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 Mike Langley
Interview.
Here Mike
Langley the Head Route Setter at The Castle Climbing Centre in
London explains about his role within the SIBL
Full Name:
Mike Langley
Job description:
Head Route at The Castle
Climbing Centre
Your role within
the SIBL (Route setter, sponsor, wall manager etc)
Mostly organising and setting
before the comp and stressing during.....
How many hours
work does the SIBL involve for you?
For the SIBL I will take half a day
a week or so before the comp to put together a team of setters
and map out whereabouts all the problems go. For the Castle
round we like use as much of the space as we have and put up as
many problems as possible so that all the categories have
specific set problems. This way we avoid too much overcrowding
and people lobbing on each other’s heads! Then the real work,
two days of setting, testing and the dreaded tapping! Followed
by the comp day, being there from early until late to make sure
everything runs smoothly with the setting and to make sure that
no one cruises all the problems.
Describe your role
with regards to the SIBL. What’s involved:
So firstly we need setters, this
year we will set the open category’s 20 problems pretty much a
whole set of separate junior problems and the fun comp’s 15 or
so problems. That’s a fair selection of funky, easy, hard,
height dependant, enjoyable, interesting, different and not too
dangerous moves to create. So I like to use a lot of setters,
there will probably be at least 6 of us. On the hardest two
problems we sometimes set them with two or more people to make
sure there are as good and bob on grade as possible. Considering
these can be font 7c moves this can take time and a lot of
cranking. We need to make sure at least one of the setters has
done the problem as well. Once I’ve got the setters booked and
psyched I can move onto to whereabouts of all the problems. We
usually draw a topo of the bouldering areas and mark out the
exact lines so we don’t get cross over’s or bottle necks of
people. At the Castle we are pretty lucky to have 6 different
areas we can make use of. On the topo’s we will also write down
who is setting what and what the grades need to be. From here we
will save all our beans until the Thursday and Friday before the
comp.
On the Thursday morning we will all
meet with Military precision in the Castle Cafe to drink
dangerous quantities of coffee before getting amongst the holds
and starting the set. We will spend all of Thursday marking up
the problems by chalking/ rubbing out and re-chalking our
existing holds to create all new problems. To always out do our
last round me and a few of the others will try and come up with
something totally different, something un-expected (this usually
involves plenty of head scratching and yet more coffee). Some of
you may remember the swinging rock rings of last year! Expect
more of the same this year.
Once Thursday’s epic is over Friday
is yet more Coffee then testing and tapping. The testing will
generally involve the problem setter firstly trying to explain
their chalking hieroglyphics to a bunch of slightly hung-over
confused setters and then convincing everyone that it’s not a
total sandbag. Before making a few tweeks and moving on. We then
do this for all the 30 or so problems.
Once we are happy with the problems
all us move onto the tapping, the dreaded tapping......
Tapping basically involves ripping
gaffa tape that does not want to be ripped into four nice linear
pieces for each hold on each problem. This is by far the grimist
job of the SIBL, mind numbing would be an understatement but
it’s what makes the comp work and it’s something that stays with
you for years afterwards! The main problem with the tapping of
the holds is that it takes flipping ages. Because we do this on
Friday it always drags on into the night. Anyway once sorted I
know we are nearly ready. A quick tidy up and we will be ready
for the comp early the next morning.
The comp day always starts with a
nasty shock for me, I arrive at the wall at 0800, that’s pretty
early for me and the first thing I see through my cycling
induced windswept eyes is hundreds of people rooming around
filling out paperwork and warming up for the comp. Once over my
initial shock I can start panicking, panicking that the problems
are not on grade, a volume will rip off the wall or loads of
people will path the hardest projects! But this is all part of
comp setting, you may get to stand there and watch people climb
but you are probably sweating more than they are..... In a
really wrong sort of way you’re saying to yourself “please fall
off, please fall off” to the dude who is currently winning the
comp and chalking up before your last, hardest problem. Once the
comp is over and as with years previous it has gone down really
well you are well psyched, so happy with your and the teams
efforts over the last couple of days, and this year we will have
a party as an excuse to celebrate as well. That is of course if
the problems are as good as they need to be. Nervous now!
How long have you
been helping out with the SIBL:
I have worked for the SIBL over the
last four years, initially working on the desk chatting,
pointing and clicking. Then as a route setter and now as the
head route setter and one of main organisers.
What is the best
part of the SIBL for you? :
Watching people having a great day
putting in maximum beans on the problems we have put up and the
feeling of total relief afterwards. The feeling that it was all
well worth the effort!
What does your
wall have to do on the day to be able to hold the event?: (any
closures extra staff etc):
On the day we will close down all
the bouldering areas with exception of the upstairs bouldering
wall, this usually means a reduction in entrance fees for those
non competitors who have come to the Castle to get away from the
rain and we put on loads of extra staff. We will run a second
smaller cafe and make sure all the SIBL organiser’s have a base.
This year we will also be setting up the after comp lecture area
and turning the Castle into an amazing night club. Phew.....
If you had to
summarise your role within the SIBL in three words what would
they be?:
Set, tape, smile!
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