Sport Climbing Conversion
The aim of this course is to provide a comprehensive introduction to climbing “Sport” routes in the outdoors, tailored specifically to Melbourne’s rapidly growing indoor climbing community.
Take your first steps outside
What is Sport Climbing?
Sport climbing means that there are permanent bolts/hardware in the rock, which has the advantage that a minimum of gear is required to safely climb on them (you don’t need to buy as much gear to start climbing in the outdoors, yay!).
Since the fixed hardware is specially designed for this purpose, the techniques to learn are much simpler than traditional – “trad” – climbing, and can be comprehensively covered in just one day.
Aims of this course
The goal of the session is to first introduce environmental concerns when climbing in the outdoors and how to mitigate these. Every participant will then climb two outdoor sport climbs, each practicing a different skill set (practiced at ground level before leading up). The climbs, in order, are:
- thread-and-lower – passing the rope through the fixed hardware and being lowered to the ground
- thread-and-abseil – starting the same as the first exercise, but the goal is to abseil down using an ATC+prusik combo instead.
- (if time allows) safely bailing from a sport route, without leaving a leaver-biner behind – and when it is appropriate to do this.
Finally, if time allows, participants will learn some additional skills, including belaying from the top of a route (and safely lowering a partner), how to how to prusik up a rope, e.g. to regain a roof after falling off, and how to clip a bolt that is out of reach.
Aaron took great care to ensure our safety at all times, thoroughly explaining the purpose of every piece of personal protective equipment and making sure we were properly geared up. His focus on safety and adherence to best practices gave us real peace of mind and allowed us to fully enjoy the adventure.
He encouraged and motivated us constantly, creating a comfortable and fun atmosphere. There was never any rush; Aaron was patient and let us take our time to adjust to the experience, always checking in to see that we felt comfortable and confident.
Thanks to Aaron’s professionalism and passion, we had an unforgettable day and felt empowered to push our limits. Great job Aaron — we can’t wait to join you for another adventure soon!
As much as I was nervous doing the abseiling I’m glad I did. Exciting and a nice feeling of accomplishment.
Aaron helped us all feel more confident to take on this challenge because of his calm, patient and skilled guidance. Thanks so much!!
