About

York University Mountaineering Club (YUMC) is an extreme sports club for anyone who enjoys climbing and mountaineering. We are a rapidly growing and very active club (around 80 members) with trips to crags in Yorkshire or the Peak District every Sunday. Most of our members also climb at the indoor bouldering centre, Red Goat, on Monday and Friday from 5pm to keep in shape. For learning and perfecting rope work and lead sport climbing we run trips to the wall at Energise on Wednesdays, and offer discounted introduction courses for complete beginners. Regular socials are also held on Wednesday evenings, including the infamous "Roped-Up" bar crawl at the start of the year. These socials are not to missed!

What sort of climbing do we do?

The type of climbing we do depends very much on what people want to do! Currently we climb a lot of trad (outdoors - placing protection in the rock as you climb) and bouldering, in addition to a lot of indoor bouldering at Red Goat. Once a term we run long weekend trips away where multi-pitch climbing on mountain crags will often be done. These are much longer routes which can involve being off the ground all day! Some of our members also do trips with a more 'mountaineering' flavour, such as alpine routes in the Alps. The club is a great way to meet potential partners no matter what type of climbing you enjoy.

What equipment do I need?

Nothing initially! Climbing equipment is not particularly kind to your wallet, so we recommend comming on a few trips before buying any equipment. The club has a lot of equipment that you can borrow so once you've decided you like climbing you will probably want to buy a pair of climbing shoes and a harness, and a chalk bag.

Do you compete?

We partake in several bouldering competitions throughout the year. We send a couple of teams to BUCS each year which is the national university bouldering competition. We also compete in the famous York-Lancaster Roses competition and in the Varsity competition against York St. Johns University. The competitions are great fun and offer a great opportunity to show off the climbing skills you've acquired from training. Nobody is forced to compete and for many, competition climbing is an idea which doesn't sit very well with the sport's more spiritual ethos. Nevertheless, bouldering is a highly social form of climbing and is really enjoyable regardless of whether you choose to compete!