Its not often that a world championship is held in your backyard, so I was really excited to get call to photograph the International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC) Climbing World Cup Toronto 2014 Boulder Competition.

The IFSC Climbing World Cup Toronto 2014 Boulder Competition was actually held in Hamilton at Gravity Climbing Gym.

I have worked with the owners of Gravity before on promotional material for the gym, so I was very familiar with the location which really helped with planning the locations of my remote strobes and remote camera mounts.

I ended up lighting the entire bouldering wall with a total of five strobes in two groups which provided enough safe light for getting the must have photos of the competition, but flexible enough that I could change up the lighting by turning one group off for some more dramatic hard light side lit shots too.

I also mounted a couple remote cameras that were focused the crux of a few specific bouldering problems, to capture a unique perspective of the action.

Plus, being a recreational climber myself was definitely helpful to anticipate the climber’s progression on each problem and be in the right place for the right shots.

The only major problem was that the competition was intensely exciting!

I caught myself on more than one occasion watching and cheering instead of taking pictures, it was a total blast to be there.

So, here is a selection of my top photos from the IFSC Climbing World Cup Toronto 2014 – Boulder Competition.

Oh, and if you are one of the athletes featured in one of these photos – get in touch with me, I’d be happy to send you a copy.

In Competition

Here are a number of the climbers in competition in the semi-finals through to the finals.

Big Moves

A number of the World Cup problems had some pretty wicked dyno’s…which were accompanied by more than a few big falls.

 Topping Out

The highlight of the competition for me was seeing the athletes succeed at completing a problem and hearing the crowd cheer their success.  It didn’t matter who the climber was or where they were from, there were big cheers for everyone that reached the top – especially if a particular climb took several attempts and went down to the wire.

Climber Physique

When you are looking at elite climbers, you kind of expect them to look a certain way.  Here are a few climbers that had that quintessential chiseled look of a Greek statue.

Woman’s Top Three Boulder Climbers In The World

Akiyo Noguchi of Japan won the tite of world champion.  She was followed by Shauna Coxsey from Great Britain in second and Alex Puccio from the USA came in third.

Men’s Top Three Boulder Climbers In The World

On the men’s side, Glairon Mondet Guillaume of France finished best in the world.  He was followed by German Jan Hojer and Canadian favorite Sean McColl.

Gravity Climbing Gym – Hamilton Ontario

Gravity did a fantastic job of hosting the Bouldering World Cup.  Building seating for several hundred spectators that starts ten feet off the ground is not an easy task, but Mike and Reid managed to pull it off – along with everything else that comes with holding an elite climbing competition.

Behind the Scenes

I personally had a fantastic time photographing the climbers.  Between setting up and managing five strobes, a remote camera and photographing the action – it was a damn busy day.  Congratulations to Akiyo Noguchi, Shauna Coxsey Alex Puccio on the women’s side and Glairon Mondet Guillaume , Jan Hojer, Sean McColl for the men.

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