Schedule of Events

Thursday March 20, 2025​

8:00am-4:00pm

Forerunning Fundamentals: Elevating Ideas and Quality with Sarah Filler & Pierre Despagne 

Sponsored by BOLD Climbing at High Point Cleveland 

This workshop is designed for newer routesetters looking to sharpen their forerunning skills and build confidence in testing boulders. Forerunning is not just a part of the setting process—it’s where the magic happens. It’s the bridge between the setter’s vision and the climber’s experience. Learn how to approach boulders systematically, focusing on what matters most during the initial evaluation. Gain insights into testing climbs that are beyond your physical ability while maintaining high quality. By mastering forerunning, you’ll not only refine the boulders you’re testing but also elevate the gym’s overall climbing experience.

($250 - register here)

​​9:00am-12:00PM

Revolutionize your Youth Programming! with Hailey Caissie

at High Point Downtown 

Games are a great way to learn new skills, build teamwork, and manage your youth group within the gym. Learn to teach climbing techniques through play with the author of 101 Climbing Games and Activities. We will go through each chapter and all three levels of difficulty to revolution the fun in your Summer Camps, Leagues, and Youth Teams.

($130 - register here​)

10:00am-12:00pm

Train for your Project

with Zach Galla 

at Synergy Climbing Gym

($150 - register here)

​​10:00am-11:30am

Hold / Volume Maintenance with Alex Waterhouse 

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

Alex Waterhouse will take the lead in explaining techniques to preserve and repair your holds and volumes.​

($20 - register here​)

10:00am-12:00pm 

The Mental Edge with Taylor Fragomeni

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

​Equipping youth climbing coaches with essential strategies to foster resilience, focus, and adaptability in young athletes. Participants will gain actionable tools for helping young climbers navigate comparison and pressure, as well as frameworks for creating and maintaining supportive team environments.

($20 - register here​)

10:00am-11:30am

The Future Climbing Gym with Chris Ryan 

Sponsored by Maverick Climbing Walls

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

The future climbing gym won't be playing by the same rules as we have been for the last 10, 20 or 30 years. With the changes in economics of project development and business operations, client behavior, and competition from many different sources, it's simply not enough to open a location, mark your territory, and hope for the best. This means that we need to do better, if you want to thrive as a business. This is an opportunity to get more from every aspect of a project; from the business model and the building design to the execution and build-out, we can put projects together in ways that create genuine community around strong financials, in meaningful spaces that inspire our users. That's The Future Climbing Gym.

($5 - register here​)​​

12:00pm-1:00pm

The State of Insurance for the Climbing Gym Industry with PJ Hennessey

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

An overview of the state of the insurance in the past 12 months & what to expect in the coming year. Discussion will be provided on changes in the marketplace, rates, risk management best practices, 24-7/unstaffed operations, ancillary operations, & more. Following the initial discussion, a Q&A session will be provided.

($5 - register here)

12:00pm-1:00pm

Mental Training to Improve Your Coaching and Instruction with Arno Ilgner & Sevve Stember

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

Today, there are more than 600 climbing gyms, over 10 million people participating in the sport of rock climbing throughout the United States, and 20,000+ climbing gyms worldwide. The popularity of climbing in mainstream pop culture, with movies such as Free Solo, has brought climbing from a fringe activity to a widely accepted sport for people of all ages. With these facts in mind, today, we’re confronted with a harsh reality: climbing gym staff are not fully equipped to help their members have transformative climbing experiences. Additionally, they’re also not equipped to teach proper falling technique and lead belay concepts to their members, leading to an increase in accidents. There’s another more widespread, insidious, and invisible experience climbing gym members are experiencing for which there is no data - mental trauma. What’s the end result? Eventually, people quit climbing. To this end, there’s an urgent need to change the culture around coaching and risk management. Gym staff need practical tools to guide risk-taking for members so members can accept more responsibility for the risk choices they make. In this session, we’ll cover the key mental training issues climbing gyms face today and how they can be proactively met with staff training, shared language around learning, and creating a gym-wide understanding of appropriate risk taking.

($5 - register here​)

1:00pm-4:00pm

Building and Scaling a Coaching Program with Marisa Romero & Taylor Fragomeni

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

A successful coaching program provides structure, opportunity, and growth for both athletes and coaches. Learn how to create a pathway that empowers climbers of all abilities to develop and succeed. Develop talent identification systems and incentives that ensure positive transitions. Equip coaches with tailored training and professional growth opportunities. Use clear goals and incentives to align your program with its mission and vision. Define success by balancing athletic development with key operational benchmarks, ensuring a sustainable and thriving coaching program.

($5 - register here)

1:00pm-2:00pm

What 26 Million Emails Taught

Us About Gym Marketing with Ryan Henrich

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

Personalized marketing delivers better results because it makes your customers feel like you know and care about them. At Approach, we've seen gyms that use customized marketing campaigns are able to drive conversions and enrich their relationships. In this session, we'll share best practices for marketing personalization and real world examples of the successful workflows that are delivering tangible results for gyms.

($5 - register here​)

1:00pm-3:30pm

Movement Fundamentals with Ross Fulkerson with Ross 

at Synergy Climbing Gym

Experience the high-level coaching, setting, and learning environments necessary to reach the next level. This clinic is designed to teach the fundamental movement system of Space, Time, and Position. With purpose-set moves and a variety of progression holds, these clinics will be accessible to climbers around the V3+ range. We'll go over the underlying adjustments and mental habits that enable climbers to unlock not just specific moves, but the mechanics behind entire classes of movements. Participants will also have one-on-one time to learn about personal training recommendations, competition tactics, and injury prevention.

($150 - register here)

2:00pm-3:00pm

Routesetting-Gym Ecosystem with Kasai Pietras 

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

The hierarchy that often exists between desk staff, coaches, and setters in climbing gyms is unnecessary and creates division within teams. It’s time to address this issue and explore how we can break down these barriers. Let’s discuss!

($5 - register here​)

2:00pm-3:00pm

How Successful Gyms Are Training And Retaining Great Staff with Weigh My Rack

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

After interviewing 100's of gyms, we’ll share 6 key characteristics that are common among the best training teams AND share tips on the most practical, actionable ways to reframe and reignite your training and onboarding processes to increase retention and improve culture along the way.

($5 - register here)

3:00pm-4:00pm

How Chiropractic and Climbing Collaborate with Dr. Evana Makhoul, DC

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

Chiropractic and Climbing truly go hand in hand; whether it’s a climber getting adjusted to an owner sending their team of setters to be seen, the collaboration that’s possible here is endless! We will be discussing the Chiropractors role in the climbing community, how and why these collaborations are effective, and the growth that is possible on both ends of the spectrum. Chiropractors have a philosophy that drives how we operate and why we do what we do, therefore, we will also touch on our philosophical drive and why it’s important to how we heal.

($5 - register here​)

3:00pm-4:00pm

Homewall Fundamentals

at Convention Center Meeting Rooms

($5 - register here​)

4:00pm-7:30pm

Expo Hall 

4:00pm-4:30pm

Athlete Signing 

in Expo Hall booth B432 

Meet pro athletes

6:00pm-6:30pm

Top 10 Accounting Tips with Allison Biek

in Expo Hall Lets Talk About it Space

Bookkeeping and Accounting are ancient skills developed to track the exchange of currency, goods and services. Abacus and Ink brings this timeless and necessary practice into the modern age with virtual services impacting climbing gym operations. We will be discussing common pain points for GMs and Gym Owners and offering real solutions so you can stop stressing about the numbers and focus on growth, your staff, your members and your gym guests!

(Free - register here​)

8:00pm-10:00pm

Social Event

at Synergy Climbing

Come gather to climb, drink and network. 

8:00pm-10:00pm

Dress-to-the-Nines Mixer for Coaches

Coaches gather for drinks and networking in a more formal setting, celebrating the community and fostering relationships beyond the gym environment.

(Free - get info at one of the Coaching Sessions​)

Date: March 19 - 22, 2025