Business climbing to new heights

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/08/2021 (1736 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Olympic sport climbing has created a buzz, and a Linden Woods boulder climbing facility is reaping the benefits.

The Hive Climbing and Fitness Centre, located at Unit 7, 960 Lorimer Blvd., is a 12,000-square-foot space designed for climbers of all ages.

Bouldering, for those not familiar with the term, is a style of rock climbing focused on strength, technique and problem-solving.

It’s entirely ropeless; athletes scale walls at different angles and fall onto 15-inch foam mats. The Hive rotates its sections every five weeks so frequent climbers can have new routes to tackle.

“It creates this cycle where people are itching to come back to have their final attempts before it disappears forever,” said Kori Cuthbert, managing partner of The Hive’s Winnipeg location.

The Hive is a modern climbing gym focused on beginner experience. The boulders, categorized by colours, are routes that are graded on a scale of one to six (one is the easiest while six is the hardest).

The Hive officially opened on Aug. 23, 2020, but has only had about six months of operations, owing to COVID-19 lockdowns.

Cuthbert said the facility has seen a lot of new climbers. Traffic has increased since The Hive re-opened this summer, and Cuthbert believes part of that might have to do with the Olympics.

Sport climbing made its debut at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and featured three disciplines – speed, bouldering, and lead.

Speed climbing pits two climbers against each other as they follow a route on a 15-metre wall set at an angle of 95 degrees.

In bouldering, athletes have four minutes to scale a number of fixed routes on a 4.5-metre wall.

Lead climbers have to scale as high as possible on a wall measuring over 15 metres in height within six minutes.

“Seeing people do it on television makes it a little more easy to understand,” Cuthbert said.

Still, Cuthbert hopes there will be some changes made to Olympic sport climbing in the following years.

“They did a combined format because they didn’t want to hand out a ton of medals,” Cuthbert said. “All the climbers were forced to climb in all three disciplines.”

Since it was combined, climbers that excelled in only one area weren’t able to qualify.

“It’s like making marathon runners do sprints and hurdles as well,” Cuthbert said.

Cuthbert also credits some mainstream movies for the growing popularity of boulder climbing. He notes Free Solo and The Dawn Wall.

“There’s definitely a lot of hype,” Cuthbert said. “Many people have had the experience of climbing at a birthday party as a kid but have never returned to it.

“Not many people have seen it in the recreational sporting world and thought of it as something they can do regularly.”

Cuthbert also hopes climbing will eventually have its own professional sporting organization in Manitoba. This would allow athletes to compete in provincial, national and international competitions.

For those interested in trying the Olympic sport for themselves, The Hive offers programming, pre-paid annual memberships, term-based memberships for students, 10-day pass cards and day passes.

More information can be found at www.hiveclimbing.com