Re: NATCC...what worked...what didn\'t?
Pros:
The preliminary events at NATCC 2011 were challenging and well run.
Difficulty levels worthy of a national championship.
With 66 competitors, I was impressed that the prelim events were completed in one day.
Master's Challenge difficult, yet contestants were given enough time to complete the event safely and use progressive gear and techniques.
Cons:
Host chapter (Southern) not allowed to run their own Master's Challenge.
Running 66 competitors through in one day is quite an accomplishment. However, I sincerely hope this does not set a precedent that we can keep cramming more and more climbers into our competitions and still expect the highest quality event.
Inspection of Aerial Rescue in-line anchor systems: I know this is a difficult subject, and I applaud the patience of the inspection technicians. However, I know we can come up with an index of acceptable configurations along with known variations that can be disseminated to contestants prior to gear inspection. Look over the index. If your system is listed, and the variation sub-list yields a compatible result... you are good to go. Only have a configuration checked if it cannot be found in the index.
The belayed speed climb was not "belayed" with a device. Climbers were on their climbing line set up (friction hitch, etc) but the tail of line was simply redirected through a pulley at the base of the tree and slack was being tended by hand.
In the Master's challenge, one competitor's primary tie in point for access and work positioning was frighteningly under sized and over leveraged. This system was a ground anchored SRT for ascent and an in-line anchor was installed for work positioning. Prior to ascent, the system and anchor point were tested by the climber and a judge/tech hanging on the line simultaneously. I was standing with a group of climbers and all of us were certain that the anchor point would fail. Alas, it did not. I had butterflies in my stomach during the contestants entire climb. The climbers around me were also nervous. Hard to go into full detail about it but I feel that the anchor point was unacceptable. The potential is very high that the test bounce created a primary failure along the anchor limb, leaving the climber with a considerably weakened TIP.
