Olympic Ice Climbing Demonstration

I was one of three Canadians invited to participate in the Ice Climbing Demonstration that was held in Olympic Park over the last two weeks.  The idea behind the demonstration is to make competitive ice climbing a winter Olympic event. Overall the event went very well and competitive ice climbing was introduced to thousands of people. Many of them were also able to try ice climbing for themselves. I was invited for the second week of the Olympics ad spent 10 days climbing and helping intorduce visitors to the sport.

Sochi airport.

The climate is very mild, but we were still able to have a wall with real ice.

 

Walking thru the park on our way to the climbing site.

The ice tower is on the right, and a difficulty wall was built on the left.

Olympic spectators trying out ice climbing for themselves.

Climbing on the difficulty wall.

After the initial panels the wall consisted of wooden boxes hung from the canopy.

I claimed this box for Canada.

In the evening we could climb under the lights and the ice tower had a video light show projected on it.

 

Besides climbing, one of the things I was able to do while I was there was attend the Women's Gold Medal Hockey Game. I was extremely fortunate to have someone give me tickets because I was Canadian. I never watch hockey, but it was still really amazing ti be there and to cheer for Canada.



Click here for a news story about the event that ran across Canada last week.