• Height: 60 feet
Task: Climbing, protected by anchors bolted on to a wall and a rope clipped onto a harness
• Difficulty level: Challenging
Salt Lake: Two hundred-odd boys and girls scaled walls at Salt Lake stadium with an athleticism that could put professional acrobats to shame.
The Open Zonal Sport climbing competition required participants to scale difficult routes on a nearly 60feet-high wall.
Among the participants were a student of Jadavpur University, a bunch of students of The Heritage School, a 17-year-old who represented India in the 2017 Open Sport Climbing World Cup and around 35 boys and girls from Bihar and Jharkhand.
The competition was held in three categories - lead, where a climber scales difficult routes set by the route setter and passes the rope through quick draws placed on the wall; speed, in which timing matters and climbers dart up easy routes; and bouldering, which involves short but extremely challenging routes.
Anwesha Konar, 19, a first- year history student at Jadavpur University, took home the gold medal in women's lead climbing and finished second in speed and bouldering.
A resident of Bon Hooghly, Anwesha started climbing when in school and now trains for around three hours every day at Salt Lake stadium.
"I wake up early, study for a while and and head for the university. I come to the stadium after classes," Anwesha said. Often, that means giving adda with friends a miss but she doesn't seem to mind.
Rudrangsho Dey, a Class IX student of Sri Aurobindo Institute of Education who finished third in junior boys' lead climbing, said he would hate it when his mother dragged him to practice every evening till he became "hooked to the sport".
For Salt Lake resident Kishore Kumar Ram, 24, climbing a challenging route allows him to be one with himself. Kishore, who has participated in several national and international climbing events, trains for at least two hours everyday and longer before tournaments. "We also do push-ups and a lot of crossfit strength training to up our game," he said.
Suraj Singh, a Class XI student of Khanna High School, played volleyball before taking up climbing in 2009 and went on to win bronze at the 2017 World Cup. The 17-year-old won the men's bouldering and speed competitions at the Salt Lake event.
