Tommy Crosby’s hands glide over one another methodically — rhythmically moving from hold to fluorescent hold. Ethereal white dust floats about his hands as he quickly and casually pulls his torso up the inverted face, his veiny forearms swelling thick with adrenaline-packed blood. He makes it look so simple, so effortless.
He takes a moment to dangle in victory atop the 16-foot wall before scuttling down a few feet and jettisoning himself back to the spongy, matted ground. Once earthbound, his eyes immediately and studiously dart skyward while his hands intrinsically reach to the pouch perched beside his tailbone to recoat his hands in sweat-masking chalk.
“Nice,” he says instinctively to a climber he notices expertly weaving up one of the many routes glaring down at him.
Lathering his talon-like fingers with another layer of chalk, he steps onto a new route, this one far more inverted and awkward than the one he just so easily scaled. Less than a minute later, he’s clawing in every direction for invisible holds while his forearms begin to quiver and his left leg, deprived of purchase, begins to imitate a bobbing sewing machine needle. He releases from the wall about 8 feet in the air, and with an emphatic plop, visibly bounces off the cushioned floor. Defeat.
“Getting there,” he says sheepishly while crawling away to reevaluate his strategy. Amid all the rock and optimism, flashes of Sisyphus abound.
That symbiosis of earned exaltation and quick, painful failure — and persistent reminders of eternally damned Greek myths — is constant at Movement Denver, the metro area’s newest, largest and most comprehensive rock climbing facility. Newly permitted and still smelling of fresh plastic and varnish, the 32,000-square-foot gym offers nearly double the climbable space of the city’s second-largest climbing facility, something to which co-owner Anne-Worley Moelter says the public has responded.
“It’s been awesome,” she said. “People are really excited to have a space like this and the city has been great.”
Following a tortuous permitting process, Moelter opened the gym with her husband and business partner in Denver’s Lincoln Park neighborhood just south of Downtown on Dec. 13. Former executives for USA Climbing, the Moelters opened their first climbing gym in Boulder in 2009, but have been eyeing an expansion to Denver for years, due to a largely untapped market and affordable rents. According to the Climbing Business Journal, the climbing industry saw a 10 percent growth rate in 2013 with 28 new facilities opened nationwide.
“We’ve always had our sites on Denver and wanted to open there,” Moelter said. “There’s no full-access facility in the city so the market has been wide open.”
And when Moelter says “full-access,” she means it. With the motto, “commitment, motivation, community,” Movement offers a slew of exercise options that runs the gamut of traditional fitness to world-class climbing.
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“You get two facilities for the price of one,” Moelter said of what the Denver location provides members. And she’s right — it’s a lot. On top of nearly four-story belay climbing, bouldering, and a 40-foot crack (on which climbers can practice shimmying up a slab of split rock), Movement offers yoga, spin and other aerobics classes, as well as traditional weight lifting apparatuses.
But despite the gym’s wide appeal to non-climbers such as yogis and lifters, the facility is one honed for climbing first and foremost. Moelter, who grew up and learned to climb in North Carolina, said the sport provides a uniquely challenging full-body workout, and that Movement’s constantly changing routes will keep both veterans and newbies on their toes – on several levels.
“The routes change every week, so that really helps with the motivation aspect,” she said. “It gives people something new and exciting to come and try.”
Unlike other mountain-centric sports like skiing or mountain biking, climbing boasts a relatively low financial barrier to entry, according to Moelter. She said a good pair of climbing shoes (which range anywhere from $45 to $160), are a vital first investment for anyone thinking of stepping into the sport.
“The rentals you get at any gym are a great starting point, but I highly recommend going to a place like Wilderness Exchange and having them talk to you about what fits — it’s really important.”
Crosby, who’s been climbing for about five years, echoed Moelter’s sentiments on the necessity of quality equipment in such a high-risk sport.
“In learning more about the sport, between hearing stories and taking bigger falls, it’s been really eye opening to learn the importance of solid equipment,” he said. “It’s so nice to have your own stuff — knowing how many falls something has taken and how old it is.”
Crosby said he snagged his first pair of climbing shoes on-sale during an REI clearance event and the sport’s distinctive blend of mind-straining problem solving and ultra-physicality has had him been hooked ever since.
“After completing a route you’ve been working on for hours or days, it’s just a euphoric release of physical and mental stress, which is really cool because it’s usually one or the other with those,” he said. “Like taking a big test on the mental side, or doing a more traditional work out to release that physical side. But climbing is definitely that cool mind/body combination that is definitely addictive – keeps you coming back.”
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Climbing Tips
No, climbing isn’t exclusive to Marine Corps recruitment commercials and employees of REI. At least that’s what Anne-Worley Moelter, owner of newly opened Movement Denver, a 32,000-sqaure-foot climbing gym in Denver’s Lincoln Park neighborhood, says. An aficionado of a sport that often gets pegged as one solely for adrenaline-junkies with more than a few screws loose, Moelter says climbing offers a unique full-body workout and its variety can provide a much-needed stimulus for those who would rather eat Spam for every meal for the rest of their lives than been damned to a mind-numbing treadmill.
“The routes change every week, so that really helps with the motivation aspect,” she says of Movement’s walls. “It gives people something new and exciting to come and try.”
So, if your Richard Simmons VHS tapes have finally melted after 20 years of daily viewings, here are a few of Moelter’s (former Executive Director of USA Climbing) tips on how to break into your new favorite sport and successfully burn off the past three weeks of cookies and candy canes. Chalk sold separately.
Climbing is a social sport – so get involved
Though individual in its physicality, climbing is a sport just like any other in that it’s grounded in camaraderie and community. Even if you don’t know anybody at the gym, Moelter suggests checking out the bouldering area because it doesn’t require a belay partner and is a particularly social area of the gym. Or, if you’re a more adventurous rookie, several times a week a facilitator will match patrons up with a belay partner based on skill level. If you want to talk social, there aren’t many other fitness opportunities that require you to put your life — or at least the comfort of intact bones — entirely in the hands, and harness, of someone else.
Gear up
Rental shoes are good and all, but Moelter says that if you’re planning on climbing quasi-reguarly, buying a decent pair of climbing shoes is a must. The uber grippy shoes can run anywhere from $45 to $160, and can be found at area retailers such as Wilderness Exchange and REI — the latter’s monthly garage sale is a great place to start.