Rock Climbing

Victoria is home to lots of great climbing at Mt. Buffalo, the Grampians, and especially at Mt. Arapiles! 

Whether you are an experienced climber looking for a broader community of enthusiasts, an intermediate needing some guidance to consolidate your skills or a beginner looking to try out an exciting new activity, the club has the people and equipment to get you climbing and keep you exploring the vertical world.

Information on how to climb with MUMC can be found at the bottom of the page.

 Climbing with a view at Point Perpendicular, NSW

We work on our skills and get stronger throughout the week by visiting one of the many climbing gyms in Melbourne. There are other opportunities such as competing in bouldering and climbing competitions, and occasionally, we offer coaching sessions.

Aaron Lowndes climbing Eye of the Tiger in the Grampians.

Harnesses, rock-shoes, ropes, racks of nuts, cams, hexes and helmets are all available for hire at nominal rates for club trips. The club also has aiding equipment, oversize cams, a portaledge and alpine gear to help experienced, active members to extend their horizons. Come to our clubrooms to have a go on our very own bouldering wall! 

For motivation to become cooler and to climb harder, read the club publication - The Mountaineer.

The MUMC Climbing System

The Ropes Safety Management Plan (RSMP) governs all rock climbing activities at MUMC. The Ropes Technical Committee (RTC) – made up of experienced climbers and executive representatives from MUMC and MU Sport – is responsible for reviewing and making changes to this framework.

The RSMP includes information on preferred practices that must be adhered to on club trips, a progression pathway from novice-level to leading and instructing, material for instructional courses that the club runs and assessment criteria for these courses.

The system broadly categorises climbers into five categories: Novices, Seconders, Independent Lead Climbers, Sport Lead Climbers and MUMC Climbing Instructors. Each of these levels requires some form of assessment to achieve and determines what club gear you can borrow and the kind of climbing you can do and who you do it with. See the progression flowchart for more details.

MUMC Climbing Progression Flowchart

All MUMC members involved in climbing activities must be assessed to fit within this framework. This is designed to ensure – for the sake of leaders, participants, the club and the university – that we are appropriately managing risks to individuals, particularly where the activity involves leaders and dependent participants.

Preferred practices, lesson plans and assessment

                                                                                                                                'It's too humid to belay....' at Nowra, NSW

How to start climbing with MUMC:

The easiest option is to climb or boulder at an indoor gym, following their rules. You can still borrow MUMC gear and there are regular social climbing trips organised this way by club members. The most popular of these is the Monday night climbing, which happens every Monday night at Urban Climb Blackburn. To get a lift there, the best thing to do is to join the MUMC Facebook group.

For climbing outdoors, there are two options for joining the MUMC climbing system: submitting a logbook or being assessed by an instructor.

1) Submit a logbook of your experience to the Ropes Officer.

Members with prior climbing experience can submit a logbook of their climbs that includes: date, location, route name, length, protection style (bolted, trad, etc), partners and notes (optional). Any easily readable format is ok, most people use a spreadsheet or export from thecrag.com. Be aware, the cleaner your formatting, the faster it’s likely to be approved (requires reading and an email response from every member of the RTC – all volunteers).

A climber approved solely on their logbook will remain in a “probationary period” until they have completed their assessment. This boils down to the need for MUMC to assess an individual before allowing them to be responsible for others.

Logbook requirements and limitations:

Probationary Seconder:
- Can show 200m or 6 climbs as a seconder on trad routes
- Multipitch experience
* Can't set up top rope anchors for novices until they have passed their Seconder assessment items.

Probationary Sport Lead Climber:
- Can show 500m or 10 climbs as a leader on fixed protection.
*Can second Independent Lead Climbers and above

Probationary Single Pitch Lead Climber
- Can show 500m or 10 climbs as a leader on trad gear
*Can second Independent Lead Climbers and above

Probationary Independent Lead Climber
- Can show 500m or 10 climbs as a leader on trad gear
- Multi pitch experience
*Can climb with Single Pitch Lead Climbers (only single pitch) and above. Stays in probation period (can only climb with non-probationary leaders) until they have demonstrated rescue skills, guided abseil, trip leader induction.

2) Complete your assessment with an MUMC Climbing Instructor:

Come on an instructional trip with the club to be assessed by an instructor. These tend to run a couple of times a year. There’s a few things that can really help this process:

- Talk to the Ropes Officer about what trips and courses you’re interested in,
- Come along to social indoor climbing and bouldering,
- Do your homework before the trip – borrow a book from the club library, watch some online tutorials, climb regularly indoors.

Other Resources

• Learning to climb -  a list of recommended books for beginning to intermediate climbers.
  

That's a lot of information! The best thing to do if you're interested in climbing is to come along to a meeting and have a chat with the Ropes Officer.