I’m a youth climbing coach and there was a climbing competition this past weekend. In the competitive youth circuit, there are several different regions throughout the country and there are local competitions throughout the year followed by championship events. The competition this past weekend was a local competition and they don’t really count for anything, you just need to go to two to qualify for the first championship event- regionals. Despite this, kids still want to do well. The oldest kid on my team is 17 and he competed for the first time on Saturday and came in 6th place. However, his score was not added correctly. He was very upset with the situation and I initially didn’t really understand why and thought he was making to big a deal out of it- after all, the placement in these comps doesn’t count for anything except for personal satisfaction, and he knows how he did, why should he care what the results say? But after reflecting on this for the past two days I understand why it’s frustrating for your accomplishments to not be recognized, especially at your very first climbing competition in which the results show you placed sixth when you should have placed second. So I’m now fully supporting the kid on my team and we’re currently going through the process to get his score changed and placement updated.
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