prosthetics lying around everywhere, guide dogs everywhere for the blind people.
It was like absolute chaos.
I've been climbing with an open wound across my belly button for the whole of this season.
Like, OK, if you're missing an arm, you feel like you can't represent the community,
then I'll do the podcast.
That's the only opportunity we get to climb a route that's been set for us,
which is one of the reasons I do it.
Welcome to another episode of the That's Not Real Climbing podcast.
I'm your host, Jinni, and I'm excited to introduce my guests, multiple for today,
Anita Aggarwal and Christiane Luttikhuizen.
Both Anita and Chris are para climbers who have competed in World Cups
as part of the RP3 sports class.
For those who aren't familiar, RP3 is a classification for limited reach, power or stability.
In this episode, we'll learn about what it's like climbing with a disability,
the difficulties dealing with classification and class merging,
whether or not the IFSC does a good job with accommodations
and the possibility of joining the Paralympics in LA at 2028.
Hope you enjoy this episode with Anita and Chris.
All right. So then I guess we can just get started.
How's everyone doing today?
Yeah, we've been looking forward to having a chat, something different at Christmas.
Yeah, this will come out in like a month-ish, but you were just out in Font, was it?
No, I was in Turkey. A couple of friends of mine went there.
It's a beautiful climbing area. I'd never been there before.
Climbed for three weeks and still sort of recovering.
But it was amazing.
I climbed so much. The last day I tried to climb the flight of Stair there, I was exhausted.
Yeah, it was a really good trip.
It was starting a new job in January and I had to climb up.
So it's a nice vacation for us.
Yeah, I didn't know there was climbing in Turkey. That's interesting.
Very 3D, two-class style. It's really cool.
And yeah, Anita, how are your holidays?
It's been all right, actually.
As an older 50-year-old who doesn't have any kids
and has one family member, my dad lives an hour away
in a small, light, old people's caravan on a field somewhere.
And then my mum lives in a one-bedroom flat another hour away in another direction.
It's not a viable sort of thing anymore.
So I rang my dad and I says on Christmas Day, I only just worked out it was Christmas yesterday.
So that's how not with it I've been.
I've been too busy climbing and socializing and completely forgot everything.
So my parents just don't celebrate it anymore.
So I'd quite happily have joined Christiana in her climbing.
Yeah, it seems to be the thing to do in the climbing world, go climbing, which is great.
I think sort of similar.
I think a lot of climbers end up just climbing on Christmas Day or over the holidays in general.
Yeah, I really like to do short bouldering session before I have to sit at the dinner table for six hours with my family.
So that helps quite a bit.
How about you?
I had a yeah, I had a well, no, I wouldn't say relaxing.
I would say exhausting.
I'm exhausted.
I need a break from my break, which happens a lot.
But, you know, life just keeps coming.
So there's really no break.
Getting back.
I'm looking forward to getting back into a routine and getting back into doing this podcast.
Had a little bit of a break, ready to start again.
So looking forward to that.
I did a little bit of climbing, but not too much.
What kind of climber are you?
I'm mostly boulder.
Just because I'm like, I like aging.
I'm starting to age.
So I need to like focus all of my effort on one thing, I think.
And so I'm focusing on competition bouldering, and that's all I'm focusing on.
But I actually did climb outside a little bit since I'm in Vegas right now.
But yeah, just a little bit of outdoor climbing.
I did ropes for the first time in like three years.
So it was OK.
So, yeah, just getting into the climbing bit.
How did you guys start climbing and get into it and what drew you to it?
Basically, in 2009, a local church got converted to a climbing wall.
Thought I'd go see what it was.
I was 35 at the time.
So quite late on in life, spent 19 years working and getting to that point where sport was just normal everyday stuff.
So I went and had a look and it was very, very new then.
There weren't very many climbing centers and stuff.
So I gave it a go.
And then life changed in 2009.
But generally just going to see what this climbing was like inside a church inside Derby, which is a hometown in the UK.
Nice.
I started climbing at least seven years ago when a bouldering gym opened in my hometown and a friend just dragged me there and I really liked it.
I used to play volleyball as well at the same time.
But then it ends every time we had to go to volleyball practice.
I just wanted to climb.
So I quit volleyball, started climbing more and more.
And then I found out that I was eligible for fair climbing in 2021 and I've been competing in RPC since then.
Yeah, in general, I just really like talking about fair climbing.
I really like the community.
It's great people. So yeah, excited for today.
And so, yeah, you're both in the RP3 category, which is for limited reach, power, stability.
So could you just explain that category a bit for the people who aren't super familiar?
And if you also don't mind sharing, what is your disability?
Sure.
If you want, I can give you a brief overview of all the categories and sort of how it goes with classification.
And very broadly speaking, there are three categories.
B for blind, A for amputees, and RP for limited range of power and mobility.
And then every category is subdivided into how severe the environment is.
So there's B1, B2, and B3.
In B1, people are fully blind, and in B3, people have a little bit of eyesight left.
For the amputation categories, there's AU for amputee at the upper limb, and AL for amputee at the lower limb.
And again, one is more severely impaired and the two or three are less impaired.
AL1 is people that cannot use their legs at all.
So usually it's people that do have their legs but they're paralyzed.
They can't do everything, and it's really, really cool to watch.
There's this Austrian guy in the campus, and he's plus, I think.
The level is super high. It's really, really awesome.
And then AL2 is for people that don't have use of one leg.
So often it's an amputation either above the knee or below the knee is one category.
People can choose to wear a prosthetic, but they don't have to.
And then for the AU, amputee at the upper limb,
we used to have AU1, so people that couldn't use one arm at all.
But last year a new category got added, so one had to go.
Which means that now we have AU2 for people that miss their arm, but they do have an elbow.
And AU3 for people that do have a wrist, but they miss some fingers.
So that's the amputation categories.
And for every category, you could say, oh, the level is so high and it's so amazing to watch.
Yeah, I don't know. There's men with one leg all-siding 8a.
There's women with one arm climbing 7b.
I don't know. I'm just always so impressed by it.
Anyways, that was Anita and me. We're in RP3.
RP is a very diverse group of impairments and disabilities.
Again, RP1 is the most impaired and RP2 and 3 are less than barely impaired.
I have cerebral palsy, which means I was born with some mild brain damage.
It affects the strength and coordination on the whole left side of my body.
So my strength is about 25% less than on the right side,
which means that on the right side it's an easy lock off. On the left, I just crash.
I have spasm in my foot, so it's quite hard to coordinate it onto a hold.
My ankle and hip mobility is a bit limited and my left foot is quite weak,
so I can't push off from one toe or from my toes,
which means it's really hard to put pressure on holds.
And because my ankle ability is limited, I can't bring my heel down.
Standing on volumes or small feet is quite tricky for me.
Because RP is such a broad category, I have cerebral palsy,
and it is not affecting me that much.
If it was more severe, I could be in RP2 or RP1.
We see people with neuromuscular diseases,
MS, cerebral palsy, spasticity, genetic,
anything that influences you neurologically or ideologically.
People that have car accidents, joint replacements, that really impair mobility.
So it can be a lot of things.
And it makes it really fun to compete in RP because there are so many different bodies and different people.
You were just making me think.
So to the audience, I'm going to speak about before and after how the competitions worked for climbing.
So when I actually first got classified back in 2017, I was actually clashed into RP2,
which was middle of disability.
And I was clashed at 7.30 in the morning when I struggled to walk and even process completely,
because multiple sclerosis means multiple scars.
So I've got three scars in my head and two in my spine.
And that's kind of severed the communication and the response time of how my limbs operate and move.
And then basically, I believe in 2019, when the able-bodied joined the Olympics,
what it actually did is it tripped out classification for us.
We were triggered into being checked to see what our disabilities were like.
So I started off in RP2.
What happens is when we don't have enough people in the class, we get merged.
And at the time, I'm just looking at a map at the moment.
If I was in RP2 and there wasn't enough upper amputees, I would be merged with them
because they merge into my category, which back in 2017 happened a lot.
My common competitor was Maureen Beck, which was brilliant for me, but there were so many...
there weren't very many armless and legless female at the time.
And then in 2021, when I went to the Moscow World Championships,
was the first time I got classified in the new classification system.
And because it became more in line with the Olympic classification,
which meant that your impairment had to be more severe,
not only myself, but the rest of the RPs in the GB team all got moved into RP3
where Christina is... or Chris is, sorry, because I might get your name wrong.
So that means that now I will never compete against the AU amputees if categories emerged.
I now compete with the legless.
So when you're looking at the RP category, RP3 is the weakest of your discipline.
But if there wasn't enough legless female in their sports class, they get merged with RP3.
Like, how did they decide that it would get merged with, I guess, amputees?
Because that seems like quite different.
Yeah, well, I'm just looking at the map. At the moment, you need...
Say you need four people to run the category.
And you've got B1 and only three people turn up. So B1 goes into B2.
And there's one person in B2 that makes four, they run on their own.
And I also look at the level.
So in general, the women with one arm climb more or less the same level as RP2 women.
And the women with one leg climb more or less the same level as RP3 women.
So that's why I think that's sort of how they decide on merging.
And I mean, merging is never fair, but it's better than no composition.
So that's why it's fair.
Well, this is it. This is it.
Back in 2017 when there was very few female climbers in legless and armless,
and there was only Pavitra who was the campus.
In RP2, I was getting merged with Ava, who is one of Chris's teammates,
which made it a lot more difficult for Ava to win over people who had moving legs because we were stronger.
Now I've been moved into RP3.
I agree with Chris that we're all of a similar impairment,
but it gives people who are in wheelchairs the ability to compete against people who should be competing against.
They've made the sport has become better because there's so many more athletes in it.
And hopefully that will grow.
So if you don't have enough of a category, then they actually kind of end up in the category that mean Chris are in,
which is we get to compete against lots of different disabilities.
It could be legless. It could be fingerless.
But you will never get any of the B category compete with any other discipline other than B.
So it's quite interesting how our class works.
And it's quite fun to not know who you're going to compete against until the final comes up.
And then you realize that you're competing against.
And I think it's the same because both of our impairments are invisible.
My weakness is down my left hand side.
I can't really feel my left hand and my left foot.
And I can't do what are known as pistol squats or I can't rock over my knee over my left foot.
And if there's no foot hold on the wall, I can't physically push.
I'm absolutely screwed if the if the root goes to the right and there's no left foot hold.
I can't climb that that particular section.
It needs more education, but it is brilliant because we don't know we could end up with legless or or handless people in our category.
And what's the reason why the B category would never be combined?
Is it just they climb at a different level?
No, the bees get combined with the bees themselves.
So B1 goes into B2 and B2 goes into B3.
But only the physically impaired, the legless and the armless get merged into our P, which is why we need more female armless and legless.
On the female side, there's less on the men's side.
There's loads like AU3 was fingerless.
This is called a digit and you need seven digits to now make the new category.
So there's loads of there's loads of people out there that got fingers missing.
But if across two hands, if they've got seven digits missing, so that makes six.
Those two on the top of the thumbs gone, it now makes you a disabled climber and you can come and get involved in power climbing.
Very specific. Yeah.
Maybe that's a good segue into classification.
I think for a lot of people, it's really new how that works a lot.
And I think the last time I checked the classification document was a hundred fifty three pages.
I think there is no way to summarize it.
But I can give my own classification as an example.
But first, I'd like to what Anita said, you need to miss seven digits.
You'd say, well, OK, that's easy. You just count the digits and then you're done.
But actually for a lot of people with congenital limb deficiencies, it's not that you're born missing seven digits.
You're like the entire bone structure of your hand is different.
So it sounds really simple.
It's a couple of fingers and you're in AU3.
But even there, it can be so tricky that people don't even know exactly what digits they have and don't have.
So the classifiers, it's really a challenge for them.
And like Anita said, the classification system changed a couple of years ago when Paraclimbing could potentially make a bid for the Olympics.
So they had to really redevelop the classification system.
I've never been classified under the old system.
So my first classification was in 2021 and how the process goes, there are ISSD classifiers, there are traditions or doctors.
There are some forms of medical background and they are trained by the ISSD.
And so what they do is apply the classification rules.
In my case, I have less mobility and strength and coordination and it's bothering my foot.
But they only look at one of those to score you the points, basically.
So what they do, they put you on the bench for bench testing and then you just measure the angle of your joints, for example, to look at mobility.
And then they have this point system that says, all right, if your joint doesn't move at all, you get six points.
If your hip joint has this many degrees of range of motion, you get, I don't know, four points.
If it's this range of motion, you get three points.
And then at the end, they just add everything up, you get a score and then you need six points for RP3 and 18 points for RP2.
So that's how they can put you in the category.
Yeah, that's my experience in classification.
And I think the new system is quite a bit more strict.
They implemented it first in 2021 and that was really sort of a test year.
They're like, OK, we think that this is a good system, but you know, you write everything down and it's so hard to say, like, how many, how do you even compare the mobility that you have in joint to people with spasticity?
And I don't know, it's so hard to make a good system.
So they tested the system and now every year they're up there.
So every year they see something on the wall or say, OK, we put this person in RP3.
But actually, we think that this mobility loss that they have in their ankle joints should give them more or less points because it really, they're climbing more or less than we thought.
So the classifiers watch all the competitions and then they use that input to update and improve the classification system.
So can you get reclassified in the middle of like a season when you're climbing?
Absolutely, absolutely.
Yeah, I don't think it's what anyone wants, but it does happen.
So first they do the bench testing.
So one classification moments, it's always before the competition, usually two or three days before.
So they do all the bench testing and then they will also watch you in your qualifying rooms just to make sure that what they've seen in the bench tests is the same as what they see in the wall.
And then they will probably also watch your finals.
And then if there's another competition and they really feel like this is not what we saw in previous competitions or it just looks so different, then they might reclassify you.
But in general, after a classification, you get either you're concerned, so I mean, some people still clear, your legs and say that you're concerned, well, too.
But for most of the RP, because at least you get a review date might be next year or it might be a couple of years from now.
But yeah, like Anika said, you can be classified within the season, but it's not common.
It's definitely an issue at the moment.
So the way it worked for me is I turned up at the first World Championships in 2021 in Moscow.
It's the first year that the GB were allowed outside the country after Covid.
So we all went out to the World Championships having not competed all year in any World Cup.
And my classification went, it's the very first time they're going to classify me.
And I didn't know what to do, so I didn't speak in my classification because I didn't know I was allowed to.
And they said, we don't know what your impairment is.
So the following day I had to go to effectively an indoor football arena and climb an artificial wall.
And they basically just asked me to push off my legs and catch a hold above my head that I couldn't reach from doing it static.
Well, I'm quite a strong upper body climber, so I just grabbed the hold.
I didn't have any sort of barriers to grabbing those holds.
And the exercises that they put me through didn't make any sense to me.
So they then said, I don't know.
I still don't know what your classification is.
So I now want you to climb in the qualifications of the World Cup and we'll tell you if you are classifiable.
So I nearly fell off the first climb.
I ended up falling and just landed on three fingers.
And then on the second climb with my neurological side, which you can't validate or classify, I actually completely forgot what I was doing.
So I fell off like the 10th black hold, A, because I was more stressed about getting classified because I was in the qualification.
And I came off the wall and I had to wait at least the rest of that day to find out if I was classifiable.
By that time, I'd basically not managed to make it to the final.
And then they said, yes, you're classifiable, but now you need to get classified again next year.
So I got classified again in 2022.
And then I got classified again this year.
And this year was the only year that they gave me a classification for more than one year.
So now I can relax next year and I can just focus on training and competing and not stressing about paying all that money to go to an event, not knowing if I'm going to compete or not.
Because our events as well in our team or in our country, everything's self-funded.
So when you want to join this level, you're kind of sort of saying, okay, I've made the team.
Now I've got to save the money to get there, to get classifiable.
And you can quite easily get unclassed.
I'm sure Chris might know there's people that have been unclassed and it's really stressful for them.
And then they're, you don't know what to do because you're trying to support your own classification as well as dealing with the issues of the community and how minute these little classification gradients are that can just make somebody go in or go out.
I haven't had a complete failure at a World Cup for classification, but Chris has. So from even just from the first phase of do you get classified, it's really stressful.
Because until you know you're classifiable each year, you've got to go through all that stress.
But armless and legless, they're confirmed.
You still have to send in strange paperwork like, can you prove that you've got your leg missing?
I send you a photo. That's not good enough.
I need an x-ray.
And we're like, it's not going to grow back.
But they still have to go through the same process and the same medical and go through the same part of going, yes, your leg's missing.
But like what's, I'd ask Chris, what was it like to get re-classified?
I don't know if I could do that in the same same day.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So far it's been more stressful every year. So my impairment really is on the minimal side.
You need six points to be an Rb3. And so far I've always scored six or seven points, which also feels weird to sort of hope that you're just disabled enough to be able to compete.
That's kind of a weird feeling.
So I've been classified the past three years and I'm re-classified again next year.
As I said, classification is always two or three days before the event because then they can also watch in qualifications and that's just where everyone gathers.
But for me, it means that every year I have to train for a whole year.
I have to drive or fly out to the first most couple of years and they tell me if I can compete for another year or if I'm out forever.
There's no in-between and it's really, really stressful.
I do like to highlight the classifier in an IFC perspective as well.
I mean, they're testing and trying to improve the system.
And at some point it will just be set and sort of, yeah, if they finish developing the classification system, everyone's just classified and then they're confirmed.
But now because it's such a borderline case, they need to classify me every year.
And the way I try to see it is that I don't want to be in a competition if I don't belong there.
So if at some point they decide, well, yeah, of course, we see that you have an environment that's just not enough, like same as missing one finger would not be enough.
So it does not mean there's no climbing, but it's not enough to compete.
And if they decide that for me, it would be, of course, a small personal tragedy, but it would be good for a sport because they're just trying to help the sport forward and just keep the competition and the categories as such.
And the categories as fair as they can.
So that's how I try to see it.
But of course, last year was pretty terrible.
We had the first work of the year with an Innsbruck.
There is always one competition before in Southlake City in the US, but it's really expensive to go there.
And I know that I'm being classified, so I don't want to fly out to the US and then sort of have the risk of not being able to compete.
I don't want to take that risk. So I went to a competition in Innsbruck in Austria.
And then the competition started on Monday.
I was classified on Saturday and then two IFC classifiers told me, yeah, we're really sorry, but this is not enough.
You know, it's going off points.
So you're not eligible, but you can always ask for a second panel of classifiers, so two different classifiers.
So we said, OK, well, for sure, we mean we're here.
We might as well. And then they did the measurements.
Of course, it's the same measurements, but they just measured the angles of the joints and everything slightly differently.
And then I was in. And if one panel says yes and one panel says no, then you can compete.
But I think they told me Sunday around 5 in the afternoon that I was allowed to compete.
And then the competition started Monday morning at 9. Yeah, it wasn't my best come.
It's very stressful. So like the process of getting classified, does that happen on the wall like the the clients for regular qualifications?
No, it is the simplest answer, I think.
So in Innsbruck, if anybody knows the Innsbruck wall, you've got the big outside wall, which is where we had the qualifications in the final.
But the actual classification, like the sports medical, as it's known, was actually done inside and the clitoris centrum on the straight walls.
So it's not the angle of the wall that's the issue.
I think the one thing I try and do when I explain it to my clients is you need to physically be able to show your impairment on the wall while you are climbing.
If the classifiers cannot see your impairment, then they don't know how to how to grade you.
So with my MS, my MS fluctuates.
So when I look at RP each year, my MS can be up and down so I can fluctuate in whichever one, two or three I'm going to end up in,
depending on whether I have a relapse.
And thank God I haven't had a major relapse.
So I've just got healthier as my body's recovered and I've ended up in RP3.
But when I was originally diagnosed when I was 36, and I didn't start competing until I was 43.
So I got classified at 43 and then they put me in RP2.
So my impairment is a condition that affects my health on a daily basis.
So from one day to the next, I might request a reclassification because my health fluctuates up and down the scale, whereas some people can have a fixed disability.
I don't understand that because my health fluctuates up and down.
So I'm kind of just waiting for me.
If RP3 gets too more specific in the classification, I fear that I will get kicked out because I don't see how my impairment affects my climbing.
And yet the classifiers can definitively see my impairment.
I just climb the way I climb because that's how I am.
I don't know how my body moves any differently to anybody else.
I'm just heavily focused on the right hand side.
Set me a left moving climb and I find it really difficult to do it.
So do you have to kind of hope on classification day that you're like feeling worse or that you're just like not performing well so you can be classified properly?
Well, the difficulty with me is it's not just another day of classification and it's not just another day of having a sports class.
I have a limited amount of physical energy because of my fatigue system.
So the stress of getting classified on the Saturday and then having to do a sports climb on the Sunday to be in isolation at six o'clock on a Monday to then climb that competition means that I will do less well at qualifications because I'm really fatigued.
And then even if I finish the qualifications and I make the final, which is the Tuesday, in this example we're talking about, I sleep all day on Tuesday.
I can't physically do anything else.
I've got to sleep to let my body recover and hope that my body is ready to climb again on the evening of the following day.
So the length of the competition and the day that you actually get classified and the additional climbing that you have to do has a big impact on how well I could make a final or a qualification.
And it's something I wanted to point out because I think unless you have this debilitating condition that flares up throughout the course of the competition, I could be an RP3 in a qualification and end up as an RP2 in the final because I can't physically climb anymore because my MS has stopped my legs and my arms from working on that particular day.
So if anybody said to me, would you change a two-day competition to a one-day competition? I'd say no.
Because I think we have a three-day, don't we? We have a classification, then we have a qualification, and then we have a final day.
So our finals are always on a different day.
But there is potential for them to run the qualifications in the final all in the same day.
For me, that just means I'm going to be really bad in the final, but that's kind of just the way that the sport is going is that if they've got to compress everything into a day, bearing in mind I've got to take medical medicine,
I've got to make sure that I have all of the rest of the energy that I need around my medical system as well.
So in RP, there's not necessarily just you have a condition that affects your skeletal system.
I'm in the bracket of my medicine affects whether I can even attend a competition.
So in Moscow, we had a teammate that couldn't go to the World Cup in Moscow because one of their medicine was banned in Russia, which meant they weren't allowed to complete full stop.
So your medical additional medical requirements around what tablets you take for pain or ataxia or neurological or brain injury, whatever it is, we have to also consider, I know it deviated a little bit, but yeah, just your recovery system to be able to climb again has a big impact on my personal planet.
And that's difficult because that's a problem that's kind of specific to you.
Like that's not something that happens to everyone in the category.
So it's just like, I think there's a lot.
I think when if you look to RP across the range and you're looking at people that have like muscular dystrophy or whatever, maybe Chris can explain, but there's probably only so much energy that my teammates have because we have quite a few people in wheelchairs now.
And just pushing a wheelchair and doing all the moving around and everything.
We can't just recover as fast as you could.
I no longer can go to bed or wake up the following day and be able to walk downstairs.
So, but yeah, I think we have had in the past in 2019 when a lot of the Americans came over, they had a big, big group of athletes that came over.
And one of their issues was that their medical requirements around the day of the competition, because if you've got to be in isolation at six o'clock and you don't take your meds till seven, if it takes you three hours to get out of bed like me, then I'm up at three o'clock in the morning just to be able to go in isolation at six to be able to make my body work and function, be able to hold climbs and coordinate.
But that's just how my body works. But there are people that have not only a choice to make on whether they can climb at this level, whether they then their medical requirements fit in with the system of traveling around the world and competing as well, because your medicine might ban you from a competition.
Have you ever needed to just like fully pull out of a competition day of or?
Stubbornly, no. I think I don't know what those power climbers are like, Chris, but last year, the day before my qualification, I met a new international athlete that had MS from Brazil, Marina.
And I saw her and I ran over to her and sat on the bench in front of her and it toppled over because I hadn't got my balance and I squashed my thumb and I crushed it and I crushed the whole top of my thumb.
And I still climbed, I still climbed the qualifications because I just went, I'm a power climber. I've just got a thumb missing. I'm just going to climb it.
Well, to clarify, you broke your thumb. You broke it, right?
I completely broke the top of the thumb. I crushed the top of it and I was climbing, climbing with like a crag glove. We tight it up like it was a crag climbing glove because I couldn't physically bend it.
So I was basically climbing with four fingers. And this year, I don't mind explaining, but I've been climbing with an open wound across my belly button for the whole of this season due to a big operation in January.
And I couldn't fall on the harness because it could rip more, but there was never any decision on whether I would compete this year.
My only requirement was, could I get to Innsbruck to get classified? Yes, I could. Right. I'm going to burn. I'm just going to enjoy it.
And I just, it's just part of how my recovery system works because climbing is my physio. So whether I've got a broken thumb or whether I've got an open wound on my belly, I just like, just don't pull the rope in too tight.
You'll let me free climb so it doesn't feel like I'm being pulled at all. But you do find that athletes climbing full body harnesses because of some of these systems, if they're tube fed and stuff like that,
then they can't wear a waist harness because it's right where the tube is here, where they actually tube feed.
And I know some clients and some athletes that have these systems or have had them in the past where they've been tube fed from the belly.
So they can't climb with waist harness, but they'll still go and compete, which I think is amazing to see the level of how good our sport is to people with disabilities and impairments.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I think your experience is a really good example of everyone's individual experience.
I mean, for me personally, my environment doesn't really affect me in daily life. It doesn't affect my health. I don't really have any medical requirements, but a lot of people do.
And they have to really manage their energy and their health. And I think it's also one of the big differences with regular competitions that for, I mean, you wouldn't go to a regular World Cup if you weren't healthy,
if you were sick. Because for a lot of climbers, I mean, 100% healthy is just they won't, a lot of climbers, they just won't get there.
Forgotten to tell you about my teammate, Ava. She sort of has a habit of before every World Championships, she gets hospitalized.
And I think both in Bern and two years before, she was at the hospital for 10 days or so, and then she went to the World Championships and placed second.
But yeah, there are a lot of climbers who need to sort of manage their health as well, next to training and the logistics of the competition.
You don't really think about what else is going on in their lives while you're watching. So it's interesting to hear the stories behind it, because you kind of just like don't really think about it.
I mean, you just see them perform and maybe, I don't know, it's weird as a viewer. It's just like, it's not something.
Yeah, and especially in RP, I think often it's quite hard to see what someone's impairment or disability is.
People watch me climb there, they say, well, what do you have? Like, what's your impairment? Because I don't see anything.
And there are also quite a lot of climbers who move better on the wall than off the wall. So if you see them climbing, you wouldn't need to see that much.
But then you see that they're in a wheelchair. Like, you wouldn't know if you just saw them climbing.
As for me, I mean, it goes both ways, right? I've been in gyms with my Dutch team clothing, like the Dutch flag on your back.
And I'm climbing and I heard people say, well, if that's the level of the Dutch team, we could be on there. You know, people don't say it.
And I understand it. I don't really mind. It's kind of funny.
Yeah, I think it's good to talk more about paragliding and to highlight that everybody's the same.
Yeah. And I guess talking about the team, how did you specifically find paragliding, I guess, at the national level? Was it easy to get into?
Do most countries have a prominent paragliding team or division or someone to reach out to?
Basically for GB, at grassroots, it's not very, very common at the moment for people to be aware that paragliding exists.
They're still not quite sure what that even means. We've had a change in how the competition seasons run.
So unfortunately, the numbers have gone down, which means that we have less events to attend for next year.
And it's all, it's basically all world of math. There's some push to try and go through social media.
But I think it's just a case of you find out about it and then like me, I try and advocate to try and promote the visibility of this sport,
especially if it makes the Olympics. It means that there could be more funding, but then more people could come and try the sport because they'll see it.
But there's not a lot of advertisement or any sort of communication to know about it.
I mean, I got diagnosed with MS in 2009. It took me to 2016 to realise there was actually a place I could go and see other people like myself.
But paragliding, I think for GB, has been going on since 2012. So I lost four years just by not even knowing it existed.
What's it like in Holland? Well, I can share my story of how I got into paragliding.
In 2020, I travelled around a bit with the van that I had back then and my climbing level increased quite a bit.
And I just noticed, well, a little more background. I didn't know that I had this impairment.
I knew that my left ankle was quite stiff, that I didn't move as I should.
And I suspected that my left side was less strong and coordinated, but I didn't know for sure. And it doesn't impair me in daily life.
So I just didn't pay attention to it.
And then I went on this climbing trip and as I progressed through the levels, I was like, wait, other people are making this field look so easy.
And I just can't, I just like, I physically cannot do it. What's going on?
So when I came back, I was a physiotherapist for something else, not on my knees.
And then we were talking about a paraglider who is now my teammate.
And then I sort of jokingly said, oh, do you think I could be on the team, you know, with my ankle on my left side that's a bit weaker?
It was a joke, but then he looked at me and he said, well, yeah, maybe you could actually.
So I sent an email to the team and you could just Google the email address, send an email. And then a year later I was at my first World Cup.
That's sort of how it went.
How long did you climb before you knew that you had, I guess, a disability?
Three years. Yeah. And I also, I always did regular sports and I mean, I was never the most talented.
I used to think of myself as just a really clumsy person.
And I've come to realize it's actually the other way around for what I have, which is very well developed, like in terms of control and physical ability.
But also you can only, you only know how you exist in your own body.
So I thought that this is what it feels like to be left and right handed.
It's like, oh, I'm right handed. So of course my left side feels like this, but it comes to realize that it doesn't feel like that for other people.
I just thought it was.
Was it kind of like a relief to find out?
Not really. It's taken a long time for me to say, yeah, I have an impairment.
I find it hard to call myself disabled because I am not disabled in daily life in any way.
But the first year when I was competing, I got the diagnosis cerebral palsy, I don't know, two or three months before the first competition, because you need to have an underlying impairment.
You cannot say, oh, I don't stretch enough. So I can't lift my shoulders above my head. So I'm a paraclomer.
There needs to be a condition lying underneath.
And I didn't know mine. So I saw a neurologist and they told me I have CP.
And it was really weird, actually. It was definitely a bit of a small identity crisis thing.
Well, it wasn't so bad. But during my first competition on the livestream, they always asked, can we share your impairment?
And I was like, well, half of my family doesn't even know. I don't think I want to see Lisa on the livestream.
So I had first year I wasn't so open about it. And then next year is, yeah, now I don't, I don't think I can go to be able to compete and have these experiences.
And I think we had talked about this a little bit earlier. So Paraclimbing is still a little bit new.
When did it start and how has it progressed since then?
I looked into this a little bit for you. It looks like it started around 2009, 2010. So it's a really, really new sport.
It's only been going 13 years. So we're trying to get at the Olympics.
And at the time, the way the competition ran, you can go to a website called Paraclimbing.org
and it's got all the links to all the videos for every year that there's ever been anything put on social media.
So when you go to Paraclimbing.org and you go back through the calendars, we've written and you can see for next year as well,
we write the calendar of what's coming up. We put a link to all the videos and the photos publication.
So when I looked back in, I think it was 2009 or 2010, they had speed Paraclimbing,
which was just random holds on a vertical wall and any discipline and competed against anybody. And I thought that was bizarre.
In my nationals back when I think I started in 2016, we had bouldering on ropes.
We had a top rope at the top of a boulder. We had that as part of our nationals.
And then going back to the calendar, I think it's 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2021 and this year.
So you can go back and again, look through Paraclimbing.org and you can see all the live streams that have been uploaded and linked to it.
But yeah, it's like 13 years old. And if we consider, was it 2017? That's when you started.
2020 was when we really got classified. It's three years old at this level of impairment. It's only three years old.
And so when did they decide to just do, I guess, rope courses?
When the able-bodied team were picked for the Olympics. I think that's when we were stuck on ropes, but international level, sorry,
we're only allowed to climb on twin ropes, which is two top ropes coming down. We're not allowed to lead climb.
We're hoping they're going to let us lead climb in the future and we would love to try bouldering, but it's only at your local national level.
They can choose to change how their national competition runs. So if USA want to put bouldering in, they can.
If they want to put speed in, they can. It's up to the federation to choose. In UK, we only follow IFSC.
So if IFSC changed, I think our national will change. But pre-2017, we had bouldering as well as ropes in the UK.
Is that something that you guys want to do? Like you want to see bouldering and speed in the international level?
Oh, I would love bouldering. There's no rope climbing in the city where I live, so I train bouldering quite a lot.
I really like it. I don't know if this is true, but I suspect that they chose for the top rope system that we have because everyone can top rope safely.
So how it works is you have the wall. Normally there's one top rope at the top, but if you fell low down, you would swing into the crowd and everything.
So they put a second top rope halfway, which means that if you fall low down, that top rope catches you.
And not everyone can fall safely, so not everyone can safely take a big leadfall.
And of course, for example, the blind climbers, I think they will lead in their free time, but in a competition, it's a little bit unfair to ask them to lock off and look for a quick draw.
Same for people with one arm, like if it's a tough hold for you to hold and then you have to clip from there, that's just a bit unfair maybe.
Same for bouldering, not everyone can take falls safely. So I think that's why they chose the top rope system.
But if bara bouldering is a thing, I'm there at every competition, every competition, I'll show up.
I'm the same because with my impairment, I can't walk down the street, I can't run, I can't cycle a bike, but I can climb vertically a lot better than I can walk.
And I prefer bouldering because I can do short climbs and have a crash pad.
Whereas I'm not very good at trying to climb in a multi-pitch because that's just not how my condition lets me climb.
I struggle to find because I am disabled in the sense that I don't work apart from the climbing coach.
I'm free most of the day, Monday to Friday, and there's not a lot of other people that are, so I boulder.
And then I only go on ropes like I think quite a lot of us do. I think we boulder more than we...
So I'd like bouldering in the World Cups as well.
Yeah, that'd be cool to see. But yeah, I guess it could be a safety concern depending on the category.
Yeah, you'd probably need a rope system.
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Back to the show. How many routes are set for Paraclimbing events?
And sometimes they're like shared between categories, correct?
Yes, exactly. Yeah. In general, I'd say they set four or five routes for classification and four Paraclimbs finals.
And then our B3 women often shares with B2 or B3, so one for blind categories,
the women with one leg, women with one arm, so A01, A02, and then maybe some others as well.
Which means it's for the route setters. I talked to a route setter who sets for nationals.
And he said, yeah, so you want to make a route that is if you share it with the campus guys,
it needs to be you need to be able to campus every move.
Then if people are blind, you need to make sure that it's you can lock off every move and look for the next hold.
Well, that's relatively easy. But then it needs to be fair if you miss your left leg or your right leg.
And it needs to be fair if you miss your left arm or your right arm.
I think what they usually try to do is sort of set a intermediate sort of they choose a point in the route where they expect, OK,
we expect the women with one arm to climb more or less until here.
So after that, we can make it a little bit harder and doesn't need to be so equal anymore if you miss an arm.
They try to create separation in the first half of the route, for example, for the A02 women and then the second part for the A02 women.
And then the last part, that's where they expect the P3 to sort of decide the competition.
I think they usually play that quite well.
It means for our P3, because I think to look at the women, our level is more or less the highest, I'd say.
It means that our competitions, you're expected to climb to the headwall if you make finals.
And the comp is decided in four or five moves, like the last four or five moves with the route.
They really expect you to climb until there. And then it gets hard for your category.
I mean, it's hard for, but then it gets really hard.
And for my environments, for example, my left side powers up.
So for me, if the crux was at the beginning, then it would get easier.
It would be way better for me.
And now it's like my left side is completely powered up and then the route gets hard.
So for me, it's not even ideal, actually, but that's how they combine the routes.
And then they set four or five usually, and then they look at the level.
So different kind of climbing standards.
So I think they can have up to eight routes during qualifications.
So they had eight routes in Innsbruck, four on the back and four on the front,
because they've got so many athletes to get through, but they can't have any more than eight.
I think in Moscow in the World Champs, they only had six because they're in that stupid little corner.
I don't know if you were there, Chris.
You're in Moscow. Okay.
So you were in a little corner, so they only had one, two, three, four routes.
And then at the moment, they only allow us four lines at Bern World Championships.
So we had one on the speed wall, I think, and then you guys were on the head wall.
They can't put any more lines on.
We've got 200 athletes competing today.
If we grow even more like we hoped to, then the IFSC would look into, do we have finals over two days?
So would you do qualification and final for RP3?
So that would impair my energy levels.
And then do it again on the second day, because someone like Matt Groom currently has to speak for like six hours continually,
because we would be going into finals at six in the morning.
No, it's in the evenings normally.
We start our finals in the evenings.
I've been in finals at 10, 11 o'clock at night and been stuck at isolation at five o'clock in the afternoon.
And I'm stuck in isolation for five hours because of the live stream.
So all of our stuff is available on IFSC YouTube.
So we're getting to a point where we either want more lines so we can run more categories in the final.
The downside is at the moment is that if we have two or more sports classes in the final,
at the moment Matt Groom can do a split live screen.
So he can talk about this person who's legless and this person that's RP.
We did have in the Brionson 2019 World Championships, we had a quad.
He had four finalists on at the same time.
He couldn't commentate with Seb because the audience can't tell which person they're looking at.
So if we have more than two people on the live stream, we now need more routes
because we're getting that good at climbing that you can't just keep multiple people on the same line,
but also reduce the length of the live stream because six hours is a nightmare.
But for us, that would be good because then they wouldn't be necessarily putting an AEU and a blind on an RP route
because you don't want to fall off halfway if that's where they are expecting the arm amputees to fall off
because they want to climb to the top.
So why can't they have a full route?
But I think that's just the progression of us growing so much.
When I first started in 2017, there were only 96 para-athletes.
I think there was, was it 200 at Byrne or something?
Which meant that because we're growing, at the moment, our RP3 final is only four athletes.
If we grow and grow and grow, that number gets bigger and bigger and bigger.
That means our final gets longer and longer and longer.
So behind the scenes, there's a lot of how quick can we get through this many athletes?
And it's quite strange because obviously in male and female competition climbing,
they've only got qualifications in the final where the root setters have got eight qualification routes
and then four finals.
And then we have up to 20 sports podiums, 10 male and 10 female.
That's 20 podiums.
60 athletes have to be announced and compete.
That's a lot more than just having six for the seniors and the females.
So our days were a lot longer.
Hopefully it'll grow.
Hopefully they'll come up with a better way of running a final because it is a very long day.
Would you prefer if they had just fewer categories and stricter guidelines for who can be a part of it?
Oh, I wanted to say because in the case of you, it'll kick me out.
So no, I don't want to say.
So I don't know what the solution is, but yeah.
I think now this is running into some logistical issues.
Like Anita touched on, normally you have six athletes in finals in burn.
It was at 70 or 80.
And first time I see isolation.
It's 60, 70 people sitting there with coaches and then people with impairments.
There are a lot of wheelchairs prosthetics lying around everywhere, guide dogs everywhere for the blind people.
It's like absolute chaos.
It's really hard.
Can be really hard to warm up as well because 70 people want to warm up at the same time.
And there's like one small ballroom wall usually to warm up on.
So yeah, it's really good that sports is growing.
And I'm also really curious how they will manage the logistics.
At the moment, we have 10 sports classes.
So three blind, two legless, two armless and three RPs.
Times male and female, that's 20 different kind of routes that have to be in a route setters head and then merged into four lines for the final.
So what's really, really good is our route setters are learning and they have progressed a lot since we first started.
But our ability to climb and I did want to point out that we can climb the same route as a male and female.
There's no difference.
There's no age in para climbing.
So as long as you're 16, you will compete against a 50 or 60 year old.
And the route setters, they're constantly involving and learning how to route set because we're getting a lot better.
So I think it'll always be 10 sports classes.
They can't have any more.
I think that's set by the IFC, which means that if we have a new category come in like AU3, which is fingers, then AU1, which was paralyzed or missing full arm is merged into an RP.
That's a little bit unfair.
But I think like any sport, any para sport, we have so many categories. They've got to whittle down how much they can get through in a three or four day competition.
And rightly so with the isolation bit, which is hilarious.
I don't know if you've experienced this yet, Chris.
In 2018 in Innsbruck in the World Championships, the seniors and the para climbers were in isolation at the same time.
It was one of the best isolations for finals I've been in because Alex Pucho and Sean McCall were playing pool while I was sitting down underneath the pool table.
So the paras were merged in at the same time.
So we have like, say, 40 athletes with 12 seniors.
And we only had a small bouldering wall with no rope.
And there was nowhere for us to actually warm up.
So someone that's in a wheelchair might not warm up in isolation because they can't get on the bouldering wall.
There's still how do they look after the athletes from a warming up point of view.
It's a lot harder for us to be able to do it.
But yeah, it can only get better.
That's what I'm looking forward to seeing the changes.
Yeah. So do you feel like in terms of venues, the IFSC has been accommodating so far?
Good question.
It depends. If I was honest, and I've not been, so I can't tell you, but because my condition is physically moving around the venue,
Villars were having a brand new competition next year called the European Championships.
It's a brand new event for Paraclimbers.
And it's at Villars in Austria. It's the hilliest, mountainistic, up and down thing you could find.
I've never been, so I don't know. I just heard from teammates.
But pushing a wheelchair and walking around on crutches, it's not the best venue.
But we have no other options.
We've only got Salt Lake City, Innsbruck, Villars that currently hold yearly competitions.
There's no other places I can think of that actually hold World Cups at the moment.
You're right. And from the organizer point of view, I mean, they're almost, well, I probably shouldn't say this,
they're almost doing us a favor, right?
Because it's so much more work to organize for a lot less exposure for the organizer.
So I think, yeah, I'm personally really happy people are organized for Paraclimbing events.
But I mean, I cannot speak from, I don't need any, like I don't have any mobility needs.
So I think I'm in a weird position where for me that doesn't really matter.
Yeah, I think you mentioned there were like 70 people in ISO.
Are there any like special things that they provide in isolation for Paraclimbers to warm up?
Or is it just the regular spray wall, bouldering wall, whatever they have?
Historically, most of the, so I've done competitions in 2018 all the way up to 23.
Most of my competitions, because they've been World Championships and not World Cups,
I've been in the same isolation as the Janyas and the Jakobsjubas.
So our isolation at the moment is only the seniors isolation setup.
There's no additional adaptations for us.
The only time I saw it was in Bern this year where somebody put in a top rope
on the top of a bouldering ply MDF wall.
It wasn't a structural top rope.
It was just put straight into the T-bolts, which is not the best idea.
So I've never been anywhere right now where anything has been put in isolation
that works for Paraclimbers.
Because I don't know, Chris, how Ava gets off the ground on a bouldering wall
if she doesn't have the rope.
I don't know how Angelino is going to do it as the campers from AL1 Austrian.
I don't know how Pavitra does it because you've got to remember,
we have to climb up the bouldering wall and we have to climb down because we can't fall.
Yeah, so a lot of people adapt their warming up to be able to warm up
if they need to warm up but they cannot fall.
Or we also trained, like within the Lodge team, we trained to do a warming up
with just a hangboard.
Sort of, yeah, you try to adapt your warm up so that if the wall is too busy
or you can't go on the wall because there are no ropes,
which is an issue, then you can still warm up properly for a competition.
Yeah, but I think Bern is a really good example of where they got.
As far as I can tell, they did everything right.
It was, from what I've heard from other people, a really accessible venue,
rent everywhere. Yeah.
Wasn't really a cool event.
This is good while you've got two of us, one that's like Chris and one that's like me.
Because the biggest problem I found in Bern is you couldn't get to the disabled toilet
because it was behind the competition wall in isolation down a lift,
which you could only access before the seniors did their bouldering or their lead.
As soon as their competition started, because we were at the same venue,
you couldn't access that lift because you couldn't go through the isolation
to get to the disabled toilet.
So it was fine we could do it, but we had to plan it.
So for example, in Bern, you had the big wall and then you had a bit on the ice rink,
which the wheelchair users and the people on crutches could get to
as long as they could get down the lift.
As soon as any of the senior speed lead bouldering that you wanted to watch was on,
you could see people being carried down the ice stadium stairs to get to that same level.
There was no way you could get the wheelchair down.
I was seeing people go down on the bum that was in the wheelchair.
So we had to plan a lot more.
And that's the thing.
If I want to go to a competition in Innsbruck,
I have to physically know three, four months ahead
how I'm going to physically travel all the way there.
I can't just jump on the plane at the last minute.
So yeah, Bern was brilliant, apart from the fact that you only disabled toilet
to get down on the ground floor.
So imagine you're down the bottom, but you need the toilet.
You couldn't get to the lift and get out.
You had to be carried up the stairs to get to the able-bodied toilets,
or you just couldn't go down to that part of the area,
which is most of where we want to shout anybody, whether we're able-bodied or not.
You still want to go shout your own country's team, don't you?
Because you want to go and support your team.
But it's just little things like that that I just want to point out
that there's a lot more that needs to be done for accessibility through mobility aids
versus assuming we can just turn up and can't just turn up, some of us.
I said it and then I realized I'm not the one to judge accessibility,
so thanks for adding that to me.
Is there anything you can think of right now that you would want to see in isolation
or at a venue that would just greatly help things?
The biggest things I've seen in the past is not having a toilet behind the final wall
when you're called from isolation to sit in behind the big wall.
When it's outdoor venues and they don't give you a toilet so you can go to the toilet,
that's one of the biggest things I've noticed because I have no bladder control.
I can't control when I'm going to go to the toilet or not.
I've had situations where I've had to go run behind a banner and have some teammates look out
so I can go to the toilet in the middle of being stuck in isolation in the final, in an outdoor event.
Because once you're put into these different parts behind the wall,
you can't move out of them.
So simple things like stuff like that is quite handy.
I don't think we'd get ropes because they build the isolation area.
It's a prefabricated area.
We get food and drink, which is good. I quite like that.
I'd like physios and stuff, but we have to bring our own or we borrow each other's.
I do find that community-wise, when we're getting ready for qualifications or finals,
whoever's brought the medical person or whoever's brought the physio,
we all share those people in isolation, which is really good.
I think the GB had somebody in burn and everybody was just borrowing him to get warm up.
Yeah, so that's sort of like an issue with funding and being able to bring people on the team
who, I guess, have to pay their own way to get to the competition.
Yeah, and there are big differences within countries as well.
In the Netherlands, we do get some funding for competitions,
and for the comps within Europe, it's usually just enough to cover it, more or less.
But we have a teammate in the wheelchair, so we need to rent an accessible apartment,
and the car needs to be big enough to sit in her wheelchair,
and she needs someone to come with her to just help her out throughout the day.
It's sort of an energy management thing, and that is not covered.
So she is still paying a lot more than I am,
because she just needs someone there because of her environment.
But I still would say that we're quite lucky in the Netherlands to get some form of support.
Some countries have Paraclimbing fully funded, like the regular teams,
and other countries just get nothing at all.
So there is big differences, I'd say.
Yeah, I mean, even a lot of athletes in the Senior World Cup circuit, I think, struggle with funding.
So is it comparable in Paraclimbing?
Like, how do you guys fund your competition journeys?
My job is my sponsor.
It's a very good question.
It's definitely something that comes up, because we are all entitled to what's known as an aid
to international Paraclimbing.
When we register for a competition, we are allowed to take a plus one.
Each athlete is on the team.
Now, currently, our team is about 22 athletes in size.
So the federation will get a small amount of money, and that is divided across 22 athletes.
So as a bigger team, we have very little money.
And I don't like to call it this, but my brain wants to say it.
I call it a rich man's sport, because there's no financial gains from competing at this level.
We don't get any rewards.
We get a lovely medal, but we don't get any financial rewards that allow us to go to the next event.
We're not big enough yet.
We don't have the audience following.
People don't come and watch our events very much.
And if we do, it's because we're with the seniors.
I've been at World Cups when there's been high-bearing people there during qualifications,
because the seniors haven't been climbing.
So mine is I coach and try and coach people in climbing.
I have the benefits that help me live on a daily basis and trying to occasionally make something that I can sell.
Or I think people make woolly hats.
I make little key rings, little short bag key rings that I sell off to the community.
But yeah.
And then I have to pay twice as much as Chris, because I personally have to take a carer,
because I can't mentally navigate the transport system.
I can't get on the plane and the train and the automobile.
I can't drive a car.
So I need that plus one.
Our team works slightly different in the sense that because our team is so big, we just meet at the venue.
There's no collective transport.
We all fly in from different parts in the UK.
We've got some people at the north of England.
Some people in the West.
We all dive on into Geneva and then get on a car or public transport and all go into competition.
And we're not very good in our team at sharing accommodation.
We're very independently collectively want to just have our own space or our own mean time,
because that's how we like to acclimatize around our events.
Personally, it's not how I can't do that.
So I have to take the plus one so I can rely on my friend, my mum, my family member.
And then people say, what does that plus one do?
Well, that plus one makes sure that I get up in the morning and I can get to qualification.
I always leave my crutches in the wrong place and they're always running around getting them for me.
I come off the wall and I can't physically breathe or walk and my mouth gets really dry.
So then I need my crutches and my drink after the qualification.
And then someone has to come and collect me for qualification too, because I've completely brain fogged out
and I don't know what time I'm supposed to be aware.
And we only have volunteers at the team level.
And without those volunteers, we wouldn't basically have a support mechanism in the federation.
So we're totally driven by volunteers and stuff at the moment.
Anita, do you have a para coach or para trainer on UK level?
They're all volunteers. I've just checked the GB website.
And lovely Zoe, who you interviewed, volunteers for the para climbing at the nationals level.
She volunteers to support a time for us.
And then we've got Jay, Jamie and Jamie, see my brain fogs kicked in.
We've got three coaches. It's all voluntary.
So yeah, without them, we wouldn't even have site guides because our site guides are our coaches,
are the ones that are married.
So that's a whole other discipline when you're looking at a visually impaired person.
I'm not visually impaired, but I'm also not in a wheelchair.
I struggle to pull a suitcase around the airport because I've got crutches.
I need the aid to pull my luggage around.
But if I wasn't visually impaired, I'd have to train a site guide or bring a friend that I climb with
on an everyday basis to compete at an international competition.
And you also have to consider that that site guide needs to be able to climb a 6C or above himself or herself
to be able to site guide that person up those kind of holes that we climb.
So the support mechanism around us is bigger than you think it is when you're looking at paragliding.
And we've got people on our team that physically can't even get themselves to the World Cups.
They're on the team, but they can't afford to come to a World Cup.
And if they don't go to the World Cup, they can't get classified.
And if they don't get classified, they can't compete.
And you can do all of that and then get told you're not.
So fingers crossed we get in the Paralympics and then hopefully funding comes our way
because it's all riding on this 2028 decision in March now, I think it's moved again.
Right. Yeah, I heard. And yeah, Chris, different experience for you or similar in terms of funding?
In terms of funding, well, like I said, I did think we have quite a good position in the Netherlands
because we get some funding from the Federation and I don't need to bring someone with me.
Yeah, we usually share accommodations.
So we just look at accommodation and transport together.
But we're a really small team. We're only three people at the moment plus a coach.
And then one of my teammates brings someone with her.
So usually we're five people at the competition.
And that's a small enough number that you can share everything, share accommodation.
So I don't think I have much to add there.
Specifically, Chris, with you and your story, I think several times throughout this podcast,
as well as during our pre-interview, you kind of mentioned that you don't really feel qualified to do the interview
or maybe you feel like a bit of imposter syndrome with like your impairments.
Can you explain why you feel that way?
Or like, do you ever feel judgment from the para community for not being as impaired?
Yeah, sure. Well, judgment, no, for sure not.
The community is very open and welcoming.
People have definitely asked, well, what's your impairment?
Because I don't see anything where to see you climb.
But actually, I really appreciate it.
Some people just ask within the community or just in daily life.
But yeah, like, I feel like I sort of have to emphasize that I am not really impaired in daily life.
And that's why we talked about doing the podcast.
I sort of wondered, am I the right person to do this?
Can I speak for this community and for people with an impairment?
Because I didn't feel like I could maybe.
But then I was talking to a German athlete who is in 82, so she's missing her forearm.
And I told her, could I be in the podcast? Could I do that?
And then she said, well, I don't think I could represent the community because I'm only missing an arm.
I don't know what it's like to be in a wheelchair or to live with a mess.
If you're missing an arm, you feel like you cannot represent the community, then I'll do the podcast.
Because apparently everyone feels that way.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I mean, yeah, you definitely have an important part of the story as well.
I mean, especially when people can't like visually, when it's not visually obvious what kind of disability or impairment you have.
I feel like that's also its own experience that is important to hear about.
Sure. Yeah, yeah. Thank you.
Yeah, that's what I when you contacted us and asked us to do the podcast, it's nice to be able to explain our situations.
Because on a daily basis, I look like an able-bodied person.
And as soon as my social media goes quiet and as soon as you don't see me in the climbing wall, there's something wrong.
There's health issues behind it.
And then as soon as I'm fit again, I'm spamming on my social media and I'm doing as much climbing as I can.
But I'd love to be able to, I don't want to, obviously, but I'd love to be able to fly into Salt Lake City to compete.
Can't financially afford it.
And my condition doesn't give me time to recover from the jet lag and the physical fatiguing of the travel to be able to fly in the day before competing fly out.
So I have to acclimatize and build that in.
So travel for me is lucky that we're in Europe and all the comps are in Europe.
If I was in your neck of the woods without the financial backing and support of the USA, they've got a brilliant team and a brilliant setup.
It's so hard to be able to come that far over to where we are.
But then again, I'd like quite like to be in Holland and just be able to get on the night train and just zip off to a different country.
Whereas we've got a bit of water to deal with, so we have to put in planes or long environmental car transport.
So it's different for everybody.
I wouldn't change it for the world.
I think it's a brilliant sport.
And the weird thing is that we all are just climbers.
We all train on the same routes that you would train in a climbing wall.
We'd all climb on the same holds and the styles of routes that you would climb, Ginny.
And then it's only when we turn it to a World Cup have they set something that works or tries to work for our own impairment.
That's the only opportunity we get to climb a route that's been set for us, which is one of the reasons I do it,
because I'm like, I wonder if I can really climb that level.
Because I don't know what you think, Chris, but you climb a, I don't know, let's just take an easy grade.
You climb a 6A indoors at your local wall and you leap climb it.
And then you go and climb a 6A in a World Cup or World Champs.
Are they the same?
Because they make us move around?
Well, I don't think they are the same.
If I climb indoors on a normal top rope and I climb it, it's straight up and down.
And I think, oh, I can climb a 6A, turn up at a World Cup, completely different style of setting.
And I'm like, this is so much harder.
It's not a grade you can actually grade because we go sideways and we go up and round corners, just like the seniors do.
I don't know how they can grade it, but it's more fun.
I think World Cups are more fun when the ropes are.
Yeah, the routes are really specific.
I mean, anyone could just go onto YouTube and type, I don't know, FSC power climbing 2023 or something and find a competition
and just look at the routes and watch some categories and see how everyone climbs.
I think it's really interesting part of the sport if you're not so value-wasted.
Yeah, I guess comparing routes they set at pair climbing in the IFSC compared to what you find at your local gyms.
I mean, I'm assuming there are huge differences.
Well, in general, the level really increases during the route.
So it might start out really easy because they don't want people to fall over beyond the session because it's so pro
and you might hit the ground.
So it might increase from like a 5C to a 7B, which is really like every move just gets harder and harder.
You're like, oh, it's still doable. It's really hard. It's really hard.
Just keep increasing like that.
In general, there are more holds.
So in a regular competition, the hold before it's up is 43, 44, and with us might be 60 holds on the wall.
For the blind categories and for people with arm infusions in general, they don't set dinos.
They want to be in static everything. So the holds are quite close.
Yeah, I guess I'm actually wondering if it might feel easier because it's set more specifically for people who have certain impairments.
For me, it feels easier. It's interesting to hear that it feels harder for you than it is for you.
Yeah, I mean, that's the thing.
I mean, we're in the same sports class, but we have different styles of climbing.
And I'm the same as everybody else.
I think when I go and look at people that are climbing in a competition and see them on YouTube, I'm like, what is their impairment?
I'm quite interested to learn about their impairments.
So when you understand somebody's impairment, you can kind of then spot it.
So I do find that it's purely my ability to climb for that number of consecutive days.
Because if I go to the local wall, I only climb every other day.
Right now, I climb every other day. I went climbing yesterday.
I got nothing left in me today to either physically drive a car or walk down the street and get a bottle of milk.
So I've got to save all my energy today just so I can go climbing again next day.
So I can choose when and where to climb.
But competition-wise, this time on this day with the classification and the qualifications
and as much sightseeing as you want to do at the country that you've gone to and the physical, getting there, it compounds really badly for me.
Whereas if they have a World Cup in the UK, yay, I'll be a lot stronger and a lot more fitter because I haven't had to travel to do it.
But it's the whole thing, getting there, traveling, seeing the athletes, seeing another country, having some sunshine.
It's raining a lot here at the moment. No snow though. I want some snow.
But it's the whole thing. Like literally the whole thing and however long it is, it is why it depends on how well I do.
It's fun to tell. In my first year of competing, it was in 2021, I did two World Cups and I placed second and first.
I was completely overwhelmed by it all.
And I was just so new to the sport and the community and everything.
And then I won a gold medal in the Grand Sons.
And then I was just standing there completely super happy, overwhelmed, everything.
Then they just tapped me on my shirt like, hey, you've got to come for your interview.
My what? Your interview with my group.
Yes. I was just completely like my face is red and I'm like, I don't know, everything's overwhelmed by me.
And then he's asking questions and I'm just standing there like, I'm talking to my group.
Yeah, it's really super lucky to be able to compete.
That's really amazing. That's a very, very good point because I'm really big on advocating for the sport.
So at the end of every one of our sports classes, if you win,
because it's live stream and the IFC and Matt Groome are there and then live streaming it live on YouTube,
what they do is they then interview the person that won.
What you don't see is you don't see it on the live stream.
So we actually don't know what anybody said and where all of those interviews have gone because I would love to see them.
Sometimes they do.
Yeah, not all of them though. Do you know what I like to do?
Yeah, not always because we've seen them in the past
because you only get in the live stream from the front and then they'll run off and do the interviews.
But yeah, it'd be good to see some of those interviews, I think,
even if it was just a load of them put together and it was like five minutes, not six hours.
And you're trying to find that person at the end of it.
Because as soon as you finish your final, the next final is out, so Matt Groome's live streaming the next final.
As soon as that final is finished, the next final is out and Matt streams that final as well.
Can we also say how amazing Matt Groome is?
Before he used to go around isolation with a pen and paper and write down everyone's names phonetically
so he could pronounce the name correctly.
I'm always finding girls, he's amazing. He's a really good commentator.
And it's also really cool, I think, that he's doing both the regular and the paraclony.
Glad you've had a good experience there. He definitely shouts out paraclimbing quite a bit.
Yeah, yeah.
It's good when we get him on the wall and he's trying a route that's been set for one of the finals.
Yeah, I think he tried one of the routes. He tried with a blindfold or with one leg or one arm.
So difficult.
I mean, I would love to try it. It sounds fun, but really hard.
Well, he came and grabbed me and Burn, which I was not prepared for.
So in Burn on the para finals, he came and grabbed me and I did some of the commentary for it at the beginning.
And that's the first time I've been invited to do it live there and then.
And his job is so difficult because you can't say certain things and you can't swear.
And in our case, just like Chris said earlier, is you can't divulge information that's not globally okay to divulge.
So even though we might know people's conditions, you can't just blur out this person's condition if they don't want it to be broadcast.
So there's a lot of extra implications behind broadcasting.
But it was amazing and scary at the same time because I was playing spot the difference on different climates.
And you never know what the audience wants to listen to in para planning.
Well, I'm glad you had a good experience and yeah, more mac room talk.
But back to back to you guys specifically.
I think, Anita, with your personal experience being an older competitor, you I think you had mentioned you were the one that Zoe was talking about in the previous podcast episode where you have like dealt with going through menopause and competing at the same time.
I'm just so curious to know what that's like.
So would I, to be honest.
And that's that's not really a joke.
So on our team, we have some males and females that are over 50.
I think our oldest competitors, 56 or 57.
I think the only benefit to get in MS is I don't know I've been through the menopause because it's the same sort of bodily issues.
So I must have been through the menopause, but I don't have any difference in my body from when I was 20 or 30 or 40 years old.
I just like so.
And because of my multiple sclerosis, I've got no temperature control in my body.
My body just decides to overheat and underneath.
So I wouldn't be able to tell you if I did or didn't go through the menopause.
I think in general, with being an older competitor, do you feel much different from when you were climbing when you were younger?
Up until the last two years, I probably would have said no.
But I've had two years of health issues that I wasn't expecting.
And I jokingly say I've shrank by about three inches because I got older and I feel a lot shorter than I was when I was climbing in 2017.
So either that or they keep putting the holds further away and I can't reach them.
From a training point of view, I do struggle a lot more to live my life and be able to train to the degree I did back in 2017.
And then I have what I really like about paragliding is I think my youngest competitor was actually Rosalie in the Dutch Nationals in 2019.
She was like 15 years old or something.
And I was like, oh, my God. And she whooped me, absolutely whooped me.
And I was like, yeah, but you're at least 30 years older than I am.
You can't compare yourself against somebody who's younger than you.
So it's not really the age that impairs at paragliding.
It's the disability.
So personally, yeah, I think everybody will still be climbing at 50 if they choose to climb at 50 or more.
And from growing the sport and identifying more people, I think more people break themselves through health issues over and later in life.
It's only a good thing from my point of view because I don't think there's any other sport I can think of, although I've not researched them,
where we can all climb as well as each other.
And however we deal with our own impairment and the challenge of that route depends on how well we get up the wall.
Our age isn't really an issue because I don't know how you understand it, Chris,
but it's our strength and our ability to climb on the wall that keeps us there.
So yeah, I think kind of have some more 50 year olds piece.
But I think from going to competitions and getting involved and talking to people and being a chatterbox
and not caring about what people say is just life experience and being a lot older.
When I was in my 20s and 30s, I was shy. I wouldn't speak to anybody.
I found it really hard to communicate in large groups.
I'm still doing to this day, I'm a very one to one type person. I struggle with large groups.
But generally, I don't find it hard to talk to people nowadays.
I mean, it's inspiring to see. I think I'm still definitely younger, but I really am scared of getting older.
So it's nice to see people who can continue climbing as they age.
I think generally you just live your life. Physically, I feel as...
So there's a difference between your body itself and your brain.
Mentally, I feel exactly the same as when I was 20 and when I was 30 and when I was 40.
Physically wise, I don't feel any different.
Mental wise, I'm more mature in my head and I have more empathy and sympathy for people
because I've been through lots of experiences. I remember when I was like that.
And I think the only difference with getting older is how much you experience life and how much you can draw from it.
But physically, your brain will always think you're 20 years old and you're always as fit.
This is why I'm struggling over the last few years.
I used to be able to do this. Why can't I do it now? My body's changed.
I can't control what my body does. I can just utilise what it is at that point in that year.
And that's why power climbing is brilliant because we're all broken anyway.
We're just broken a bit more or less for one year to the next.
Yeah. In general, what I really like about power climbing is that you have to get really good in your strength.
You have to really lean into your strengths to sort of compensate maybe for your impairments.
And I think there are a lot of climbers who are almost a bit afraid to train what they're good at.
Everyone's like, oh, train your weakness.
But I think with power climbing, there are things that you're physically not able to do.
So you might as well be really good at your strong points to compensate for the rest of your body, basically.
So that's what I really like.
And people with really weak muscles might have incredible technique and people that miss a leg very cordially is insane.
And that's what makes it really cool to watch as well.
Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Cool. Yeah.
So I think looking forward to the future, I think we were hoping to hear back about the Paralympics in 2028, but they did not.
They pushed that back.
Yes, I think they've pushed it back to March now.
Well, yeah, I was hoping we would find out by now.
But okay, we'll have to check back in March.
I was going to say, I'm not sure even if they go in, I think, unfortunately, I'm not sure our category would be in.
But if they do, it'd be good to interview people.
I don't think so.
The biggest category with the most athletes in is the most obvious because you want as many athletes.
So when you think about Paralympics, what is the biggest category with the most athletes in that's visually disabled?
We can still compete at IFSC level, and I think I will.
But at least we don't have to worry about the Olympics in that sense.
No, if it becomes Paralympic, I don't think at least RP3 won't be in there.
That's what I think because the IPC, International Paralympic Committee, has expressed that they prefer visual impairments.
And that I mean impairments that you can see.
So you can see what someone has.
So it probably means people with an amputation or visual disabilities.
I'm not sure if RP will be in there.
But I do think we can be sure that they will not give us 10 medals for all the categories.
That won't happen.
So they have to make a decision somewhere.
We'll see.
We'll see how it goes.
Any like guess as to like which categories or like how many medals that they'll award?
It's I think we all are debating it.
I think what we can say is everybody has their own opinion.
But the only thing my logic says is it's got to have a lot of athletes.
And I would assume, I'm just assuming here, don't take me granted, that they have to have the male and female equivalent of that sports class to make it fair for a show event.
So now what sports class, we're called sports class, not categories, has a lot of male and females in it.
It's visually inspiring to watch as a show sport.
Remember it's just a show sport for getting.
If you could have a guess, what would you say, Jimmy?
Put the owners back on you.
What do you know now and what has the biggest category, male and female?
Well, I mean, you mentioned that there's not many females in the amputee sports class.
Not when I first started.
It's changed now.
Not when I first started.
I would think that the showiest class would probably be like the amputee category.
I wouldn't be far off.
But then again, that's the great thing about doing this as well, is we've got, if they don't get into 2028 and they get into 2032, even if they did have my category, I'm not competing at 60, I don't think.
They won't have my category.
But it gives us so much more time to find more people to build.
And that's that having said that, that's quite strange, isn't it?
Are they going to pick a category in March based on the current level of athletes, especially since like the sport is still small and still growing so fast?
A lot changes in five, eight years.
Yeah, it's a long time.
Yeah.
How do you think inclusion in the Olympics would change Paraclimbing?
From what I know, we do have a transgender policy.
There is a policy in place that says how the LGBT community can be involved within the competition scene.
I know from a LGBT national's point of view, we have a policy as well.
So we have a system in place for non-binaries and transgenders.
The only thing I've seen lately is something the Americans were talking about.
I think they've changed their policy and that's created a bit of an uproar at the moment.
And without saying anything, I didn't know a transgender competed in Bern at our World Championships.
I think it's brilliant.
I think the fact that we can have anybody, any discipline, any transgender in our competitions, I think it's really good because it's for diversity and inclusivity.
It's showing that the sport is really young and we're still taking advantage of these issues around who can and can't compete.
Yeah, it's hard about Olympics.
I know it's hard to tell how it will change.
For sure, there will be a lot more exposure for the sport, but I don't know what the implications of that will be.
I mean, of course, you're hoping that all countries would get more funding and just to be even more equal to regular competition climbing.
But I don't know.
We'll see what happens if it happens.
But in 2028, I mean, I'll be 33 by then. Yeah, I can compete.
Yeah, she's actually young.
I hope it goes through.
I hope to see you compete, Chris, at least, maybe.
Thank you.
But I mean, yeah, hopefully it would all be positive things, right?
If it got included, maybe more funding, just more exposure in general.
I think it triggers a lot more federation funding and a lot more, I think, visibility wise, it'd be good to get us more on social media and live streams.
I think at the moment being trapped into the YouTube system means we don't get as much publicity as the seniors do.
So it can only get a lot better.
The fact that we're even being considered as amazing compared to all the other sports.
They don't show it on Eurosport, the Paraclimbing portion.
So if you missed a few live streams, what's Paraclimbing?
Yes, it's all on YouTube, IFC. Just type in Paraclimbing, you can see everything.
OK. Any final thoughts before we go into some quick Discord questions from the audience?
Actually, I think we covered most things.
Yeah, we'll just get into a few of these questions then.
So the first one was, are there any para athletes who do speed?
There are no speed competitions as far as I know. I think everyone, when you find the speed, well, somewhere we just tried it out.
I had a friendly speed competition, someone from my sports class in Bern, but there are no competitions.
I don't know of any either.
So have either of you tried it? So you've tried it. Anita, have you tried it?
I think I have. 42 seconds or something.
Honestly, I think I tried it.
I think I tried it 2017 or 2018 and it was about 47 seconds.
But I'm only five foot three. That's my excuse. The holds are too far away.
I have a teammate that did, I think, 18 or 19 seconds. Seems quite fast.
I mean, don't feel bad for that time. I think I did a similar time and I have no excuses.
Well, it's an excuse. It's just climbing. You just climb.
I think it was like cardio halfway. I was just tired.
I was toying with the idea that my world has invented a paraclimbing speed hold that caters for the impairment.
And therefore they give us a speed climb where it's got four sections from left to right.
They tweaked the hold. I reckon it'd be possible, but not with the current hold.
Oh, so it's an issue with the hold, not like a safety concern.
It's like anything, isn't it? We are trying speed climbing on the able-bodied hold designed for the seniors.
And in my head, I want a smiley face smile of footholds and handholds above it.
So the impairment that's missing has got something to stand on and put a foot on.
But that's just adapting it for us. We can do it. I'm sure we can do it.
It's just whether people want to try competition for us.
OK. Next question. There are comparatively few Paraclimbing World Cups per season.
Would you like to see more?
Yes, absolutely. But I do think we have to be careful that enough people can attend.
As we talked about, some people it's really hard to travel to the competitions.
So I think if there were six or seven World Cups next year with the more regular circuit,
I'm not sure that all of them would be attended with the same number.
I think that's something to be careful.
I think the last thing I learned is if we had five World Cups like the seniors do,
I think the top four would be counted and that would give you a yearly ranking.
The fact that we only have three at the moment means until we hit five,
we don't trip into actually getting that yearly ranking,
which is why we all want to go to the World Championships because that gives us our overall ranking.
And it's financial. It's not cheap. Like Zoe said, it's not cheap at all to run an event.
So I think it's to do with continents as well. It's which continents those World Cups would be held on.
So that's why we've got China, Europe for the seniors. They have continents within there.
But yeah, if they had back-to-back weekends, I wouldn't be able to do it.
I need at least when I finish...
I would just run out of vacation days.
Yeah, there is that as well. Yeah, definitely.
But after every World Cup, it takes me two weeks to physically recover before I can go to another World Cup.
But yeah, I'm sure it's going to grow.
I think if it gets funding, the countries that get funding are the ones that can hold the competitions.
That's why it's probably France and Austria at the moment.
Maybe Switzerland. Well, Switzerland's a bit ours, isn't it? So that's three. And then America.
Yeah, I think that kind of can lead into the next question about future areas of growth.
What are the potential futures of growth for paragliding?
Could we see more again, paraspeed climbing?
I guess people really want to see that.
And para ice climbing.
I don't think so. Everyone wants to see disabled people try and go fast. It's interesting.
I think the way I see it, the biggest development would be in terms of rad setting.
They're already trying to push the level a little bit.
But if I look at myself, the routes could still be a lot harder.
I personally feel like the top level of our pace theory, we cannot always show what we train for and what we can do,
because we have to, of course, combine the routes with other sports classes.
So I think, yeah, there's a lot of because we always train on regular climbing routes.
And then they make, yeah, I know it's kind of hard to describe, but I think it would be a lot more interesting.
And this could be harder as well.
Yeah. And I'm thinking maybe I should retire because you make many harder and I won't be able to climb.
No, as I mentioned earlier, the first time in August, we're going to have a European Continental Championships.
It's the first ever brand new event coming next year.
The emphasis is on European. So unfortunately, it knocks anybody out of our sports class that's not in Europe.
But at least it's progression for us in Europe. We're getting another competition.
Future, there's discussions and it might take a long time yet,
but we, the athletes, really want to have the ability to showcase lead climbing.
And we have, and I think it's the first time in the last couple of years,
our routes have kind of shared the able-bodied routes, which is not overlap.
We're getting so good that rather than them set routes for ourselves,
they're starting to borrow the senior qualifications and adapting them so we can climb them
because we're now getting to that level.
I think everybody wants bouldering, just who's currently in.
We would love to even try all bouldering.
I personally, I would love to see an AL1, a leg amputee, an arm amputee,
like the best of the best in para climbing, all climb one route and see who is the best.
It'd be set for the impairment to be able to climb it.
I would just love to see a camperser climb off against a legless and an armless
and just overlap the route because we already climbed the same route,
but just have a one-off sort of crazy, can we still beat Angelino and he's,
and he compass the route, like challenge would be good.
Yeah, I would love to see it.
Have either of you tried ice climbing?
I want to. I so want to.
Yeah, same. Haven't tried it, little us two.
You've got the best team out there as well.
Yeah, I'll probably go try two things. There's a small wall where you can try it.
Yeah, I've been speaking to the Dutch couple ice climbing team,
and they seem to do a lot of coaching and training and showing you in their little thing,
in their little built up cake, raising awareness.
And the person I spoke to basically told me, I think there's three people with impairments
that currently climb in the UIAA ice climbing able bodies,
but there are people with impairments that still climb the access.
So the reason I overlap, it's just not very well advertised at the moment.
And last question I have here, how does the path to becoming a high level paraclimber
differ from that of a typical able-bodied comp climber, or is it pretty similar?
I would say in Paraclime, well, now we have new events, European championships,
but before that, there were only the World Cups and all championships,
and if you're lucky nationals.
So you cannot do the national competition circuit in your country
and then maybe do the European Cup and then maybe larger events and then go to World Cups.
It's either you climb a World Cup or you don't climb a competition at all.
So I think the level at the World Cups is like the mighty people and it's their first competition ever.
It's a shame for me.
I had never even done like a local Bollary competition or something, my first competition ever.
It was a World Cup.
Terrifying.
Yes, it was.
But it's really fun.
I mean, the community is amazing and everyone knows the experience.
Everyone's been there at their first competition.
So I think there aren't many steps in between.
You can become a World Cup climber quite quickly, I guess.
And I would say in terms of age, it's a little bit different as well because normally, I mean, I'm 28.
I'm not old at all, but I started competing when I was 25.
On the regular circuit, I don't think that would happen.
So the community is a bit more diverse.
But yeah, what's the path?
I don't know, just send an email to your federation or I'll send you a message on Instagram.
I'd love to help out.
And then if you can make it to the competition, get classified and then hopefully you can compete.
I don't think there's a very specific path to follow.
What do you think, Anisa?
Okay, so the simple answer is if your country doesn't have a power climbing team or isn't actually even on the awareness,
contact your federation and make them aware that you would be interested in getting involved in power climbing.
That would then give them the opportunity to find out what they need to do to bring your country into climbing if there's no nationals.
I don't know what Christmas is like, but I was just doing local bouldering competitions as a compete against a normal able-bodied person.
And then because we ran a national to select the team, I think we were quite small at the time.
Those that hit the podium were given a place on the team because there wasn't a person in that disability.
So it's just a case of making them aware, the federation, and then you can bring another country in.
Once the country grows, you might get some nationals.
And like Chris says, if there's no nationals, they'll probably take you straight into World Cup levels.
And we work backwards.
Once we've done World Cups, we trigger nationals.
Once the nationals have triggered competitions, we find more people.
But we don't even have regionals at the moment.
We don't have it in the UK.
We just put it, just go, I want to join. What do I need to do to join? And where do I go to join?
And so if you don't have nationals or regionals for selection and you kind of just start out at the international level,
how do you know if your ability is comparable to the other international competitors?
Well, of the two countries I'm thinking about, they both had a visual impairment.
They were both missing some kind of physical, and they therefore could just say, yes, you're going to get classified.
It's just RP.
I do think there is a guideline somewhere about the level that the rewards will be more or less safe.
If you have the level to climb the World Cups.
But in general, I mean, the community is so nice.
You can always find a power climber on Instagram that sends them a message.
We'll figure it out.
Do you know what level, grade, routes might be?
We have a document on IC climbing under power climbing documents or resources.
It's a guideline. But to make your National Federation team doesn't have to be that level of grades.
First of all, you've got to actually saying, well, I'm the only athlete can I join?
And I've now joined and I can afford to go to the venue.
Oh, shit. I now know how good I need to be.
So I'll go away, train and try again.
It works backwards because if you don't.
Yeah, work of level women are three around seven B or something in finals for the men, seven C, eight A.
But as RP three and like amputees, probably to the sort of the highest levels there.
Like Chris says, it's not a full seven A.
It could start at six A six B six C and then check us off.
So it's different to reading it in a gym.
Yeah, that's interesting to know, because I mean, they kind of refuse to say a grade for the able bodied climb.
So it's good to know that they have something, some info out there for pair climbing.
Well, I think that is all the questions I had.
Thank you guys so much for joining me.
Is there anything else that you want to shout out or let people know where they can find you or reach out to you?
Yeah, sure. I mean, you can find me on Instagram.
My name is Christiana, Christiana, my name basically with underscore.
I don't know. I'll type it somewhere.
Yeah, I'll leave it. I'll leave all the information below as well.
But I would love it if people reached out.
I mean, I love something like pair climbing.
I mean, you know, climbers or just regular climbers.
And yeah, and I want to say that I just found myself so lucky that I can compete in these pair climbing competitions and meet all these amazing people.
And you know, it's super happy to be here.
Thanks so much for your time today. It was lovely.
Yeah, thank you.
Anya, do you want to do you have anything?
Yeah, no, please do contact me through Instagram, dazzle underscore UK.
I'm certainly up for helping people as much as I can get into climbing.
Or you can email me Anita UK at Gmail.
Even if it's not GB related, I can certainly point you in the right direction of where to start and who to contact for your country.
But yeah, just bug us on social media. It's the best way.
All right. Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for joining the podcast.
Yeah, thanks for having us. Thanks very much for having us.
Thank you so much for making it to the end of the podcast.
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