Have you ever been to nationals for rock climbing? Well, nether have I. It was the first time I had tried to get to nationals. I got an invitation but couldn’t go because I had camp. I hade to qualify for divisionals, and regionals. To qualify for divisionals I had to go to four competitions to tell the people that I was serious about it. Divisionals was in Portland, Oregon. At a place called Club Sport. It has big grey forty five-foot walls that overhang, turn, and have cracks and features. Features are texture in the wall so you can put your feet on them without them slipping off. I walked in the back door. I had to do this to prevent cheating. I was guided to isolation, a bouldering area with a tarp hanging down to prevent my view of the route. I stretched and climbed around for an hour to warm up. I sat there for about two hours until my category was allowed to preview the routes for five minutes each route. My category was Youth C. it is for the ages twelve to thirteen. Then I went back into isolation with my teammates. There is no one my age on the team but I know some people, there was Talbot, Walker Andrew’s older sister on the team. After about one and a half ours more it was time to warm up again I warmed up for half an hour. I sat in a chair and waited to be guided to my first route. When I got to the rout I waited faced away from the wall. There was a set time to climb. Six minute climb. Thirty second transition. When I started climbing it was easy then the last part was harder. The second one was the same. But the third one was overhanging halfway up, until it got to very small handholds and I fell off.

I got my score and saw that I advanced to the finals of divisionals. This took place in Washington. Here the walls were not as big as Club Sport about thirty-feet. The same thing happened in the finals except that I was in the afternoon group instead of the morning group. I didn’t know why they separate people from the morning and the afternoon. I thought it was probably so people didn’t have to wait a long time in isolation without talking to anyone that wasn’t in the competition.

It was ninety-five degrees outside and I was stuck in a room that was one hundred and had very high humidity. That climbing gym that I was in was called Vertical World. It also had a team. I know several people on that team that are my age and are friends. I did my stretching and warm up and finished my eighth or ninth water bottle. It was my turn again I finished the first two routes but fell on the last hold. I checked my score and again I got somewhere in the top ten. I had made it to regional’s.

In the end of June. I got on a plane with my dad and flew to Salt Lake City, Utah. It was about ninety degrease outside. We drove to the hotel across the street and spent the night.

I was in the morning group again waiting for my preview of the routes. After the preview I knew what I had to do keeping the image in my mind I waited for what felt like an eternity, six hours. I was within one of the last ten people to leave. This meant I had a huge crowd watching me climb. I got all three routes. Happy could be I got another nights rest. I was in the noon group this meant I could sleep in a little bit. I waited for my turn and when it came I got up and sat at the chair in front of the rope it was nerve racking sitting there with a huge crowd waiting. Going to nationals depended on that climb. I went and made it only a few holds from the top. I only had to do one route that day.

I decided to stick around for the score. When it came out I was surprised to see that I was fourth only six of the people could go to nationals. But after talking with my dad and coach we decided that if I would have gotten first or second. Then I would have been taken out of camp to go. But I didn’t, so I didn’t go. Although it would have been cool to go to nationals, at the time for no apparent reason a little part of me thought that I would not be that cool and I didn’t really want to go. Though that was only a little part.