Harvard Rocks MIT Climbing Competition

More than 90 mountaineers, competing in categories that ranged from “Good” to “Wicked Good,” participated in the fourth annual MIT Climbing Competition held this weekend at MIT’s Bouldering Wall.

Harvard student Keller Rinaudo ’09 participated in the most advanced level and won third place.

“I’m very happy with my result,” Rinaudo said. “This competition convinced me to build our own bouldering wall [at Harvard]. We have one in Claverly, but it is pretty poor and I would really like to build another one.”

Aryesh Muk-herjee, a third-year graduate student in applied physics at Harvard, was one of the two organizers of the event.

“The competition is a good way to bring people together and see some excellent climbing,” he said Saturday.

“The people in it are mostly there to have fun; climbing is a social sport and we try to maintain the same spirit at our competition.”

Although Harvard usually has a large and notable presence at the event, according to organizers at MIT, this year’s competition only included five Harvard students.

Lucas T. Laursen ’06, President of the Harvard Mountaineering Club, said that though an e-mail had been sent out to the club members about the event, many did not register.

“The club is very decentralized,” Laursen said.

The two-day competition was open to climbers of all levels.

The first day of competition was for beginner and intermediate climbers, while the second day was for the advanced—“Wicked Good”—competitors.

Professional and very advanced rock climbers, which included Rinaudo, competed yesterday afternoon.

Prizes were awarded to the top three competitors in each category.