Where Climbing Came From: The Origins of Chalk, Climbing Shoes, Grades, Climbing Walls and Competitions
Most of what you see in a climbing gym appeared between the 1930s and the 1990s: Pierre Allain invented the soft-soled climbing shoe in 1935, John Gill brought gymnastics chalk into climbing in the 1950s, and the first modern climbing wall went up in a corridor at the University of Leeds in 1964. Rope climbing's 5.10 and bouldering's V grades grew up separately: YDS was published with a 1956 Tahquitz guidebook, V grades with a 1991 Hueco Tanks guide. Competitions began with Soviet speed events in the late 1940s, lead competitions arrived with Italy's SportRoccia in 1985, and climbing made its Olympic debut in Tokyo in 2021.