2024 NiBS Round-Up
Report by Zane Bray
The 2024 Season of the National Indoor Boulder Series was an absolute blockbuster of an event medley, hundreds of amazing boulders, two brand new gyms, rad DJs, a hype MC, prizes galore and more participants than ever before from across New Zealand.
Every year the NiBS series gets bigger, puts on a massive show and drags people across New Zealand to join the fun, and this year really delivered, it was the biggest climbing series New Zealand has ever seen!
Kicking off at BoulderCo Auckland in May, with enough room in the biggest boulder gym in New Zealand for everyone to spread out, everyone could pull on and give it their best go. BoulderCo really delivered something for everyone and some new names mixed with the regulars on the podium and set the stage for the series podiums to be decided at the end. Luka Sugimoto-Faulkner, also competing as an Under 18 took his first win in the Open male category, while Cirrus Tan won the Women's event at her home gym.
From there the circus rolled down to Uprising in Christchurch. Uprising is always a stellar location for national competitors who can tie it in to a day out in Castle Hill Basin on the Sunday, making it an incredibly worthwhile weekend for those from out of town.
Uprising pulled out all the stops, dragging in hometown NiBS regular DJ Hayden Jensen and that guy who likes a good costume to hype up the crowd, Finals was electric! They really blew the roof off the place with some powerful and explosive climbing from Daniel Perrella Lewellen (1st), Bazooka Joe Dravitzki (2nd), and Oskar Wolff (3rd). Erica Gatland even popped up to remind everyone that she’s an unstoppable force when she wants it, and she wanted it, taking out first place for the women, while Becca Hounsell claimed second as she did in Auckland.
A few weeks later the party came back north to the brand new BoulderCo Hamilton. At the fresh gym Travis Rangi’s setting team really delivered the goods, with more tops from all participants in the initial rounds than AS Colour. But the struggle was real in the finals, with Mr Wolff and George Sanders showing us what to expect from Wellington home town boys (Oskar is currently resident in Dunedin), and for the Women, Cirrus Tan won again, while Dixie Whiting and Sophia Cook surprised the stacked field to place 2nd and 3rd respectively.
Which then brought us to the final round at the freshly minted Faultline gym in Wellington, and golly gosh Faultline really shook things up, dropping the beat downs on so many.
Limiting entries to ‘only’ 100 people each round, Faultline was a sold out full house all day. With arguably the hardest qualifying setting in all the events, there was a lot of worn skin, the mats caught a plethora of bodies hitting the floor and everyone had a rad time, fighting to get their top seven boulders done. Brooke and his setting team really delivered the goods.
And then came finals, and oh, what a show! Talk about ‘Hard comp final climbs’, the finalists had to pull, push, balance, jump and struggle their way up the wall while DJ Harrison Kennedy kept shaking Faultline with his Phat Beats, for his third year DJ’ing a NiBS final. Amanda Speed came out on top for the Women, with Cirrus Tan and Helen Lee taking the other podium positions. In the Men's, Luka Sugimoto-Faulkner took his second win of the series (and third podium), followed by Finlay Cate in second (as per Auckland) and Falk Neal Hormann squeezed out Oskar Wolff for third.
The Faultline results really shook up the series podium, with Luka Sugimoto-Faulkner beating Oskar Wolff to first in the Men's and Finlay Cate taking third overall. In the Women's. Cirrus Tan took a comfortable victory, with a second place her worst result. Becca Hounsell consistency with two seconds and a fourth put her ahead of Amanda Speed, who was third.
None of this would have happened without our illustrious sponsors: La Sportiva, The North Face, Climb Craft and Bivouac Outdoor.
A huge thanks to our amazing supportive gyms and their tireless setting teams: BoulderCo Auckland and Hamilton, Uprising Christchurch and Faultline Wellington. Also, a special thanks to The Lions Foundation NZ for their support towards event costs and all the awesome volunteers who make it happen.
And thanks to you, our phenomenal participants and supporters who turn up to the events.
After hours of climbing, finals, training, flights, unknown costs traveling across NZ for the biggest climbing series New Zealand has ever seen, our full National Indoor Boulder Series results for all the categories can be found here: https://www.nibs.nz/results