Page 12 - 2021 AMA Summer

GUESTWRITER
EXPERIENCE OF TOKYO 2020
Natalie Berry
3August 2021. I’m sitting in the bustling press room at the Aomi Urban Sports Park in Tokyo, preparing to
cover Sport Climbing’s Olympic debut. Commentators are nervously rehearsing behind me. “This is the moment that Sport Climbing has been waiting for,” one enthuses in a hushed tone. It’s a historic event indeed, and as both a journalist and former GB Climbing Team member, it’s an exciting culmination of many years of anticipation and preparation.
Nearly a century after the first Olympic mountaineering medals were awarded to the 1922 Everest expedition team at the 1924 ‘International Sports’ Week’ in Chamonix — later recognised as the first Winter Olympic Games — the first medals in Sport Climbing were finally contested. Faster, Higher, Stronger. Speed, Lead, Boulder. Never has a sport so perfectly embodied the Olympic motto.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Tokyo Games took place in an unprec- edented context. The rules were strict: masked faces, no crowd, no cheering allowed. Rigorous testing and isolation
rules made for a more subdued event than the typically festive global celebration of sport.
Nonetheless, the delayed 2020 Games symbolised triumph over adversity; a turbulent year in limbo, life on hold. Missing out became commonplace – now, taking part was paramount. Many athletes had become injured or had struggled to cope mentally with the postponement. But in Tokyo, win or lose, participants gratefully embraced the opportunity to share their passion on a global stage.
The ‘Father of the Olympic Games’, Pierre de Coubertin, mirrored this sentiment in his Olympic philosophy. ‘The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle,’ he said. ‘The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.’
Cynics argue that competition climbing ‘is not [real] climbing’. The medium and the setting are different, but the mechanics are the same, as can be the sensation of
physical and mental challenge. Climbing is one of the most primitive forms of locomotion, alongside walking, running and swimming. Our suspensory ancestors spent significant time in trees around three million years ago, and the ability to leap, swing and catch with such poise is a long-dormant skill that the complexity of modern rock and indoor climbing can reawaken.
The history, traditions and ethics in climbing and mountaineering also share many storylines with competitions: the triumphs and failures; the rituals and superstitions; the heroes and villains; the teamwork and rivalries. During the final evening of competition, Mt. Fuji — Japan’s highest mountain — was visible 60 miles away in the distance to the lucky few who were privy to an elevated view of Tokyo’s skyline beyond the climbing structure. The scene provided an interesting juxtaposi- tion of the ancient traditions of mountain- eering and this modern-day discipline of climbing.
Often, people can be quick to criticise the competitive element of sport, denouncing it as unfriendly or unpleasant. Yet even with Olympic medals on the line, climbers worked together and exchanged ideas during route observation; a camaraderie that was noted by the global press. Col- laboration is part of the spirit of the activity — across all disciplines of climbing.
Each medallist held onto and stared at their medals in disbelief for hours after
12 / ARMY MOUNTAINEER
Alberto GINES LOPEZ of Spain
(Credit Daniel Gajda/IFSC)
Shauna COXSEY of Great Britain
(Credit Dimitris Tosidis/IFSC)