OCF

CEC and USA Climbing are thrilled to introduce the North American Cup Series. The North American Cup Series will feature the three individual disciplines of cli...mbing bouldering, speed, and lead climbing. The Series, which launches in June, will kick off in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, and will consist of five stops across North America. https://climbingcanada.ca//climbing-escalade-canada-in-pa/ CEC et USA Climbing sont ravis de présenter la Série de la Coupe Nord-Américaine. La série de la Coupe Nord-Américaine offrira des événements pour les trois disciplines individuelles de l’escalade bloc, vitesse et difficulté. La série, qui sera lancée en juin, débutera à Salt Lake City, Utah, États-Unis, et comprendra cinq étapes à travers l’Amérique du Nord. https://climbingcanada.ca//climbing-escalade-canada-en-pa/

The Board of Directors of Climbing Escalade Canada (CEC) is seeking candidates for positions on the board of directors for the upcoming year. Deadline to apply:... April 2, 2021. For more info: https://climbingcanada.ca//call-for-nominations-of-cec-bo/ Le Conseil d’administration de Climbing Escalade Canada (CEC) est à la recherche de candidats pour des postes au d’administratrices et administrateurs pour l’année à venir. Date limite d'application: 2 avril 2021. Pour de plus amples détails: https://climbingcanada.ca//appel-de-nominations-pour-le-c/

Following the success of our Girls & Womxn in Climbing Series and as an alternative to in-person events, we have decided to continue hosting informative webinars for our members and the broader climbing community. Next up, we are pleased to present the OCF Peak Performance Webinar Series with Dr. Tyler Nelson. Dr. Nelson is the owner of Camp4 Human Performance. Based in Utah, he is a certified strength and conditioning specialist who works with athletes and climbers from aro...und the world. He has a doctorate in exercise science with an emphasis on tendon loading and rehabilitation. Targeted towards athletes and coaches, these webinars will cover a series of topics on physical training for competition climbing. The webinars will be held Saturdays at 11:00am EST via zoom: March 27 - Strength Training & Mobility April 3 - Injury Prevention & Recovery April 10 - Testing & Tracking The webinars are free to attend. However, we are accepting donations to fund an exciting new inclusion & equity initiative which aims to address systemic barriers to participation in our events. We are raising funds to cover training and competition costs for athletes in financial need. Special consideration will be given to BIPOC youth. An application process for these scholarships will be announced in conjunction with the launch of the OCF’s 2021-22 season. Register Now @ https://www.climbontario.ca/

The CEC needs your help! The CEC Diversity & Inclusion Committee wants to know: Who are the Canadian climbers? What motivates them? What barriers to participati...on do they face? Fill out the 2021 Demographic Survey today! https://climbingcanada.ca//the-cec-di-committee-launches-/ CEC a besoin de votre aide! Le comité de la Diversité et de l’Inclusion de CEC veut savoir: qui sont les grimpeurs et grimpeuses canadien(ne)s? Qu’est-ce qui les motive? Quels obstacles à la participation rencontrent-ils/elles? Remplissez le sondage 2021 dès aujourd'hui!!! https://climbingcanada.ca//le-comite-di-de-cec-publie-un-/

The CEC- Climbing Escalade Canada has announced the athletes selected for the 2021 High Performance Program! Congratulations to all, including ON athletes: Indiana Chapman (L, C) Justine McCarney (B)... Lia Wieckowski (C) Madison Fischer (B) Riley Galloway (B, S) Lucas Uchida (L, B, C) Zach Richardson (B)

Reminder - We’re Hiring! Want to help design the future of high performance climbing in Ontario? We are looking for a head coach to develop and implement a high performance program for OCF athletes. Deadline to apply is this Sunday, Nov 15th. For more details and how to apply visit our our website - https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-job-posting-head-coach/... Will Johnson

OCF Job Posting - Head Coach The Ontario Climbing Federation (OCF) is seeking a coach to design and implement a high performance program for OCF competitive athletes. Full job description and how to apply can be found on our website - https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-job-posting-head-coach/

The CEC has announced the cancellation of the 2020-2021 Open National Competition Series but remains hopeful of being able to host a modified 2020-2021 Youth National Competition Series. The OCF has worked closely with the CEC and other PSOs over the past months, and we support the CEC’s decision. If the CEC Youth Boulder/Lead National event goes ahead in May 2021, the OCF will be prepared to host qualifying events for our athletes. Our August member survey showed a high leve...l of support and enthusiasm for competitions this year: over 70% of responding members said they would definitely or very likely attend OCF competitions if they can be run safely. If CEC series do not go ahead, we will still consider hosting local events once it is safe to do so. Full announcement can be viewed on our website. https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-2020-21-competition-season-

OCF Member Survey and Launch of 2020/21 Supporter Membership As all areas of Ontario are now in Stage 3 of the government’s reopening plan, the Ontario Climbing Federation (OCF) is now actively planning our 2020/2021 season. Our season may look a bit different this year, but our priority will be to ensure a safe return to competition for our athletes and members. As part of our initial steps, we are conducting a member survey for our current members to gain a better understan...ding of the needs, concerns and barriers that you anticipate during our next season. A link to the survey has been shared with all 2019/20 members via email. Launch of 2020/21 Supporter Membership The OCF is a not-for-profit organization and we serve on behalf of our members. With 2019/20 memberships expiring on August 31, 2020, and with no OCF events currently scheduled, we have decided not to open Athlete and Coach memberships at this point in time. We will open these membership categories once we announce our season. Meanwhile, Supporter memberships will be available for purchase as of Sept 1, 2020. For more information, please visit our website: https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-member-survey-and-launch-o/

IT Job Posting Reminder: deadline to submit applications is this Friday, Aug 21.

OCF Job Posting - IT System Administrator The Ontario Climbing Federation (OCF) is seeking a skilled IT professional with experience both in IT Operations and basic Web Development to help maintain the OCF IT systems. Full job description can be found on our website - https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-job-posting-it-system-admi/ ... If you are interested, please send your resume and cover letter to [email protected] by Friday, 21 Aug 2020

We hope that everyone is keeping safe and having a lovely summer so far! We are pleased to announce the new OCF Board for the 2020/2021 season. The Board has been hard at work with planning, and we are really excited to share some of our priorities: 1) We are working on becoming a recognized PSO! This work involves developing new policies and certification programs for coaches, routesetters and officials. 2) We have been working in collaboration with the CEC and other PSOs on... return to competition plans that prioritize athlete safety. 3) We are developing a program to improve access to OCF events for youth from underrepresented groups, with the goal of making our sport more accessible and inclusive. We will be announcing more details on these initiatives in the upcoming weeks! Stay tuned! See more

A message from the OCF Board of Directors to the Ontario climbing community. Full statement can be found on our website: https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-message-to-the-ontario-cli/

To our athletes, coaches, supporters, volunteers, gyms and everyone else who contributed to the 2019/2020 season, the OCF Board thanks you. Despite the abrupt ending caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we are proud of everyone who competed, volunteered and supported the Ontario Climbing Federation helping to make the season prior to the crisis a big success. Thank you to all members who were able to attend the OCF Annual General Meeting which was held this morning. For those who... were unable to participate, please review the documents on our website summarizing the season along with the presentation and slides of the meeting itself. We will do everything we can to keep you informed as soon as possible about next steps for the upcoming season. In the mean time, have a great and safe summer. #OntarioClimbingFederation

Dear OCF Members, Our AGM Member Package was sent out to 2019-2020 OCF Members yesterday by email. It includes instructions on joining the meeting as well as the Board's 2019-2020 Impact Report. If you're not able to attend the AGM, please check out the Impact Report to see what we've been up to. For the rest of you, see you on Saturday! 2019/2020 OCF Board

As previously announced, the OCF 2020 AGM is scheduled for next Saturday, May 23rd at 10am. The AGM package (including instructions on joining the virtual meeting) will be sent to all 2019/2020 Members by email this week. Please make sure your contact information is up to date in the registration system. In order to help us prepare for the meeting and make it as informative as possible, please submit your questions in advance to [email protected]. We will try to address as... many of these as possible in our AGM presentation. We will also include a question and answer session at the end for additional questions that come up during the presentation. At this time, we would also like to introduce the two candidates up for election to the OCF Board: Jamie Galloway and Davis Barton. Please visit our website to read their full bios. Some additional reminders: - Only Members may attend the AGM and vote for Directors - Members include anyone with a 2019/2020 Competitive Athlete, Coach or Supporter Membership - All Child Members may attend the AGM but may participate only as an observer - A parent or legal guardian of a Child Member may vote on behalf of that Child Member at the AGM and for elections to the Board We look forward to seeing you next weekend.

https://www.climbontario.ca/ocf-ontario-climbing-gym-reope/ Dear OCF members, We hope you are staying safe and healthy. ... We are excited that the collective efforts of physical distancing have started flattening the curve. With last week’s Phase I announcement by the Ontario government, the return to activities such as climbing could soon be possible. The OCF is not a recognized PSO as defined in Thursday’s announcement. As such, our 2019-2020 season remains cancelled, and we will not be scheduling any further competitions until it is permitted and safe to do so. As the situation develops, we continue to work on behalf of Ontario's competitive athletes and continue working towards our goal of gaining official status as a Provincial Sport Organization in order to better serve our members. Although the OCF’s mandate is limited to competition climbing, we are working to support Ontario gyms however we can. We have been actively participating in a National Pandemic Taskforce, which has produced letters for use in discussions with government and public health authorities, as well as a guidance document for gyms to use when planning their reopening. For more information, please see https://climbingcanada.ca/en/pandemic-task-force/. As private businesses, Ontario climbing gyms will each make their own decisions about reopening. Ontario gym owners have been collaborating to coordinate their planning around reopening. Our full website post includes a message put out by many of them following Thursday’s announcement. Sincerely, The Ontario Climbing Federation Board #ontarioclimbingfederation #ocftogether #statement #governmentguidelines #phac #ontario #healthandsafety #stayinformed #stayhealthy #staysafe #climbing

REMINDER: We are looking for new candidates to join the OCF Board of Directors! The deadline to submit your interest is tomorrow at midnight. Please see our April 27th post for full details and contact us if you have any questions

The 2020 OCF Annual General Meeting will take place by videoconference on Saturday May 23rd, 2020 at 10:00am. Detailed instructions on joining the meeting and on voting for new Directors will be sent to Members by email. Please make sure your contact information is up to date in the registration system. Also, at this time, we are looking for four new Directors. Interested Members are asked to submit letters of interest to [email protected] by May 8th. ... Please see our website Recent News for more additional details on the meeting and on becoming a Director. https://www.climbontario.ca/notice-of-the-ocfs-2020-agm-an/

The OCF Difficulty Season is suspended until further notice. Ontario's Chief Medical Officer of Health is recommending the immediate suspension of all large events and public gatherings of over 250 people due to COVID-19. Our competitions are consistently over this threshold. Therefore, in consultation with our host gyms, the OCF Board has decided to suspend the OCF Difficulty Season until further notice. OCF Difficulty Local #2 (scheduled for March 28/29th, 2020 at Boulderz... Etobicoke) is officially cancelled and will not be rescheduled. We will issue full refunds to all registered athletes. A decision on whether and when OCF Difficulty Provincials will take place is deferred until there is more clarity on the COVID-19 outbreak. We will continue to monitor the situation and will provide updates as soon as there is new information. The health and safety of our athletes, coaches, volunteers and spectators is of utmost importance in everything we do. We thank the Ontario climbing community for their support and understanding.

Please see the statement published March 11th on the CEC’s website for the OCF’s official position on COVID-19: http://climbingcanada.ca///official-statement-on-covid-19/ We are closely monitoring the outbreak and have been actively consulting with the CEC and our fellow PSOs. We plan to follow all recommendations from federal, provincials and local health authorities. ... As of today, all of our events will take place as scheduled. However, we continue to monitor this fast-evolving situation and will provide updates as necessary. If our competitions go ahead as planned, we will issue more detailed policies and recommendations on illness and hygiene prior to each event.

Check out some of Will's pics from the Youth C and D categories at Speed Provincials!