CLIMBING “I
’m not strong,” Steve McClure tells me for the second time in an hour.
His forearms, however, suggest otherwise. As he methodically starts his breakfast (muesli, no milk), I can’t take my eyes of these twin coiled brown serpents of muscle, fi rmly attached to a compact, nut-brown body. Like many elite climbers, he makes the rest of the population appear over-sized and clumsy.
But it should come as no surprise that Steve looks like
the perfect climbing machine. Steve, 43, might be famously understated, but these forearms have kept him at the top of his vertical game for 15 years, clawing his way up the very hardest rock climbs in the UK
“BREAKING INTO THE NINTH GRADE MEANS ENTRY INTO THE BIG BOYS’ LEAGUE, BUT FEW WILL EVER GET THERE.”
In person, he has a relentless, quiet energy. He may be understated, but not to be underestimated. As we talked, he carefully continued to fuel up for a day’s climbing, quickly accumulating maximum calories on his plate for sustained performance – with, of course, a few bread rolls secreted into his bag for minimum spending. We were in glamorous Arco, Italy for their annual Rock Legends Award. For the fi rst time ever, a British climber, Steve, was nominated, up against the awesome Adam Ondra (who had just climbed F9b+: the hardest grade on the planet), the mighty Alex Megos from Germany (who had made the fi rst onsight of F9a) and US superstar Chris Sharma. It was a gathering of the past, the present and the future of elite sport climbers.
In the world of elite rock climbing, breaking into the ninth grade means entry into the big boys’ league, but few will ever get there. This level is the absolute living end of modern rock climbing: huge routes swaggering up savagely overhanging cliffs, where the handholds are so improbable that hanging off a doorframe with one hand would count as an easy rest. Steve, who lives in the rather more gritty Sheffi eld, was enjoying the unusual experience of being in the presence of the few climbers in the world better than him. Since the extraordinary thing about Steve is not that he’s climbed F9a+, but that he’s almost single-handedly fl own the fl ag for high-standard sports climbing in Britain, whilst being almost twice the age of other ninth-grade climbers, and all with two kids and with what effectively amounts to a full-time job. A design engineer in a previous life, he made the leap to full-time climber in 2000, he explained over a breakfast tea: “I was lucky: all the climbing projects were left wide open. Everyone went off to climb hard grit routes. Jerry Moffatt and Ben Moon went bouldering. No-one was interested in the limestone any more. Completing Ben Moon’s project at Kilnsey (which became Northern Lights, 9a) made me, and it gave me the confi dence to give up my day job.” His tally of new UK climbs alone is unparalleled. He’s notched up nine routes of 9a and above: Mutation, Northern Lights, Overshadow, North Star, Batman, the traverse Finest Pedigree, Hubble, and two variations on existing routes that also make the grade. But it’s Overshadow that stands above the rest. This limestone symphony at Malham Cove, Yorkshire took Steve 40 days of work over four years, and is still the UK’s hardest route.
“It’s a hard F8a+,” he explained, “Then straight into a Font 8a with no rest whatsoever. Then, if you manage, you can get a bat hang with your toes before continuing into a pumpy F8a+ route”. In other words: brutally hard. “But I don’t think of myself as a professional climber or a professional athlete.” He continued, “I just want to go climbing. I’d be bored if I didn’t have a job. It gives me a focus. I think it’d be really hard to be given £50,000 a year to just go out and climb.” Climbing is, however, still his profession. He works up to 30 hours a week, a mix of routesetting, team management, events and consultancy. The constant juggling “can be wearing,” he admits, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. “Anyway, there’s no money in climbing,” he explained, “The top guys get a decent amount, but people don’t realise just how quickly that drops off further down the scale.” Pro athlete or not, Steve had been nominated for the Rock Legends for his latest climb, Batman, also at Malham. Last year he overcame a long-term fi nger injury to succeed on this, the UK’s second-hardest route at F9a/+. Linking up two already extremely hard climbs with a 10-metre section of new climbing, this sustained route fi ghts its way up miniscule holds, with barely a single point to stop and clip. Later that day, whilst Steve’s forearms took him up some overhanging limestone, the jury locked themselves in a dusty room and debated at length about the defi nition of the award and the four nominees. Opinions were cast, heads nodded. “If I could vote with my heart, I’d vote for Steve,” observed one magazine honcho on the award panel, “It’s amazing to see an over 40 climbing at the same level as the youth. But, if I vote with my brain, I must choose Ondra.” The award, predictably, went to Adam Ondra; you can’t argue with the maths of F9b+. I texted Steve to prepare him for defeat but, after spending a great day climbing in the Italian sun, he wasn’t fazed. He did want to clear up one important point: was the evening buffet still free? That night, a crowd of young Euro climbers gathered in the hall of the Arco Rock Master competition complex for the award ceremony. The Arco Rock Master was the fi rst climbing competition in 1987 and they were here to compete, to watch and to pay homage to their legends. Clutching ice cold Peronis, all eyes of the honed crowd were fi xed on the climbing montages projected on to a giant screen. A clip of Steve blasting his way up a grade nine nasty came on. Forehead veins looking set to explode, he lunges for a tiny hold, misses, yet with impossible body tension, cantilevers himself back into position. The crowd gasps. Steve might not consider himself strong, but they would disagree.
P Steve McClure on his own Batman, graded F9a/+, at Malham, Yorkshire. Steve made the fi rst ascent in May 2013, three years after fi rst bolting it. “It’s extremely sustained on tiny holds, with barely a single point to clip, never mind chalk up,” said Steve. “It’s a very rare fi nd, and I’m extremely privileged to have found it.”
“FOREHEAD VEINS LOOKING SET TO EXPLODE, HE LUNGES FOR A TINY HOLD, MISSES, YET WITH IMPOSSIBLE BODY TENSION, CANTILEVERS HIMSELF BACK INTO POSITION.”
Later, it’s obvious that Adam Ondra and Alex Megos also hold Steve in great respect. They both follow the achievements of this madly dedicated British guy who somehow defi es the rain and lack of rock to keep the spluttering fl ame of British sport climbing alight. “To climb 9a+ at 43 is amazing,” exclaims Alex Megos, “My trainer tells me of all Steve’s mythical routes in your country, and one day I’d love to try them.”
Adam Ondra has been over: it took him two visits and seven days to climb Overshadow, which he thought was just a whisker away from F9b.
42 | 70TH ANNIVERSARY YEAR | FOR BRITISH CLIMBING AND WALKING SINCE 1944
PHOTO: TIM GLASBY
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