the grade vs a comp climb where the beta and holds you can use are significantly more straightforward.

Where are you guys watching?!

NBC 

Tal M wrote:

Most olympic mens climbing grades are going to be well into the 5.14 range - especially since there were no tops. So this one was probably 5.14b-ish? 5.13 would have most of the climbers topping. There's a difference between climbers trying to flash an outdoor route at the grade vs a comp climb where the beta and holds you can use are significantly more straightforward.

Good point! Definitely looks harder than 13 anyway on second thought.

But that’s just your guess? Is there no official grading of the difficulty? I didn’t hear any of the announcers talking about the grade nor anything listed when I tried to search for it.

I guess it would make sense for elite climbers to go into it knowing roughly what the grade is. I just haven’t seen any of this info anywhere.

No official grades, Sean McColl a while back said lead grades for men are typically between 5.13 and 5.14 depending on the stage - since this is the olympics I would imagine it would trend towards the higher end there, and also he said that in 2013 and comp climbing ability has improved a lot since then. IFSC refuses to grade their routes though, so you'll never get an official grade.

Christian Donkey wrote:

Good point! Definitely looks harder than 13 anyway on second thought.

But that’s just your guess? Is there no official grading of the difficulty? I didn’t hear any of the announcers talking about the grade nor anything listed when I tried to search for it.

I guess it would make sense for elite climbers to go into it knowing roughly what the grade is. I just haven’t seen any of this info anywhere.

I think the grading is progressive - first 5-10 meters are 5.11+/12- or so, and by the top it's in the mid 14s.  That big move to an overhang undercling sloper seemed to shed a lot of climbers.

Moved post to a no spoiler thread on how to watch.

Bryan wrote:

Can we please keep this thread no spoilers and just about how to watch and we can start a different thread with OLYMPIC SPOILERS in the title? I'll start the new thread, Matthew, can you edit your post and paste it in the new thread? Maybe rename this one with something like "how to watch" or "no spoilers"

I just started watching Men's Speed Qualifiers and my 30 minute NBC trial ended so I'm getting Peacock. I also heard somebody say you can go through Japan's broadcasting station with a VPN set to Japan. Even with the spoiler tag on the last post I saw some results when scrolling through trying to see how best to watch, a little annoying.

This is the link to the broadcast from Japan - https://en.sports.nhk.or.jp/olympic/highlights/list/

I don't think they will post qualifiers but i think you could watch the main events for free if you have a VPN that you can set to Japan. I think there's also a way to watch from a Canadian station but I'm not sure.

Just got Peacock, the app seems useless, I can't continue to watch the speed qualifiers there nor anything else so far. Does anybody know if I can do it if I pay for premium? I'm fine paying, just want to watch.

Okay, through Canada with a VPN set to Canada I can see all of qualifiers here I'm pretty sure - https://www.cbc.ca/player/sports/olympics/sport%20climbing

Uh, sorry for the confusion. This thread wasn’t intended to be spoiler free or about how to watch for that matter. Kinda hard to avoid “spoilers” for a sporting event that already happened, especially when the info’s blasted all over the internet when you search for Olympic climbing. I’ll rename the thread to include a spoiler warning.

Okay well that plan backfired… I’ll just stay out of these threads for a while. 

https://olympics.com/tokyo-2020/olympic-games/en/results/all-sports/olympic-schedule-and-results-date=2021-08-03.htm#CLB-2021-08-03

The results for bouldering are confusing. I dont watch comp climbing, so what do the numbers mean? Top, Zone, X, X. What are the X's?

All mens qualifiers have happened, here's the results for folks interested

Climber | Speed | Boulder | Lead | Total

1. Mickael Mawem FRA | 3 | 1 | 11 | 33
2. Tomoa Narasaki JAP | 2 | 2 | 14 | 56
3. Collin Duffy USA | 6 | 5 | 2 | 60
4. Jakob Schubert AUT | 12 | 7 | 1 | 84
5. Adam Ondra CZE | 18 | 3 | 4 | 216
6. Alberto Gines Lopez ESP | 7 | 14.| 3 | 294
7. Bassa Mawem FRA | 1 | 18 | 20 | 360
8. Nathaniel Coleman USA | 10 | 11 | 5 | 550

Some other people of interest

9.  Alex Megos GER | 19 | 6 | 6 | 684

12. Jan Hojer GER | 11 | 9 | 9 | 891 

17. Sean McColl CAN | 14 | 15 | 8 | 1680

Full list here: https://olympics.com/tokyo-2020/olympic-games/en/results/sport-climbing/results-men-s-combined-qual-0001sp-.htm

Craziest thing to me is that even without speed, Ondra still would have qualified in 4th. Just in case anybody is wondering what finals would look like without speed:

1. Jakob Schubert | 7 | 1 | 7
2. Collin Duffy | 5 | 2 | 10
3. Mickael Mawem | 1 | 11 | 11
4. Adam Ondra | 3 | 4 | 12
5. Tomoa Narasaki | 2 | 14 | 28
6. Alex Megos | 6 | 6 | 36
7. Alberto Gines Lopez | 14 | 3 | 52
8. Nathaniel Coleman | 11 | 5 | 55

So only change would be Bassa getting dropped for Megos. Pan Yufei would miss by 1 point, Aleksey by 5.

@Matthew: Bouldering scoring looks like TxZy A B, where x is the number of tops, y is the number of zones, A is the attempts to achieve that many tops and B is the attempts to achieve that many zones.

On a per boulder basis it's TxZy which is attempt to top and attempt to zone for that problem individually.

Mickael Mawems boulders looked like T2Z2, T1Z1, T1Z1, Z1 - 3 tops, 4 zones, 4 total attempts for tops (T2+T1+T1), 5 total attempts for zones (Z2+Z1+Z1+Z1), so his final score is T3Z4 4 5

I watched the USA Network coverage and it was terrible. They only really focused on one boulder problem, which happened to be the easiest. From what I saw boulder #2 didn’t have any tops. And one of the other boulders had a feet first start to a hand jam, but I only got to see it in the background while they were focusing on the v5 that everyone was flashing.

Beyond this they only showed one of Ondra’s speed runs and two moves of one boulder. It seems like he should have gotten more camera time with the hype leading up the the event.

Is the live coverage any better?

Peter Funk wrote:

Is the live coverage any better?

No - you'd hear the announcers say "XYZ just topped boulder 2" while the camera sits for 3 minutes on some punter repeatedly falling off boulder 4, and sometimes not even get a replay. 

Boulder two had two tops from Tomoa and Mickael Mawem I believe.

NBC has a full replay but if you dont have a subscription you only get 30 mins. However there are infinite ads so if you just skip around you can probably watch quite a few of your favorite climbers do their stuff.

In comp bouldering a top is a top, a zone is a designated half-way point established to create separation in scoring. The numbers are the amount of attempts it took to get to a zone/top. Scoring is most tops first, then if there is a tie in tops it comes down to most zones, and if that is tied it comes down to least attempts taken.

Lead routes tend to start easier (5.11) and ramp up to 5.14 to create 'separation' so you don't have a bunch of people falling at the same spot, as ties in lead are kind of annoying (I believe a tie in finals is broken by your score in qualifiers, then time?)

I just watched the replay (link) and that was extremely fun. I fast-forwarded the boring bits (of which there were lots), and was able to get through the 5 hour broadcast in an hour and a half or so.

• I think the format of the comp makes the bouldering the toughest to watch. Since 4 climbers are going simultaneously, the camera seems to never find the most interesting action. And it's clear the announcers don't have control of which camera goes to TV. So at one point the shot lingers on Chon Jongwon chalking up for 45 seconds, while the announcers are like "and Ondra tops the green problem!!!!" but you can only see his blurry foot in the background. And sometimes you don't even get a replay. I hope they figure it out for the women and the finals. maybe a split screen would be better? 
• The speed and lead are better for TV since only one thing is happening at a time. Because lead is last, the stakes and tension really build as the qualifying picture takes shape over the course of the round.

Other takeaways and scattered thoughts:

• I had never heard of the Mawem brothers before but now I'm rooting hard for them. Hope Bassa's injury is ok (which would push Megos out of the finals!!)
• Psyched that both Americans are in. Duffy looked very strong on the lead wall.
• Ondra was uncharacteristically stoic after falling on some of the boulders and lower than he wanted on the lead wall. He was obviously unsatisfied, but kept the YEAAARRGGGHH in check. But he lives to fight again on Thursday.
• Handjam. Awesome.
• it was 32*C and humid, which I understand is very hot.
• At one point of the announcers mentioned that he'd never commentated on climbing before and boy did it show. ("we lost a lot of athletes on the crosshand to the overhand... just brute strength...is there a knot in the rope??") But more than the funny lingo, I really missed having an announcer that could talk a little more about the detailed beta some folks were using. Like how Tomoa double dynoed to the yellow jug, where most went with one hand. Or how some were skipping the undercling match and crossing through, which looked more efficient. Or how Duffy had the guns to open hand through the tiny edges in the top third of the route, while a lot of them were crimping the heck out of them. So they should have asked me to commentate.
• who are the belayers?
• can't wait for the women!!!
• USA! USA! USA!

• I had never heard of the Mawem brothers before but now I'm rooting hard for them. Hope Bassa's injury is ok (which would push Megos out of the finals!!)

Bassa's injury straight up looked like a torn bicep, highly doubt he climbs in the finals. There is still a ton of conflicting statements about whether Megos would even be in if Bassa doesn't climb so who knows

Maxwell Testa wrote:

Bassa's injury straight up looked like a torn bicep, highly doubt he climbs in the finals. There is still a ton of conflicting statements about whether Megos would even be in if Bassa doesn't climb so who knows

Oof I saw a clip of the injury and I really do not recommend seeking out that footage. Doesn't look like he'll be back. Yikes.

My how-to-watch beta for other Americans without cable: use a vpn (i use hola for chrome which is free) and then view it on https://www.cbc.ca/ from Canada; either live stream at an ungodly hour or can replay the full video the next day after the fact.  Thanks Canada!

Nkane 1 wrote:

• At one point of the announcers mentioned that he'd never commentated on climbing before and boy did it show. ("we lost a lot of athletes on the crosshand to the overhand... just brute strength...is there a knot in the rope??") But more than the funny lingo, I really missed having an announcer that could talk a little more about the detailed beta some folks were using. Like how Tomoa double dynoed to the yellow jug, where most went with one hand. Or how some were skipping the undercling match and crossing through, which looked more efficient. Or how Duffy had the guns to open hand through the tiny edges in the top third of the route, while a lot of them were crimping the heck out of them. So they should have asked me to commentate.

They should bring you on. The cbc commentators definitely lacked depth, and there was some cringe as you mentioned.  At Rubtsov they said "I dont think he realized he missed the clip!"... when he had clearly realized he fumbled it, then kept climbing to try to get a better stance to try again

Nkane 1 wrote:

• who are the belayers?

They appear to have been provided by the olympics, and were using tube style belay device.  Does anyone else know what is normal for competition climbing?  I would have thought that they climbers would bring their own belayer.  But I guess they just keep a good amount of slack to avoid shortroping the leaders, since its an overhanging wall anyway.

Nkane 1 wrote:

• Handjam. Awesome.

Yeah that was great (the memes thread has a post that captures how it felt watching climbers trying to grab at the crack).  Looked like that problem also drew some blood from Coleman

Mitch L wrote:

They appear to have been provided by the olympics, and were using tube style belay device.  Does anyone else know what is normal for competition climbing?  I would have thought that they climbers would bring their own belayer.  But I guess they just keep a good amount of slack to avoid shortroping the leaders, since its an overhanging wall anyway.

I watch a stupid amount of competitions because it's one fo the few things I can have on during work and still get stuff done. Yes, venues always provide the belayers - though I have no idea how they are selected. I will say the amount of slack given during this qualification was wayyy more than usual. I forget who fell on lead about 2/3 the way up and ended up about falling to about 10 feet above the mat... but that is not usual. 

Other thoughts. Commentary was unusually terrible. My favorite was Jakob Schubert on a slab, who notoriously hates slabs, and hearing "this is his bread and butter." Mixing up the Mawems. Goofing up the scoring system. Not understanding something that would painfully obvious to anyone who climbs (Why others weren't using Mawem's heelhook on M3 for instance.) Usually commentary is done by Matt Groom with a pro climber who didn't make finals to add "color commentary" and that system has been pretty good. 

Also, Mickael Mawem's seeming blockbuster performance is complete surprise! Wow! What an underdog rise. I honestly didn't have him in the running at all.