I stand in front of a 15-metre high slopy wall, speckled with holders of contorted shapes and colours, looking at it as if it is a peak in the Himalayan mountain range. At the Equilibrium Climbing Station in Indiranagar, I am in the midst of an exercise in failure. For a little over 20 minutes, I have been like a fish attempting to go up a tree. Some of my postures while trying to scale the wall can help illustrate a book titled 'All Fall Down: 10 Disastrous Climbing Techniques’.
Mohammed Niyamathulla, 34, an instructor at the climbing gym, persists with me. “Left leg, first. Then, left hand. Then, right leg, right hand,” he repeats the instruction that is simple to follow but not so easy to execute.
Left leg, left hand, right leg… thud. I fall for the 10th time on the heavily padded floor. When it comes to body balance, yours truly is an antithesis to Lionel Messi.
Like the spider from the apocryphal tale of the Scottish King Robert the Bruce, I try and try again till… Niyamathulla gives up motivating me and proceeds to make a phone call.
Finding success
After a water break and a few minutes of self-motivation, I move to another wall that’s 17 feet. Here, Niyamathulla asks me to use only the yellow holders to go up. I insert my hands into a pouch of chalk powder for better grip, I adjust my climbing shoes that suffocate my toes (“It’s supposed to be tight,” says Niyamathulla) and try again.
I plant my left leg on a tiny dirty yellow holder on the bottom left corner of the wall. I pull myself up, clutching another yellow holder and placing my right foot on a holder above. Toes ache, biceps shake but balance doesn’t desert me this time. One yellow holder after another, I reach the summit, touch the topmost holder for two seconds -- as instructed by Niyamathulla -- and before he could finish saying, “Now slowly come down the same way you went u…”, I plummet to the heavily cushioned floor.
- Speed climbing: Two climbers secure safety ropes to themselves and attempt to scale a 15m-high wall, set at an angle of 95 degrees, faster than their opponent.
- Bouldering: Climbers scale as many fixed routes on a 4m-high wall as they can within four minutes. The routes vary in difficulty and climbers are not permitted to practise climbing them in advance.
- Lead climbing: Involves athletes attempting to climb as high as they can on a wall measuring more than 15m in height within six minutes.
The multiple failures notwithstanding, there’s a sense of accomplishment and an eagerness to do climb again, within.
This, Niyamathulla says, is what makes more people take up climbing. “Even if you don’t get it right the first time, with more attempts, you can see yourself improving.”
Niyamathulla, however, got it right the first time. His right leg was infected with polio at birth. Still, at an adventure camp in 2007, when Keerthi Pais (national climbing coach and founder of Equilibrium Climbing Station) asked him to go up a climbing wall, he went up, using only his hands.
Climberspeak
When asked what climbing means to Niyamathulla, he says, “It’s a wonderful journey.”
But international climber Bharath Pereira’s answer to the question is a tad extreme. “I don’t know... Climbing has always been a part of my life. So, I can’t imagine life without it. I would probably kill myself if I can’t climb.”
Pereira, 18, who trains at Equilibrium Climbing Station, took up the sport when he, as a four-year-old toddler, was besotted by the sight of someone going up the 50-feet high wall at Sree Kanteerava Stadium.
National level climber Mahanya Sridhar, 29, one of the partners of Equilibrium Climbing Station, too, started climbing after staring at the same wall.
Climbing, he says, can be meditative. “When you go up, you are up against yourself. When you move from one point to the next, your focus is sharp -- at that moment, you do not think about anything else.”
Climbing, according to him, requires as much, or perhaps more, brain as brawn. It is, he says, a great exercise in problem-solving. “You need to map the route, be aware of the holders -- how and where to hold them. Your mind has to always work -- which arm and which leg goes where.”
Growing interest
Mahanya says more and more people are becoming aware of climbing. Equilibrium Climbing Station, according to him, attracts about 400 unique visitors every month.
“With our people travelling to places like Europe [where the climbing culture is vibrant], the activity is bound to get popular here, too. And, the segment of population with high income have started to look beyond gym for fitness options,” he says.
But is climbing for all? What if one isn’t muscular? Is there a minimum fitness requirement for the activity?
I find my answer as I am about to leave. Anaika, a slim 10-year-old, warms up with a skipping rope before beginning her daily climbing session.