Jan

23

Tour de Bloc 9: Climber’s Rock

Rock Climbing / Tour de Bloc
Dave Voltan on problem #3

Last weekend’s Tour de Bloc was a lot of fun! It was also full of surprises. First of all, even though the field was super strong, two returning veterans of the Tour de bloc scene (Dave Voltan and Gary Posey) managed to clinch a spot in the finals, while one of my favourites and a regular finalist (Seb Lazure) just missed finals by 8 points. Matt Moreau is a new force in the Tour this year and he showed up and took 3rd place (eking out ahead of Eric Sethna by 2 attempts). In fact, the men’s final ranking was very close – and all about attempts. Fred Charron repeated his amazing performance at the last Tour de Bloc, finishing in 2nd place (1 attempt ahead of Matt). And, in a throw-back to the old days – Rockhead‘s team member and G6 representative Dave Voltan came out on top by finishing 3 final problems in only 4 attempts (one fewer than Fred)! Congrats buddy!

For the ladies, the field was also big (about 40 competitors!), including none other than Thomasina Pidgeon from out west and a whole group of super strong women! Every year the women’s field gets stronger and more impressive! Iyma Lamarche continues to impress on the Tour scene, taking her first win (yep, she beat Thomasina by 7 attempts). Way to go Iyma! Unfortunately, I didn’t get any decent pictures of the women’s finals :( .

Congrats to Voltan and Iyma for their amazing performance at the Climber’s Rock competition! Here are a few photos of the men’s finals!

Fred on problem #2 and #3.

Matt on problem #2.

Eric on problme #4.

Here are the official final results:

Women’s Finals:

  1. Iymma Lamarche (4/6 & 4/6)
  2. Thomasina Pidgeon (4/13 & 4/11)
  3. Kerry Briggs (3/5 & 4/7)
  4. Kacy Wilson (2/2 & 2/2)
  5. Marieta Akalski (2/4 & 3/5)
  6. Su En Neo (1/1 & 3/4)
  7. Amanda Berezowski (1/2 & 3/8)
  8. Kaska Kowalska (0/0 & 3/11)

Men’s Finals:

  1. Dave Voltan (3/4 & 3/4)
  2. Fred Charron (3/5 & 3/4)
  3. Mathew Moreau (3/6 & 4/5)
  4. Eric Sethna (3/6 & 4/7)
  5. Keith Mackay (3/6 & 3/6)
  6. John Bowles (3/8 & 4/12)
  7. Gary Posey (2/7 & 3/8)
  8. Jo Skopec (1/3 & 2/3)

 

A few more pics:

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Nov

07

Tour de Bloc 9: Joe Rockhead’s

Rock Climbing / Tour de Bloc

This past saturday was the first competition of the 9th Tour de Bloc season and the first thing I noticed was how big the women’s field was compared to other years (about 35 open competitors)! I found that to be a real good indicator of the tour’s success and the popularity of bouldering in Canada, which is exciting to witness.

This competition also proved to be interesting because there were so many new faces to the finals! My two favourite competitors to watch on Saturday were Kacy Wilson and Fred Charron. They both put up super impressive performances, gave it their all, and showed that they are real contenders for the number one spot. Also, I particularly enjoyed women’s and men’s 3rd problem, because of their very intricate beta reminiscing of the European-style problems we are used to seeing on the World Cup series (Thank you Tonde!). It’s unfortunate that no one could manage to finish men’s third problem, but great fun nonetheless!

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Nov

03

Tour de Bloc 9: Let the pulling begin!

Rock Climbing / Tour de Bloc

Tour de bloc 9 begins this weekend at our favorite local gym: Joe Rockhead’s. Today, I was lucky enough to get a preview of the final problems for the comp this weekend. Brace yourselves! It really is looking like this competition will be one of the best we’ve seen out east! It surely will set the tone for the rest of this year’s tour de bloc. Hope you all can make it!!

As I promised many of you, here is a sneak peek of the finals problem:

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