Rochester’s Roca Climbing and Fitness youth ready to conquer US National Climbing Championships – Post Bulletin

ROCHESTER — Erik Cmiel remembers not long ago when the Roca Climbing and Fitness climbing team was waiting for its first young climber to qualify for the USA Climbing Nationals competition.

Those days are long gone, and Cmiel plays an important role in them.

Now he and four others — one of the program’s best — from Roca are headed to Utah.

“I first made it to the national level in 2019,” said the 19-year-old, who graduated from Mayo High School in 2023. “I was the first person from Roca to make it and now to see five people go — for the last four years, we’ve had at least three people go every year — it’s just crazy to see, especially from a small venue like Roca. Now it’s a nationally known venue.”

Cmiel is part of a group of five climbers — along with Lilly Thome, Addie Scheid, Ben Edwards and Nick Dewhirst — who will compete in the USA Climbing Youth Nationals July 7-14 in Salt Lake City. Thome and Scheid are the first Roca women to qualify for the national event as part of the club.

All earned their spots with top-six finishes at the Division 6 Championships in Arlington Heights, Illinois, last month. Thome finished seventh but still qualified because she had the sixth-highest score among American-born climbers.

Those five players were among 10 qualifiers for Team Roca who helped the club finish third out of 25 teams from 12 Midwestern states.

“I’m so excited to see all these kids compete at nationals,” Cmiel said. “It was amazing to see, especially Nick, Lilly, Addie, I’ve known them all for a while, they’ve been strong kids on the team and they’ve worked really hard.”

For Cmiel, the circle seems to be complete.

At 19, this is his last year of competition at the youth level before aging out. He has been competing regularly at nationals since 2019. His best performances were a 15th place in 2023 in hard climbing/top rope and a 15th place in 2022 in bouldering.

Bouldering is a form of free climbing that is practiced on small rock formations or artificial rock walls without the use of ropes or harnesses.

This year’s national competition will be held in Salt Lake City at USA Climbing’s National Training Center, a facility Cmiel knows well.

In fact, he’s spent quite a bit of time there over the past year. Cmiel recently finished his freshman year at Westminster University, a private college in Salt Lake City where he’s climbed a lot. He’s now ranked in the top 20 in the country for a sport that’s making its second Olympic appearance. Cmiel has done his best to make the U.S. team, competing in the World Cup trials and reaching the semifinals in roping last fall. He also competed in the Olympic team trials last spring.

“I think the World Cup teams are definitely in my future if I continue to compete in all the climbs,” Cmiel said.

That’s what made him so valuable as he returned to Roca this summer as an athlete and coach. Cmiel, Edwards and others contributed immensely to the growth of their fellow climbers.

“It’s really inspiring and motivating for me,” Dewhirst said. “Because they push me to improve and be more consistent in my climbs. They also make it really fun to hang out with them and climb with them.”

Dewhirst was just happy to qualify for the second day of the Division 6 championships, but the next thing he knew he was heading to his first national championships.

“I was really surprised that I did it,” the 14-year-old said with a laugh. “It was a really fun day.”

Thome and Scheid also both had work to do after the first day at Divisionals.

Thome finished eighth, while Scheid was 11th in their respective divisions during qualifying, but both outperformed their efforts on Sunday. Scheid placed fifth, while Thome placed seventh, earning each a trip to Utah.

“I was really impressed,” Cmiel said. “On Saturday, Lilly, Addie and Nick all qualified for the next day, but if they had placed the same as the first day, they wouldn’t have made it. Then, every single one of them in the finals pulled themselves together and put on a really good performance. And we were like, ‘What the hell is going on?’ It was so good to see because I knew they were all capable of it. To see all that effort put into it and to be able to go to nationals like that, I’m really excited.”

Cmiel finished third in his division after earning first place in Saturday qualifying. Edwards edged out Roca with a second-place finish. Now they head to Utah and look to make the most of it. Especially Cmiel.

“To be able to support Roca in these last national championships and kind of see it all – at least my youth series – come to an end,” Cmiel said, “is just awesome.”