UKC

This week's Friday nighter is a great video of young American climber Brooke Raboutou. Brooke is the daughter of Didier Raboutou and Robyn Erbesfield - two champion climbers from the early 1990's.

It is no surprise that with a climbing pedigree like that Brooke has redpointed the difficult limestone sport route of Welcome To Tijuana (8c) in Rodellar, Spain at the tender age of 11!

Read more at http://www.ukclimbing.com/news/item.php?id=67783

In reply to UKC News:
My God, could they be more gushing about her?

In reply to UKC News:As with gymnastics this age group is the future of single pitch sport climbing.

In reply to UKC News: Incredible ability ,although it makes me wonder whether the ultra competitiveness is actually a natural personality trait or has more to do with pushy parents. crying because you fell off an on sight can't be a healthy way to deal with failure

In reply to watson23:



As opposed to what - swearing a lot ?

In reply to watson23:

If you're not crying, you're not trying.

In reply to shark: yes, everybody should swear rather than cry

In reply to watson23:



And what would everybody think of her parents then ?

In reply to shark: that would depend on the level of swear words used. you think its ok for an 11 year old kid to be crying because they they failed to on sight a route then?

In reply to UKC News:

I dont think her mum was that pushy. She seemed pretty cool to me and very encouraging.

In reply to watson23:

She should read the Rock Warrior's Way.

In reply to watson23:

Yep. As much as crying for missing a penalty or any other sporting disappointment. The only diffrence for adults is that they have learnt to control or hide or channel their emotions differently. All part of growing up.

In reply to USBRIT: do you think in future, sport climbers will peak before they even hit their teens. I'm not so sure, didn't Ondra climb 8c at 11, has he even peaked at 19?

In reply to shark:


seems like a lot of pressure. especially as it wasn't even in a competitive setting like missing a penalty would be

In reply to shark: Typical example of the obsession with ticking the big numbers, as opposed to just enjoying the climbing.

Mind you, with her genetic background, and both parents being professional climbers, I suppose being a professional climber is pretty high on her agenda, so the big numbers are what matters.

Which is a shame really, at 11, she should be just enjoying the whole climbing experience, without the pressure to make headlines.

In reply to Goucho:

I think you are reading into this what you chose to read in to it. Enjoying climbing and hating failing on a route are not mutually exclusive. It is absurd to suggest she has an agenda. She looked she was having fun to me.

In reply to shark:
She looked she was having fun to me.

+1

In reply to Goucho: If she was bimbling around on 6a's she wouldn't be pushing herself and therefore probably would not get the same kick out of it.

For a lot of people climbing is about climbing harder and harder stuff.

That's one of the things I love about climbing, it's different things to different people.

In reply to jezb1:
Of course it is, - although I'd still say, is the desire to climb ever harder routes because of the challenges and attractions those routes inspire in you, or in order to say you've climbed a certain grade?

And I can't help thinking looking at the video, that there's an awful lot of comments about 'youngest', 'breaking records', 'best', 'phenomenon' etc etc going on. Also, putting an 11 year old through that kind of training intensity, could well cause problems in later life regarding tendons, ligaments etc.

No criticism intended, just an observation and an opinion.

In reply to UKC News: Seems to me that crying at 11 because you don't get your own way is not that odd. There is something about it all that makes me feel uncomfortable but that says at least as much about me.

8c ha, what's she ever done on Grit?

In reply to UKC News:


Hope she really enjoys it..hope her tendons are ok

In reply to UKC News:

I wonder how her elder brother's getting on.

jcm

In reply to UKC News:

Nice kid.

S

In reply to shark:


+1

She looked pretty settled when she was going back up it. And if you care about something then its always going to suck if you don't succeed. And for kids "things sucking" can often involve tears. Better to care about something than to just not give a shit...

As for the "youngest" and whatever, I got the feeling it was a generic video rather than aimed at a climbing audience (the "check out the others in the series" bit and so on) and so I'm not surprised because its probably the easiest way to explain quite how good she is to a non climbing audience.

It's crazy stuff but isn't it a little misleading to say that she's the youngest person to have climbed 8c? Ashima Shiraishi is the same age and sent two 8c+'s last October... she didn't even bother with 8c, she went straight from redpointing her first 8b+ to flashing one and then began working on two 8c+'s that she redpointed in two days total... That's downright mind boggling that right there.

In reply to UKC News: I'm amazed at how much people seem to think they can work out about the girls life and motivation from a carefully edited 10 minute video clip.

Great achievements but what about the UIAA advice re crimping and fingerboards.......

In reply to Scott_vzr:

It's just that....advice. It's not the law.

It could be worse. What do people think about this kid in the same series ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbmbScZgZD8&feature=player_embedded

In reply to 1poundSOCKS: Well single pitch sport routes are ideal for the likes of this age group,and maybe early teens. Its pretty obvious that gymnastic abilty and lighness will prevail on this type of climbing,much more so than multi pitch trad routes where belaying etc would come into play.Ondra is now getting on a bit ,maybe lucky he still has the build of a 11 year old,and some very patient belayers.

In reply to USBRIT:

Ondra is a lot taller then me ( i'm 5ft 8in in bare feet ) and he is not as skinny as he looks on vids in real life. Quite large for an 11 yr old.

Having just put up what he says is his hardest route yet ( in the world ?) i would suggest he is still improving.

How do you mean belaying would come into play on multi pitch trad routes and what do you mean by he has patient belayers ?

This is the same Ondra who has ground up bolted 9a Czech sandstone routes btw, same ethics as yourself i believe.

In reply to biscuit: and free'd the 'little big wall' in madagascar.
Can't remember the name of the climb but it was called little big walling in one of my climbing DVDs when Caff and a few others have a play at it.

In reply to puppythedog:

Exactly. I just get a bit fed up of his attitude shooting down what he seems to see as inferior sport climbers.

I think all that is happening is that the boundaries of climbing are being pushed by the 1st generation who have climbed and trained from a young age. The same happened in tennis, golf, swimming etc.