If Firefox and Safari being bad wasn't bad enough, You Tube is being a pain today :( The Element review is up and kicking, we'll add videos once YT works properly DROP TEST We've conducted a drop test on peoples holds, see our results: here NEW COMPANIES Bolo, Bomber Holds, Rise Holds and Uprising holds all added with logos to the site! AND Koru holds from New Zealand!! AND Atxarte!! See the New Stuff section for a looksee!
NEW REVIEW SLOPERS! YEAH!! Climb It's Moderate slopers are: here
COMPETITION We have a set of Project Holds: Shellshocked to give away! Email us with your most embarrassing climbing story, whatever makes us laugh the most will win :) (50 words tops, make the subject line STORY) We look forward to your shame! INTERVIEW UPRISING Interview with Uprising from New Zealand: here
CLIMBING SHOE TESTS (CHR's sister site) Dustin is sponsored by Evolv, he reviews shoes for us and he says what he thinks: here HOLD OF THE MONTH Element are first up with some new holds: here
NEW STUFF Osm'ose are first up... new holds for 2010: here
NOVEMBER WRAP UP DROP TEST!!: here We test some Basalt holds from Dream Holds: here Osm'ose's Frictions give us some hell: here Element are back with an Aftershock or two: here Contact climbings Warheads. Bomber :P here We ran two interviews: Summit Labs and Uprising Full post here!
Anyone that's been following us for a while should remember this review: here because it was one of the few reviews where we set and set and basically got nowhere! The holds in question were what were called at the time "Top Out Slopers" a set of holds so large and yet so thin you could barely get a grip on them. The now renamed to "Shallow slopers" these holds were designed for gyms / walls that allow you to top out over the top of your boulder. At the time we wanted more of the shapes, but with a more friendly usable area, slopers are great training holds... and low and behold some months later a package arrived.... the Positive Slopers was in the house.
One thing we're positive about is that they're slopers :)
Are they positive slopers? Well compared to the Shallow slopers, yeah. But compared to say some other slopers that are out there that you can get you whole hand over they're not all that positive. When you look at them against their counterparts in the range then yeah they're positive... and then when you set most of these holds on the vertical they're far more like ledges or edges than anything so therefore very beginner friendly
We've had these holds on the wall for months as part of an endurance route that we set so we could work upon our stamina, originally they were mid way through a 60 move route that worked your grip groups in different sequences and then of late we've had them at the start of the route.... waaaaay back when we had a shorter endurance route we had them at the end and that was a pretty bad idea, or good idea... it depends upon how you look at it... after 30 odd moves around a wall and then hitting these holds they were hard to hold onto because of the pump.
Aren't slopers meant to be easier to hold onto when you're pumped?
These holds lend themselves to pretty easy routes overall, they're big and friendly for your fingers, so they're very beginner friendly, so we mixed them up with the Shallow slopers and what we got was something that was just brain melting. These holds when you mix the sets are pretty hard to tell apart and harder to read than you think... in a more than a couple of cases you'd think you'd be going into a simple move and find it more tricky to hold onto.
SUGGESTED USES:
Unlike their slimmer counterparts these holds are pretty good up to 45 degrees, then the going gets very very tough, nigh on impossible would actually be closer to the mark. Some of the XL's and larges can easily be held onto with a little work and some core strength; it's a case of picking what you think you can hold onto and then going for it. We tried all of them, and when we found that the hold was too hard we put it around the corner onto the vertical part of the wall and then used it there as a helper hold. All of the holds on a vertical wall are positive enough that 95% of climbers will be able to haul on them with little or no problem, this is true probably up to 30 degrees... and then it becomes a strong climbers game only.
The variety of shapes that these holds encompass is quite remarkable, you've got every kind of sloper, except for sloping pinches (we used the Teknik Svelts to fill in this gap) most of the holds from the medium and above sizes are easily matchable where needed.
OVERALL BUILD
Number of holds: 4 holds per set (size wise)
Type (Bolt / Screw Ons): Bolt ons
Price per hold (set price divided by number of holds):
XL: 78 / 4 = $19.50
L: 45 / 4 = $11.25
M: 31 / 4 = $7.75
S: 21 /4 = $5.25
Color: Orange
Bolt placement: Centered
Sanding: Flat and smooth
Texture: Even across the holds, quite grippy
Set size: Small to XL
Versatility: Slopers or slopey side pulls
Pre-drilled screw holes: Nope
Now we've come to, and so should you, expect a certain quality from Climb It! As per usual they deliver, the urethane is solid and the shapes all have a nice even texture across the range... same for our other review... they all feel the same... as they should. The shapes are all nice to hold and tendon friendly, except for some of the smaller ones on steep terrain as you want to get your thumb onto the slopey lips for extra purchase. All of the holds have an inset washer that's square to the backs of the holds and an indented Climb It logo.
The only point we'd make, like we've done before is that the holds have a sharp edge where the bottom of the hold meets the wall and if dropped or mishandled during storage chipping will occur. In the larger shapes the backs have been hollowed out to save weight, all of the holds that have this feature have a column for the bolt which means strength isn't compromised in any way. Adding a pre drilled screw hole is something we've mentioned before when it comes to Climb It's holds, although these holds shouldn't spin they do from time to time and adding this feature will give gym owners a little piece of mind... have you ever drilled a screw hole onto a hold? You need to be gentle because you don't want to make a huge mess out of it, or snap your hold... if there was one you could use it (or not) as you'd see fit. It's something EVERY company should do on ALL of their shapes (We'd say from Medium up)
WHAT ARE THEY MADE FROM: Urethane, one of the pockets bounced and took a little scuffing during our drop tests
PACKING / SHIPPING: Not bad, box was a little beaten up during transit. Some of the holds had very minor scuffs
RATING: Noodles: Now it is a well known fact that I believe that slopers are the best shapes to train on and after being shut down by the Topouts I was interested to see what these would be like. We've said that on a vertical wall that they're pretty good for most people and if that person is climbing sensibility then they "should" have no problem... I've been spat off of some of the routes we've set because I was just being careless... or for that fact because these holds seem to chalk up very very quickly.
There are lots of plus' and minus' to these holds. There is a lot of shape variety in the set, the holds are all have pretty well the same "outer" shape, it's the angle of the slope and as these are subtle shapes that makes them feel different when you weight the hold. I think that Louie has taken a blank that he's shaped and then just carved many different variations on the sloper theme... I don't know this for a fact, it's just a guess. Could the holds be improved? Well yeah they could, but only in a limited sense of the word improved.... after the Topouts (Shallow slopers) we asked for more positive versions in the same style.... and here they are, and they compliment each other as in they're slopers that are in the same vein.... we got what we asked for.... so how would I improve them?
That's the question isn't it!
See, these shapes are I suppose pure slopers, there are no thumb catches or dimples for you to cheat the shape. The texture is enough that you can use your thumb to get some more skin onto the shapes. What you see is pretty much what you get. So the question still remains... how would I improve these holds.
I'd make another set that has little areas for a thumb catch. Nothing major, no huge divots, just subtle little areas that I could get a little more purchase with my thumb etc. Why do I say this? Because sometimes the Top Out slopers will be too much (hard to hold onto) and the moderates too easy... but you want something in between. I pitched this idea at Chris and Eve and they went one further... why not hard on one side and then the easy(er) on the other? More bang for your buck, less material being used (better for the environment) and better for you. The other thing would be a letter or symbol on the holds so that you can sort your sets out, finding the difference between the shallow slopers and the moderates was really hard to do.
That said, I like the holds. They're simple and there's not a whole bunch of ways that you can cheat any single move that's been set... sure I've powered through stuff that we've set, mainly because I could (I find them easy to play on)... give these holds into the hands of a more experienced routesetter and watch the fun begin.
Chris: I remember a time when I loathed the sight of a sloper. It took a while before I got accustomed climbing on them and the Moderate slopers are good holds to train on for someone wants to improve on that kind of grip. I`m not saying that they`re easy, but if you compare them to the shallow slopers there is a big difference in friction, fingers will be constantly searching for a better grip on the hold. With the moderate slopers, the incut on the hold makes for a better grip.
When we had them at the end of the endurance route, we had a hard time getting through the whole problem. The Moderate Sloper sequence in itself was not all that difficult and in time even the newbie Nick was able to get through it. The problem is if your pumped, or tired, or over trained or all of the above, these holds don`t have much to offer, but fresh, a newbie like Nick will gain confidence and will improve technique.
As for the term ``pure sloper``, these holds are close but not quite there. Ok...so they`re round open hand grip shapes but they do have an incut on them that makes it so you can really bear down on your fingers. In my eyes a ``pure sloper`` is open hand and when you try to bear down on it, you`ll get spat off and really need to keep an open hand grip to get any kind of grip on the hold. That is the definition I would give the Shallow Slopers.
We have a large variety of slopers, from pure slopers to slopes with a twist of pinch on them, and when I first started climbing with Nuds he would always tell me that slopers will make you strong. I didn`t ponder too much on the idea at the time but I`ve personally seen my climbing improve after working some hard sloper problems down at the gym. The Moderate Slopers are easy shapes to climb on, but the smaller ones are harder to grip and are a great way to see stronger climbers work hard for the send.
PROS:
Beginner friendly, angle dependent... for slopers
Wide range of sizes, lots of variety
CONS:
Sharp edges might chip
Chalk up really fast
Hard to tell apart from the other holds in the same range
------------------------------- Another new company... there's lots to see. Click the logo to head on over!------------------------------- oooof that is a big ol hold ------------------------------- Here's Osm'ose new holds... 2010 style
Straight from the box you're going to look at these holds with their evil black coloring and think WTF are these. You're going to hold them in your hand and you're going to think "heavy"... and then you're going to touch them and wonder what the hell you're going to do with them.
Now, Noodles has spoken to the makers of these holds... Dream Holds and when asked what he wanted to review he said "Basalt" and "Gritstone", both types of rock that he's climbed on a lot. The reason, he explains, for picking the basalt holds was pretty simple... he wanted to see if someone could make holds that feel like the evilness that is the crags. Basalt is a particular type of rock he explained, and it has a particular style of climbing... you have to hold on, but not too much... clamping down too much just leads to you falling off. So here we go... Dream Holds Basalt!Now that you've seen them you can probably get what we're talking about when we say evil :) First thing that has to be said is that we have one of the rocks that these holds were made from (and we're holding it for ransom!) and when you look at the rock compared to the hold all of the details are there, the hold is just a little... (maybe 2mm) smaller. Even before climbing on the holds we could tell we were in for something special... could it be that we have a manufacturer that is making real rock holds that are ACTUALLY LIKE REAL ROCK?? It couldn't be so!!!
Ok, so evil or as we like to think a little bit metal... here come some devil fingers and here comes some climbing! --
-- As you can see we let Jeff set the first route, Jeff's not set before and he likes to run fingertip to fingertip moves. That's a good and bad thing, problem is that Jeff is a tall guy with long arms, and so has Chris, Noodles on the other hand is always going to have trouble with long wide moves and as you can see even after we tweaked out the start move, came around the corner of the 45 degree wall into the 30 wall there was a stopper move for a while... Jeff and Chris managed to rock through the move but Noodles was shut down. As it was so long a move Noodles moved one of the key holds a little closer so that he and other people might have a chance of finishing the route. Once that route was dispatched we set something that ran the other way across the wall, this time finishing on the 45 with some of the holds bolted onto some Motavation volumes. --
-- This time the route was far easier, but still tricky, Noodles set all of the holds in some of their worst positions. Nothing but slopers and nasty little edges for us this time :) But with some good footwork the route was dispatched with little ceremony; but some skin was shredded during the process.
SUGGESTED USES:
Now these holds could go steeper and there's one reason why we're not putting a 60 degree logo up here, and it's pretty simple really... it's because despite having lots of options on these holds, much like their real rock counterparts, there's just not that much to hold onto.
The holds do range from pretty small to pretty large, most of them can be matched without too much worry but you have to be careful about how you grip these holds as they are formed real rock and therefore you can expect to get some skin damage much like when you climb outside. Despite these holds being nice and very realistic they're something you could train on for a pretty long time, just not as long as you'd probably really want to as we found with some of the people that hit certain areas of the holds got some flappers and split finger tips.
OVERALL BUILD
Number of holds:
Type (Bolt / Screw Ons): Bolt ons
Price per hold (set price divided by number of holds): 69 / 12 = 5.75 GBP per hold (approx $9.50 per hold)
Color: Black
Bolt placement: Middle on all of the holds
Sanding: Needs some work
Texture: Hahahaha... slick
Set size: Various sizes of holds
Versatility: Varies with the hold
Pre-drilled screw holes: Yes
These holds are well built, they're resin and they're heavy as hell and each hold has an inset screw hold... and by the looks of it the screw holes have a little inset washer in them... a pretty nice touch! The sanding on the backs of the holds is a little off, nothing massive but you can tell from the back of the hold that they've not been sanded down on a bench sander so that they'd be uniformly flat... none of the holds were warped but you can see that there are a few minor gaps at the backs of some of them
With the holds being resin a degree of care will have to be taken when storing them, I'd not want to drop on of these from up high to a padded or semi padded area... we've not run a strength test as of yet but the weight of one of the holds and then a concrete floor is going to make a loud noise and we think some shattered holds.
Texture wise you're looking at a near perfect replication of Dumby basalt rock from up in Scotland (see Noodles comments) and thou there are a lot of "real rock" holds out on the market these are probably the most realistic holds we've seen and have climbed on; and that's not an easy thing to say as Summit Labs granite holds were amazing as were Climb It's Silverado Cobbles. Right, sorry, went off the page there a little! Texture wise you are going to wonder if you can hold onto these holds when you first get them, some chalk later and you're going to be very surprised at how well they climb and the level of precision that you're going to have to use to climb on them... you'll not get away with brute force moves very much.
From a shape perspective this is where you'll have to use a degree of common sense when setting with these holds as they are molded from real rock and therefore there are imperfections in the shapes and there are some areas that are more than a little painful to grab onto. Dream Holds have looked around and have found something that gives the feeling of real rock and the texture of real rock, in this case basalt, and have limited (from what we can see) any areas that could cause too much discomfort.. but there are a few places that remind you where these holds came from... outside
WHAT ARE THEY MADE FROM: The holds are heavy resin
PACKING / SHIPPING: Best we've ever seen. Think of a Russian doll... a couple of well packed boxes with the holds inside a larger box that had packaging in it. The box and holds came through in perfect condition
RATING: Noodles: Lets do a simple equation! Because kids, math is fun! If you take a set of basalt holds and then add chalk what do you get?
Probably some of the best real rock climbing holds out there..
The above line does come at a price and there is a disclaimer. Let me explain. We're seen real rock holds, Summit Labs Granites, Climb It's Silverado Cobbles, Atomiks Fonts and a whole host of others, the ones listed are shapes that we like and we'd recommend for people to try... some of the others are OK, and a few are just plain not so nice. How can I say that these holds are "probably some of the best real rock climbing holds out there?" simple really, I've climbed in the area where they're from and I remember just what it was like to first get on that rock and these holds are 90% of what that rock and those crags feel like! They represent, for me, the area and the type of rock very well but they're not something that I'd run laps on... nope! I put a lot of work into the routes that we set and climbed on in the videos, as well as a bunch of stuff that hit the editing room floor and I climbed hard on those holds, set some silly moves; easy moves and pretty well everything in between... and I paid the price. Eve paid the price, KC really paid the price and Nick paid the price!
What's the price?
Skin. You will at some point loose some skin, not much in my case, but I did loose some.. KC got a flapper and a few other scrapes along the way. That is the problem with "real rock" holds, they treat your digits like you're on real rock.. so it's always a good idea to be careful
Chris: Not having been around Europe to climb and thus never experiencing the various rock that they have in the region, these holds bring that real rock experience to the inside. Besides, here in Canada our winter is longer than climbing season and anyway of experiencing the real rock feels inside is welcome.
I have spent most of my time climbing inside. I have a great deal of confidence when climbing on familiar holds but with The Dumby’s you’re always guessing and praying that you’ll stick the hold. They found the best shapes to mold from and that made for highly detailed holds. After Noodles bolted the holds to the wall there were still little detail gone unnoticed before that now stood out. At some points the little ridges and imperfections were the only thing giving you any friction and there are plenty of grip options. The bigger holds are my favorite. They’re not any easier but there are more options for grip. Where most of us were matching the top of the holds I found that I could crimp the top and pinch the bottom to get through the move. There is also one that has a small thumb catch that you can really dig into. On that note, the holds are sharp and hurt. I came away with my fingers feeling like they’ve spent the day climbing hard outside.
They really do feel like you’re climbing outside…only with a heater 5 feet away…and being able to set with these kinds of holds makes for something different and appealing. As hard as the holds are and as much as we all left with something sore, the holds drew us all in and we had a fun session climbing hard.
PROS:
Some of the best real rock holds out there
Inset screw holes in all of the holds
CONS:
Slick til you chalk them up
Heavy as hell
Expensive if you're paying in dollars
PRICE: 69 GBP gets you 12 mixed size holds (There are two sets)
We've been working on this for a long long time... we wanted to look at peoples holds and then see if we could break them. Through trial and error we've got some numbers and a video for you all.
Now let US, and when I say US I mean the folks over at Climbing Hold Review put something straight before we start. We're not trying to damage anyone's business, we're just testing holds and seeing what we find out along the way, this is simple testing, simple everyday things that could happen to your holds.... that's it. Enjoy the read... but first let me tell you what we called this little shin dig : Now first of all we made a test bench and we started torquing holds up on it, we also tested what someone with a normal T wrench can tighten a hold down to, taking the average, we found that if you're really hanging on the wrench you can get between 12 and 18 ft lbs of torque. Now not many people understand torque... so we went and tightened holds down to 20 ft lbs which is 240 inch pounds of force on the area of the hold.
Every hold was taken up to 20 ft lbs of torque and here's what we found:
At this force you're likely to pull your t nuts into the wall and into the back of the hold
We used a 5ft long torque wrench so to get the forces we applied with a T wrench you are essentially the Hulk!
One of two things will happen if you hit the magic number of 20 ft lbs:
1) You've got a great chance of shearing your t nuts threads
2) You might compress the material of the hold you're testing
Basically what happens is the inset washer is pushed towards the back of the hold... this means the hold doesn't sit flat on the wall anymore and has now become dangerous to use as the structure of the hold has been compromised.
With that test done, we went to 30 ft lbs and gave up! At that pressure you just pull your T nut through the wall. In a one off "let's see how tight we can tighten a hold til it snaps" moment we took one of the hollow backed Holdz Ripplez and went nuts on it (for regular readers this is the hold that Noodles threw out of the 2nd storey window onto concrete to have it bounce!)... the hold took 30 ft lbs and then we grabbed a scaffold bar and went up to 50 ft lbs (600 inch pounds) and then we got scared and stopped because if this hold broke into pieces then someone was going to get killed by shrapnel... it would have been like a bloody grenade going off!
In a separate test when we were researching what we wanted to do Noodles' dad drilled and tapped a 3/4 inch piece of steel plate (not a simple task) he grabbed one of Noodles holds (which in this case was a Holdz Mini Jugz from 7 years ago) and then tightened it down to the steel plate. The thinking behind this is that the thread won't rip like a T nut and therefore you can really tighten the hold down.... wrong! Holdz holds take martini headed bolts, and therefore the driver used to tighten them is small... what we found with this: is that even with really expensive allen drivers all you're going to do is snap them. (Three of them to be exact)
So we moved onto the fabled DROP TEST! Yeah, this is basically where you're going to break most of your holds anyway! Of course throwing holds into a box without a care will also crack and chip them, that's why we're careful with ours :) The test is a simple one, no rocket science here.. knock a hold off of a ladder that is 57 inches high (just less than 1.5m), film it and see what the damage outcome is... and cue the video:
PROBLEMS WITH OUR METHOD: Right, we know there are some flaws with the science in what we've done, here's what they are:
Compounds > Some holds are resin some are PU
Mass > We have a 700% varience in force because all of the holds were different weights
Shapes > Not everyone makes the same shape, so this will impact results
Now using some simple math and a quick calculation we can even things out a little work out the force that was exerted upon the hold at the moment of impact! Using:
F = ma
Where F is force in Newtons, M is mass in kg and A is acceleration (9.81 metres squared) we can work out and see some interesting figures!
RESULTS:Damaged means: that the hold took some scuff marks or chipped slightly, nothing that would stop you using the hold Broke means: The hold broke either fatally or to a degree that rendered it unusable
CONCLUSIONS: Now you can see that urethane holds in general took a larger force hit (across the weights) than the resin holds and still remained intact! The only resin holds that broke in test 2 (Dropped from the garage ceiling) was the Friction hold and the Nicros hold. The Friction hold snapped clean in half at the bolt hole and the Nicros snapped on one end (But the climbing area is still intact)
Not one urethane hold broke during the tests apart from the Element worm, and that is because of the shape of the hold, think of a big handle, really it's not all that surprising. Even when dropped from a greater height the urethane holds just bounced, some took some light scuffing but nothing that compromised the holds in anyway What has surprising to see what the Holdz hold breaking, you can really tighten up these holds and they always remain intact... but drop one from a small height and they snap
WHAT WE'LL DO DIFFERENTLY NEXT TIME?:
Multiple drop tests of each hold
Take the time that it takes for the hold to hit the floor from a standstill (so we can get better figures for our calculations)
Have a smaller mass range
Try to use similar shapes
AWARDS: Despite what we found, we do have some awards :)
Best Noise: Go's to the Globe for making the loudest noise when it hit the floor Best Bounce: Element Climbings Aftershocks, from the ceiling of the garage, bounced and hit me in the knee when I was on top of the ladder. Highest Torque: Holdz Ripplez took the highest load, we actually stopped as we were scared Surprise Surprise: Megahold's Roof Jug, we've broken these because of their badly placed bolt holes when we've climbed on them but when dropped they were fine
We're going to make sure to test all new holds and mixes in the future with a drop test. Chances are we'll do mass drop tests like this one and then publish our findings.
Again, hailing from France comes Osm'ose... And you'll know that the last set of holds we tested from these guys was the Manip (here) and we basically had our asses handed to us on many occasions; we figured that this time it's be a little different... were we right or were we wrong?
Once out of the packaging these holds actually felt larger and slightly easier than the Manips, this set only had one screw on hold, so ease of movement for setting was much faster than pulling out the drills. The holds have a completely different feel to them despite being made of resin, these feel like they have slightly more friction to them and more space for your fingers, and surprisingly more options for subtle matches and sneeky sidepulls than the Manips.
As we've been training for the Tour De Bloc we were working on some hard sequences, so straight out we decided to set something that would be "semi easy"; here's what the video shows
I guess we were wrong, again these are super technical handholds to hold onto; I mentioned this to the guys at Osm'ose and they agreed that both the sets we have are hard and we're made to be that way... I guess we can see how our working relationship with these guys is going to go, we even suspect they're sitting in high wing backed chairs, stroking cats and laughing manically at out attempts to climb anything on these holds with a degree of grace :) Well that's the way we roll sometimes, we're not graceful, we sometimes have to brute force our way through some moves... sometimes we hit the wall by ourselves and just work (see Noodles comments)
Osm'ose have done themselves proud, if we look at the two sets we've reviewed, they're both technical out of the box, well made and easy to set hard sequences with. We set a fair amount of routes with these holds, we tried a bunch of different moves and sequences that tested us and the holds pretty thoroughly
SUGGESTED USES:
If you're strong you'll be able to pull on these holds on a 45 degree wall, at most and to be slightly nicer to your fingers we'd go no further than 30 degrees, 15 for beginners. There are most hold shapes in this set, with anything that is a jug missing entirely from the set, you're looking at mostly crimps. subtle slopers and edges with the occasional tricky pinch thrown in for good measure. Now we're no slouches where it comes to climbing (we think anyway), but the route that Noodles set at the end of the video was just plain crazy at the end, so much so that he spent an hour in the room by himself and Tyler throwing himself at the end of the problem... he went so hard at the move that he ripped a hole in his index finger on the second to last move. Kudos to him he managed to get the move.
If there's a competition and you have a flat wall then this set is going to fit in and you should be able to set pretty well whatever you want, as long as what you want is hard. Unless you have a home wall that's either flat or slightly overhung then you shouldn't even look at these unless you want to work really really hard.
OVERALL BUILD
Number of holds: 16
Type (Bolt / Screw Ons): Mainly bolt ons with one screw on
Price per hold (set price divided by number of holds): 41.90 / 16 = 2.62 per hold (Euros)
Color: Sandy
Bolt placement: Right in the middle
Sanding: Flat and smooth
Texture: Good, a little rough at times
Set size: Medium
Versatility: Loads
Pre-drilled screw holes: Yes on every hold
Again these holds are super well built, they're well formed; you can tell they the shapes are well thought out and will lend themselves instantly to harder routes. The shapes are well thought out and construction is solid throughout the range, they holds have that resin weight to them, these holds certainly are heavy so shipping might be a little expensive. The bolt holes are right in the middle and are well shaped to take martini shaped bolts.
Color wise we were surprised, we're seen two tone colored holds before... but these look almost like light desert coloring a good mix of camo. They're not meant to be camo colored at all, but how these holds have turned out was quite pleasing to the eye.
The texture on these holds feels slightly gritstone-esque and you can really feel that the texture is going to be grippy, from the packaging to the wall if you're setting nicely these holds really don't need chalk but soon as you start taking liberties you're going to need to chalk up.
Versatility wise there are a lot of options, there are subtle moves to be had on most if not all of these holds, none of them are going to be easy matches but the moves will be doable... really really hard moves or subtle; the way you set dictates what you're going to get
WHAT ARE THEY MADE FROM: Resin, they're making urethane holds soon
PACKING / SHIPPING: Super well packed, the holds were shrink wrapped onto cardboard
RATING: Noodles: Again Osm'ose holds give me a kicking, this time in a right proper fashion. I thought the last set, the Manips, were hard and technical; these are just as hard but in a slightly more tendon friendly manner. These aren't SO hard, you can set reasonable routes with them whereas the first set the Manips were just hard even when you thought you were setting a nice easy route.
The first route that I set had a series of technical moves that were part of a low traverse, I was simply shut down on the move and even thought I worked it for a while I could never find the hard / foot placement to make the move, it always felt like I was uncomfortable in the move... sometimes it just flows and when I myself feel uncomfortable in a move it means I'm either going to find it hard or I'm not going to be able to do it, or I'm going to have to do it in a weird fashion that most people would think would be uncomfortable. What suits one climber, might not suit another.
Now next time I set with the holds I tried to play nice, only sticking in one absolute killer move near to the end... and boy was it harder than I thought, it was a side pull to a hand drop on a hold that one way is great, but when you're trying to reverse the move just an absolute stop dead killer. Here's the video of me spending an hour trying the move that shut us down on the reversal of an otherwise fun route. WARNING: There is a bunch of swearing in the video, so it's not suitable for all people if they're easily offended... (Normally I'd not post something like this but as Tyler had shot it and I re watched it I decided that it shows a climber just working hard at something that makes them happy.... climbing)
Sure I get frustrated from time to time with a move or a route and I'll train / try to get the route til I can walk away happy knowing that it's done. And yeah, I swore my ass off, that's part of my nature when I get shut down...
Where would I suggest you put the holds? Vertical to easy overhangs should make some interesting bouldering problems or routes. That's what I think they lend themselves to and they're tech as hell to climb on.. not for everyone that's for sure.. but they will suit some people
Chris:
When I first started climbing, I spent all my time in the gym. I didn’t have a car, was in school and I didn’t have a steady climbing schedule so pulling on plastic was my gateway to the climbing world. When I started climbing outside I realized that having good technique and foot work is critical. With indoor climbing you can always get away with a little brute strength and ignorance to get you through, >but if you encounter the Frictions, they will spit you off if you’re over zealous.
I don’t think that a set like this is best for a set-up like ours unless you already have plenty of holds to play with. These guys are small, technical holds that most people would use as footholds, but if you have access to a large commercial wall, then setting a hard vertical route will be using these holds at their best.
So my thoughts….I’m not sure what side I’m on. On the one hand they’re really unique shapes unlike anything we’ve reviewed in the past, on the other technical little bastards that I probably wouldn’t invest in if I had my own home wall. To make the holds so we could actually hold onto them, we found ourselves squeezed in the corner or setting the holds on volumes to change the angle. Having big footholds helps ;)
I guess I’m still caught between two worlds. The holds have a certain appeal, and although they are hard to grip, it’s not impossible when everything goes your way but you will come away with some sore fingers if you’re not used to climbing small holds. Setters can easily force moves. With a small area for your fingers, these holds don’t give you much room to match, if there is any room at all. They’re well made and the shapes are unique but when you climb on them, you’ll work for every inch.
PROS:
Superb construction and shipping
Super technical, there's lots of subtle ways to grab these holds
Would be good in a comp or long lead route
CONS:
Very heavy for their size, might push up shipping costs
Not really for beginners, they can be a little finger tweaky
Fairly limited in use, slight overhangs and vertical are where they're best placed
Element has been around for a while but has kept under the radar working on shapes and recently released some of their creations upon the climbing world. One of their newest shapes, The Aftershocks, kept up with the cracked rock theme found on the Quakes and Tremors. The Aftershocks have the same texture as the holds mentioned above but are of different shapes. Where the Quakes are by far the biggest holds and rock on roof sequences, the Tremors are medium ledges/pinches, the Aftershocks have filled up the void and consist of small to large pinches. Now we use the pinch classification for these holds lightly, they are actually classified as large ledges and slopers on the Element Climbing website. Their classification is a little misleading. There are no set guidelines that hold manufacturers use when classifying their holds and we here at climbing hold review have had some feedback on the issue; we have some stuff in the works that we'll unveil in the New Year; maybe it won't be industry wide but you will have some way of seeing the sizes of the holds :)
So suffice to say that Element Climbing has their own way of classifying their holds. When it comes to the kind of shape or grip, the fine line black and white can be askew, and the Aftershocks are round like slopers and have one good ledge on each hold, but since we’re exclusively bouldering we find them to be used more as pinches than anything else. As for the size, there are eight holds in the set, two of which could be called a “large hold”. As for their little brothers and sisters…well that just says it all…they’re the same kinds of shapes only smaller. If Element had to give this set one designation, it should be a medium size set.
We like bright colored holds. Not only do they look cool but it’s easy to spot the next move when the holds stand out. Element sent us our first set to review in dark green and we weren’t to keen on the color, but this time around their holds are bright. The set has eight holds and the sizes are from two finger pinch (I mean ledge;) to large open hand matches. Although
The shapes are easy by design and we raised the difficulty by setting the holds far apart. We’ve had these holds sent with the Quakes and Tremors and we’ve been climbing on them for a while. The sets compliment each other and we set a round all the way around the wall using the three sets.
SUGGESTED USES:
A set with this wide a variety can be set on any terrain bar the roof or super steep angles. Not every hold will be good on the 45 but there is a hold for every angle. We mainly put them on the 30 degree wall and they made for some fun warm up routes or for some bounce around routes where we took it relatively easy. When they were set on the 45 they were very hard to hold onto even though the holds range from small to large, the large holds are ok, but the small holds are just plain hard to grip there's not really enough to hold onto comfortably; mind you sometimes a challenge is a good thing... but these were just plain hard to hold onto... probably too hard to hold onto for most people comfortably.
Mixing these holds in with others that are the same color (like we did) will make for some very interesting routes, when we set with the Rock Candy Ruffles the route was fun and allowed us to have way more fun than with the holds by themselves. The smaller holds should really be foot holds, so that means you've got four good handholds and four good footholds.
OVERALL BUILD
Number of holds: 8
Type (Bolt / Screw Ons): Bolt ons
Price per hold (set price divided by number of holds): $44.95 / 8 = $5.62
Color: Lime green
Bolt placement: Right in the middle
Sanding: Excellent
Texture: The cracks in the holds help, you can dig your fingers in a little more
Set size: Small to large
Versatility: So-so
Pre-drilled screw holes: ?? CHECK ??
Where they could save weight, they did it. Although the larger holds of the set are large enough to match, they still only fit in the palm of your hand. Element molded these shapes with hollow backs and it a good attention to detail. I think that if they could, they’d scoop out the backs of the smaller holds as well. The texture is nice and has good friction without the burn. If they’re like the hold we’ve had from them in the past, they can get a thick layer of chalk on them before they start to lose their grip.
WHAT ARE THEY MADE FROM: Urethane
PACKING / SHIPPING: Well packed, no damage to speak of
RATING: Noodles: This is the first set from Element Climbing that I'm not so mad happy about, there's nothing wrong with them, nothing at all. They're perfectly fine shapes, nice to hold onto and there's a good mix of sizes to allow you to set whatever you like. They're just not my favorites that's all. The holds are all well built and most of the shapes are hollow backed, something that some of the larger company's should look at, if Element can hollow back their holds of this size then so could you :D
When we'd climbed all over the place on them we decided to rock in with the Ruffles from Rock Candy to spice up our route and to add some edginess to our sequence. Adding these holds added a degree of fun that we needed, it was raining outside and we we're getting shut down on a couple of problems we'd set. Before we added in these holds I was having trouble with the sequence that Chris had set the smaller holds were just too small for me to be pulling myself off of the floor on time and time again; so I sat it out and let the others beat themselves up on the route.
If you get these holds in the same color as a bunch of other holds then they'll fit in nicely on any routes you'd like to set, for short bouldering problems they're not so bad, you can set some fun stuff but nothing massively outstanding in my honest opinion; you win some, you loose some
Chris: Element climbing has sent us plenty of holds in the past. They have a large selection of shapes and the ones we've seen in the past have all had a degree of challenge to them, the Aftershocks are much easier to climb on than the previous holds we've reviewed. The shapes of the Aftershocks are straight forward, its obvious where the good part is and despite the grip you use, you will always feel solid. Personally I find that the set by itself is nothing special and serves better purpose if you have other holds to set with. We had more fun with the problem we set with the Ruffles than anything else. It didn't take too much time before everyone sent the problems we set on the vertical and 30 degree. Even with the long moves we all got around it. The Ruffles added diversity and a degree of difficulty that the set can't offer on its own.
As a whole, this set would not be my first choice from Element. I find that the shapes are very simple and there isn't a whole lot of variety for setting. What the set has going for it is the variety in size. The grips may stay the same from hold to hold, but the degree of difficulty increases as you get onto the smaller holds.
PROS:
Nice hollow backs on small holds
Large variety of sizes
CONS:
The small holds are very small and hard to hold onto on steep terrain
We find new companies from time to time, a while back we found out that Uncarved Block were still kicking about making holds, now we've found that New Zealand has a hold company that's called Uprising, as we don't know anything them we decided to have a little chat with Sefton to see what's up with them and their holds Name and job Sefton - Director/Developer of Uprising
How long has Uprising been around? Uprising has been in the mix for about two years now.
How hard was it to start a climbing company? Did it take long? I guess I find the process of designing and creating holds and training devices really exciting, so it was easy from a motivational perspective. Always trying to find a new way to improve is really important to me.
Why the name? I was looking at the cover of one of my favourite Marley L.P.'s and thought "Damn, that'd be a great name for a hold company". Guess I was kinda obliged to do it after that he he.
Where are you based? Christchurch, New Zealand. It's the closest main city to Castle Hill and has a great climbing scene.
How many people work on making the holds? I carve the shapes, but the holds are poured by a team of sedate but hardworking capuchin monkeys, led by Minty (pictured).
What's your process for shaping a new hold? Do you say grasp a door handle and find inspiration? I tend to just throw some headphones on and go for it. I seldom have the exact shape a want in my head, it usually takes a few random swipes before I start to see the hold.
We love the look of your training shapes especially the Sky Hooks look interesting, how long did it take to come up with the shape for those? Thanks! The Skyhooks were weird. I just woke up at 3am one night picturing these portable training devices that could flip up to have a bunch of different grips. I made them the next day. The cool thing with the training devices is that people always come up to me showing different ways they have discovered to train with them.
How about the Extensor? Is that an existing device or did you take a forearm bar and then refine it? It started off as a forearm bar with climbing hold texture, then I realised that a shorter cylinder held with the fingertips was perfect for strengthening the wrist stabilisers on the side of the forearms (like the muscles you use for a gaston away from your body). Forearms are really complex machines with so many different muscles (about 18 each) so it is really important to balance them out to prevent injury. Great for increasing blood flow pre-exercise too.
The market is getting flooded with new company's, how do you feel about the competition out there? The are some great companies out there. When climbers are motivated and creative it really shows in the holds. Other companies make holds that are so bad it defies belief.
Are there any particular hold company's product that you like? Most of the big names have a some really good shapes in their catalogue, however I think that in a few years time the way holds are made will be completely different from the traditional methods.
What holds from your line would you suggest for (and why?): 1. A home wall The Jugular and Anger Management Sets are great for a vertical wall for beginners and kids, and for overhanging home woodies especially if combined with the Rufus and Striata sets for some warm up jug hauling. Of course a Revolution Board is necessary for the best workout possible. ;-)
2. Gym looking to spice up their walls? The 30-Hold Set has been a big hit in climbing gyms, especially with route setters who like making technical, subtle sequences which climb like rock and require the foot confidence of an outdoor climber. They are all dual-textured and are great value for money.
As you're in NZ, where would suggest someone that's visiting for a few weeks go and climb? We are lucky enough to have one of the most amazing bouldering destinations in the world at our doorstep - the Castle Hill / Flock Hill basin. It is definitely world class and worth going the distance to experience. There are also 100's of crags in the South Island to explore from sunny limestone clip-ups in Golden Bay to epic alpine granite in the Southern Alps.
How often do you add shapes to your current line up? I try to release new sets every couple of months. If I go too long without carving I start getting itchy fingers!
Any holds you're particularly proud of? Well, to get a set of 5 holds I will usually carve around 50 and choose the 5 I like the best so I'm pretty proud of them all. Any hold that lets you feel the subtlety and enjoyment of moving over rock is great in my books.
Any shout outs? To all the climbers in the Northern Hemisphere freezing their asses off right now - remember it's summer over here. Tempted?
It's always nice to see something from Contact Climbing, their holds always have a pretty unique feel to them but of late they've been very quiet... they've been away from shaping and they spent the summer outside sending! But Autumn is here and now they're back in the workshop toiling away, molding and getting shapes ready for the winter season.
First up are the Warheads...As you can see that the Warheads are a large set, and when you look at the price being $48 then you're looking at some holds that are jacks of all trades, good for pretty much (notice we say pretty much) any angle... some of them are actually a little trickier to hold than first glance may suggest. Why do we say they're pretty good for all angles? Look at the image above... lets go left to right:
Huge sloper, but there's enough for you to grab onto for when it's on the roof
Massive jug, hang on anywhere
Jug, really incut, super fun to swing about on
Sloper, we put it on the roof and Noodles managed to hang and campus off of it when it was on the Nicros Jug-or-Not, but it was horizontal
Huge sloper, but it has a sneaky incut right at the back which gives you some help when it's on the roof
Big ol' edge, the area you grab is a little sharper than we'd have really liked, but it's doable
See we're not completely mental :) We've had these all over the wall and they perform well, the lines that have been incut around the holds really help with the grip, and even though they don't really need the lines to help the grip on these holds because they're grippy as hell without the lines. That being said they do add an nice aesthetic to the holds
The devil is in the details with these holds, from the well placed pre-placed screw holes to the little nuclear symbol that's around the Contact logo... they're called Warheads so that's a nice touch!
Eve wanted to set with the holds as soon as she saw them, we've been setting some hard stuff and none of it's been very easy... so she wanted the holds, and she wanted to play on the 45 degree wall, so we let her play where she wanted. The one thing she mentioned about what she was going to set was the fact that she was going to put the sloper as the last hold... we didn't worry! Well we didn't worry until we tried to stick the last move... til we actually tried to stick the last move and we got spat off of the wall. Spat off of the wall until Eve told us that the walls upright on the left was in, still we had trouble as the footwork was a little tricky to get right... but we got it done. As we we're comfortable with the holds and we didn't want to use the side wall, we wanted to try to finish the route without it... NOPE! Fail, the sloper is just too hard to hang as the last move... but rotate it slightly so it's angled and it's much easier to hold onto... well it's hard, really hard.
Apart from one of the holds that is a little sharp on the edge and the sloper that is hard to hang onto these holds are good for short bouldering problems on pretty well any angle; we let Eve play with them and she wanted a simple problem on the 45, if you've watched the video then you can see that Eve was pretty sneaky with what she set... that sloper was plain evil as the last move! This set has a little (actually large) something for everyone, big ol jugs, a sloper that's just about doable on the 45 and then the large sloper (number 1) that's go to much room on there that you have so much friction you can stick it easily and then there's number 5 a hold that's a sloper or a huge edge it's having a slight identity crisis.
Ok, we made a complete mess of the walk through, and we're sorry about that... we learnt that our files on the camera get over written :(
Versatility: Quite a lot, spin them around Screw Holes: Yes
NICK - THE NOOB "Hey everybody, The Noob is back with another color commentary ( YAY!!! ;D ). I haven't been climbing nearly as much as I should these past few days but I was lucky enough to drop in when everyone was testing out a set from Contact Climbing and as the name of the set suggests, these holds are the bomb!
So Warheads, what's so good about them? Well for starters there weren't any rough edges I could find to rip your hands open and keep you off the wall for days healing, they're a large set so there's plenty of surface area to grab on to unlike some other holds on the wall right now (you know who you are) and best of all you can use them on any (and I mean any) incline you can dream up! I got a chance to try them out on the 45 and I'll admit they were fun to climb there but they really blew me away (hehe, I made a funny ;p)
When we reset them on the roof, it was the first time I've managed to climb a route on the roof so I was pretty impressed with myself and the holds. It gave me a real incentive to try out some other sets from CC and after briefly looking over their catalog I've got a couple ideas I want to bring up the next time we climb. I'd also like to see if we can set something interesting on the 30 to the 45 and see how they transition from one slope to the next but I'll have to leave that up to the guys for the final approval as well as certain time constraints (so many holds to review, so little time).
So why should you get a set of these for your wall at home? Well, they're comfy, easy to set on any incline and from their design and the six holds included in the set you can make a ton of easy to challenging routes depending on your skill level. Of course that's good news for me and all you other novice climbers out there but the best part is that they aren't an expensive set either (about mid-range based on what I've seen). My advice, get the set! I just hope I get a chance to try more CC holds so I can form a better opinion of the company as a whole.... like getting a set of large and medium Guidelines for example (Noodles I hope you're reading!!!). As far as first impressions go I was blown away ;)
My name is Morgan Barnes. Making climbing holds. No no, your real job!
Well I work at the animal shelter on Fridays. It feels nice to help out the animals.
How long as Summit Labs been around?
For about 1 year now.
Why the name?
I was trying to come up with a name while hanging out in my back yard. We have this sign the says "Summit Lab. 6mi." I thought it would be an appropriate name seeing as were at nearly 8,000 ft.
Where are you based?
In the San Luis Valley, in Southern Colorado. Home to Penitente sport crag, the Great Sand Dunes, and some really nice artisan hot springs.
How many people work on making the holds?
So far,.. one. With more interest we would like to hire more people. I have a few people in mind.
You make holds that imitate the outdoors... was this a conscious decision?
Very much so. We always say that keep the crimping to outside... the holds we reviewed certainly reflect our ethos, what's yours when it comes to shapes and shaping?
I feel that climbing in the gym is directly based on climbing outside. In my eyes you are either training to climb outside or trying to recreate that experience. The shapes I make either recreate the experience or create a fantastic version of it, as in the case of the Granite Slopers
How hard was it to start a climbing company? Did it take long?
It wasn't really hard. I went to art school for sculpture and spent a good deal of time showing in Denver. Making climbing holds combines two things a really enjoy, climbing and sculpting. I took about 6 months before it really started to take shape.
Right now your line up is limited, what's on the cards with regard to new shapes?
I am developing some lines of hybrids. Making holds like dual texture huecos, using real rock casts.
The market is getting flooded with new company's, how do you feel about the competition out there?
I get excited to see the new stuff other companies come out with. It seems like it is definitely beneficial to consumers to have more companies fighting for their business.
Are there any particular hold company's product that you like?
I like how playful So ill is. DRCC's Force Edges are really nice eye candy (they may have even inspired the holds I'm working on ATM). I think it is nice to see companies like Climb It and Dream coming up with even more real rock holds. I'll be excited to see the Dream review when it comes out.
We hear you've been doing a lot of new routing out where you are... how's that going?
Fantastic, we have been developing all kinds of bouldering and putting up new trad lines daily. This area is ripe for development, in regards to trad and bouldering (seemingly endless amounts to those willing to wander). The sport climbing has pretty much seen it's limit here, I don't really think there is too much more to develop. There is however some quality climbing on a line of basalt cliffs. Some 35-45ft trad lines we have been putting up.
Is there a guide yet?
Not yet. You can find some of the boulder problems we have put up on Bouldr.net. I will be adding more problems as I get images for them.
What does the future hold for Summit Labs?
I hope to end up doing more custom orders. I have some ideas for custom orders; ie large features, casting entire boulder problems that could be attached to walls, or casting holds that are site specific for people who want to train specific types of rock. I am also interested in whatever ideas anyone else has.
------------------------------- 30% off on November 27th only! Here's their new stuff:------------------------------- ------------------------------- The Ripplez have been released, 140 new holds ------------------------------- Nitrite from Element Climbing ------------------------------- Motavation Volumes are looking pimper!
------------------------------- New episode from So Ill
------------------------------- Uprising Holds has been added to the page------------------------------- Core Climbing from the UK has been added to the page------------------------------- Bomber Holds, Facebook page has been added to the page ------------------------------- Rise Holds from NZ have been added to the page----------------------------------------------------
In this introduction of our newest friends from France, Osm'ose, most will say “Osmo-who?” kinda like I did when I first saw them appear on my facebook page. For those who are curious, the word “osmose” is the obsolete form of “osmosis”, and the rest you can find on the Internet. Since they don’t have an American distributor, there isn’t much buzz in the North American climbing circles around Osm'ose, but they have been making their mark in Europe, making holds and pre-fabricated wooden panels for your home wall or gym.
We received two sets from Osm'ose, our featured set this week: The Manips! We had these holds in the package until the very end, opening it minutes before we set our first route, and we knew that they weren’t going to be friendly. We debated (while still in the package) which holds were foot holds and which ones were not and came to the conclusion that, being as small as they are, we were going to use them all as hand holds. Was that a mistake? We thought so but stuck by our guns and the holds were cut out of the package and onto the wall.
The set is a mixed bag between bolt on and screw on holds. The screw on holds are small, but they all have an incut and have a good grip on them (Except one, the most evil sloper known to mankind). Most of the bolt on holds are crimps with the exception of the deadly three! Of them there is a two finger pocket, that you can barely get two fingers in, a ledge, that you could barely get a fingernail on, and a tiny slope you can barely get any skin on, so to say the least, with Noodles setting the first problem, I was scared. The holds have been designed with the real rock feel in mind and for the most part they do a very good job of simulating the outside we all love to play in. Most of the holds are textured and the texture helps in sticking those nasty little crimpers. They’re not the smallest crimps out there and they are nice on the hand and skin. Here come the exception to the rule. Remember those holds, the deadly three? Well they, on the other hand are not textured. Other than the little dimples found for thumb catches they are featureless and very hard to stick.
The crimps are incut and we didn’t work too hard to stick the moves but the deadly three needed to switched around. We had the small edge up in the corner thinking that we wedge ourselves in the corner but we were quick to realize that you could only get around it if it was above our heads to get any kind of grip on the hold. Needless to say we had to tweak out the route to be able to get it to go
We moved onto the next problem. Learning from our last problem, we set the smaller bolt holds to the Motivation volumes we received a while back and started a problem on the 45. It went from the overhang to the holds we set on the volumes. Moving across those moves was tougher than we thought. These holds won’t give you an inch, they need to be climbed on with confidence and grace... and you've seen us climb sometimes... confidence we have in bucket loads... grace... not so much :P Without either, you’ll that the mat is your only friend.
Have we over done the symbols? Well not really, this set does have a bit of everything, screw ons, pinches, edges, crimps and slopers... all in 14 holds.
Do we think they'll go on the 45? Yes if your fingers are super strong, this set doesn't lend itself to this type of terrain easily.
The set as a whole is meant for vertical to slightly overhanging terrain. We didn’t have too much trouble powering our way through sequences on the 30 degree wall. Our problems arose when we had to get through a static sequence that required a balance of agility and strength. Core strength is a must. The holds simulate how it feels to climb hard outside: there’s no two ways of gripping the hold, only the right way or you're flying off. Gyms with aretes are going to love the little screw ons as they're really at home on a desperate slapping move; they're big enough that you can get friction on them but not so big that you can hang and chalk :) What this set does lend itself very well to is hard boulder problems, sure there are some semi easy holds in the set but overall you're looking at a set of holds that are going to make you work in pretty much any combination that you put them in
IF you're a complete sucker for punishment on your home wall then have a look at these holds (although Eve suggested most of them would make amazing footholds rather than hands)... and for a gym they could be what you're looking for but where you put them will determine if your customers will like you and the holds :)
Number of holds: 14 Price per hold: 1.50 Euros per hold (About $2.20 US) Color: Pink and purple swirls Bolt placement: Well placed Sanding: Flat and real smooth Texture: Grippy, you'll need it Screw Holes: Yes on every hold!
Its the first time we've ever had our fingers on Osm'ose holds...come to think of it we're probably the only people in Canada to have these holds...and its a surprise that we haven't seen these holds around any gyms in the area. The shapes are nice, the attention to detail is evident in the texture and the fact that they've added a screw hold for the every bolt on holds. Good, well made holds, no complaints. All of the backs are flat, the screw holes are well placed and you can tell that a lot of experience has gone into the overall build quality of the shapes.
The holds only take martini headed bolts so make sure you have a stock of these when you order.
WHAT THEY'RE It's nearly 1am after a good session and some dinner, I'm tired, my finger tips bruised and for what? If you look at it in climbing terms, probably nothing! But if you look at it in route terms... and the level of setting we've been pulling off (being unprofessional professional setters and all that) we've done a lot. Let me explain!
Osm'ose are a company from France We wanted to review their holds, we had trouble getting their holds? Why? You'd think that it'd be an easy no brainer, but it's not. It's really not... there was politics involved and shippers and possibly a few vampires, pirates and other marauders along the way. But in the end we prevailed, and we have the holds and we can put our opinion to them, after all, this is what we do over here at CHR.
Never, and I've seen a lot of holds, never have I been so shut down by some holds (last week and the Rock Candy Ruffles aside), never have I, sod that, never have we been shut down by a set of holds... let me phrase this correctly... erm... shut down so well; again let me explain.
Normally you do this: a) get holds from packet b) find bolt c) move about holds to make pleasing sequence d) repeat C cos you made a boo boo somewhere e) climb and enjoy
We mucked up twice with these holds, twice, and I set the first one and then Chris fell into the same trap on the second route. Why? Because these holds are deceptively hard, like hard hard... to clarify, beyond Chris Sharma hard on vertical in some cases. I really am not joking, I'm being serious as hell! These holds lull you into a false sense of security, they make you think that you are Sharma and that "this move will be easy"... and it's not a bad thing in any case We made mistakes with what we set, I don't say just I because it was a "we" situation. I set something that I thought would go, we'd touched the holds but not pulled down on them at this point and boy was I wrong... seriously wrong. One pained shoulder later, I switched two holds and we were away and flying. Was what I thought going to be an easy route was in no shape or form easy? Nope, not at all, it was hard on the vertical and it was harder on the 30 degree wall... the screw ons in this set are thin, hell some of the bolt ons are thin, they make some of Franklin Climbings shapes look huge!
If these holds are what Europe is putting out then there is no wonder why the Europeans are so strong (and I'm European remember), if people have stuff like this in the gym for the winter months no wonder they win most of the comps. For a home wall this set I'd say... how hard to you want to go.... like how hard do you want to go? If the answer is hard then welcome to Osm'ose. Gyms, oh that's another case! Go and buy them, and give me a plane ticket and I will come and set the most evil route known to man, it's not really that hard to do with these holds, I could do with a week away from work so please send me a request :P (No one need apply unless you weather is described in brochures as "tropical") If you have a comp and you need something spicy then you have found what you're looking for and when I say spicy I mean you'll feel it on the way out spicy... these holds are tech and hell, make you work for every god damn move and if you get the route you're going to feel like a king... a king on a big bloody horse, after a HUGE battle with a beer in your hand... you will feel proud to finish anything set wth these holds
Did I think the start on the 45 would go? Undercling and a shallow two finger pocket to finger tip death crimp of doom? (Thank god for the Motavation Volume it was on) Hell no! Did I manage to walk away from it? Hell yes! Do my fingers hurt? Yup! Would I climb that route again? Yup, but I'd make the finish HARDER. (That's just me, and it will be done, don't worry, I'm 5 paces away from the wall) These holds range from thin, and when I say thin I mean less than a pad in depth (screw ons and bolt ons) to not so thin.... like maybe a half pad.... maybe. There's some slim pickin's in this set... some very thin pickin's. Not that that's bad, that's fine there are a infinite number of ways that you can set with these holds.... just remember that the largest holds is less than a pad deep and that some of the holds have so thin an area to grab on is tiny, so so tiny... welcome to a land of balance and friction (I spent a lot of time brushing the holds to get the grip I wanted)
Osm'ose were the first French hold company, hell I remember buying holds from a guy who resoled shoes in the back of a truck in Fontainbleau and those holds are hard as hell ten years ago, these holds are hard in the here and now... and they should be looked at, I'm going to try to get the Manip set into a comp as I want to see the chaos that happens...
Am I surprised by Osm'ose holds? yes, they're plain amazing... and thank god they're switching to urethane soon... I hate chipping resin holds!
Just wait until we open up the OTHER SET OF HOLDS... there's more of this company's holds in the cupboard.... and we've not touched them yet!
Its been a while since I've been blown away by a set of holds. The packing was a nice touch and it was like celebrating Christmas early for us when we opened the package and set the first problem. We've seen some pretty amazing holds from our local suppliers, but its a nice treat when you get something different that catches your eye. We're used to seeing big flashy holds, but these shapes are small and discreet. The colour scheme is great, but it won't stand out too much on your wall. The thing is, they're just great holds. The size of the individual holds in the set are small but size of the set itself at 14 holds makes it so you can set over and over again with the same holds. The down side to this is that half the set are screw ons so you can either get a drill or make a work out of it.
I haven't been out of north America to climb yet, but I've noticed that your average climber from Europe is pretty damn strong and that places like Fontainbleu and Gritstone have a spirit of their own and produce distinct climbing style. The inspiration is felt through holds coming from Europe. These holds have a certain something that sets them apart from their North American counterparts.
PROS
Technical as hellgood competition holds
Good mix of screw ons and bolt ons
Pre-drilled screw holes on all bolt ons
CONS
Only take martini head bolts, no dual use bolt holes here
Not great for training on steep home walls, the holds are too small
Rock Candy? More like Rock Crisps! (Chips for our American speaking readers)Yup the holds we're looking at today are called the Ruffles, it brings up images of crisps for us, we played with pulling holds out of empty packets for the walk through video, having the bags as our chalk bags as we climbed... we dreamt of so many things to do and what did we get stuck on? We got stuck on one move on one problem for over a week (going on two now)
Why did we get stuck? Well these holds:have slots where you grab them, one side incut and one side slopey...
We figured that as the incut side is incut we'd set a quick problem on the 45 degree wall, dispatch it quickly and then set some other stuff...How wrong were we? Pretty damn! One move off of one hold is what we're (currently) stuck on... but we're working the problem AND IT WILL GO. They are pretty well incut, deceptive in their manner that's for sure. The dual texture is slick which means that the chance of getting a thumb catch on all of these holds is the best part of impossible, so you're stuck just having the textured part of the hold, which is grippy as hell but sometimes when it gets chalked up gets hard to hold.... a quick brush and you're away again, hitting the mats time after time.
And we kind of enjoy the fact that we're being shut down by a set of holds that look like you can just crank and not worry about having the work the problem.. we were wrong. So we marked the holds and their rotation on the 45 degree wall and then played about some traverse stuff where you have to match the hold. Playing about on the route we found that on most walls the incut area are nice to grab and move across on, there's not too much trouble there... spin the holds 180 and you end up with the slopey side, all we'll say here is thank god for the dimples in the textured area as you're going to be holding on for dear life if you're trying the moves on a slight overhang :)
Next up? Well the walk through video had a good idea in it... put the slots vertically and see if you can use the opposing edges to move across... ooooof. Sometimes you can run the opposing moves as a match (using the slopey side and incut sides) other times you're going to find it really really tricky to pull this move off as the slopey side is just a little too slopey. This means you end up having to turn your body and get both your hands onto the incut side and then go for the next hold... cue a few barn doors as you try this one.
We added the 45 degree logo although, after 3 rounds, we couldn't get ourselves up the problem. An extra foot would have made the all the difference with this problem but we worked out some beta that got us to the last hold, only problem was we were never able to connect all the moves:P On a vertical wall the incut sides are huge and if you want to make the problem more challenging its a matter of spinning the hold around for the slope.
We set a bunch of routes with these holds, but from the video you can see only one... and there's good reason for that it's because even though we moved the holds around we just didn't film it as we were pre-occupied with getting this route done. From low ass dragging traverses' to slopey side pulls these holds have it all, one thing (we didn't try) but think might be a good idea is for the Trad Monkeys out there to look at these holds as we think they could be used for practicing to place gear for when you're outside (just don't weight it) the slots in these holds are just begging to have some cams and nuts wedged into them!!
The holds are pretty technical and something that will give people a lot of fun, so far we've seen little of the Rock Candy hold line but what we have seen so far is impressive for a small company
Versatility: Inbuilt with the design Screw Holes: Yes on all holds
Ok... the two things that stand out about these holds are the colour and the texture. The hold itself is translucent and so it gives the colour of the hold a unique tone. So Ill mold some holds with this translucent urethane but are one of very few companies who do so and Rock Candy is among them. Don't think that translucent means weak, the urethane in these holds is nice and strong, we cranked one of the Ruffles up to 20ft lbs of torque the other night (Most people can turn a wrench to 10ft lbs or maybe 15) and the washer was still in the same place that it started in; it didn't sink as the urethane compressed
The dual texture of the hold is discrete, and they look as though they're regular textured holds. Its until you get your hands on them you realize that they have a little more to offer. Along with the dual texture the shape incorporates thumb catches in ridges that are molded along the hold, but remember the thumb catches are smooth so even though you can get something on them it's not as good of a placement as you're going to expect... same go's for feet, if you're careful you can stand on the slick part of these holds, but if your footwork is clumsy then you're going to struggle.
Sanding wise the backs are smooth, the bolt holes although not centred are square with a nice flat washer and the textured part of the holds are grippy but not so that your finger tips are going to be bleeding at the end of a session. Cleaning wise the chalk will be within the slots on these holds and therefore we pressure washed them down in the garage; the texture and holds came back out like new.
These holds were shaped by Tony Reynaldo and we're not sure whether we should praise him or hunt him down with dogs :) The man is obviously an evil genius and we tip our hat to him and hope he shapes some more of these holds without the dimples and a super smooth exterior for our climbing enjoyment
*Ding ding* Round Three Right this is starting to get on my nerves. I'm so so close to nailing the route it's not even funny now, add to that my old climbing partner Jeff is back in town and he's not climbed for a good long while and he's almost nailed this route on a few occasions. We're now resting more than usual between attempts, the music is getting heavier and heavier and the amount of footage that we've filmed that cannot be used due to language that would make a sailor blush is starting to get a little silly... I'm flying off on the last move and I am really really throwing out some interesting combination's of words, some of which I'm not even sure I've used before... at times it's involving mothers, others it involves mothers and animals. Frustrated? YES!
Nathan and the team at Rock Candy have done a great job on these holds, my setting... well... Chris and I both wanted to set something hard (comp season is coming) and we wanted to push ourselves and have something to work on. We both agree that the difficulty and technical nature of these holds and my setting have made a wonderful wonderful route, sure it's frustrating, sure it's hard and I'm having to work to get that last hold and the final hand up to match it... but is it worth it? Is it really worth hurting fingers and cursed mothers to get that one last move and the first send of this little 5 move route?
FUCK YES!
Well done Rock Candy, I hate and love you in equal parts... I'll love you more once I finish this route :P
(Update: (October 21st) day before posting the review, as the wall is (well mine) in my house I just snuck in and warmed up and then had a few runs up the route... the last move is soooo close now I can taste it, if we get this route I swear I'll video it to prove that it went down (if anyone has these holds and needs a close up image of the route so they can try it drop me a line, we'll post your videos of your attempts (and fails :P))
We managed time after time to get to the last move on the 45 and it always ended with our butts on the ground screaming some profanity. The holds are large enough and they have quite a large incut but if your feet come off the wall it becomes very hard to stick the holds. We had to make sure to keep our feet on the wall and we don't have many large feet on the overhang so it came down to core strength and lots of it! The holds are big enough to hang on the 45 but they are very hard to pull down on. If we put a big foot in the right place, we might have managed to get the last move. It may sound like I'm making a bunch of excuses for not being able to send the problem and to be honest, we were very close to sending and its just a matter of being a little stronger...or a little more committing....or a little of both....my point here is that there not impossible to get up.
The thing that stood out for me is the texture. The dual texture is well done and you get no grip on the smooth part of the hold but the ridges incorporated into the shape make it so you can use them as thumb catches, which should have aided us in getting up the 45...but it did not :P There is a variety of sizes in the set and for us (we try to set exclusively with the holds that we review) it gives us more options to set with. On another note, we had the smallest holds at the bottom of our problem. It went without a hitch, we figured out what feet to use and away we went. The smaller holds required a lot more body tension to keep your feet on and it Noodles thought it would be a good idea to leave them at the start of the problem. He set the largest hold as the last hold on the problem. It was big, incut, and we should have made it up....but we did not :(
PROS
Slopey or incut your choice
Could be used to practice placing trad gear
CONS
The set isn't all XL sized holds, three are... two are L or Medium
Dual texture isn't as slick as you think, you can stand (on) and thumb catch the ridges if needed
The company once called Pusher was a big player in the early days of climbing holds. If you, like us, spend a lot of time at the local gym you might have spotted a Pusher hold from the “P” that they would brand their holds with. Well out of the ashes that was Pusher, the phoenix rose as Revolution Climbing. Revolution sent us a whole box of holds, some big, others small, and we ended up getting a large selections of sets to play with. When we started off with this review, noodles and I couldn’t decide which set to review first so to make our lives a little easier, we decided to review two sets in one. Noodles let me pick out the sets and he was a little surprised from the selection I made. With the variety of holds on hand, I wanted two sets that would be different and settled on the Huecos L2 and Fossils sets
Good thing Revolution Climbing marks all their holds with a code so you can distinguish which holds go together. Its pretty simple, each set is designated a letter (in our case “H” for the huecos and “F” for the fossils) and the sizes…well..its pretty redundant, L for large, M for medium…but it’s a nice touch and it makes it easier to organize your holds. We got 8 sets all molded in the same color so having the sets marked on the holds made it really easy to find the sets for our review. I chose these two sets for one main reason. Between the two sets, there are a variety of grips. The fossils are the smaller set of the two and they’re mainly crimps but are textured so it seconds as a pinch. The larger Hueco set has three jugs and two pinches.
Revolution has a large range of holds that they’ve divided up in four main categories. The Huecos are found in the “Real Series Holds” and we had the Large 2 series. I’ve never been to Texas but I’ve seen many a climbing video from Hueco and the variety of pockets and crimps are reflected in the Hueco series holds. What makes this a good set is that the shapes are quite different, the only common thread being the inspiration of the place by which they are named, and if it weren’t for the code on the holds you could almost say that these holds come from different sets. The pockets are big enough to for a full hand with room to spare and have a deep scoop where you can easily get grip on, except that they are thin and when we get them on overhanging terrain they are not as easy as they seem. So we raised the bar a little and put them on the roof. Matching on the roof? Fail! The holds are big, but if you try to get the match there isn’t enough room for all you fingers so you actually need to match with three fingers on the hold which proved to be a little too much for our fingers.
The pinches have an interesting shape. They are both drastically different from each other but are both large one hand pinches On the one hand you have a geometric shape with no incut and while the other hold has a weird crescent moon shape that has some features on it so you can get a better squeeze on the pinch. They’re pretty big and most climbers won’t find a problem climbing on them.
SUGGESTED USES FOSSILS
The Fosils are bolt on crimps. They have a slight incut but there’s not much to hold onto. These holds were also in a route at our local gym. Holds of this size are great on routes and for moves that require a lot of balance. You don’t want to be cranking hard on these holds all night and we didn’t want our fingers to hurt too much in the morning so we set some short moves on the vertical wall. My guess is that these holds could make it comfortably to a 30 degree wall but the steeper stuff is reserved for the brave. There are larger sets series but we have the smallest bolt on holds from this series and were limited to our vertical wall. Crimping for the most part is uncomfortable and painful, but the Fossils have a good shape that doesn’t hurt as much as other crimps. They have a texture and sometimes, on other holds, the texture may have sharp edges that dig into your fingers but the crimps from this set are comfortable.
SUGGESTED USES HUECOS
Any angle and even the roof. It might not be the best place for them but with pockets that big we couldn’t resist ourselves. But that’s only half the set. The other pinches are good fro vertical and even shallow overhangs. We could have put them on the 45, but the pockets with the pinches gave us a good variety and we could make a longer problem with the holds that we got. The set is great for anyone…I mean anyone. Novice climbers will have no problems with the jugs while working on their pinch. Want to set hard? No problem here. You can try out an undercling on one of the jugs or better yet, put them on the roof. The jugs are deceiving and harder to hold on to than you’d expect.
Versatility: The Huecos are jugs so there's a bunch of uses, the Fossils are pretty well one use Screw Holes: No not needed
All of the holds have a "R" for Revolution and letter denoting their set and size, this is a godsend when you're digging through a bucket of holds looking for the rest of a set. Thankfully Jeremy has a brain that remembers what holds are where and the number of holds in a set, so we're not so bad, but thank god for the letters on the holds!!
Way back in November of 2008 we ran a review on some of the Shellshocked range from Project Holds; you can find it here... the one size of holds we didn't review was the 2XL's, we did everything else up to and including the Wedge but we had a hole in our line up between the XL's and the 3XL's... now we can fill the gap (other than the really big shapes in the lineup) and you can see what this size of hold is like. Without further ado, meet the Shellshocked 2XL holds:
Now if you click the link and read the last review you'll see that there were a bunch of problems with the holds; the Wedge got stuck on the wall and we had to do some fairly brutal drilling around the t nut to get it off of the wall and we noted that the color despite the holds being poured at the same time was a little inconsistent when it got to the edges of the shapes. This time we had no problems, the holds are a light pink and the color is nice and flat across the holds and as these holds aren't anywhere near as large as the Wedge we've had no problems with t-nuts and lock ups! Where we did have a problem was one entirely of our own doing :D
Setting late at night when you've had a few too many beers for your birthday might seem like a fairly bad idea, and when we went back and looked at what had been set and we started to session the problem that we started to think that we could have set something that was a little out of our range and possibly a little crazy because some of the moves were really hard. Rather than just re-set the route we decided to try it a few times to see if it'd go. Chris mentioned that we'd set something similar a few years ago with this holds that were a little more positive to hang and he believed that it would go.
So round comes Noodles actual birthday on the Sunday where we had a full schedule of work on the site to be completed, we weren't even going to climb but as we needed to film for an upcoming review we grabbed our gear and off we went. The other route didn't even get a look in, we figured out what we had to do to complete the route, it was now a race to see who would actually be the first to stick the move (the one from under the box to the 30 degree wall) and then to figure out the final move which was a match on the most positive hold of the set.
Shallow walls, arete and the tops of bouldering walls is where we'd suggest putting these holds (see Noodles comments for more info on this)
The holds despite of a big area are hard to match, ok we did set harder than usual but that's part of the point of climbing; you want to test yourself... and when we say hard to match it was purely hard because of our route. On a vertical wall on a route these holds should be ok for most people to haul on, as the angle goes up even a little bit they become exponentially harder. Using them on opposing moves make them a whole bunch of fun to climb on, locking the moves, catching another hold and then moving your feet up slowly and gently so you can catch the next hold is an exercise in movement and balance.
Versatility: Lots, depending upon where you set Screw Holes: Yes on one of the holds
NICK Once more the noob puts his two cents in on another set of holds! First of all I'd like to take the time to say OW!!! Being a bit new to the sport my fingers haven't built up to the point where they can take most of my weight on them and as you'll see in the video, the holds are nowhere near as easy to get a hold of as the Shellshocks that are up on the wall. As usual, these new holds sucked chalk like crazy the first few times we tried them out but once they'd been used a bit things started going better. I enjoyed the challenge of this new set a lot more than the Shellshocks but I'm not sure which set I'd pick for a wall of my own. The texture of the new holds was a bit smooth for my liking as I prefer a rougher feel which gives me the impression of more grip but that's just a question of preference and not worth much consideration since the holds had excellent grip after a bit of use. The overall shape of the set was great, not to easy to find a good grip but that made them all the more challenging and I for one think that's a good thing! Not much more to say about them really. I liked them a fair amount and the pain they induced wasn't unbearable so I'll say they are a worthy addition to any wall, gym or home. Oh! Despite what's shown in the video, I did finally manage to get through the first route but I don't know how much longer the holds will stay on the wall so I might not be able to do it in reverse. Fingers crossed, noob out! :D
There's a company that you may have noticed that pops up on our site from time to time; Beta Clothing. We have a long running relationship with them, pretty much from the start of climbingholdreview we've had most of our t-shirts printed by them; they took our logo and reworked it into what you see on the back of our shirts.
Beta has been a Tour De Bloc sponsor for some time and they're producing some products that stand out from the normal run of the mill products that you sometimes see. Let's have a chat and see what's what :)
1: Name and job. David Smith, Owner / Director of Beta Clothing Designs Inc.
2: Beta is a Canadian clothing company, how long have you been operating? Beta was established in 2001, just after I graduated from Industrial Design at OCAD in Toronto, however it really only got serious around 2005. Since then every year Beta has doubled in size and evolved into what it is today.
3: What's the goal of Beta? To deliver quality products, at affordable prices WITHOUT cutting corners.
4: Any stand out products that you're really proud of? The two-tone Tektonic zip hooded sweatshirt from last years fall collection is probably my most favorite as of yet. It was the first product of ours to truly explore original design and move in a direction that we could call our own. It was a very small step, but a huge success and the beginning for what is to come.
5: You sent us a bunch of Cadence shorts telling us that they'll last, they do! How long did they take to design? Each product is a labour of love and takes a long time. I personally research the fabrics, develop the fit and style, develop the colour combinations, and create all of the artwork for each product. Essentially I am responsible for the whole package, overall I try to ensure that every product is truly the best it can be with the resources we have at hand.
6: We get our shirts printed by you, can you talk us through the design process step by step? Everything we do, we do to the best of our ability…whether it is our custom collection or branded clothing for you guys we oversee and manage every step of the process to ensure the highest quality and the best results. For your shirts, we track down the suppliers, develop the artwork with the client (as you know) suggest ink colours and locations, we will go as far as to produce colour mock-ups of what the finished shirt will look like BEFORE anything happens. This way the client is sure they know what they are getting. We essentially take on all of the responsibility and headache that comes with developing and producing branded clothing and allow our clients to relax knowing that they simply place their order with us and can rest assured that the end result will be delivered on time, on budget and with the highest level of quality available. We try to make every project as stress free as possible; we know that our clients have better things to do, so we take on all of the responsibility to ensure that the final product is where it needs to be, when it needs to be there, with no stress and no surprises.
7: You're also a Tour De Bloc sponsor, how did you come to fit with the climbing community? Are you a climber? Are we climbers…ABSOLUTELY, Beta is currently staffed by some of Ontario’s strongest climbers and our team definitely includes some of Canada’s best. We have all been climbing for many years, and have been around the Tour de Bloc since its inception. You could say that Beta was born in climbing and has been raised in the city…We have been a Tour de Bloc sponsor for the last 6 years straight.
On a more personal note, I have been climbing for 10 years, I have climbed all over North America from here in Ontario to the New River Gorge (WV), The Gunk’s (NYC), The Red River Gorge (KY) and Mexico to name just a few. I trained and traveled most frequently with my younger brother Mark. My hardest red point is 5.13b (8a), though I was painfully close (last move of the crux) to my project at Lions Head, Lion King 5.13c/d (can’t claim it yet). I train twice a week in a gym and do cardio training and hot yoga on the side.
My goal is still to redpoint 5.14, which I know I am very capable of doing, though it is quite difficult to maintain that degree of fitness while managing a company as involved as Beta. I have told many of my friends that for now Beta is my 5.14 and when it is where it needs to be, it will be the greatest redpoint of my life. In the meantime I just want to maintain my fitness and enjoy all that is going on right now.
8: Being a clothing company, we know you sponsor a bunch of people (We'll we co-sponsor one of the athletes) who are they? Anyone famous? As mentioned our company team boasts some serious talent, all team members contribute to the growth and development of the company on different levels based on their skill sets. But at the end of the day, Beta would not exist without the quality people that make it work. They are (in no particular order) Dustin Curtis (National Team Member), Bonnie de Bruijn (National Team Member), Daniel Martian (All round amazing climber, one of Ontario’s strongest climbers), Mark Smith (My traveling and training partner and again one of Ontario’s strongest), James Stuart (13 years of climbing), Frank Kocis (5 years of climbing) and myself (10 years of climbing).
9: What's new with the company this year? What’s new with the company this year… everything! We are just starting to roll out our newest products, definitely the best styles we have ever had to the opportunity to produce. We recently launched our new e-store and blog and both are kicking ass. Our clothing will be available in several Toronto stores starting October 1st and we are gearing up for the One of a Kind Show near Christmas. On top of all of that we cleaned up our branding, hired some more staff and most importantly signed on with the Tour de Bloc for another year, this time as a silver sponsor. Overall, we are gearing up for our best year yet and things are going very well…
9a: One of a Kind Show? Never heard of it.. care to explain? The One of a Kind Show is a massive show that occurs twice a year, once in the spring and once for the Christmas season. It is Canada’s largest and most prestigious show where independent designers can showcase their products. The concept is that it specializes in one of a kind, small businesses; designers and artists that are independently trying to build a name for themselves in the marketplace.
It is an amazing show with an attendance of 150,000+ people for the Christmas show and it has always been one of the best ways for us to be able to meet and truly get to know each and every one of our customers. You build real relationships with the people buying your products, each season they come back to see what new products you have and how you have been. It is a very enjoyable way to do business and it allows all of our supporters to come and meet the design team, hear about the products and really learn what goes into making the clothing and building the business. We are very well supported at these events and we love it, people from all over Canada come to see what we have been up to.
If you have never been it is worth the experience, I believe for the x-mas show there are something like 500 different vendors. Again, it is a great experience for both the company and the customers, it allows us to put a face to our names and more importantly it allows us to shake the hands of every customer that comes out to support us. Something that I am very grateful to be able to do.
One of my goals when I started Beta was to always be accessible, I always want people to feel like they know me or someone from the brand. That’s why we love the Tour de Bloc as well, we set up at every event we can get to so that everyone can learn firsthand what we have been up to as a brand, I find it’s a far more personal way to do business with people and by far the best.
10: In five years, where do you want Beta to be? Five years from now I want Beta to really be at the forefront of performance fashion apparel. Few people really understand what it takes to be creative in this industry and the time, energy and money it takes just to run the business, without trying to reinvent anything.
Every year Beta releases products that are far more creative and interesting than a lot of what is on the market. This will continue with each year passing, the only thing I want to see is the level of our creativity grow to such a degree that it truly becomes our reputation. I want people to see our designs and be blown away; I want our brand to be respected for doing things better than most and still keeping things affordable.
11: Where can people get your clothes? Is it just online or are there stores that they can go and see the products first hand? As of October 1st of this year, we will have our products in three boutiques in downtown Toronto. We also frequent a lot of clothing shows and events; we will be attending all local Tour de bloc competitions with our team and a full selection of our newest styles. Lastly, we offer a personal shopper experience where we bring the clothing to you (Greater Toronto Area only) and there is our e-store. Remember that all of our products are guaranteed for life and we have a fantastic exchange and returns program. So if you are psyched to try our products and can only get them from our online store, relax knowing that if you aren’t truly happy with the product you can always send it back and we will makes things better. Full post here!
Element Climbing sent us a box full of their new shapes. They’re a relatively new company and are working hard making their mark on the climbing community. From our experience climbing on their holds in the past, Elements shapes are unique, versatile, finger friendly and from our first impression of these holds we expected no less from this weeks featured set, the Ions:
The Ions are an eight hold, medium to large pinch set. The Element medium and large size have a wide range of sizes and if you compare the size to that of some other companies holds, you could say that the set incorporates three different sizes, small, medium and large. The smallest of them all is two finger pinch with the largest, make that the two largest, are big enough to match. The design of each hold is based upon the same theme: an incut pinch with a bulbous area to grab that helps keep your fingers in the groove of the pinch and prevents your nail from scratching along the wall when executing the more dynamic moves. As similar as they are, the shapes are all different, ranging from size and the angle of the incut and our first thought was to get them up on the 45... but Nick got them first
Nick was given the rare honor of getting the holds brand new, straight from the box without anyone touching them other than us with our usual walk through shenanigans. Nicks a new climber and he's never set before, so we let him play and helped him on his way with a wrench and some bolts. The one thing that we forgot is that Nick, like Seb, is have quite the span on them and they've got way more reach than either Noodles or Chris, so what Nick set was quite a surprise as the last move was pretty damn long :) For someone that's been climbing for 3 or so months he's setting some stuff that's pretty hard, and if he can do the moves and can complete the route then it means that they're pretty beginner friendly
So we went to work setting another problem on the 45. After taking a closer look at the holds we realized that we may have been a little over zealous on our assessment. Our original idea was to get them all up on the overhang, traversing across and finishing up high; but the smaller holds from this set could set off a finger injury and we decided to use the larger holds only. These pinches aren’t for the faint of heart, they’re narrow and you might let out a grunt or two when climbing on overhanging terrain. What saved us was the incut, they have an incut on either side that will allow you to get your thumb around the underside of the hold and you can really clamp down on the hold. Getting the route from start to finish was really hard and quite taxing; but as always we carried on and got the job done. --
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We probably went a little overboard with putting these holds up on the 45, but what’s life without a little adventure. We’ve had other pinches up on the 45 and Chris has spent weeks trying to get up the problem, without any luck. We set a very similar problem this time with the Ions and it took us a couple of tries before we got to the top of the wall. They’re hard, but not impossible. They're pretty interesting to climb on, pretty friendly for people that have trouble with their pinch strength these are a good step to getting some power on shallow angled walls, if you're strong then crank the angle up and bring the pain
Put the holds flat in the horizontal plane means you're going to get some nice semi incut edges that have a round edge, they're not the most comfortable but they work pretty well, the good thing about these holds in this rotation is that you can match most of them much easier than when they're used as they were intended
Versatility: Pinches or edges Screw Holes: No
Beginner friendly pinches
Good price
CONS
Unless you're strong you will be looking at shallow angles for these holds
Just as we finish out Ruffles review Nathan sends me an image of the BIG new Ruffle -----------------------------------
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Ready for Halloween!----------------------------------------------
SUPER SALE FROM CONTACT CLIMBING Tech Wedges, $24 for 7 holdsGuidelines medium, 5 holds instead of 8 for $24. Soon they'll return to $35 Leftovers medium, 5 holds instead of 10 for $24. Soon they'll return to $35Grits medium, 5 holds instead of 10 for $24. Soon they'll return to $35 New holds being molded next week, meet the Handles
That logo is not us giving a Big Up to anyone, that's the film company that makes the films you probably love to watch on your down days!
Climbing movies come around, we've been waiting for this one that's for sure. When it's raining we climb and then chuck on a movie our playlist is: Dosage V, Stick It, One Summer and a few others. One of them needs to get bumped for this: Big Up Productions are just putting out high quality climbing films, from locations to climbers to just the quality of the filming these guys are GOOD. Rather than drag my ass across town I just went and downloaded this from their site, as $23ish (CDN) for just clicking a few buttons I'm pretty happy with the way I can get this (although I'll end up buying the DVD anyway)
Some climbing films are hit and miss, this is just plain hit. From Caldwell burning off the kids (as he puts it) to Sharma on Jumbo Love and then everything that's pushing the sport to the next level (seriously 2500+ moved for endurence training?) this film is filmed well, has a great sound track and enough movments of "aww come on that's impossible" to keep you inspired throughout the coming winter months. Don't believe me? Here's the trailer:
We don't rate films, we rate holds... but if we did rate films this would be five star, beating out Dosage V by a country mile.
You can download the film here if you have a pay pal account, or order it through the site, it's well worth a look if you like some crazy climbing
INTERVIEW UPRISING
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