Ready to rock: The Box Canyon Climbing Competition in Socorro is more celebration than competition
At the New Mexico Tech, climbing is a way of life.
“It’s one of the attractions for students that come here,” said Jay Ann Cox, New Mexico Tech communications specialist. “It’s something that we definitely mention in our recruiting.”
That pitch centers around the school’s proximity to The Box Recreation Area — aka “The Box” — a 640-acre space with five cliffs on either side that features ideal terrain for technical rock climbing and bouldering.
Box Canyon is located approximately 15 minutes away from campus, which explains why New Mexico Tech has robust participation for both its climbing team and climbing club. Count Scott Roberts, the team’s coach, among those who were initially drawn to the university for this very reason.
“I specifically came to New Mexico Tech about 25 years ago for the climbing,” Roberts said. “That was really my only metric. It definitely does draw students.”
The Box Canyon Climbing Competition was born in 2013 out of the love for all things climbing. While the event will include virtually every member of the New Mexico Tech climbing team and club, it’s designed to encourage climbers of all levels and backgrounds to join in on the fun.
“I guess the inspiration kind of started for trying to get some sort of competition going for the team, but we just didn’t have a really good indoor wall at the time,” Roberts said. “But then it just immediately morphed into a broader scope of turning it into more of a festival and climbing competition just for the general community.”
The competition is student-run and features two days of festivities, beginning with a belay certification course — which is required for sport climbing — and a screening of climbing-centric films, entitled Reel Rock, on Friday, Nov. 3. The next day is highlighted by the climbing competition itself, with free coffee at check-in and the popular Cubish Foot Cart on hand throughout the day. The event concludes with an awards ceremony and a raffle that offers thousands of dollars in prizes.
Ready to rock: The Box Canyon Climbing Competition in Socorro is more celebration than competition
“(Climbers of any kind) are welcome,” said Giulia Luebben, president of the New Mexico Tech Climbing Club and one of the captains of the climbing team. “We have people coming in from all over New Mexico, even outside of New Mexico at all different levels. We have competition categories from very beginning up to advanced. … It’s more of a climbing festival than a purely competition. It’s non-students and students alike.”
For the uninitiated, bouldering doesn’t use ropes and has shorter routes, while sport climbing requires the belay certification and typically involves longer routes. Crash pads will be prevalent wherever bouldering occurs.
“There’s a lot of them everywhere, so you can climb basically where ever you want and be safe,” said Brayden Stidham, vice president of the climbing club and another team captain.
Though there is a scoring element for both the bouldering and sport climbing categories, all parties involved want to emphasize that the event is more celebration than competition.
“I think you can expect to come down and have fun, meet a bunch of like-minded climbers. That’s the biggest (thing),” Roberts said. “It’s really about a bunch of people coming together and getting a big session in and enjoying ‘The Box,’ which really is a super-special climbing area — just really a wonderful natural resource that we have in Socorro.”
“The Box,” and all it has to offer the climbing community, truly is the main attraction.
“It just has so much high quality climbing — sport and bouldering,” Stidham said. “All difficulty levels, all grades. Like really good no matter what level you’re at.”
