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Comment by fracus | Hacker News Reader

Seems bizarre to keep the same wall config for all of time. The sport becomes about muscle memory more than anything else. The competitors can literally turn off their conscious brain. It would seem to me, it would be more exciting as a spectator and competitor if they had to problem solve on their way up there. Records could be less about best times and more about how many rounds did someone win in a row or something.

They could even still incorporate the one standardized wall config as a speed round once in a while or integrate it into the competition in some other way.

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> Seems bizarre to keep the same wall config for all of time. The sport becomes about muscle memory more than anything else.

Plenty of other sport are pretty much the same each time, particularly track and field.

Exactly, I don't understand people who watch any of the tracl and field disciplines and complain about this wall being the same everytime. Like there's about 10 different disciplines of people running on a plain track and that's fine but people climbing the same wall isn't. I totally get that you might find lead or bouldering more interesting but that's not the point.

This is a whataboutism.

The same wall config is only for the speed competition. There has been debate about changing it though, cause like you said they become muscle memory and hyper-optimized.

There are other forms of competition:

- bouldering: how many of 4 short boulder problems can you finish

- lead: how high can you get on a longer, higher route (pictured on the right of the image in the article)

In these ones the problems are switched up every competition.

This is also why every climber complained about speed climbing being a part of the climbing competition in the previous Olympics.

It's an entirely different discipline. Seeing lead climbers compete in speed climbing is like seeing Eliud Kipchoge matched up with Usain Bolt for sprinting.

Boulder and lead are at least somewhat related, although I still think it would be nice to see separate competitions here, too.

I hope they do split up bouldering and lead next olympics. At least for Ai Mori's sake!

Indeed they will separate them at the 2028 LA Olympics. There will be 3 separate medals for boulder, lead and speed.

> This is also why every climber complained about speed climbing

not every climber. Its clearly a different discipline. Thats why boldering/lead is separate from speed climbing.

But then lead is different to top rope and sport different to trad. And indoor is very different to outdoor.

> not every climber. Its clearly a different discipline. Thats why boldering/lead is separate from speed climbing.

It wasn't separate in the previous Olympics, that's my point.

>But then lead is different to top rope and sport different to trad. And indoor is very different to outdoor.

Except for trad most climbers I know do a mix of all of these.

Speed climbing is just so different from everything else that I don't even know one climber out of the hundred or so that I know that does it regularly.

I do think it'd be amazing to see a "decathlon-like" competition where runners were measured in the 100, 1500, and 10k cross country, though. Figuring out how to even it out would be a chore, though.

I don't watch this event but, coming from other sports, I think there's more to this than sheer muscle memory. Humans are not machines. Sometimes you compete with ongoing or lingering injuries. Conditioning changes even for the most disciplined of athletes. All of these mean that a different approach might be warranted for each event depending on your "set-up".

Not to mention other variables outside of the human body. Perhaps the type of rope could matter in your performance. The age of the holds could matter too; even when the governing body standardizes on a replacement period for holds, I'm sure competitors would have strong opinions about the difference between a hold at the start of its service life versus one about to be replaced.

Also, the one thing I love seeing in physical contests is how competitors eke out the last bit of performance advantage with sheer willpower. Muscle memory takes care of the actions but performance and willpower is a conscious effort.

In short, no, I don't think competitors can literally turn off their conscious brain and just let muscle memory take over. If a field has jargon, there's a hell lot to geek over it.

And in further support of what you are saying, when I'm in the flow state, either for programming or for workout or for other hobbies, I am not conscious. That's kind-of the definition of flow.

or people who describe an expert as someone who is unconsciously competent, they no longer have to think about what they are doing they just "know".

And as yallpendantools is saying, operating at that level of expertise is much much more than sheer muscle memory, though the muscle memory is critical. My typing skill certainly helps me find flow in my programming work, I don't have to think about how to type each letter, when I'm in flow the ideas "just appear" on the screen.

So rather than saying the competitors turn off their conscious brain, maybe it is better to say that they transcend it?

Once an activity has become a “competitive sport” it has a way of prioritising “measurable” over meaningful or enjoyable. When you develop a critical eye for this aspect of sport, the Olympics stop being enjoyable and become an utter horror of human maladjustment, a horrid parody of what it alleges to stand for.

>as a ... competitor

Are you?

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