We travelled to this round without two of our star climbers from round one:
Tony Musselbrook, who came first at Redhill, broke his finger a few days before. He quickly gave up his new hobby of dustbin leapfrogging, deciding it was silly and not at all compatible with climbing.
Joel Charley scored equal highest at the last round and came third in the climb-off. He had been climbing at the Junior British Climbing Competition Team trails in Sheffield the day before and was to be delivered direct to the Castle by proud grandparents.

Our climbers nearly did a collective faint when they realised that DMM were sponsoring the round and lots of sparkly bits were up for grabs. The climbing was fairly uneventful with Zippy's problem setting causing a variety of contortions of face and body.
There were a few controversial incidents:
There was the "Do bolt holes count as features?" question. Apparently they do..... or don't depending on........ well, just depending.
Then there was that do-it-yourself-judging spectre showing its darker side. I know this is a 'fun' competition and self-judging saves time but it has a nasty way of generating suspicions and somehow devaluing the whole competition thing. I think it was Matt Cousins who, towards the end of the day, pointed out a problem where the rules had changed so much over the course of the comp that it was plainly a completely different problem with only start and finish holds in common with its predecessor.

Another incident, witnessed and reported immediately by Matt, led to an upsetting episode for all involved. I should not and will not go into details here but several of us openly explored the boundaries between cheating and making a genuine mistake. Eventually Rob Dixon, as organiser, ruled that a genuine mistake had been made and also removed the illegitimate point.
The fact that this decision was a relief to Matt, who consequently claimed first place, has to be balanced against the gracious way in which the other climber accepted his fate when he was relegated to second place. The whole episode, although resolved amicably at the end, left me uncomfortable and a little apprehensive about the next round.

Anyway, on to brighter things:
In the Male Open Chris Powell, Russ Bates and particularly Joe Cook had a great time and improved their finish positions by fair few. Tom, on the other hand had a battle on with Trevor Nagler, some Russian Internationals and Adam Lincoln (scary climber guy from 'The North'). He finished fifth but, nevertheless retains a strong position overall.

The Junior Male category saw excellent performances from Will Cousins and Callum Harris who climbed themselves to third and fourth place respectively. Joel and Nathan also retained top ten places.
David Box, in his first ever competition, had a great day thanks to Jason Pay's careful coaching. David scored a respectable 48 and finished 35th.
Matt Cousins was, eventually, first. I am particularly pleased for Matthew. His conduct during this round was excellent; determined yet responsible. That he had to suffer the onslaught of Rob Dixon's crazy logic in the dispute over first place was a great shame. Yet, in the 'just-for-fun' head to head he came out on top - easily. Well done Matt.

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