John Gill gilt als einer der Väter des modernen Bouldern. Er prägte den Begriff der “moving meditation” für das Bouldern. Auch Udini verweist immer wieder auf John Gill und seine lesenswerten Artikel rund um die Philosophie & den Lifestyle des Boulderns.

Im Folgenden ein paar Zitate aus einem sehr lesenswerten Interview mit John Gill:

It ultimately comes down to concentration, focus. Easy problems can be delightful moving meditations, and the more challenging routes can sharpen your ability to focus. […]

If the only thing you can think of as you boulder is to punch out the other guy and boost your numerical rating, you miss the point of bouldering – which is to simplify the act of climbing, stripping away all extraneous factors.

Einfach herrlich! Das ist die Essenz des Boulderns!

Wunderbar und immer wieder lesenswert sind auch seine Ausführungen zum Thema Schwierigkeitsgrade:

Such ratings are not intrinsic to the rock – they are a social construct. The tail wags the dog. Besides, rating schemes are always flawed. I can no longer tell where genetics ends and “difficulty” begins. Can you? The truth is each act of climbing by an individual is an individual act, unrelated to someone else’s performance on the same rock. When you truly understand this, you free yourself from the strong currents of mainstream practice and philosophy and appreciate the simple, unexploited experience of climbing.

Bild via threerockbooks.com