With 180 competitors Sundays event was the busiest they have ever had and attracted a very high standard of competitor, including Gaz Parry and John Partridge from the British Bouldering Team. However the competition remains a fun outing and a great opportunity to pit your bouldering skills against your friends and other enthusiasts. The team at Craggy worked all week hosting the tri services bouldering league on the Wednesday and then the SIBL on the Sunday, with all routes set specifically for each event by Mark Croxall, Mike Hadcocks and Danie Rushmer. For SIBL depending on the category entered you get a colour coded score card and then your left to find the routes tagged with the colour of your card. Craggy 2 crew along with the SIBL team were on hand to help entrants find their way about the myriad of walls and what could have been chaotic (due to the high numbers), was incredibly well ordered and fun for juniors as well as the adults!

The Southern Indoor Bouldering League has been in existence in one form or another for 20 years and has recently been given a revamp by Sam Johnson who took it on in 2009. However this year other commitments meant that Sam passed the baton on to David Andrews, although a relative new comer to bouldering, has big plans to expand the series. “Craggy 2 is such an amazing venue, the level of organisation and quality of the routes is incredible and a great place to start the series,” says David who has pulled together an impressive list of sponsors and high profile venues for this season’s 6 competitions and urges anyone who is toying with the idea to get involved. A view echoed by Gareth Squire centre manager at Craggy2, “competitions and especially SIBL are especially welcome at our wall as they give a real sense of focus to boulderers especially during the hard winter months where getting outside can seem a distant goal”. Prizes were donated by Rock On and Sportiva who had a big presence on the day setting routes and with a boot demo respectively.

We were especially proud that Craggy members turned out to compete in such numbers and featured so well in Tiffany, Vicky, and Lucy Bradbury in the juniors, who has been with us through our kids clubs and Craghoppers. We are yet to get the full results from SIBL, so if you were wondering where you came, so are we! I have been assured by David Andrews that the full results will be found on www.sibl.co.uk in the next few days.

SIBL first round at Craggy 2 results

male open: 1st Jon Partridge (190) 2nd Tom Gore (166) 3rd Marcin Franiak (165)

female open: 1st Tiffany Soithongsuk (130) 2nd Yvonne Cortrulia (122) 3rd Vicky Hau (111)

male junior: 1st Max Wright (168) 2nd Oscar Krumlinde (156) 3rd Brendan Gallagher (142)

female junior: 1st Becky Whaley (134) 2nd Lucy Bradbury (127) 3rd Izzie cooke (121)

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Tags: competition, Craggy 2, SIBL

Mark is in all this week setting various areas around the centre with the usual array of fun and exciting routes for you to enjoy. Mikee will then be joining in the fun by setting routes 39 – 41, the slabs opposite the shutter door. The schedule is as follows:

Monday: 42 – 44

Tuesday: 44 – 48

Wednesday: 49 – 52

Thursday: 53 – 57 and 39 – 41 set by Mikee

Friday: 1 – 4

All of these areas will be closed during the day for setting but we will aim to have them back open by about 6.30pm each night!

Enjoy!

Tags: Climbing, croxall, Guildford, hadcocks, mark, mikee, route, setting

We have a jam packed week of setting going on at the moment with several areas of the centre having a summer set! Here is the propsed plan of action for this week and the following:

Monday 15th – Lines 13 – 16 (Setter Mark)

Tuesday 16th – Lines 17 – 20, 69 – 70 (Setters Mark and Graeme)

Wednesday 17th – Lines 24 – 28 (Setter Mark)

Thursday 18th – Boulderwall (Setters Mark and Mikeee)

Friday 19th – Lines 73 – 78, 58 – 60 (Setters Mark, Ben and Graeme)

Thursday 25th – Lines 21 – 23 (Setters Mikeee)

That works out at Approximatley 72 new Top ropes/leads and 42 new boulder problems!

With all of the setting going on it does mean that some areas of the centre will be out of action while the setting is taking place but we will aim to keep disruption to a minimum and have everything finshed and ready to climb by the evening!

Also due to popular demand for more lead routes we are converting lines 16 and 61 from top ropes to leads as well this week, so there should be plently to keep you busy!

Enjoy!

Tags: boulder, craggy, Guildford, island, Mark Croxall, Mikee Hadcocks, route, setting, wall

Setting, setting, setting…  No rest for the wicked apparently!  Especially for Mark who has broken his hand but still keeps setting!!  Don’t worry though, we’re not abusing him too much.  He’s getting lots of support from Mikeeeee and Danie until he’s fixed again.

If you click the link below you’ll see what we’re up to over the next couple of months:

The Craggy Diary June & July 2011

Guildford have a selection of routes going up all around the centre.  New top ropes, lead climbs and bouldering so whatever lights your candle there’ll definitely be something to put a smile on your face!

Craggy2 will be setting in the Rock Room this month.  Potentially it will be team midget, aka, Danie and Mikeee, so watch out all you tall folk! 

As always, all feedback is gratefully received!  If you have any comments about Guildford please get in touch with Ben at ben@craggy-island.com and if you have comments about Craggy2 please get in touch with Gareth at gareth@craggy-island.com.

We have a lot of route setting coming up in the next couple of weeks starting with this coming Monday 6th June. The week’s antic will include the following areas being reset:

Routes 7 – 9 (Steep lead walls opposite the traverse wall)

Routes 19 – 20 (Steep lead walls near woody)

Routes 80 – 86 (Top Ropes closest to changing area)

As well as all of these being changed, the Boulder wall will also be having a reset on Thursday when Mark joins forces with the ever keen Mikey for problems galore!

The traverse wall will then be getting a reset on the 23rd June followed by the Auto Belays the week after on the 30th June.

Enjoy!

Tags: Guildford, Mark Croxall, mike hadcocks, route setting