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Pygmalion- How a greek myth effects british sports climbing standards (Read 49451 times)

gme

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I have separated this from a certain other thread where the initial conversation started so it is disassociated from any particular individual’s performance. My comments in there were never intended to be about a single achievement but about something I am genuinely interested in both climbing and, more pertinently to me, recruitment, management and development of my employees.

In the 15 years I have been in business I have employed 100s of people from backgrounds as diverse as prison and privately educated graduates. The levels of attainment that these people had reached varied massively and were linked with a number of external and internal influences, of which, in my opinion, the effect of the level of expectation that had been put on them was a major contributor.

Possibly one of the most rewarding things I have had from my businesses has been the development of a number of my staff, seeing them grow from kids, who had pretty much failed school and left with very modest ambitions, into positions well above anything they ever thought they would be able to do. These are not kids who were told they would be failures but ones that were given achievement targets at a pretty average level, had attained them, and been rewarded and praised for their success. So having achieved what they had been told was a really good job for them they assumed that was a high point of the career and settled in for the duration rather than trying to go further.

Over the years I have learned that It is only when the same people are told that, whilst their achievements so far are ok they are nowhere near what they are capable of, they can really go on to maximise their potential. And in order for them to realise this they need someone they listen too (coaches, teachers, managers etc.) to truly believe they are capable of much more and to be ambitious for them

The effect this belief by the coaches/teachers/managers has on the performance of the individual is widely documented as Self-fulfilling prophecy. I could give you links but it’s easy just to google “the Pygmalion effect”, or the “Galatea effect” or if you want to see the negative side of it look up “the golem effect. There are dozens of papers written about it.

I had a good diagram to go in here but no idea how to get it to work.

So what has this got to do with climbing and the reporting of an ascent of route x by person y.

Firstly I want to point out that I am talking about performance based climbing here which involves grades, competition and a desire to be really good. I am not talking about people who just want to potter about having experiences, nothing wrong with that but it is totally irrelevant to this subject.

I personal believe that British climbers and the climbing media are holding back the progression of our young climbers by overly celebrating relatively minor achievements. I feel that we are setting our bar far too low and therefore having a negative effect on their development.

I think one of the major causes of this is the fast food style of reporting on the internet and, more pertinently, chatrooms. In the age of interactive news reporting everyone can influence the media and therefore the athlete, inadvertently filling part of the role of the coach/teacher/manager and therefore have an effect on young climber’s expectations. And i believe the problem is caused by the fact that most people have very low expectations themselves and often have little concept of what constitutes high level performance. If you look at the two popular climbing forums here-

UKB is a lot better than UKC in its levels of knowledge (with one or two very vocal exceptions) and a lot of people on here have climbed at a high enough level to really have an idea of what the difference between 8b and 9a is, and they have an idea of where real cutting edge climbing is at. However many dont but the levels are such that there is no majority and therefore a balance is met. This probably lead to the way the other topic was approached.

UKC however is heavily populated by people who think E6 or 8a is pretty much living end and anyone climbing those grades is up there with the best. This has an effect of dumbing down everyones expectations, it reduces the level of when something becomes news and therefore the expectations of people in the sport.

With the exception of Steve McClure British sports climbing has not really moved on for 15 years whilst the number of participants has increased and the facilities have both increased in number and improved in standard. This can easily be written off by saying that everyone is into bouldering but whilst there has been a lot of bouldering only walls built the number of good quality lead walls has increased as well and therefore we would assume that participation has as well. We are also told that there is no funding available for young kids! Well sorry but this has always been the case and perhaps its due to the fact that most of the companies doing the funding are global and therefore base who they sponsor on globally significant ascents. So we have better facilities, more participants, it’s easier and cheaper to travel, knowledge of training is much better and more easily available, equipment is better, coaches are available at every wall etc. etc. etc. To me it leaves our low expectations as the key thing that’s holding us back, something that wasn’t an issue in the 80s and 90s when we had the best climbers in the world and therefore 90% of the news was about the cutting edge and it was in hard format so generally written with a bit more care and attention and in much less quantities.

I am not trying to be all doom and gloom as we do presently have a large pool of young climbers who look like they have what it takes to operate in the upper levels of the sport, what Shauna, Mina and now Michaela (see a trend of raised expectation) has done for women’s bouldering levels proves what is possible . But we and the media need to raise our expectations to help them get there.

I am sure a lot of people will think this is just a load of bollocks, so please just ignore it and don’t comment. If you disagree and can put points forward to counter or support my beliefs I would genuinely like to hear them. I have no objective with this it’s just something I have become interested in, mainly with management of teams at work, and am open to other people’s thoughts on the ideas.

I also wasn’t happy with how the thread about Jim Pope’s ascent had been perceived, as I think it was looked at by some, who I don’t think read the whole thread, as being some kind of put down on the lad which I can assure him it never was, well on my behalf anyway.

Sorry about the length of this but I don’t have a blog or anywhere to put it so here seemed a suitable place. I hope it’s of interest to others if not feel free to log pile.

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Gav this is really intersting, I disagree with you on several of your points, but rather than hashing out something quick on the phone now I'll write something more cogent when it's raining tomorrow.

abarro81

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On the whole I agree with most of that. Although I'm not convinced that this effect is actually that great, and that the reasons for Brit sport standards being shit aren't more down to other things (think we did this a few years ago in a thread entitled "British standards - shit or not shit"). Having said that, I've never been a kid who's good, so maybe that warps my view. Incidentally, all those who I looked up to as talented youths from my first few years climbing (Bristol) never developed to anywhere near their full potential. I (who was always shit) have stuck with the 'trying to get good' shit more and now climbed harder than most of them, so maybe you're right? Or they're just cooler and less OCD. [Feel free to punter me for being an arrogant prick]

With the exception of Steve McClure British sports climbing has not really moved on for 15 years

Is that true? How many Brits climbed 8c+ or harder from 1997/8-2000? I count 13 from the last couple of years. (Clearly our standard compared to the best has declined from your day, but given the expansion of climbing in other countries that's not really surprising)

(Ste Mac, Jordan B, Tim P, Caff, Robins, Dave Mac, Ted, Ryan, Me, Tom B, Pearson, Ben D, The Fresh Prince)

P.S. I too think it's interesting. But then I enjoy foot-on-campus aero cap...
« Last Edit: October 03, 2014, 06:04:57 pm by abarro81 »

Stu Littlefair

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Interesting post Gav, and better separated from the Jim Pope thread. I too think what you describe is a factor affecting UK standards, but not the main factor - I think a cultural focus on grit and bouldering has been more influential, but I don't want to drag this thread off topic.

One area I think the Pygmalion effect might be large and detrimental is how we handle the transition of competition climbers from junior to senior competitions. This is a tricky thing to get right for all athletes; senior competition implies a big step up in performance. Expose an athlete to it too early and it can be overwhelming.

But if you leave an athlete in junior competition too long then the effects you talk about are very strong - the athlete feels they are at the top of the sport and eases off, thus limiting attainment.

The UK has a proud history of youths who place highly in european and world youth events who never quite cut it on the senior stage. Maybe the Pygmalion effect is why?

Stu Littlefair

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With regards to reporting, I wanted to write a separate post. I agree it's an issue, but I think it is more to do with how things are reported, rather than them being reported in the first place.

Some ascents are reported on UKC as if they were great achievements in themselves, as opposed to an indicator that some young kid has promise.

I think it's great if people get recognition on UKC and here for "minor" news stories, but you have to get the tone right, if you don't want people to feel like they're a big cheese.

kelvin

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It was nice to read Ben Davison say the other day that La Dura Dura is a goal. Maybe someone should point him in the direction of the world's first 9c tho? Someone has to do it first, why not Ben?

The lad I'm off to Spain with next year has only been climbing three years and is at 8a+ just about but I'm always bangin' on at him to train (he does non). I asked him the other day what his aim is for the trip and he replied 8b - well, he's under orders to buy a 100m rope and then he'll have no excuses to get on Fisheye. I just want him to aim far higher than he thinks he can achieve.

Personally, I'm not much of a runner, never have been and three years ago after another knee surgery, I was told not to run anymore. A mate who's a personal trainer suggested we run across the country (Rat Race's The Wall) over two days, which at 69 miles was gonna be a big ask as I'd never ran anymore than ten miles before and not for a long while. So I set the bar real high - entered the Expert class to do it in a day and got training. Everyone told me to aim for 20hrs and be happy but that sounded a bit pathetic to me. I decided I'd be happy with 17hrs but really wanted nearer 14 - must set high goals eh? Ended up tweaking my achilles a few weeks before but was on for my 17hrs anyway, so much for everyone including my physio, PT mate etc saying be happy with 20hrs. As it happened, I stopped running to help a guy who was about to stop and walked with him for the last few hours and we finished in 20hrs anyway  ;D Point being - nobody really pushed me to aim high and that happens all the time in all the sports I've participated in. It does my head in.

It's not about pushing youngsters but rather, showing them that they can be something a whole degree better than they ever imagined.


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I think this is a well needed discussion, and I'm sure it will branch out a bit because the pygmalion is likely just one of a number of factors responsible for the trends in British sport climbing. Anyone care to guess why our expectations/standards dropped/stalled after the mid 90's despite steve's efforts. There is clearly a big gap between our standards and those on 8a.nu for example - 9a's get reported on there pretty frequently and no one bats an eye lid unless the climber is either very young, hasn't been climbing long, or its a route with a serious reputation.

I think Stu makes a good point regarding the tone of reporting. After all, even if we re-set our standard to 9b+ being the top (assuming they're not there for most climbers) there will be a period of disequilibrium until the new standards are met. I suspect we are probably at that stage now, as there has been a clear rise in standards over the last 5 years. The uk climbing media still have to publish news, and not all of it is going to be cutting edge stuff.

bendavison

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It's also worth mentioning the role of coaches in setting the bar for expectations. Arguably this is more important as I reckon for many youngsters the coach is their view of the top level, or at least where they get their view of where that level lies. This isn't as simple as the coach telling them that 6c is good but really you're shit until you've climbed 9a+. It's important to give the kid the confidence in their own abilities, and in the coach, to reach that level, and this has a lot to do with expectations. I certainly know that in all the sports I've done that often a big motivation is not wanting to let the coach down, and that should not be underestimated, but it has to be done carefully; based on real belief in the climbers potential.

abarro81

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Anyone care to guess why our expectations/standards dropped/stalled after the mid 90's despite steve's efforts.

- Grit
- Bouldering
- Probably didn't help that Ste isn't seen as someone who's into training and all that lark, whereas Ben and Jerry are, so those looking up to Steve - but without the raw talent - potentially had a worse role model than when Ben and Jerry were top dogs?

Stu Littlefair

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Good points Ben - coaches play a massive role and I know folk like Tom Greenall think that motivating your athletes is the most important, and the hardest part of the job.

I think an un discussed  factor holding back progress is the nature of UK sport climbing. If you're a young climber starting climbing in northern Spain, or in the Basque, the huge lines in Rodellar and Baltzola are going to be hugely motivating. To climb 8c+ on this territory you've got to be a good all round climber.

In the UK, most of the lines people aspire to will be short and cruxy. There are literally hundreds of climbers in the UK with the finger strength to climb a euro 9a, and a handful with the fitness...

Doylo

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In the UK, most of the lines people aspire to will be short and cruxy. There are literally hundreds of climbers in the UK with the finger strength to climb a euro 9a, and a handful with the fitness...

The lack of friendly 9as definitely limits the chances of the 8c+ brigade on home soil. Apart from Rainshadow the others are all hideously crimpy. Pete Robins has done quite a few 8c+s in Wales but the Big Bang is so hideously sharp it's just not a nice project unless you're under 9 stone.  Pasquills been trying Mutation for years but that's probably 9a+ in reality and the others are Mcclure crimp horror shows too.  I don't know how much this Pygmalion effect has on British standards but the lack of variety in our hardest routes doesn't help.

abarro81

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+1 to that. What I wouldn't give for a Santa Linya, Gorge de Loup, Pic st Loup or Baltzola within driving distance!
« Last Edit: October 03, 2014, 08:42:13 pm by abarro81 »

petejh

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Clearly the 'expectation' of an easy escape to a sunny endurance paradise has lowered expectations of what's achievable on home soil! Expect to crimp and suffer and ye shall succeed.

Doylo

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+1 to that. What I wouldn't give for a Santa Linya, Loup or Baltzola within driving distance!

Yes but you'd be a solid 9a climber and your ego would be unbearable  ;)

Muenchener

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I'm sure the limitations of the available rock must play a part. There was an interview with Alex Megos recently where he said the reason he hasn't climbed 9b yet is that there aren't any in the Frankenjura.

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I'm a total outsider and have never climbed in the UK, so ignore if you like.  BUT, I live in Alaska which is really remote from anything resembling hard climbing.  I've been the strongest boulderer in Alaska for 15 years, and when I could be bothered to rope up, one of the best (if not the best) sport climber in the area.  However, I was a minnow in a puddle (not even a pond).  Compared to world or national standards, I was/am nothing special at all.  Over this time, I've watched 20-30 kids come through all with the potentail to take it well beyond me, but they never did. And for 10 years, I was stuck at the exact same spot.  Why? 

I've always been convinced that your day-to-day experience is what will shape your expectations in climbing.  What you see and experience on a day-to-day basis will dictate what you percieve as hard.  For example, if you regularly climb with a bunch of guys who onsight 8a, then after some time your view will be that an 8a onsight is no big deal.  I think this applies regardless of your own level.  So this would apply to coaches, trainers, and climbers. 

How does this fit with GME's theory?  If everyone thinks 8a is hard, then the expectation is to reach 8a.  If you think 8a is "it", then it's very rare and to have the vision to go beyond that.  Locally that has meant that 5.12 was "hard".  The gym rarely sets anythign harder.  All of the older guys have plateaued for years at 5.12 and for no real reason.  The kids around here never really seem to take that next jump.  There's always 1 kid on the local climbing team that is the #1 kid and even he's barely at the 12+/13- level.  Even after they leave for college, very few of them seem to take that next step. 

Historically in the US there have been "pockets" of talent that seems to pop up and push the standards (at least the local national standards).  Smith Rocks in the 80's, Salt Lake City in the 90's, and Boulder in the 2000's. 

Sometimes you get exceptions, but as a whole, it seems like you have to have that constant standard around you to push on.  In the last 3 years I've finally had 3-4 guys here pushing the v10/11 envelope, which has in turn helped push me further along as well.  Being able to join in the loving UKB community has helped me communicate directly with others who climb as hard and harder.  I've been able to share training ideas, motivation, etc.  Those have all helped me push through further than I would have ever guessed. 

fatdoc

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I have separated this from a certain other thread where the initial conversation started so it is disassociated from any particular individual’s performance. My comments in there were never intended to be about a single achievement but about something I am genuinely interested in both climbing and, more pertinently to me, recruitment, management and development of my employees.

In the 15 years I have been in business I have employed 100s of people from backgrounds as diverse as prison and privately educated graduates. The levels of attainment that these people had reached varied massively and were linked with a number of external and internal influences, of which, in my opinion, the effect of the level of expectation that had been put on them was a major contributor.

Bonkers to have to copy this essay to make it a relevant post.. But there is something in this for me, a really really thought provoking post. IMO


Possibly one of the most rewarding things I have had from my businesses has been the development of a number of my staff, seeing them grow from kids, who had pretty much failed school and left with very modest ambitions, into positions well above anything they ever thought they would be able to do. These are not kids who were told they would be failures but ones that were given achievement targets at a pretty average level, had attained them, and been rewarded and praised for their success. So having achieved what they had been told was a really good job for them they assumed that was a high point of the career and settled in for the duration rather than trying to go further.

Over the years I have learned that It is only when the same people are told that, whilst their achievements so far are ok they are nowhere near what they are capable of, they can really go on to maximise their potential. And in order for them to realise this they need someone they listen too (coaches, teachers, managers etc.) to truly believe they are capable of much more and to be ambitious for them

The effect this belief by the coaches/teachers/managers has on the performance of the individual is widely documented as Self-fulfilling prophecy. I could give you links but it’s easy just to google “the Pygmalion effect”, or the “Galatea effect” or if you want to see the negative side of it look up “the golem effect. There are dozens of papers written about it.

I had a good diagram to go in here but no idea how to get it to work.

So what has this got to do with climbing and the reporting of an ascent of route x by person y.

Firstly I want to point out that I am talking about performance based climbing here which involves grades, competition and a desire to be really good. I am not talking about people who just want to potter about having experiences, nothing wrong with that but it is totally irrelevant to this subject.

I personal believe that British climbers and the climbing media are holding back the progression of our young climbers by overly celebrating relatively minor achievements. I feel that we are setting our bar far too low and therefore having a negative effect on their development.

I think one of the major causes of this is the fast food style of reporting on the internet and, more pertinently, chatrooms. In the age of interactive news reporting everyone can influence the media and therefore the athlete, inadvertently filling part of the role of the coach/teacher/manager and therefore have an effect on young climber’s expectations. And i believe the problem is caused by the fact that most people have very low expectations themselves and often have little concept of what constitutes high level performance. If you look at the two popular climbing forums here-

UKB is a lot better than UKC in its levels of knowledge (with one or two very vocal exceptions) and a lot of people on here have climbed at a high enough level to really have an idea of what the difference between 8b and 9a is, and they have an idea of where real cutting edge climbing is at. However many dont but the levels are such that there is no majority and therefore a balance is met. This probably lead to the way the other topic was approached.

UKC however is heavily populated by people who think E6 or 8a is pretty much living end and anyone climbing those grades is up there with the best. This has an effect of dumbing down everyones expectations, it reduces the level of when something becomes news and therefore the expectations of people in the sport.

With the exception of Steve McClure British sports climbing has not really moved on for 15 years whilst the number of participants has increased and the facilities have both increased in number and improved in standard. This can easily be written off by saying that everyone is into bouldering but whilst there has been a lot of bouldering only walls built the number of good quality lead walls has increased as well and therefore we would assume that participation has as well. We are also told that there is no funding available for young kids! Well sorry but this has always been the case and perhaps its due to the fact that most of the companies doing the funding are global and therefore base who they sponsor on globally significant ascents. So we have better facilities, more participants, it’s easier and cheaper to travel, knowledge of training is much better and more easily available, equipment is better, coaches are available at every wall etc. etc. etc. To me it leaves our low expectations as the key thing that’s holding us back, something that wasn’t an issue in the 80s and 90s when we had the best climbers in the world and therefore 90% of the news was about the cutting edge and it was in hard format so generally written with a bit more care and attention and in much less quantities.

I am not trying to be all doom and gloom as we do presently have a large pool of young climbers who look like they have what it takes to operate in the upper levels of the sport, what Shauna, Mina and now Michaela (see a trend of raised expectation) has done for women’s bouldering levels proves what is possible . But we and the media need to raise our expectations to help them get there.

I am sure a lot of people will think this is just a load of bollocks, so please just ignore it and don’t comment. If you disagree and can put points forward to counter or support my beliefs I would genuinely like to hear them. I have no objective with this it’s just something I have become interested in, mainly with management of teams at work, and am open to other people’s thoughts on the ideas.

I also wasn’t happy with how the thread about Jim Pope’s ascent had been perceived, as I think it was looked at by some, who I don’t think read the whole thread, as being some kind of put down on the lad which I can assure him it never was, well on my behalf anyway.

Sorry about the length of this but I don’t have a blog or anywhere to put it so here seemed a suitable place. I hope it’s of interest to others if not feel free to log pile.

*edit* as I lost it posting via iPad... Anyways.. I have no answers or direct comment, except this concept adds more than a little food for thought, which I find fascinating.... What the future holds.. Christ.. I have no idea! Looking forward to the Further UKB response
 :popcorn:
« Last Edit: October 03, 2014, 11:16:53 pm by fatdoc »

Johnny Brown

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The UK has a proud history of youths who place highly in european and world youth events who never quite cut it on the senior stage. Maybe the Pygmalion effect is why?

I don't think so. It's because at about the same time they get driving licences and then leave home. That means they can get stuck into real climbing (as in rock), and probably drink, drugs and girls too. Of the three british junior champs I climb with all have gone on to a full and varied climbing career, they just don't bother with comps.

I have made this point before, and on the other thread, but I think a big problem is the cliquey nature of the Sheffield scene, and the numbers of folk it sucks in. I'm sure Gav will dispute this, being a founder member of the School, but if you look at the UK's top sport climbers how many live and train in Sheffield? Gaining the respect of respected elders and peers is an achievement in itself and stymies further ambition. Performing well in training is seen as almost the ultimate - look at the respect and credibility given to Simpson for being good in the School. At the same time the scene tends to create a pecking order and folk seem to settle into their places. I'll add that the worst I've seen this was in Yorkshire, where nobody even tried the projects because Matt and Tim had, and if they couldn't do them you wouldn't be able to. So youths either get sucked in to competitive training with no outcome, or get rejected by the clique for not being strong enough (this is what I assumed Gav meant by overhyped initially).

The current best seem to be those who keep their distance and their focus.

Nibile

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competitive training with no outcome
Beautiful concept. I want it tattoed on my back.

Oldmanmatt

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I wrote something similar to JB.
About being an outsider to the Sheff scene in the early 90's.

Then deleted it because.

Wrote it again.

Deleted it again.

JB might have summed it.

I think if you want blame something for the lack of progress, then I would first point to the prevailing "Trad is the only real climbing" attitude of the Establishment (you can decide who they are). How many sport crags are there, Outside a certain radius of Sheff?

If you live in the SW, south of Bristol, three? And no low grade sport (when I take my kids I would usually drive to Portland so they can lead a 4/5).

Then there's the climate...

If there is a problem with the "community's" attitude, I would have thought it's a lack of support for hard sport outside of the scene up north.

Maybe it's far better accepted up there, but down here it's not.








Muenchener

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I suspect cliques and cliquiness may not be a uniquely British phenomenon.

Oldmanmatt

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My post came out way whinier than I'd intended.
I lived and climbed outside the UK most of my adult life and didn't really experience too much cliqueiness.
And I've been seriously disappointed with the prevailing attitude in this region since returning in 2008.

There are some great climbers here, but so many old codgers.
Oddly around my age and they have a big influence over their kids attitude.

There's nowt wrong with trad! It's just still the most important playing field in UK climbing and as long as that holds hard sport will be a minority activity.

Fiend

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Good thread, good replies, but as before it boils down to not having enough good sport climbing and not having enough dry weather. Move UK to Catalyuna and the standards would rise for sure.

Stu Littlefair

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Sorry fiend - i don't think that's right. We've got loads of good sport climbing, right up to the standard needed to be world class. I don't think it's quite the right style to make it easy for people to reach the magic grades, but the quality isn't an issue. And the weather in the UK is actually ideal for hard climbing. Try climbing 9a in Spain in the middle of summer.

Also, I don't recognise JBs characterisation of the sheffield scene. I think the sheffield scene has been quite detrimental, but more because of the amount to which power is idolised, rather than because of an obsession with training.

In fact, up to a few years ago, the Sheff scene was very anti-training. I still remember the reaction Jules got when she returned from Spain and started stamina training to a stopwatch. It was enough to make her feel very uncomfortable about doing it. Now of course, everyone's at the ancap and aerocap and - guess what - standards are going up. Not because everyone's stopped worshiping at the altar of training, but because they're doing the *right* training now.

In other parts of the UK, the trad fetish has been actively harmful, perhaps especially in the SW. It actually held back read standards for a while, since our best tradsters didn't have the sport chops for the hardest lines. John Dunne made this point pretty forcefully way back in the mid 90s at a Q&A at the Kendal film festival...

Will Hunt

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john Dunne made this point pretty forcefully way back in the mid 90s at a Q&A at the Kendal film festival...

Go on...

 

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