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http://westernfrontonline.net/2010073012488/sports/ascending-arborists/
Ascending Arborists
by Gina Cole
Friday, July 30, 2010
Caution tape and crowds surrounded five trees at Elizabeth Park. Everyone around the trees tilted their heads back, and some shouted up into the branches.
“Work through the burn!” “Monkey boy! Woo! Ding, ding, ding!”
A bell rings and a man in a helmet descends from the canopy, panting.
Saturday, July 24 marked the first time Bellingham has hosted the Puget Sound Regional Tree Climbing Competition.
The Pacific Northwest chapter of the International Society of Arboriculture hosts three regional competitions each year in Washington, Oregon and British Columbia.
Competition coordinator James Luce, an arborist for the city of Bellingham, said the competitions like this do not damage the trees because competitors do not use spikes, spurs or raw ropes.
The event is intended to promote quality tree care as well as promote the industry.
The community and the city used the event as an opportunity to teach people about trees and tree care. Volunteers displayed brochures about selecting, planting and caring for trees, as well as identifying trees in Bellingham parks. Samples of wood, roots, saplings and twigs were laid out so visitors could learn how trees grow and how to plant them and take care of them.
Competitions are also an opportunity for climbers to learn. The goal is to showcase the latest in safety and climbing techniques while creating publicity for the tree care industry.
“Ultimately, it makes you a better tree-care worker and climber,” Luce said. “I know it did for me.”
The events also allow participants to bond, share an experience and swap stories.
“It kind of brings people out of the woodwork who share professional pursuits,” Luce said.
Most of the competitors were certified arborists who climb trees every day doing tree care, which can include pruning or even removal of trees. Climbers of all skill levels are encouraged to compete.
The competition consisted of five events and a final “masters challenge” for the top few finishers. Because the point is to learn and improve, all the events mimic what arborists do in their daily work.
Belayed speed climb
The belayed speed climb is a speed event in which participants must climb 60 feet up a tree as quickly as possible using some combination of the tree itself and the belay line they are connected to.
Crowds cheered when competitor Steven Conrad rang the bell at the top. He had earned the fastest time of the day at that point, at 50.88 seconds.
“That’s how I climb a tree every day,” Conrad said, lighting a cigarette. “It’s all about finding the route up the tree. It’s a little bit like going through a maze 60 feet up.”
He said climbing trees was similar to climbing other things, with one small difference.
“It’s all forearms, like a rock climber,” Conrad said. “But you have a chainsaw attached to you.”
Conrad owns Urban Forester Tree Care Professional. He lives in the Columbia neighborhood, just blocks from Elizabeth Park, and he said the park’s trees are especially fun to climb.
“Nothing like smoking non-filtered cigarettes and climbing trees,” Conrad said.
The best parts about climbing trees, Gray said, are getting to see everything from high up and waving at children on the ground.
“I like to come out of the tree upside down, like Spiderman,” Gray said. “They eat it up.”
An hour into the competition, children had began to shimmy up the park’s basketball hoop and hit the metal bar at the top, imitating the ringing of the bell.
Aerial rescue
The aerial rescue simulates an emergency scenario in which a climber might have to help an injured climber out of a tree.
Competitors must get up the tree and safely rescue a roped-up dummy before handing the dummy off to emergency medical technicians.
There is a five-minute time limit for the event and climbers get points for following rescue protocols. These protocols include talking the person through the situation. Competitors shouted at the dummy as they completed the task: “Can you hear me?” “Hang in there, Chuck!” “What do you say we take a ride to the ground?”
Tree care is dangerous work, and injuries in trees are more common than falls to the ground because belay ropes usually catch climbers if they lose their grip.
The biggest danger of a fall in a tree is swinging on the ropes and slamming into the tree, said Merrill Larsen, an arborist with international company Bartlett Tree Experts.
“If you’re doing things even remotely right, there’s not a chance of falling to the ground,” Larsen said.
Secured footlock
Footlocking is a technique climbers use to get up a rope hanging from a tree. Climbers twist the rope around their feet so they can stand on it, reach up with their hands to hold on and grab another lock with their feet.
In the footlock event, competitors must use the technique to climb 50 feet up a rope as quickly as possible to ring a bell at the top.
Throw line
Arborists use ropes to help them get into and around trees. They get ropes into trees by first throwing a special, strong, lightweight line attached to a weighted shot over the branches. Once they have the right branch, they can use the lighter line to pull the climbing rope into the tree.
Target limbs were marked at 30, 40, 55 and 63 feet up a beech tree and competitors had to get a line over those branches.
Work climb
The work climb was the closest any of the five main events came to mimicking an entire tree-care job. Competitors had 5 minutes to climb to five different stations in an oak tree and complete tasks at those stations.
The climber starts at the top of the tree, rings a bell with a handsaw, rings another bell with a pole pruner, tosses a stick to a target on the ground, walks out a limb to ring a third bell without bending the branch too much, then finally must get out of the tree by landing with both feet inside a target on the ground.
Masters challenge
After an hour-long lunch break, the three people with the highest total scores from the five events competed for overall championship in the masters challenge.
The event is similar to the work climb, but harder: The tree is more difficult to climb and move around in, and the stations are tougher to get to.
The masters challenge took place in a silver maple more than 5 feet in diameter that stands out as a focal point for the trees in the park. It is the largest silver maple in Washington state. Its branches shaded most of the audience of about 100 people spread out on the grass.
Competitors are allowed 15 minutes to complete the challenge and they are not allowed to watch the others complete it. They must start with none of their equipment in the tree and finish with none in the tree, completing the entire challenge all the way through just as if it were a regular job.
Only one climber completed the masters challenge in time: Scott Nyuli, a self-employed part-time arborist from Salt Spring Island, British Columbia.
He finished with 30 seconds to spare.
The winners
Nyuli won the competition overall with the highest total score from the events and the first-place finish in the masters challenge. He has been an arborist for 11 years and has been competing for eight. He climbed at 2009’s international championship in Rhode Island, but finished in the bottom half of competitors there.
Nyuli placed in the top three for all five regular events, taking first in the work climb and the aerial rescue.
The other two top overall finishers were also Canadian.
Second place went to Zach Sanchioni of Vancouver, British Columbia, who also placed second at British Columbia’s regional competition on July 10. He has been climbing for four years.
Although he has made it to four masters challenges in the two years he has been competing, Sanchioni struggled in Saturday’s final climb, eventually getting stuck on a high branch.
Rounding out the top three was Lloyd Rumbolt of Victoria, British Columbia.
Rumbolt almost finished the masters challenge but ran out of time before he could take his ropes down.
The judges gave Conrad the Spirit of the Competition award. He and his company helped set up for the event, and Luce said he maintained a positive attitude throughout his first competition even when he struggled with the footlock.
The next stage`
The top three qualifiers from each regional competition will go on to compete in the Pacific Northwest chapter competition on Sept. 26 in Tacoma.
Two winners from that competition – one woman and one man – are sent to the world championships in Australia.
Climbers who win international competitions sometimes pick up sponsors, but Luce said they do not compete with that as a goal.
“People don’t do this for the money,” he said. “They do it to learn and share experiences.”
Nyuli, who won the chapter competition in 2008, said he always enjoys the tree climbing competitions because he likes seeing familiar faces and loves being in trees.
“You kind of feel like you’re in the hand of something bigger,” he said. “It’s very humbling.”
Ascending Arborists
by Gina Cole
Friday, July 30, 2010
Caution tape and crowds surrounded five trees at Elizabeth Park. Everyone around the trees tilted their heads back, and some shouted up into the branches.
“Work through the burn!” “Monkey boy! Woo! Ding, ding, ding!”
A bell rings and a man in a helmet descends from the canopy, panting.
Saturday, July 24 marked the first time Bellingham has hosted the Puget Sound Regional Tree Climbing Competition.
The Pacific Northwest chapter of the International Society of Arboriculture hosts three regional competitions each year in Washington, Oregon and British Columbia.
Competition coordinator James Luce, an arborist for the city of Bellingham, said the competitions like this do not damage the trees because competitors do not use spikes, spurs or raw ropes.
The event is intended to promote quality tree care as well as promote the industry.
The community and the city used the event as an opportunity to teach people about trees and tree care. Volunteers displayed brochures about selecting, planting and caring for trees, as well as identifying trees in Bellingham parks. Samples of wood, roots, saplings and twigs were laid out so visitors could learn how trees grow and how to plant them and take care of them.
Competitions are also an opportunity for climbers to learn. The goal is to showcase the latest in safety and climbing techniques while creating publicity for the tree care industry.
“Ultimately, it makes you a better tree-care worker and climber,” Luce said. “I know it did for me.”
The events also allow participants to bond, share an experience and swap stories.
“It kind of brings people out of the woodwork who share professional pursuits,” Luce said.
Most of the competitors were certified arborists who climb trees every day doing tree care, which can include pruning or even removal of trees. Climbers of all skill levels are encouraged to compete.
The competition consisted of five events and a final “masters challenge” for the top few finishers. Because the point is to learn and improve, all the events mimic what arborists do in their daily work.
Belayed speed climb
The belayed speed climb is a speed event in which participants must climb 60 feet up a tree as quickly as possible using some combination of the tree itself and the belay line they are connected to.
Crowds cheered when competitor Steven Conrad rang the bell at the top. He had earned the fastest time of the day at that point, at 50.88 seconds.
“That’s how I climb a tree every day,” Conrad said, lighting a cigarette. “It’s all about finding the route up the tree. It’s a little bit like going through a maze 60 feet up.”
He said climbing trees was similar to climbing other things, with one small difference.
“It’s all forearms, like a rock climber,” Conrad said. “But you have a chainsaw attached to you.”
Conrad owns Urban Forester Tree Care Professional. He lives in the Columbia neighborhood, just blocks from Elizabeth Park, and he said the park’s trees are especially fun to climb.
“Nothing like smoking non-filtered cigarettes and climbing trees,” Conrad said.
The best parts about climbing trees, Gray said, are getting to see everything from high up and waving at children on the ground.
“I like to come out of the tree upside down, like Spiderman,” Gray said. “They eat it up.”
An hour into the competition, children had began to shimmy up the park’s basketball hoop and hit the metal bar at the top, imitating the ringing of the bell.
Aerial rescue
The aerial rescue simulates an emergency scenario in which a climber might have to help an injured climber out of a tree.
Competitors must get up the tree and safely rescue a roped-up dummy before handing the dummy off to emergency medical technicians.
There is a five-minute time limit for the event and climbers get points for following rescue protocols. These protocols include talking the person through the situation. Competitors shouted at the dummy as they completed the task: “Can you hear me?” “Hang in there, Chuck!” “What do you say we take a ride to the ground?”
Tree care is dangerous work, and injuries in trees are more common than falls to the ground because belay ropes usually catch climbers if they lose their grip.
The biggest danger of a fall in a tree is swinging on the ropes and slamming into the tree, said Merrill Larsen, an arborist with international company Bartlett Tree Experts.
“If you’re doing things even remotely right, there’s not a chance of falling to the ground,” Larsen said.
Secured footlock
Footlocking is a technique climbers use to get up a rope hanging from a tree. Climbers twist the rope around their feet so they can stand on it, reach up with their hands to hold on and grab another lock with their feet.
In the footlock event, competitors must use the technique to climb 50 feet up a rope as quickly as possible to ring a bell at the top.
Throw line
Arborists use ropes to help them get into and around trees. They get ropes into trees by first throwing a special, strong, lightweight line attached to a weighted shot over the branches. Once they have the right branch, they can use the lighter line to pull the climbing rope into the tree.
Target limbs were marked at 30, 40, 55 and 63 feet up a beech tree and competitors had to get a line over those branches.
Work climb
The work climb was the closest any of the five main events came to mimicking an entire tree-care job. Competitors had 5 minutes to climb to five different stations in an oak tree and complete tasks at those stations.
The climber starts at the top of the tree, rings a bell with a handsaw, rings another bell with a pole pruner, tosses a stick to a target on the ground, walks out a limb to ring a third bell without bending the branch too much, then finally must get out of the tree by landing with both feet inside a target on the ground.
Masters challenge
After an hour-long lunch break, the three people with the highest total scores from the five events competed for overall championship in the masters challenge.
The event is similar to the work climb, but harder: The tree is more difficult to climb and move around in, and the stations are tougher to get to.
The masters challenge took place in a silver maple more than 5 feet in diameter that stands out as a focal point for the trees in the park. It is the largest silver maple in Washington state. Its branches shaded most of the audience of about 100 people spread out on the grass.
Competitors are allowed 15 minutes to complete the challenge and they are not allowed to watch the others complete it. They must start with none of their equipment in the tree and finish with none in the tree, completing the entire challenge all the way through just as if it were a regular job.
Only one climber completed the masters challenge in time: Scott Nyuli, a self-employed part-time arborist from Salt Spring Island, British Columbia.
He finished with 30 seconds to spare.
The winners
Nyuli won the competition overall with the highest total score from the events and the first-place finish in the masters challenge. He has been an arborist for 11 years and has been competing for eight. He climbed at 2009’s international championship in Rhode Island, but finished in the bottom half of competitors there.
Nyuli placed in the top three for all five regular events, taking first in the work climb and the aerial rescue.
The other two top overall finishers were also Canadian.
Second place went to Zach Sanchioni of Vancouver, British Columbia, who also placed second at British Columbia’s regional competition on July 10. He has been climbing for four years.
Although he has made it to four masters challenges in the two years he has been competing, Sanchioni struggled in Saturday’s final climb, eventually getting stuck on a high branch.
Rounding out the top three was Lloyd Rumbolt of Victoria, British Columbia.
Rumbolt almost finished the masters challenge but ran out of time before he could take his ropes down.
The judges gave Conrad the Spirit of the Competition award. He and his company helped set up for the event, and Luce said he maintained a positive attitude throughout his first competition even when he struggled with the footlock.
The next stage`
The top three qualifiers from each regional competition will go on to compete in the Pacific Northwest chapter competition on Sept. 26 in Tacoma.
Two winners from that competition – one woman and one man – are sent to the world championships in Australia.
Climbers who win international competitions sometimes pick up sponsors, but Luce said they do not compete with that as a goal.
“People don’t do this for the money,” he said. “They do it to learn and share experiences.”
Nyuli, who won the chapter competition in 2008, said he always enjoys the tree climbing competitions because he likes seeing familiar faces and loves being in trees.
“You kind of feel like you’re in the hand of something bigger,” he said. “It’s very humbling.”
just messing with ya hope to see you in Tacoma.
