Episodes 46-48: World Cup Pressure with Angie Payne

Pressure.  No matter if it's a comp, a project, self-inflicted, or external - we all feel it.  In these next three episodes I sit down with my good friend Angie Payne and discuss the pressure cooker situation of a World Cup comp.

A few weeks ago, Angie and I attended the Vail World Cup, and while I ambushed competitors with my microphone, Angie, a former competitor, captured in photos the emotions that this sort of intense pressure creates.  Then we sat down and discussed it all.  Her photos, the comments from competitors, and our own experiences.

You'll hear comments from several of today's top competitors including Alex Puccio, Shauna Coxsey, Janja Garnbret, Jan Hojer, and more, and not only can you hear their take on it, but you can see their emotions in the photos for each episode.  

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While you listen, flip through the photos to see exactly what we we're discussing.  The photos are all time stamped so that you can follow along with us.  If you plan on listening using an app on your pocket super computer, you can click on a link in the podcast description to go directly to the gallery for that episode.  Enjoy, and let us know what you think of this format.

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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT (EP. 46):

Kris Hampton  00:31

What's up everybody? I'm your host Kris Hampton. Welcome to Episode 46 of The Power Company Podcast brought to you by Powercompanyclimbing.com. This episode is going to be something a little bit different. This is part one of a three part series and the whole goal here was to dig into the pressure that the World Cup competitors feel and how can we relate that to outdoor climbers. You know, it really isn't necessarily all that different. And my good friend Angie Payne and I went to the World Cup in Vail. And while I ambushed people with my microphone and ask them questions about pressure, Angie shot photos that that and she was trying to capture, you know, the emotion that comes with all of that pressure and how competitors deal with it, and those moments on the wall, or back in iso or waiting to come out onto the mats, that you can really see that pressure. And we weren't really exactly sure what this was gonna turn out to be when we first started. But I think we came up with something really cool. And some really interesting conversation was spawned by the competitors comments, as well as Angie's photos. So while you're listening to this episode, and Angie and I are talking about specific photos, all of those images are up on our website. So you can go to Powercompanyclimbing.com and click on the blog post for this episode. Or if you're on your phone, and you're using a podcast app to listen, you can just scroll down into that the description for this episode and there will be a direct link right to these images. And it's definitely worth going  to look at because there's there's so much that we can't describe that's that's in these images, that's in the emotions, that is in these in these moments that that Angie captured that I really suggest you go take a look at. And you know throughout the episode we're going to be hearing from people like Alex Puccio and Shauna Coxsey and Janja Garnbret and Megan Martin and Sean Bailey and, Brooke Raboutou and a bunch of other competitors. So so, you know, thanks to those guys for taking the time out to talk to me. I had no idea going in how difficult it was going to be to get these people to talk while they're in competition mode. Some are easier than others. But you know, I think I'll probably go back if you guys enjoy this. So let us know in the comments, either on the blog, or on the podcast reviews or somewhere, let us know what you you know how you feel about this episode and these images and if it's something you'd like to see again in the future. All right, that's enough for me. You guys get the picture. I'm going to bring in my good friend, Angie Payne.

Angie Payne  03:47

A lot of internal dialogue, a lot of internal battles. I mean, I guess climbing is, is that but yeah, competition just takes that whole experience and condenses it down into a really short period of time.

Kris Hampton  04:15

So, you know, going into this thing, I knew I was going to go to the World Cup, I knew I wanted to ambush people with a microphone. And when I got there, I really still didn't know what I was going to ask them about or what this whole project was gonna be about. You know, I appreciate the photos you are able to capture of the emotion that's happening outside of just the normal climbing shot. So I knew I wanted something to do with that. And then you had the idea of, because pressure has been something that's affected you in these comps quite a bit, that was an interesting take that we could ask competitors. How is it that you can have a tough problem and then get it all back together in those four minutes or whatever between problems to be able to perform better? Because in your experience, you had a tough time with that, right?

Angie Payne  05:17

Yeah, that's one of the hardest parts of competition for me is dealing with the failure of it.The failure on a larger scale and the the mini failures that happen along the way, you know, it just failing on an attempt, failing on a boulder problem, it's really hard to rebound from that. For me, that's one of the things I've struggled with the most is sort of getting into a downward spiral as the competition goes along, or as the round goes along, or even as your five minutes progresses, getting tunnel vision, and then trying to recover from that and come back. And I think I'm the most fascinated, and the most in awe of people who can do that really well. 

Kris Hampton  06:01

Right.

Angie Payne  06:02

 I just, because I'd never really got the hang of doing it well, every time. There are definitely still times, you know, 18 years into competing, where I would just sabotage myself. Like, I would just totally let it get the best of me and, you know, I'd mess up some boulder problem early on, and then it would affect me for the rest of the competition.

Kris Hampton  06:27

Do you think it was easier for you to do earlier in your career? Did it get harder as time went? 

Angie Payne  06:32

Yeah, I think it definitely got harder. It was, I think it was easier when there weren't any expectations. Because if I didn't do well on the first boulder, I maybe I wasn't that surprised. You know, I was like, well, this is hard. I didn't do that well, on the first boulder, I wonder how the second boulder will be? And if it was, you know, if I did well, I was like, "Oh, cool. I did well." But yeah, of course, the more I did it, the more expectations I had and then the expectations make that letting go of failures, harder and harder and harder.

Kris Hampton  07:04

Right. How much of those expectations do you think were built on being Angie Payne?

Angie Payne  07:11

Man, I mean...

Kris Hampton  07:12

 As the name got bigger and bigger?

Angie Payne  07:14

 Yeah.

Kris Hampton  07:15

Did those expectations grow along with it?

Angie Payne  07:17

Yeah, for sure. I mean, that sounds egotistical to even say, but it definitely. it gets in your head that other people you think that other people have expectations for you.

Kris Hampton  07:33

Right.

Angie Payne  07:33

When...

Kris Hampton  07:34

You know, when I talked to Alex Puccio, she said pretty much the same thing.

Alex Puccio  07:37

You know, it's funny, I think the more seasoned you are, the more nervous you get, because I think most athletes that will say the same thing, that our seasoned competitors, just because you have more expectations, and the better your results are, you have expectations on yourself and then people have expectations on you. So the first competitions I ever did were actually the least amount of stress, because you just going in here, it's fun, and you don't like you kind of care, but you're like, I don't know what to expect. Like, I'm just gonna go out there and see what happens. And so you're not as disappointed or, you know. It's like the lows are real or not, like they're really low now, but they're not as low before you.

Angie Payne  08:10

I think that it's easy to start thinking that people expect things of you. 

Kris Hampton  08:17

Right.

Angie Payne  08:18

When in reality, it's, I think it's really just you expecting things of yourself, right? And then, and then kind of projecting that onto everybody else like, Oh, these people expect me to do this. Like, yeah, maybe for like 10 seconds of their life watching the competition, they think, Oh, yeah, she's done really well. Watch. She's gonna do well. And yeah, maybe they expect you'll do well. And when you don't like, honestly, they're gonna forget about it within 45 seconds, like, it's not gonna affect their life. If you do well, they are psyched and if you don't, they might be a little bummed for you. But like, I think what I've really learned is that I always thought people expected things, but it was just that I expected things.

Kris Hampton  09:05

Yeah, I think that's totally true. You know, as a viewer, I like, you know, I watched the competition, I'm rooting for someone every single time. But that doesn't mean I'm going to be upset if the person I'm rooting for doesn't win, you know. I'm more in it to see a good competition and to see good climbers perform well, and I'm stoked to be able to watch it. I'm not a comp climber at all, you know, but I get stoked just to watch the competition and just to watch people perform under pressure. Whether that's fall apart under pressure, that's just as interesting to me, honestly, you know, so I, you know, I think you're right. I don't think there are so many people out there putting all that weight on the competitors. I think competitors most most likely put it on themselves most of the time.

Angie Payne  10:02

Yeah, it's really easy to, to make up a story about what everybody else is thinking. Yeah, like, oh my gosh, if these people, you know, if I don't do well, these people are gonna think that it was just a fluke, that, that I wasn't really, you know, a great competitor after all, and especially if you sort of do well for a while and then start going downhill.

Kris Hampton  10:26

 Right.

Angie Payne  10:27

 Which is, which is pretty easy to do. Because you get more expectations, put more expectations on yourself and put more pressure on yourself and it gets harder as you go along.

Kris Hampton  10:36

Yeah, and it can look downhill after just one comp.

Angie Payne  10:39

Yeah, exactly.

Kris Hampton  10:40

 It doesn't mean it's downhill, you know.

Angie Payne  10:41

Right. And especially in these World Cup comps, like the field is so stacked, that somebody who wins might not make semi finals the next week.

Kris Hampton  10:51

Right.

Angie Payne  10:52

That happens. 

Kris Hampton  10:53

Totally. 

Angie Payne  10:53

And the difference between first and 25th isn't actually that huge in the World Cup competitions. So like, somebody who wins could get 25th and if you just looked at the results, you'd think, Oh, my gosh, what happened to that person? They really messed up this comp. But it might be that they had like four extra attempts, or they had you know, and that kept them out of semi finals. It's just crazy how, how small the differences are. And, you know, it makes you feel like you just have to perform perfectly. That's a huge pressure to put on yourself,

Kris Hampton  11:34

 For sure

Angie Payne  11:34

Trying to be perfect.

Kris Hampton  11:35

Yeah. And it's probably a, for most people, I imagine it's a negative thing, you know. It's their, their mistakes are going to be amplified. They get in your head a lot more. It's just gonna cause this bad spiral.

Angie Payne  11:49

Yeah, and it is a spiral. And for me, that's what it's always been. It's, it's really hard for me to get out of the spiral once it starts.

Kris Hampton  11:56

Do you have specific examples you can remember, of times when you've spiraled down?

Angie Payne  12:01

Yeah, for sure. There was actually one of the times was in the World Cup in Vail and it was in semifinals and I fell on the last move of the first boulder problem. So there's, there were four problems in semifinals and came out, climbed well on the first problem, but fell on the last move a couple of times. And because of this IFSC scoring you, if you climb to the bonus hold, you get the bonus, and then you do six more moves and fall on the last move, it doesn't matter. You still just get the bonus.

Kris Hampton  12:33

You just wasted all that

Angie Payne  12:34

So you just wasted all that energy. And I think I fell on the last move a few times. Got really frustrated, went back behind the wall, and couldn't let it go. Fell on the last move of the second problem a couple times. 

Kris Hampton  12:47

Oh, man. 

Angie Payne  12:47

So I'd only gotten credit for two bonuses at this point. 

Kris Hampton  12:50

Right. And now you've done 12 moves

Angie Payne  12:53

 Exactly. Now, 

Kris Hampton  12:54

Six times 

Angie Payne  12:55

I'm super tired, at elevation in Vail, it's definitely harder. And I fell on the last move of the third problem and the last move of the fourth problem. I fell on the last move of every problem in semi finals. And I ended up in 17th place. There were only four moves in the whole round that I didn't do.

Kris Hampton  13:12

 Right. 

Angie Payne  13:13

But I got 17th place. And it was... I think if I had done the first problem, there's a pretty good chance I would have done at least one of the other problems.

Kris Hampton  13:22

Right.

Angie Payne  13:23

 Maybe maybe I would have done them all. It's hard to say.

Kris Hampton  13:26

Yeah yeah.

Angie Payne  13:26

That's the thing, you just never know.

Kris Hampton  13:27

Impossible to say

Angie Payne  13:28

 Like what that inertia can, you know if you get into

Kris Hampton  13:30

 Momentum means a lot

Angie Payne  13:31

Yeah, if you get that good energy going on that first problem, it can carry you through and change like the way the whole round goes. 

Kris Hampton  13:39

Yeah, totally. 

Angie Payne  13:40

And it's really just one move that can do that, you know. So you have to be able to, to let that go if you want to rebound. And for me that's really hard.

Kris Hampton  13:50

Yeah, I think that's tough. That's a tough situation to be in because, you know, like you said, you could very well look at that as a great performance. 

Angie Payne  14:00

Yeah.

Kris Hampton  14:00

There were four moves in the round you didn't do right. You know, you got to the last hold of every problem. 

Angie Payne  14:06

Yep. 

Kris Hampton  14:08

But then you're judged by this, the scoring system.

Angie Payne  14:12

Exactly. Exactly.

Kris Hampton  14:14

Is it easy to to go to blaming the scoring?

Angie Payne  14:22

Yes, it's very easy. 

Kris Hampton  14:23

Yeah. I imagine it would be. I

Angie Payne  14:25

t is easy. It's definitely like one of the first things that I get frustrated with in those situations. I mean, really, what I should be frustrated with is my inability to 

Kris Hampton  14:40

Your tactics.

Angie Payne  14:41

 Yeah, my tactics and like my strategy and my climbing and my inability to let the first failure go. That's what I should be frustrated with, but it's really easy to take it out on other things like well, if it had been this other scoring, I would have been in like, you know, fifth place or if it had been this other way, I would have, you know, in some comps, it's been like, well, I would have won if it had been this other way. And 

Kris Hampton  15:05

Totally

Angie Payne  15:05

Sure, it's easy to look at that and when you're frustrated with yourself, it's super easy to take it out on just about anything else. I mean, I think whether we like to admit it or not, humans like to make excuses.

Kris Hampton  15:20

Yeah, totally.

Angie Payne  15:21

And I'm no exception. 

Kris Hampton  15:22

Yeah, I've been reading this book called Mindset by Carol Dweck. And it's a, it's a deep look into fixed mindset versus growth mindset. And one of the hallmarks of a fixed mindset that she writes about is that fixed mindset people often blame everything but themselves, you know, think Donald Trump, and the growth mindset people will look a little deeper and say, I could have changed this and had a better outcome. 

Angie Payne  15:57

Yep. 

Kris Hampton  15:57

You know, and, and that brings up two posts on Facebook that I was actually kind of excited to see when they popped up. Because they really played into what you and I were going to be talking about, and one was Jakob Schubert and one was Alex Puccio. And they were posted in back to back days, you know, I don't know how much Jakob's post influenced Alex's post. It very well could have. But they were, they are an interesting contrast, you know, and I'll read them both and then we can talk about them. Jakob's post was, "The World Cup and Vail went very badly for me this year. After a fifth place in Japan, I had high expectations and felt very strong. But unfortunately, the comp was already over after qualifiers. I'm always trying to analyze my mistakes and unsurprisingly, it were the slabby technical boulders again, that were the problem. Careful, long speech about my thoughts on routesetting incoming." I think that's interesting that he was careful about this. He thought hard about this before he said it. And to be clear, before I go into this, I was in full agreement of his post when I first read it. And then I thought a little more about it, and we'll talk about that, but he goes on to say, "I have to say that in my opinion, the setting of our group's qualifiers wasn't diverse at all. Three out of five boulders were slabs and only one boulder was pure fitness on holds. Some might say that's a new style of bouldering but in my opinion, it's bad setting. Bouldering shouldn't only be about standing on your feet. When you're done with qualification and feel like you haven't even climbed today since no boulders were exhausting at all, it just feels wrong to me. I like to fight on boulders and feel a physical strain. Sure, slabby boulders are part of the game but they shouldn't be the most important thing in my opinion. Crimps, slopers, pinches, big moves, campusing jumps, coordination toe hooks, heel hooks, power endurance, there's so many things. That's what I love about this sport. To be fair, it was difficult for the route setters because the wall in Vail is not great and they did a very good job in both semis and finals. But still, I want a shout out to all route setters to try to set more diverse in the future in all rounds qnd especially also in qualifiers. I don't think the randomness that some qualification rounds had are good for the sport. There shouldn't be only crimpy boulders nor only volume boulders nor only slabby ones. Lately holds have fallen out of favor and huge volumes that look cool have taken over. But a mix of both of them would be the best in my opinion. The style of a lot of boulders has nothing to do with rock climbing anymore. That's a fact. Whether you think it's good or bad is a matter of opinion. In my opinion, some funky boulders are definitely fun but I think we should forget the," or we shouldn't forget the origins of the sport, I think is what he meant to say, "Peace." And like I said, I agreed with that. 

Angie Payne  18:43

Right.

Kris Hampton  18:43

Initially. You know, and I still do to a point. And you're of the ,you know, of the generation that was very good at holds. If you're if you go into a comp and you see crimps up a steep wall, you're stoked. 

Angie Payne  19:05

Yeah. It would be like heaven.

Kris Hampton  19:07

What was your thought, hearing or reading his post?

Angie Payne  19:13

Um...that's a good question. So it's, it's hard for me to look at that question without bias because my boyfriend was one of the route setters. 

Kris Hampton  19:24

Yeah, yeah, sure. 

Angie Payne  19:25

And I have spent a lot of time seeing the perspective of the routesetters because of that. I've never been a route setter, but I know how much thought they put into it. And I think competitors in general, these World Cup competitors know that]. They know a lot of time and thought goes into it.

Kris Hampton  19:42

 Right.

Angie Payne  19:44

 It's easy. I mean, I've I've thought the same thing that he wrote a lot of times, you know, when I don't do well. It's it's typically when I don't do well that I look at that. I'm very critical of what types of problems were there. Oh, there's all, you know, it feels like the fourth women's problem in finals at Nationals is always pinches up a steep wall. 

Kris Hampton  20:07

Right. 

Angie Payne  20:08

But the only time that I've ever really said that is when I haven't done as well as I wanted to. So I know that, you know, I'm I can relate to what he's saying, this frustration of not doing as well as you wanted to do and looking at the outside things like that. Like what, what kept me from doing well was those slabs. Well wait, there were more slabs in my group than there were the other group. Why were there three slabs? You know or whatever it is that you look at.

Kris Hampton  20:35

Right.

Angie Payne  20:36

 It's, you know, you kind of want to try to explain away your failure. You want to look at Okay, why did I fail? Which is good to look at, like, sure, why did I fail? What can I do better for next time?

Kris Hampton  20:47

 Yep. 

Angie Payne  20:49

I think you got to be careful though, because you want to make sure that you keep the focus on the potential for improvement and not just placing blame and making excuses, which is really easy to do. And I've done it 100 times, you know, like, Oh, well, that problem was reachy. That's not fair. That's why I didn't do it. Because it was reachy and that taller person did it. It's like, maybe that's not true. There were probably you know, typically, there's also like some other people who are shorter than me who did it.

Kris Hampton  21:19

 Right exactly.

Angie Payne  21:20

 Alex Puccio is not taller than me. And there are a lot of problems that I've probably said were reachy that Alex has done. So that's sort of eliminates that as an excuse. 

Kris Hampton  21:32

Yep. 

Angie Payne  21:32

And I think that there's there's always, there's always that, you know, there's always somebody you know, that maybe isn't as good at slabs or that also got through, that through that route. You know, maybe they don't love slabs either. They got through and everybody in that group had to deal with it.

Kris Hampton  21:51

 Exactly.

Angie Payne  21:52

 But it's easy to forget that.

Kris Hampton  21:54

 Yeah, you're all having the same competition. 

Angie Payne  21:56

Exactly. 

Kris Hampton  21:57

You know, right at the beginning of what he says, "I'm always trying to analyze my mistakes ad unsurprisingly, it were the slabby technical boulders again, that were the problem." 

Angie Payne  22:07

All right.

Kris Hampton  22:08

 I think right there is where he started to go wrong. The slabby boulders weren't the problem. His preparation for the slabby boulders was the problem.

Angie Payne  22:16

Was the problem, right. The fact that maybe he's not as good at the slabby boulders, and he just, you know, it just so happens that his round had those. That the problem is that he's not good at those.

Kris Hampton  22:25

Right. And if that's the direction things are going and you want to be a competitor, you better go that direction. 

Angie Payne  22:31

Exactly. 

Kris Hampton  22:31

You know or you're gonna have this sort of post over and over after every comp. 

Angie Payne  22:36

Yeah. And I felt that. I mean, like I said, the thing that sticks with me the most and you know, that I think about in this instance, is that the times when I've been the most frustrated and said things like this. There, it's like always like the steep pinchy boulders, because I suck at pinches. I suck at steep pinches, steep thuggy climbing. And a lot of times, that's been what has kept me from performing as well as I wanted to at a competition, because there are these steep

Kris Hampton  23:06

And I know you've spent time working on it. 

Angie Payne  23:07

I have, yeah, I have spent time working on it

Kris Hampton  23:10

And that can lead right into it. Like I spent all this time working on it. And I still didn't do as well as I wanted.

Angie Payne  23:14

Right right.

Kris Hampton  23:15

I'm not the problem.

Angie Payne  23:17

 Right, right. Yeah. It's because, you know, it's because they just always do that, blah blah blah. It's so easy to say that when you don't do well. It's, it's funny, because I look back at all the times I did do well and it's pretty rare for me to analyze the boulders when I do well, which is kind of messed up, you know. I should be looking at them in those circumstances, too. And if I'm going to be critical of of things when I don't do well, I should be critical of them when I do well. But 

Kris Hampton  23:48

That's a good point,

Angie Payne  23:49

But it's easier, you know, I should look at the whole competition, regardless of how I did and think okay, you know, rationally how, how was this competition? How is the organization? How were the boulders? How is the diversity of setting? How is this and that and that?

Kris Hampton  24:06

And even though I did well, could I have done better?

Angie Payne  24:09

Right right.

Kris Hampton  24:09

Is there something I could improve, you know, based on what I saw on this comp?

Angie Payne  24:13

Yeah. But it's super easy to just forget about all that stuff.

Kris Hampton  24:18

Yeah, I loved it. The setters did great.

Angie Payne  24:20

And I know the setters deal with that a lot. 

Kris Hampton  24:24

I'm sure.

Angie Payne  24:24

They, they hear...it's like one of those...that's why I think it's one of the hardest jobs because if you do your job perfectly, you don't hear much.

Kris Hampton  24:33

 Right. 

Angie Payne  24:34

You know, it's very rare that people say, "Oh, my gosh, that setting was amazing. Did you see that? That setting was so cool. Oh, wow."  Like you don't hear that that often. What you hear more often is, "There were four slabs. That was so boring. Oh my gosh, there was that thing looked like this and that looked..... like why did they do that? Why did they set that?". You know, it's like they get criticized a lot more than they get complimented.

Kris Hampton  24:34

Yeah, and the people who don't do well love to blame outside factors because blaming yourself is hard, you know. Really stepping back and saying, "This is my fault", you know, that's a tough thing. I dealt with that this morning in a strange way. I walked out and I had a parking ticket. And I was immediately like, well, there was a big Sprinter van parked right in front sign and, and then I'm like, you know, what I should have just looked. That was really stupid of me. You know,

Angie Payne  25:25

Yeah it's hard to take the

Kris Hampton  25:26

So I'm gonna pay the ticket and, yeah, just take it.

Angie Payne  25:29

Yeah, I mean, it is really hard, especially in a really stressful situation like in, like a competition. It's like, you're already dealing with a lot of stress. You know, your emotions are always heightened, and everything's, everything feels way more stressful, and it feels like, but I put all this time into it. It can't be my fault. You know, like, I prepared. I did everything that I could to prepare. There must be some reason that I didn't do well. It's like, sometimes it's just because you got in your head about it. Maybe you didn't train as well as you thought. Maybe you didn't train the right things. Maybe what...I mean there's 100 things that you can do wrong yourself and it's typically like, that's what went wrong. Yeah. Because like you said, everybody's having the same comp, like everybody's trying the same boulder problems.

Kris Hampton  26:17

Yeah. People got through those problems just fine.

Angie Payne  26:20

Right. Yeah, yeah, exactly. 

Kris Hampton  26:22

And they did well on the powerful problems that came later. 

Angie Payne  26:25

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  26:25

You know, so maybe their preparation just better and you know, that needs to be taken into account. And I was really impressed when I read Puccio's post. And again, it came a day after Jakob, so maybe his had something to do with hers. Maybe it changed her thinking, I don't know. You know, I'm totally guessing here. But her post was, "Another year and other Vail World Cup. This time I walked away healthy. Besides staying healthy, I have to admit, I got pretty scared at this comp and maybe the most scared I've been in a competition ever. It was a strange feeling, especially in finals eyeing up the dynos and feeling a wave of nerves and fear pour over me, and not from the pressure this time. I'm very happy that I eventually made myself stick the dynos and complete the boulders but it took a lot of mental power and determination. It was also a cool feeling to a flash the first boulder and I was the only one to send it. In the end, I ended up in fourth place by attempts. Us top four athletes all had three tops, and it came down to falls. I'm really happy to be climbing outside a lot now. But we'll probably go into the gym once in a while to work on my dynoing before the Munich World Cup in August. Thanks for putting me out of my comfort zone World Cups." And if one thing that's really interesting, is when I read her post, at first, my immediate reaction was that maybe it's not genuine. And, and that's on me, not on her at all. That's on me. I think we take the complaints as genuine. And when people are, are saying, I screwed up. I want to get better at this. We take that as you're just trying to look good for people.

Angie Payne  28:12

 Right. Right. 

Kris Hampton  28:13

You know, and and that's definitely me being trapped into that that feeling somehow by society or by media or whatever. But I do think it was interesting that she comes right out and says, "I was pretty scared. Maybe the most scared I've been in a competition ever." I think that's I think that's really hard to do when when you're Alex Puccio. Yeah, you know, when people are like, you know, you're you're so badass and then you come out and say, I got really scared. 

Angie Payne  28:48

Right. Yeah, I thought this is really, yeah, it was a really cool post for me to read from Alex, because I just know that there's a lot of things she could have written about this competition, I'm sure.

Kris Hampton  29:04

Right.

Angie Payne  29:06

 I would guess that she wanted to be on the podium, you know. I would guess that getting fourth is hard, because you're just off the podium. She's had a really rough few years at Vail, blowing out her knee in iso a couple years ago, and then having this neck injury last year and having to get surgery. Like Vail's kind of been a rough place for her and there's probably a lot of emotional baggage that comes along with that walking into that comp. There's a lot of expectations that she puts on herself, I'm sure because she's won this comp before. And of all the things that she could have written, I thought it was cool that she wrote this, because I'm sure she was really scared. And you know, I think in this case, it's like, pretty genuine that I'm sure when she looked at that dyno on women's four, she was like, Oh my god, my knee, my neck, whatever she was thinking, you know, just like I don't want to do this jump and you have time to sit there. It was like this interesting problem where they're sitting on this volume, kind of like looking up at the finish that's not that far away. But it's kind of a weird jump. And to really have the time to think about that, and know, like, Oh my gosh, am I gonna end up in third or fourth or whatever, you know, like, who knows what was going through her head. So I thought it was cool that she that she wrote that. Yeah, there's just a lot of things she could have said and it's cool that she just said, I was scared because at times, that's just the hardest thing to say.

Kris Hampton  30:31

Yeah. And she says, "It wasn't from the pressure this time", which I thought was, was pretty interesting. I talked to Alex beforehand, you know, before the, I think it was after qualifiers....I can't remember....no, it was before women's qualifiers and, and she said that Vail was one of her favorite comps because it's close to home and she gets to see her mom.

Alex Puccio  30:54

 I mean, it's still like a little vacation with some stress, because you're competing, and it's not as much money and here, I get to see my mom and stuff, so this is one of my favorite events of the year. So.

Kris Hampton  31:03

So she wasn't feeling pressure, it didn't seem and I thought she was being very genuine when we talked through the World Cup. But then that fear came in.

Angie Payne  31:15

Yeah. Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  31:17

And I, you know, watching.... she came out, did she come out first in finals?

Angie Payne  31:21

Yeah, yeah. I think she did come out first. 

Kris Hampton  31:24

And....I think so, because when I was watching her, and she was trying that dyno, I was initially like, that must be really hard.

Angie Payne  31:32

 Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  31:32

You know, because she wasn't even close the first few times. 

Angie Payne  31:36

Yeah. Yeah

Kris Hampton  31:37

 And then when the other girls came out and did it quickly, I was like, Oh, you know. 

Angie Payne  31:43

Yeah. She was just scared. 

Kris Hampton  31:45

There was some trepidation there, you know, she wasn't really going for it. So she built herself up to going for it right in front of everybody, which I think is a really hard thing to do. 

Angie Payne  31:56

Yeah,it's like, one of the hardest things to do.

Kris Hampton  31:58

Yeah, it's, I think it's easier to just stand there and say, I can't do that. I'm not gonna get up in front of everyone and fail. But I think a good competitor is going to get up there and fail. And I thought she did a great job you know, giving it giving it what she had and working your way through it in that short little window.

Angie Payne  32:17

Yeah, I think it was, it was cool because you could see in the first attempt or two that she really didn't try very hard. I mean, Alex is not bad at jumping. She's, she's pretty damn good at it. 

Kris Hampton  32:28

Right. That's exactly what I was thinking.

Angie Payne  32:29

And she said that when we talked that

Angie Payne  32:29

Whenever whenever you see that...I don't know....and when you watch people compete a lot, a lot of times you can tell when they're trying and when they're not. Or, you know, when they're, I don't know, she just didn't look like she was comfortable up there. That's for sure. And it makes sense. You know, I was watching thinking, gosh, I wonder what she's thinking about. Like all these, all this stuff she's dealt with in the past that this comp, and here she is, and she's sitting on the wall, and she has time to think about it. Yeah, that's a really hard place to be as a competitor.

Alex Puccio  32:49

But I think now after my injuries and stuff, I'm trying to get in a better mental place as I was, I guess, in the beginning of my competitions, where yeah, I'm showing up when but then so is everyone else. So go out there and try to have as much fun as you can.

Angie Payne  33:11

I think that's pretty cool. "I'm strong enough to win, but so is everyone else" and at the World Cups, that is like, absolutely true. 

Kris Hampton  33:20

Yeah. 

Angie Payne  33:21

If you counted the number of people that come to Vail that have made a final, I mean, I don't know what the number is, but it's huge, you know. The number of people who are capable of making the finals is, is just gigantic at these comps. And, and a ton of them have won as well. So you know, it's pretty intimidating going into these things, thinking there's 20 people who could win this comp.

Kris Hampton  33:49

Yeah. And a lot of people show up there totally surprised, that they're, that they've made it to finals, you know, or out of qualifiers even.

Angie Payne  33:58

 Yep. 

Kris Hampton  33:58

And, you know, one of those that I talked to, she was so excited. And when I asked her initially, if if we could talk, she's like, I'm not good with the English, you know? And I'm like, well, let's give it a shot. And that was Katja Kadic, I believe is how you say her name.

Katja Kadic  34:14

Um, I just told myself, I had nothing to lose. Because yes, yesterday, it was a tough round for me. Um, I don't know, after the each boulder, I breathed really hard and couldn't rest this five minutes. So yeah, today was, I don't know, the boulders were great and I did my best and hope it will be enough. 

Kris Hampton  34:39

You know, she was so surprised at making it out of qualifiers that she was giddy. You know, she was so excited and you know, visibly like shaking, she was so excited. And, and I watched her go out there and look like she was having the time of her life. You know, she looked like she was having so much fun and Alex Khazanov, who climbed really well and looked like he was having just the most fun of anybody, you know, he echoed the same sentiment. 

Alex Khazanov  35:10

So I'm just trying to have fun. I mean, I just like lucky to be in the semi final and climb in this amazing crowd. And for me, it's most important to have fun. So even if it's a hard climb, I just keep being positive and just try the hardest and just with a smile, and it's always works the best. When I topped number three, I just I was shocked. I just kept going with the flow. And this is the best way it works for me. 

Kris Hampton  35:32

That's the way to do it. Because you should be a little bit surprised when you make it to finals, because almost anyone there could.

Angie Payne  35:42

 Could make it to finals, yeah,it's true. I mean, those, it's, it's so fun as a competitor. Well, as somebody who's been a competitor who's not competing in the event, it's so fun to watch those people climb, the people that you can just tell they're so thrilled that they've made it to the next round and they're trying as hard as they can. And I think why I like that so much is because it's like, it's what I felt at one point about every competition that I entered.

Kris Hampton  36:10

Right right.

Angie Payne  36:11

 And it's really, really hard to find that feeling again. So when you see it in somebody else, you're like, Oh my gosh, they're having the time of their life. There was a kid in Nationals this year. What was his name? Alex Goldwater? You know who I'm talking about....the kid who was having

Angie Payne  36:28

That might be the wrong last name. Anyway,

Kris Hampton  36:28

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah he's my spirit animal. 

Kris Hampton  36:32

I remember the kid you're talking about. He was SO stoked.

Angie Payne  36:34

He was having a blast in finals. And he was so fun to watch, because you can just tell, he didn't have expectations. He wasn't like putting a ton of pressure on himself. But he was climbing his hardest. You could tell he was trying his hardest and that was really cool. And you just don't see that as often in these competitions, especially the World Cups,  because all of these people put a lot of pressure on themselves and have expectations. And so it's pretty rare, I would say in these World Cups to to see somebody who just looks like they're having a blast. 

Kris Hampton  37:08

Totally, 

Angie Payne  37:08

Which is kind of sad but, you know, it's also the reality that the more you do it, the more expectations you have.

Kris Hampton  37:19

Was it Alex Waterhouse?

Angie Payne  37:20

Waterhouse, yeah that's his name. Not Goldwater. Waterhouse. Yeah. It was Waterhouse. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, that that kind of joy, you don't see it as often in the, in the World Cups or the higher level competitions. But it kind of reminds me of how fun it can be when we don't have crazy expectations.

Kris Hampton  37:42

 Yep, totally,

Angie Payne  37:43

But it is really hard to just force yourself into that feeling. You know, it's hard to find that feeling and tap into it.

Kris Hampton  37:48

Do you think having someone you know, a teammate or friend or whatever, back in iso with you to laugh with, joke witt, do you think that's something that's helpful to have?

Angie Payne  38:04

Yeah, I think that can be

Kris Hampton  38:05

 To get in that fun place

Angie Payne  38:06

Yeah. To get in the fun place. Yeah, I think that is, that is helpful. I mean, I've definitely had comps, where like me and Alex Johnson have been in iso and just laughing and having a great time and kind of remembering that it's not the end of the world, whatever happens, it's really not the end of the world. Like we're just having a good time. That's definitely refreshing to have. And, you know, a couple years ago, there was, there was Nationals, um a Nationals where it felt like that in iso, we were just kind of goofing off. Maybe not taking it as seriously as some people think we should have. But that's what we needed because we've done it so many times and put so much pressure on ourselves. And it's just...

Kris Hampton  38:27

And how did that comp end up? 

Angie Payne  38:51

Well, one of those comps, we were both on the podium and it was like the happiest probably I've ever been on a podium before in my entire life. I mean, I was thrilled. I was, that was a couple of the last Nationals that I did and it was that feeling again of just this pure surprise, like, Oh, I didn't know I was gonna end up here. Well, this is nice, you know, like, sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn't. But when it does, like, it's nice. It's always nice.

Kris Hampton  39:19

And I think you can see, you know, this this friendship or partnership or, you know, you can see it in some of your photos. You know I'm looking right now at the the one of I believe it's Akiyo and and I don't know, 

Angie Payne  39:35

Her teammate?

Kris Hampton  39:36

Yeah, I don't know his name.

Angie Payne  39:37

I don't either, but they were both like waiting to go out in finals. 

Kris Hampton  39:39

Yeah,

Angie Payne  39:40

And laughing

Kris Hampton  39:41

And they're just laughing and talking to each other and, and look like they're genuinely just having a good time.

Angie Payne  39:46

 Yeah, they do. That's I like that photo because it's like one of the few moments where it doesn't look like they're having,, like putting a ton of pressure on themselves.

Kris Hampton  39:56

And that's that's I think that's an interesting contrast with the Japanese is they they're obviously very focused. They can you know, him in particular, look very serious. 

Angie Payne  40:08

Yeah

Kris Hampton  40:08

Very intimidating. A lot of the comp, you know, every time I tried to approach the Japanese team, it was like, they would just get surrounded by team officials you know, and they rolled in this big group so there was no, no talking to them. You know, it just wasn't gonna happen. And but in this moment, right before they're about to come out, I mean, they're chalking up.

Kris Hampton  40:30

Yeah, they're waiting to come out.

Kris Hampton  40:31

They are just about to compete and they look like they're having so much fun. 

Angie Payne  40:35

They do. Yeah. And that's nice. I mean, they're, you know, I noticed in in here, when you talk to people, a lot of people did say, you just have to remember to have a good time.

Kris Hampton  40:46

To have fun

Angie Payne  40:47

 You know, you have to tell yourself to have fun. And I think one of the things that I highlighted that I liked a lot is from Brooke Raboutou and she just said,

Brooke Raboutou  40:56

I try to keep it low key. Like you said, have fun. It's my biggest goal. Like, think of the big picture. I mean, we're all just having fun at a climbing competition.

Angie Payne  41:04

 Coming from somebody so young, it's pretty cool to hear her saying that. Because that's something I always say to myself, and that's advice that I would give to the younger competitors is you really do have to think of the big picture. Like this is a competition. We're climbing up a wall on plastic grips. It's kind of weird and crazy. And like, it's really not a big deal. 

Kris Hampton  41:30

Yeah.

Angie Payne  41:31

 But it's also interesting, because in the moment, you have to convince yourself that it's a really big deal. So in order to care enough to make yourself try hard enough, you have to trick yourself into thinking that it's really important in that moment. That, you know, trying to get to the top of this boulder is the most important thing I have to do right now and then as soon as it's over, you have to remember, this is in the grand scheme of things this is not a big deal.

Kris Hampton  41:59

Yeah. And I saw several people able to turn on and off that intensity that that I thought was really impressive. You know, we saw it with Petra was able to go out there. 

Angie Payne  42:16

Yeah, she's good at that. 

Kris Hampton  42:18

And she can be very intense. 

Kris Hampton  42:19

You know she looks very intense. And, but she was able to, I don't know, you know, some of your photos of her, right before she's about to come out, she's got her eyes closed and you can tell that she's taking deep breaths and

Angie Payne  42:19

Yeah, for sure. 

Angie Payne  42:34

Breathing,  yeah. 

Kris Hampton  42:36

You know, maybe that's when that switch happens. Maybe she can, she's composing herself, preparing. She goes out there and then she's very good at the minute she hits the mat, she can go back to this is really fun.

Angie Payne  42:54

Yeah. And she smiles.

Kris Hampton  42:55

Let's get the crowd involved. 

Angie Payne  42:56

Waves.

Kris Hampton  42:57

 And then she composes herself again, and gets right back on the wall. And I think that's really impressive.

Angie Payne  43:01

It is, it's really impressive. I mean, that's like, two completely different mindsets. And to switch between them quickly is really hard I think. I mean, because I take things too seriously, I would say, some of the time. And, and sometimes that feeling lingers, you know. It's hard to just to just switch it off. I've gotten better at that. I think as I've gotten older, it is one of the things that of I can let it go a lot faster now than I then I could when I was a kid. It is, yeah, I think you do get better at that part with age, and you also just have other things going on in life, you know. It's like, this is only one part of life. This is not my whole life anymore. Maybe it was the most important thing when you're a kid, but as you get older, there's other stuff happening. And but it I mean, it's cool that some of these competitors are already in that mindset, or at least telling themselves like I need to remember the big picture. You know, even though they maybe their big picture is different than than my big picture. It changes as you grow. But it's good to at least have it on the radar. Like this is just a climbing competition. 

Kris Hampton  44:11

Right. 

Angie Payne  44:11

And I mean, so many of these youth kids said, like, there's tremendous pressure on them in the youth competition.

Kris Hampton  44:18

Yeah, I was blown away by that. Every time I every time I talked to a youth competitor, I made a point of asking them where do you feel more pressure? You know, in the youth camps or here on a bigger stage at a bigger event? 

Kris Hampton  44:31

Yeah, at a World Cup. 

Kris Hampton  44:32

Yeah, yeah. In front of a huge crowd of people. And all of them, without hesitation, you know, it was Lily Canavan. 

Lily Canavan  44:40

Um, I think I definitely put more pressure on myself in the youth events because, um, here no one's expecting me to do well. Like I've never done well at one of these before and like not as many people know me. At the youth events like I've been doing those for like eight and a half years now. So like, a lot of people know me and I've done well in the past, so I feel like people are expecting more.

Kris Hampton  45:00

Megan Mascarenas, yeah

Megan Mascarenas  45:02

Probably in youth because climbing was like my 100% focus and there was events like year round, so it was like constant pressure. But now doing just the adult bouldering season is easier. 

Kris Hampton  45:13

Brooke even laughed at me and said,

Brooke Raboutou  45:16

The youth comps for sure. Just because this is just, I don't know, no expectations.

Kris Hampton  45:21

Yeah, just having fun here?

Brooke Raboutou  45:22

Yeah, I mean same with the youth, but like, definitely more expectations.

Kris Hampton  45:26

Like you're stupid for even asking this question.

Angie Payne  45:29

Yeah like of course the youth comps are more stressful. Which is crazy to me! So crazy! I mean, that's definitely changed. The youth comps I think have changed tremendously since I was a youth competitor. And I mean, it part of it does make me, I don't know if sad is the right word, but it is hard to see the youth competitors putting that much pressure on themselves in the youth events. Just because of what we're talking about, you know, like, you have to think the big picture. And when I was a youth competitor, I never thought this would be true, but you forget most of your results. You forget most of those competitions. 

Kris Hampton  46:06

Right, right. Yeah

Angie Payne  46:07

I look back and there's very few youth competitions that I remember. There's very few adult competitions that I remember, just from 10 years, you know, the last 10 years. 

Kris Hampton  46:15

It's like your juvenile criminal record, it just gets wiped away.

Angie Payne  46:18

Haha wiped away, yeah. I mean, it's hard to think that when you're when you're, you know, 13, like, someday I'm not even gonna remember this. 

Kris Hampton  46:27

Right.

Angie Payne  46:28

And like and nobody else is either and it's just, it's just one event in your life, you know. It's one moment in your life.

Kris Hampton  46:35

It's interesting that you're, you know, as a, as a youth competitor, that that really is your identity a lot of the time, you know. It's what you're, it's what you're doing four or five days a week with a team, practicing. And then you go to these events, and it's a large for most of these kids, I imagine, it's it's the main time that they travel, main time that 

Angie Payne  46:59

For sure. 

Kris Hampton  46:59

That they go anywhere.

Angie Payne  47:00

 Yeah, a lot of these kids like their teammates, I mean, that's their social life. I mean, it was kind of when I was a kid, it was partially that way, too. 

Kris Hampton  47:07

Right and it's got to be more intense now. 

Angie Payne  47:09

More so now. Yeah, definitely.

Kris Hampton  47:11

So I imagine it's really easy to wrap up their identity in those youth comps.

Angie Payne  47:17

For sure. 

Kris Hampton  47:18

And if they do well consistently, people expect them to do well, again. 

Angie Payne  47:23

Yep. 

Kris Hampton  47:23

You know, and

Angie Payne  47:23

Yeah and I mean, that's just another example of what I think every competitor youth or adult deals with is like, the more you do it, the more expectations you have and the more, the more pressure you put on yourself. And that that happens with the youth competitors, because they start so young now. They, they might be in the youth circuit for, you know, from the time that they're 8 until the time that they're 19. You know, some of them, some of them go all the way through from, you know, maybe maybe 10 to 19. That's like a big chunk of their life is being in youth competitions. So you can see, you know, it makes sense

Kris Hampton  47:59

And a very formative part of their lives.

Angie Payne  48:00

 Yeah, exactly. It makes sense that they put a lot of pressure on themselves. It's just also like, it's hard to see, looking back as, you know, being in a different place, it's hard to, to see the kids like crying at the competitions and being so hard on themselves. You just want to go up and tell them like, this is not a big deal. Don't cry. Like this is not worth it. But I've been there. 

Kris Hampton  48:23

Sure, 

Angie Payne  48:23

I've cried at plenty of youth competitions. Plenty of adult competitions, even, I've cried. It's like, it's hard because you do convince yourself that it's really important. And it's hard to remember that, you know, even a couple months down the road, you're gonna forget about it.

Kris Hampton  48:41

All right, now is the perfect time for you to go to Powercompanyclimbing.com and check out the photos that Angie and I've been discussing, or if you are on your pocket supercomputer, you can go into your podcast app. The description for this podcast has a direct link right to those photos. Please go check those out. I'll wait. Okay, like I mentioned, this is Part One of a three part series and Parts Two and Three were released at the same time, so they should already be loaded into your podcast apps. So if you've got another 30 minutes, go listen to Part Two. If you've got a little over an hour, listen to Parts Two and Three. Why not? The next episode, we'll get a little more into how the youth competitors deal with it and how their coaches are helping with that and the role those coaches play. We'll also talk to Alex Puccio and Janja Garnbret about traveling.  We'll get big picture perspective from Megan Martin on on real life pressure and we'll talk to Shauna Coxsey, who just won the overall title for the second year in a row and discuss the idea that success breeds success and does Shauna ever even really think about her failures? I don't know. We'll see. Share us on your social medias. You can find us on the Facebooks, the Instagrams, the Pinterest. You cannot however find us on the Twitters because we don't tweet. We scream like eagles.

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT (EP. 47):

Kris Hampton  00:05

Hey everybody, Kris here. Just a quick note, this is Part Two of a three part series. So if you have not heard Part Two, which is Episode 46, then please go back and listen. And if you have, don't forget that we have all of these photos that Angie and I are discussing up on the website Powercompanyclimbing.com. Or you can click on the direct link in the podcast description right there on your pocket supercomputers.

Angie Payne  00:32

A lot of internal dialogue, a lot of internal battles. I mean, I guess climbing is is that but yeah, competition just takes that whole experience and condenses it down into a really short period of time.

Kris Hampton  01:02

If they do well, consistently, people expect them to do well, again. 

Angie Payne  01:06

Yep, 

Kris Hampton  01:06

You know

Angie Payne  01:07

Yeah, and I mean, that's just another example of what I think every competitor, youth or adult, deals with is like, the more you do it, the more expectations you have, the more you the more pressure you put on yourself. And that that happens with these competitors, because they start so young now. They they might be in the youth circuit for, you know, from the time that they're 8 until the time that they're 19. You know, some of them, some of them go all the way through from, you know, maybe maybe 10 to 19. That's like a big chunk of their life is being in youth competitions. So you can see, 

Kris Hampton  01:41

Totally.

Angie Payne  01:42

You know, it makes sense

Kris Hampton  01:42

 And a very formative part of their lives. 

Angie Payne  01:44

Yeah, exactly. It makes sense that they put a lot of pressure on themselves. It's just also like, it's hard to see, looking back as, you know, being in a different place. It's hard to, to see the kids like crying at the competitions and being so hard on themselves. You just want to go up and tell them like, this is not a big deal. Don't cry. Like this is not worth it. But I've been there. 

Kris Hampton  02:06

Sure

Angie Payne  02:07

I've cried at plenty of youth competitions. Plenty of adult competitions even, I've cried, It's like, it's hard, because you do convince yourself that it's really important. And it's hard to remember that you know, even a couple months down the road, you're gonna forget about it.

Kris Hampton  02:22

Yep. Yeah, you know, it's funny, I went to Divisionals yesterday and part of the part of the reason I went was to go watch a girl that I'm going to be working with, and the other was to watch Brooke, because because I talked to Brooke at the World Cup, because I climbed with her outside and I've seen her seemingly have no pressure.

Angie Payne  02:47

Right.

Kris Hampton  02:48

 When she's climbing outside, she's doing little dances and acting silly, and it's so much fun to watch. And she's genuinely in love with what she's doing. And then at the World Cup, there didn't seem to be any pressure either.

Angie Payne  02:59

 Right.

Kris Hampton  03:00

 You know, she was able to be that same silly Brooke. And then I went and watched her Divisionals and maybe it's because I was looking for it, you know, maybe it's because that's what I wanted to see, but it looked like stress. When she came out for the finals problem, she didn't look like she was the same carefree kid. You know, she definitely looked a little stressed. And then after it was over, after her speed round, she was doing little dances. 

Angie Payne  03:33

Yeah, she's like back to her, yeah, like carefree self.

Angie Payne  03:34

Yeah, for sure. 

Kris Hampton  03:34

Yeah it was right back to Brooke and hanging out with the other ABC kids. And you know, and that made me think of, she's got this amazing coach who's also her mom, you know, and, and she's able to, to deal in that world of pressure. You know, and I think that's one thing that's really important are the youth coaches. 

Kris Hampton  03:57

When I talked to Lilly Canavan, she said something that I was a little blown away by. And in fact, I thought she was one of the most, one of the best people I talked to, as far as giving me something actionable, that could be carried away and, you know, apply to other people.

Lily Canavan  04:14

 Um, I just like really tried to shift my focus towards the next problem. My youth climbing team at home that I was on until last year, they hired like, like a mental coach that helped us like with a lot of strategies to like, put the past in the past and like, only think about what you need to do at the moment. Um, definitely, like having a routine before every boulder or even like, the night before it just like getting in the right mindset, like doing the same thing helps a lot.

Kris Hampton  04:42

 And I think that's huge for 18,19 year old kid to go into an adult comp with that kind of a tool.

Angie Payne  04:51

Yeah, yeah. I mean, gosh, it's just, yeah, when you say, when you say it that way? It's like they are, they are kids still in these, you know youth events. They are kids.

Kris Hampton  05:01

Right.

Angie Payne  05:01

 And they have a tremendous amount of pressure. I mean, it's easy to perceive that there's a lot of pressure from the outside when you're a kid too.

Kris Hampton  05:10

Right

Angie Payne  05:10

You know, like I said, I think most of it's from yourself, but you haven't really realized the extent of that yet. When you're a kid, you think that everybody's expecting so much of you. It's like, that's so much pressure to put on a kid to put on. So yeah, it's good that they have tools, some of them and there's more of that happening now with the coaches, and you know, like, just people it is, there's plenty of that happening as well. I mean, it's not all like, they're just suffering through it all the time. Like, there's plenty of camaraderie. There's so many good things that come out of the youth camps and more so now with like, coaching and teams, and just like the, the friendships that they have, it's amazing. It's there's so many good things. It's just hard to look at, you know, as, as an adult, it's just, it's hard to see kids cry at a climbing competition and, and feel like they're just beating themselves up, you know.

Angie Payne  05:10

Yeah. 

Angie Payne  05:13

But it's, it's great that there are coaches that do give them tools and perspective. I think perspective is really what the kids need the most in those situations.

Kris Hampton  06:16

For sure. 

Angie Payne  06:16

They just haven't they, you can't blame them, they don't have perspective. They are kids 

Angie Payne  06:21

Exactly.

Angie Payne  06:21

Like this is their whole world.

Angie Payne  06:22

No matter how mature they are, they are, you know, it's still a very narrow perspective, for most of them. And I talked to Sean Bailey, who was the top American male, and he was one of the others that I thought was really impressive. When I was talking to him because... 

Angie Payne  06:38

Yes, what he said was cool. 

Sean Bailey  06:40

This one not so much. I'm mainly focused on sport climbing, especially this season, and last season. So this one, it just kind of lined up with my training cycles and lined up before Europe, so I just kind of wanted to see where I was at. And there's no pressure because I haven't trained boulders for, you know, four months, five months. So yeah, I mean, I'm just kind of here to like, see how it goes.

Kris Hampton  07:01

And then I got to talk to Tyson Schoene, Sean's coach, and unfortunately, the audio with Tyson got really screwed up for some reason. But when I talked to Tyson, I asked him the same questions about Sean, you know, except for "Were you nervous for Sean, or were you stressed out watching Sean compete?". And surprisingly, Tyson said, "Not at all", you know, and then he echoed the exact same thing that Sean said, That we weren't really worried about this comp. We've been focused on sport. That's where we're putting our energy. This was just kind of a let's see what happens. Let's see what it's all about, you know. And so I could tell that there was that connection there that Tyson and Sean had obviously talked about this. It's something that came up and, you know, I think that's important that that there are coaches out there like Tyson, and like Lily Canavan's coach and like, Robyn, talking to Brooke, about keeping the pressure off going into these big events.

Angie Payne  08:00

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's such a great example of, not that Sean wouldn't have done really well, even if he was, you know, focusing on this competition, like, I'm sure he still would have climbed incredibly well. But it does go to show like, a lot of times, you do really, really well, when there isn't pressure like that you know.

Kris Hampton  08:20

And when you're having fun, you know,

Angie Payne  08:22

 You're just 

Kris Hampton  08:22

The expectations aren't burying you.

Angie Payne  08:25

You know, as Oh, this is something that's happening along the way to this other goal. And sometimes that's when you do your best is when you're able to take that pressure off in one way or another. It sounds like for Sean, there just wasn't pressure.

Kris Hampton  08:40

 Yeah. 

Angie Payne  08:41

And so, and he climbed incredibly well and maybe that had something to do with it, you know?

Kris Hampton  08:45

Yeah. And it's not that he didn't care about his climbing, you know, I don't think that's

Angie Payne  08:48

Right, no, there's there's photos. Like you can tell he cares. Like when he fell, he was like, he wasn't psyched.

Kris Hampton  08:53

Yeah, I'm looking at that photo right now of Sean coming off the wall and you can see, I mean, he just came off the wall split second earlier and, and you can see that he's upset that he's falling. 

Kris Hampton  09:06

You know, but he didn't, you know, didn't carry that through. You know, even the position of his hands as he's coming off the wall, he's like, "What did I just do? I can't believe that I just screwed up." 

Angie Payne  09:06

Yep. 

Angie Payne  09:18

I know. I know.

Kris Hampton  09:19

So.

Angie Payne  09:20

Yeah. And I mean, 

Kris Hampton  09:21

These kids care a lot

Angie Payne  09:21

Oh yeah, for sure. And I think that's, that is important. It's not like, you know, I would never say that you shouldn't care about this stuff. I mean, look at my life. My life has been this. I've cared a lot about this stuff. And I think that's important. It's just, you know, and you have to be, you have to have that passion and that caring about what you're doing. Like you're climbing up a wall on plastic grips, but you do have to care a lot about it, to put that much energy into doing it all the time. And I think that's awesome. And I think it's even more awesome when you can care about it so much and still keep the perspective of all the other things that you care about, too. Yeah. And and you know, like just how you deal with it is more important than how you do you know. How you deal with the outcome I think is more important than the outcome itself. And that's something I'm still learning, you know. Even as an adult, it's hard to learn how to deal with the failure, or how to deal with the success even. Let's keep it all in perspective. Yeah, I'm doing well now but there's gonna be times when I don't, or I'm not doing well now and there's gonna be times when I do. 

Kris Hampton  09:23

Yep.

Angie Payne  09:23

It's just a rollercoaster. 

Kris Hampton  09:24

And I think that caring is a really important part of it. You know, I read a book not too long ago called Grit, The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth and that, she defines grit or mental toughness as passion and perseverance. She doesn't believe that you can be truly mentally tough if you don't truly care about what it is you're doing.

Angie Payne  10:56

 Right.

Kris Hampton  10:57

You know, you can go through the motions of something all day long, but to really be mentally tough and push yourself, you have to really care about it. And and I think those kids have that for sure.

Angie Payne  11:08

 Oh, yeah.

Kris Hampton  11:09

They're able to, you know, let the expectations roll off their back if they are in there. 

Angie Payne  11:16

Yeah, that's gonna take them far, I think, the ones that can do that. That's a huge, huge skill to learn. And I mean, obviously, it's, all of this applies outside of climbing as well. But just to like, let that stuff roll off your back and move forward with it is really important. 

Kris Hampton  11:35

Yeah. 

Angie Payne  11:35

And I mean, and that's another thing, climbing teaches these kids all these things in the context of a competition, which is cool.

Kris Hampton  11:42

 Oh, yeah, it is huge.

Angie Payne  11:43

 To like to put that pressure on a kid and then teach them how to deal with it, there are so many positive things about that. As long as you know, they learn the skills to deal with that. 

Kris Hampton  11:54

Yeah, for sure. 

Angie Payne  11:55

As long as it doesn't crush them, as a young child.

Kris Hampton  11:57

Yeah I think that's, you know, that's one of the coolest things about climbing and it it certainly happens in the comps as well, maybe in a, you know, more intense sort of way, that you get these great life lessons. You know, as a as an experienced competitor who's traveled to compete, where do you feel the most pressure? Because like you said that, you know, that event at, you know, Battle In The Bubble, I think it was, that when you when you did so well, that was on home soil.

Angie Payne  12:33

Right. 

Kris Hampton  12:33

You know, that was right here in front of your home crowd.

Angie Payne  12:36

Yeah.

Kris Hampton  12:37

Do you feel more pressure away from home or less pressure?

Angie Payne  12:40

That's, yeah, it's hard. Because when you travel, I mean, I think Puccio kind of addressed this, but when you travel, it's like there's a bigger investment. 

Alex Puccio  12:50

I think traveling, you have to use a lot of your own money and so it then becomes more stressful. I think it depends what country. I don't like flying, but I love seeing new places. So I think it's a, there's good and bad things.

Kris Hampton  13:03

Right.

Angie Payne  13:04

Um, financially and just timewise you just feel like, "Oh, my gosh, I came all this way I really want to do well." So there's that pressure. I think though, I think I just put more importance on the home competitions. Like, for me personally, they're more important just because I really enjoy the fact that, that it's a hometown crowd. You know, like, I love that. I really love when I feel like the crowd is, is in it with me, which they always are on some level. But it's it's cool when people know you and they're people that you climb with every day, then there's like a new level of support that you feel. So I think that there's a special kind of pressure that comes with the hometown....

Kris Hampton  13:50

Yeah, you do take all that 

Angie Payne  13:51

The home competitions

Kris Hampton  13:52

All those good parts of it and turn it into now I need to do well because now I've got all this support.

Angie Payne  13:57

Exactly. Yeah, I just feel like you don't want to let these people down. And I think that somebody else said that.

Kris Hampton  14:04

Janja

Angie Payne  14:04

 Janya.

Janja Garnbret  14:05

Well. I like to travel a lot. So yeah, it's super cool to be on different places and try different styles of boulders. Actually I feel more pressure on the on the home competition. So yeah, I like it more outside yeah.

Angie Payne  14:20

Yeah, it's it's interesting. Yeah, I guess that probably like on a sentimental level and an emotional level, I would put a little bit more pressure on myself at like a home competition. But logistically and financially there's definitely a lot, a different kind of pressure when you when you go pretty far away for a competition. You feel like you need to like make the most of it.

Kris Hampton  14:44

Are there particular competitions that you did often that you felt more at home at and then in turn, put more pressure on yourself?

Angie Payne  14:52

A little bit. Yeah, I mean, like there, there's some competitions. I used to do the Dark Horse competitions all the time and I felt like I kind of had, you know, I felt kind of at home at those after doing for a couple years. 

Kris Hampton  15:03

Right.

Angie Payne  15:03

Definitely put some pressure on myself, um, as the years went by with those competitions. Aside from that, I mean, I guess most of what I've done, I have traveled a fair amount for competing, but I've done a lot of competitions in Colorado, because Nationals are in Colorado. 

Kris Hampton  15:19

Sure

Angie Payne  15:20

For a lot of years too, so

Kris Hampton  15:21

 Yeah. And you haven't done the World Cup circuit at all?

Angie Payne  15:25

I've never done the whole circuit, no. I went over to Europe and did a couple comps one year. 

Kris Hampton  15:29

How did, how did that feel? 

Angie Payne  15:32

Oh, man, so different. It felt so different. I did feel that that weird pressure of Gosh, I just invested a lot in this,

Kris Hampton  15:38

There's a lot of money involved.

Angie Payne  15:40

Yeah

Kris Hampton  15:40

 And, you know, we saw that with Alex having to crowdfund her competing.

Angie Payne  15:45

Exactly. And then feeling like oh, my gosh, 

Kris Hampton  15:47

And then getting injured. 

Angie Payne  15:48

Right. 

Kris Hampton  15:49

And you know, so I imagine that pressure is tough, when there is that much money behind it.

Angie Payne  15:51

It's real for sure. Yeah, that's like a real real pressure. But I yeah, I also I don't know, I just felt like I was a complete like, complete nobody, unknown person when I was over there, too, which has a certain amount of freedom comes with that, when there aren't these attached, you know, perceived expectations from the crowd.

Kris Hampton  16:17

Right.

Angie Payne  16:17

 Which can, can be freeing for sure. You also lose that feeling of connection to the crowd too, that personal connection, you know, when you go somewhere where you feel like you're a nobody. It's like it has its pros and cons.

Kris Hampton  16:31

Yep. Yeah. There's the photo that you have of Alex, and this might be my favorite, I don't know. I really like the one of Alex sitting in the chair, very intense as well. 

Angie Payne  16:42

Yeah. Right. 

Kris Hampton  16:43

But I really like the one of her, you know, she's cut off. She's standing behind the wall, and you can only see half of her. And it almost looks like this, like she's made peace with something. 

Angie Payne  16:55

Yeah, I agree. 

Kris Hampton  16:56

It's the it's the feeling I get from it that that, you know, what she said to me when we talked was very genuine. You know, that's how it feels in that photo, that she's happy to be here. She's healthy. She's like, she's making peace with these things that have happened to her World Cup bids in the past.

Angie Payne  17:16

Yeah. Yeah, I think I felt that too. And like, just from that comment that she made, too. It's like, it was really cool to see. I agree. I think she did come to some kind of like different level of, of contentment or of acceptance and didn't seem....she just seemed more accepting of it all and and like, definitely more at peace. And that photo, I like that photo too. She does seem kind of like she's just released some amount of pressure or something, like, just like, brushed it off. Like, "Okay, here I am. Everything that's happened up to here, it's like behind me."

Kris Hampton  17:55

Yep. Can't change it. 

Angie Payne  17:56

Can't change it.

Kris Hampton  17:57

It what it is. 

Angie Payne  17:57

Just accept it. 

Kris Hampton  17:58

Yeah. Accept it and move on.

Angie Payne  17:59

 Yeah, I think she she did that this year, which was really cool to see.

Kris Hampton  18:02

Yeah, I think so. How about we take a quick break and regroup and get back at it? 

Angie Payne  18:08

Yep.

Kris Hampton  18:12

 Hey, everybody, Kris here, I'll try to keep this short and sweet. Since this thing became officially official, have basically been obsessed. I've got dozens of episodes waiting to go out and I'm constantly recording new conversations. I want to continue putting this level of energy into it and you all can help. We've created a page at patreon.com/powercompanypodcast where you can help support what we're building. In return, even for as little as $1 per month, you'll get access to the brand new We Scream Like Eagles Podcast, which includes tips from our guests, extra conversations about hot topics and q&a with your questions posed to our guests. If you think it's worth more than $1 a month, we've got other rewards available on top of the bonus episodes like stickers, ebooks, t shirts and training plans. So if you've been considering pitching in, now's the time. That's patreon.com/powercompanypodcast. Thanks a ton. And back to the show. 

Kris Hampton  19:12

Question for you. This is something I, you know, have thought a little about. The kids, like we mentioned, have sort of a narrow perspective of what pressure even means, you know. As an adult yourself, who's dealt with things that are far more stressful than a climbing comp, you know, even if it's a World Cup, you know, how how easy was it for you to start putting that into perspective? When you came back to competing after you had gotten injured and you took the break, you came back and you seemed like and I'm I'm envisioning that photo of you, at the top, so stoked and you know, you were able to find that happiness in it again. 

Angie Payne  20:04

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  20:05

How much of that had to do with perspective on what pressure really actually means?

Angie Payne  20:11

Uh, yeah, I mean, I think a lot of it had to do with that perspective. I mean, so much of it, first of all, just had to do with appreciating climbing, which I had never done before, as much as I did then.

Kris Hampton  20:24

 I remember having that conversation with you years ago, that you were finding the joy in it

Angie Payne  20:28

Yeah, I could just like climb again. And that was amazing, because I had been through this, you know, just annoying ankle injury and just to be able to move again was amazing. And then to be able to climb and compete and feel like I was climbing well again, like it was just all...I was so happy. And at that, I think that photo that you're talking about is from Battle In The Bubble, and I was just couldn't stop smiling because I was it was the first comp I'd done after I had the surgery on my ankle, and I was just so excited. 

Kris Hampton  20:32

You were Alex Waterhouse.

Angie Payne  20:36

I was! I really was. It's like, one of those few, you know, there's, that doesn't happen to me a ton, especially after so many years. It just doesn't happen that often where you can tap into that. And yeah, but when you when you can, it's amazing. And I think a lot of that was from just a new perspective. I had a completely new perspective on, on climbing, on my health, like the health of my body. And, yeah, I had a perspective, like, I'd been through something that was hard for me, you know, which was just dealing with an injury that a lot of climbers deal with, but it was the first time I really had to deal with that. So like I did have a new perspective on well, this competition, you know, it's a competition, but at least I'm climbing.

Kris Hampton  21:49

Right. 

Angie Payne  21:49

Like, at least once it's over, I'm gonna go and do more climbing. And, you know, I think that that is a big, it's a big part of that joy that I felt at that time.

Kris Hampton  22:00

Yeah. And Megan Martin said something similar when I asked her about, what's the difference between American Ninja Warrior and this World Cup, pressure wise.

Meagan Martin  22:09

I feel like normally I put pressure on myself, but I've had a lot of stressful things to deal with lately, so I'm actually more excited about this one.

Kris Hampton  22:16

So this is small potatoes?

Meagan Martin  22:17

 Well, it's not even that it is small potatoes. Like it's still a big thing. But I'm just excited to climb and have fun. So I'm not that stressed today. So I'm excited.

Kris Hampton  22:25

Oh that's good.

Kris Hampton  22:26

She mentioned to me that she'd had a stressful week, you know, and then I then I asked her about well, what's the difference between Ninja Warrior and this? And she's like,

Shauna Coxsey  22:35

Yeah, I feel like American Ninja Warrior is very stressful and since I just got done doing some of that, like, I feel like this is just gonna be more fun. I mean, it's still it's on TV, like, I feel like there are, I mean, there's always expectations for things. But for that one, I feel like there's a lot of expectations, so I just 

Kris Hampton  22:50

Like the world's watching?

Meagan Martin  22:51

 Yeah. And so it makes me really nervous and I feel like since I'm done with that, I'm like, Oh, yay, just climbing! And like, I have five minutes to figure it out or four minutes, I can't even remember, to figure out my boulders. I don't have to like be perfect on everything right away, so it, I don't know, it feels more chill.

Angie Payne  23:05

Yeah. And I think that came through in her performance too, because it was like the best that she'd climbed in the World Cup before in her qualifier round. And I think that was a huge part of it was that she didn't put, she wasn't putting a lot of pressure on herself at all. 

Angie Payne  23:17

She really just wanted to do the best she could do. And she did and it was cool.

Kris Hampton  23:17

She was having fun.

Kris Hampton  23:22

 Yeah, that was really fun to see. 

Angie Payne  23:23

Because I know how much pressure she feels from the Ninja Warrior stuff. 

Kris Hampton  23:27

Yeah.

Angie Payne  23:28

You get one try. 

Kris Hampton  23:29

Exactly. 

Angie Payne  23:29

That's, it is crazy.

Kris Hampton  23:31

 Yep. 

Angie Payne  23:32

You really just get like one try. It's like if you had to walk out to a boulder problem, and you get one try.

Kris Hampton  23:37

Yeah.

Angie Payne  23:37

That would suck.

Kris Hampton  23:37

 So I think that four minutes that she has to complete a boulder problem probably feels like she gets all this bonus time. 

Angie Payne  23:45

Yeah. Bonus tries! Woo hoo!

Kris Hampton  23:47

 Yeah. 

Angie Payne  23:47

Yeah. And, and there is some, I'm sure that that that helps. There's something to that, you know, having some other kind of pressure that feels like it's more, like whatever it is. And then, you know, being able to put the pressure in perspective so to speak.

Kris Hampton  24:03

Right. 

Angie Payne  24:04

The pressure of the event is just, you know, maybe it's not as great as some other pressure that you feel in life and once you can put that into perspective, that is helpful.

Kris Hampton  24:15

What do you think someone like, Shauna, who's, you know, this is her...she's the champ. Like, she's, she's coming at these things having dominated the last few years, you know. And I know you know this sort of feeling, but how do you think someone like Shana actually deals with that pressure? You know, when I when I talked to Shauna, it was it was a very pro answer. You know, I think she she's had to answer this before. In fact, the first thing she said to me was a lot of people ask me about pressure and

Shauna Coxsey  25:00

People ask me a lot about pressure and how I deal with it. I think that the main thing for me has always been the experience and doing competitions and, and just trying out different solutions. But there's no real method. There's no solution to how to deal with pressure. I don't think there's a like one formula fits all. And I yeah, as I like develop and grow as a, as an athlete, and as a climber, and a competition climber, I think that that that's part of that development and growth. I'm very much like what's next type of person. I'm always thinking about what's coming. So it's not okay, so, yeah, like thinking of times I failed and succeeded. It's like, okay, like, I'll take what went well, but yeah, I don't, I don't really remember the times I don't do well. I don't know, my memory is just bad.

Kris Hampton  25:38

That's a good thing.

Shauna Coxsey  25:39

I think I'm always like, what's next? So if I'm out on a boulder, and I've had five minutes, and it's been hard, it's like, okay, that's done. What's next? Like, there's no like, Oh, my God, I should have done that. Like, well, I need to do the next one. So okay, that's done, like up and on to the next one. 

Kris Hampton  25:53

And not that I don't think she was being genuine, because I do. I think she was being genuine. But I think that, that all that success sort of skews your idea of how that pressure feels, you know, and maybe you don't feel it a ton until there's failure.

Angie Payne  26:11

Right. Yeah, I think that that that could be true. Yeah, when you're doing well, and when you're handling the pressure well, it doesn't feel like it's that much maybe. You know, like, I remember a time when I was, when I won some comps consecutively back in the day and for a moment, I didn't feel as much pressure.

Kris Hampton  26:33

Right.

Angie Payne  26:34

I just had confidence. I just had confidence tha,t I mean, I, I definitely remember going into competitions when I was like 20, maybe 19 or 20, when I first moved to Colorado, and just I had so much confidence that I was going to win, that I was capable of winning, that it was a different feeling. Like there was pressure, but I don't know how to describe how it was different, but it definitely was. Maybe I just had, you know, more momentum from the winning and that gave me the confidence and then the confidence overrides the pressure. You know, you feel the confidence more than you feel the pressure, maybe.

Kris Hampton  27:14

Yeah. How old were you when this was happening?

Angie Payne  27:16

I think I was like 19 or 20. 

Kris Hampton  27:18

Okay, 

Angie Payne  27:18

Yeah, 20... between 19 and 21 is when I like, won a couple, there were like three Nationals in a year and there was a PCA comp and you know it was before Puccio started competing.

Kris Hampton  27:24

Right right.

Angie Payne  27:28

 Before she started her her dominance. But I do remember, at first, when I first started winning, I did feel just confidence, and I didn't feel a lot of pressure. But it quickly caught up to me and then I just went into this pretty dark place, feeling like if I did anything less than winning, it was a failure. 

Kris Hampton  27:55

Yep. 

Angie Payne  27:55

And that's like, so I kind of swung to the other extreme, you know, of having still still having some confidence, but really starting to feel like oh, my gosh, wait, I've been winning a lot. What happens when I don't?

Kris Hampton  28:08

Yeah, and it might be dangerous. You know, I think that confidence is important to be able to carry through. But the first time you lose it and you no longer have that confidence, you're in a really dangerous position. Because then anytime you win, it just puts more pressure on you the next time to win because you're like, I can't lose this confidence I've got going.

Angie Payne  28:32

Exactly.

Kris Hampton  28:33

It's just going to screw things up. And I when I talked to Megan Mascarenas, she said that

Megan Mascarenas  28:38

Last year, I felt a lot of pressure because I won two years ago and then I didn't want people to think like, oh, maybe it's just a fluke or something. So last year, I felt a lot of pressure. But this year, I'm more just here to have fun, see some new climbs.

Angie Payne  28:53

Yeah, no, I totally get that. And that that's kind of what I felt  you know, in a condensed timeline when I was 19, or 20, or whatever it was, and, you know, won, you know, maybe three comps in a row or something, and then started kind of feeling that way. Like, I don't want people to think that I can't win, you know, that that was just like a little streak that I had, and I can't do it anymore or something.

Kris Hampton  29:13

 Right.

Angie Payne  29:14

 Yeah, definitely putting that pressure and then it starts to get kind of dark. I think for me, it started to get kind of dark when I started feeling that way. 

Kris Hampton  29:20

I think that's interesting in a sport like climbing because it's not like it's not like you can accidentally send a hard boulder problem. 

Angie Payne  29:28

Right.

Kris Hampton  29:29

You know, you either can or you can't. There is no, there aren't really any flukes, in climbing, you know, so to to have a strong competitor like Megan or like yourself, refer to it that way, like maybe it was you know, it wasn't real. 

Angie Payne  29:48

Yeah. Yeah,

Kris Hampton  29:50

I think that's really interesting. 

Angie Payne  29:51

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I don't know maybe it just shows that there's, like....I don't know... it's weird.... like that there was a serious like crack in my confidence that sort of started to widen or something, you know. Because I do feel like, I don't know, I maybe for, gosh this is gonna sound really depressing, but maybe, since then I've been trying to find that confidence again, like that kind of confidence, whatever it was that I had, when I was 19. 

Kris Hampton  30:20

Do you, do you find it outside?

Angie Payne  30:21

I don't feel like I've found it again....umm...a little bit more outside, but not a, it's like not as concentrated, the feeling isn't as concentrated. 

Kris Hampton  30:32

Sure.

Angie Payne  30:32

I guess when I when I know, I mean, there's plenty of times I try a boulder problem outside, and I know I can do it. And I have that kind of confidence, like, I know I can do this boulder problem. It's just a matter of time. So in that way, I do have that, you know, just 100% confidence. Like, I can do this. I know I'll do this, eventually. It's different than the competition variety.

Kris Hampton  30:56

You don't get that four minute window.

Angie Payne  30:58

Yeah, it's it's definitely different. You know, it's like stretching that out over the course of years, potentially, while you're projecting something as opposed to walking into a competition that is a short period of time and just having that utter confidence that you can, that you can win you know.

Kris Hampton  31:15

Yeah.

Angie Payne  31:16

That's such a weird... I don't know....but I do feel like it's, I had something different when I was that age. Maybe it's just that I didn't have the expectations. It could have been that.

Kris Hampton  31:28

Yeah. I mean, I think we've seen with the youth competitors that that's

Angie Payne  31:31

Yeah, that's a real thing.

Kris Hampton  31:33

That's a major thing.

Angie Payne  31:34

It is a real thing. 

Kris Hampton  31:35

Shauna said something interesting when we talked that, you know, I asked her if there were, if there was a time when she thinks back on, a time when she has failed on a problem, and then is able to pull it back together, like, does she refer back to that moment, when I got it back together at this comp, I can do it again. And her response was, "I don't even remember my failures." Like I don't I don't think about them at all. And she she was almost upset with me for even asking. And she's like, you know, like, God, I can't even I don't even remember failing, you know, and I'm like, and I wonder if that can even be true. Or if it's, again, back to that, I'm really successful right now, so that's not entering into my brain.

Kris Hampton  32:24

Right. Like there there are definitely failures within those successes. You know, she doesn't, in this comp, she didn't top problem number one.

Angie Payne  32:24

Right. Like, you don't even want to let it enter into your brain. Maybe that's the strategy right, not let it enter into your brain.

Angie Payne  32:38

Right. And she, you know, nobody flashed every single problem, so everybody's had their failures. 

Kris Hampton  32:44

Right. Exactly. But, but not remembering those failures. And maybe, you know, we're having these quick conversations. I'm just ambushing people, so maybe when I said failure that meant to her this catastrophic,

Angie Payne  32:57

Yeah, breakdown in life or something. 

Kris Hampton  32:59

Right. But I think it's interesting that she doesn't think about failures at all, even using them as motivation. And then she's, you know, dominating the circuit right now. 

Angie Payne  33:11

Yeah. I mean, maybe there's something to it then. I don't know, I definitely can't relate to that. I can't relate to that feeling of 

Kris Hampton  33:19

Yeah I can't either.

Angie Payne  33:19

Of not thinking of my failures. I guess maybe when I was 19, or 20, I was more that way, like, because I hadn't really had as many to think about, especially like, in that particular moment, you know, like, in that year, whatever. It was like, well, there really, yeah, I can't think of any because I've just been succeeding, you know. 

Kris Hampton  33:43

Crushing everything

Angie Payne  33:43

It's like, and, and it does, you get this momentum going and that's what I, you know, I think you do feel that way on some level, like, No, it's just all it's all good. It's all positive. I don't remember the negative. It just rolls right off my back until like, I definitely remember a distinct moment, at the, at a Spot comp. And I had been, you know, mostly just doing boulder problems in these competitions and just with this confidence of like, I could do this boulder problem, and then I would do it. 

Kris Hampton  34:17

Right. 

Angie Payne  34:17

And I couldn't do the fourth problem in finals and the crowd was totally behind me and they were so psyched, and they were cheering me on

Kris Hampton  34:24

 Right. Everything was in your favor and it still didn't work.

Angie Payne  34:26

I just remember, I remember looking at, like, looking at the crowd and just thinking to myself, I just can't do it you guys. Like sorry, I just can't do it. 

Kris Hampton  34:35

Yeah.

Angie Payne  34:35

And feeling really like, frustrated about like, no matter what, how hard you scream, and no matter how hard I try, I'm not doing it. I don't know. I'm just not doing it. And that was one of those moments of like, that I remember, like a moment of failure that I, to this day, remember. That frustration of just like, Oh, wait, it's not always gonna be like this feeling of I walk up to the problem and know that I can do it and then do it, you know? It's just not always gonna be that way.

Kris Hampton  35:05

That's funny, I just realized that I cut both of these episodes at a spot where Angie and I are talking about our own failures. Is that a coincidence? I don't know. But I think failure and pressure are both important parts of this big process. There's one more part coming. If you've got the time, go listen now. If you don't, be sure to listen later, and definitely go to Powercompanyclimbing.com. You can click on the direct link right there in your podcast app in the description and check out Angie's photos. you know, we're gonna be talking a lot in this next episode about some of her photos that really depict true pressure even in the seemingly unflappable competitors like Shauna Coxsey and including a photo series that is really incredible of Russian competitor Alexey Rubtsov. It's almost heartbreaking to look at. We also talk with Jan Hojer and explore how, you know, this super super nice guy master competitor can seemingly contradict himself in back-to-back sentences when it comes to discussing pressure, that maybe he doesn't even realize how much pressure he's putting on himself. And we ask all of these competitors, really successful, top climbers, what's the secret? And don't forget, share us with your friends. Tell your mom. Tell your grandma. Tell everybody. You can find us on the Facebook, you can find us on the Instagram, the Pinterest. No Twitters. We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT (EP. 48):

Kris Hampton  00:03

Hey everybody, Kris here. Just a quick note, this is Part 3, the final part of a three part series, talking to my good friend Angie Payne about pressure. If you have not yet, please go back and listen to Parts 1 and 2. Those are Episodes 46 and 47. And if you have listened, but you have not yet gone to the website, Powercompanyclimbing.com, to check out Angie's photos, you need to do that now. Go there, check those out. As a photographer, Angie also has this unique perspective of having been a successful competitor all the way from her childhood up until her adult years and, and you can really see that in her photos. You know, she knows where those stressful moments happen and she knows where the pressure is, and she knows how to capture it. So particularly with this upcoming episode, there are some photos you're definitely gonna want to see.

Angie Payne  01:01

A lot of internal dialogue, a lot of internal battles. I mean, I guess climbing is is that but yeah, competition just takes that whole experience and condenses it down into a really short period of time.

Angie Payne  01:29

I don't know, I definitely can't relate to that. I can't relate to that feeling of 

Kris Hampton  01:33

Yeah I can't either.

Angie Payne  01:34

Of not thinking of my failures. I guess maybe when I was 19, or 20, I, I was more that way like because I hadn't really had as many 

Kris Hampton  01:44

Right

Angie Payne  01:46

 To think about, especially like in that particular moment, you know, like in that year, whatever it was like, "Well, there aren't really...yeah, I can't think of any, because I've just been succeeding" 

Kris Hampton  01:57

You were crushing everything

Angie Payne  01:57

And it's like, and, and it does, you get this momentum going and that's what I you know, I think you do feel that way on some level like, "No, it's just all it's all good." It's all positive. I don't remember the negative. It just rolls right off my back until like, I definitely remember a distinct moment at this at a Spot comp and I had been, you know, mostly just doing boulder problems in these competitions and just with this confidence of like, "I could do this boulder problem", and then I would do it.

Kris Hampton  02:12

 Right.

Angie Payne  02:22

 And I couldn't do the fourth problem in finals and the crowd was totally behind me. And they were so psyched, and they're cheering me on.

Kris Hampton  02:39

Right. Everything was in your favor and it still didn't work.

Angie Payne  02:40

 I just remember, I remember looking at, like looking out at the crowd and just thinking to myself, "I just can't do it you guys. Like, sorry, I just can't do it."

Kris Hampton  02:49

 Yeah. 

Angie Payne  02:49

And feeling really like, frustrated about like, no matter what, how hard you scream, no matter how hard I try, I'm not doing it. I don't know, I'm just not doing it. And that was one of those moments of like, that I remember, like a moment of failure that I, to this day, remember that frustration of just like, "Oh wait, it's not always gonna be like this feeling of, I'll walk up to the problem and know that I can do it and then do it.", you know?

Kris Hampton  03:16

Sure. Yeah.

Angie Payne  03:16

It's just not always gonna be that way. 

Kris Hampton  03:18

And I, you know, I saw that with Petra, when she was trying the dyno problem in finals and she was asking the crowd to get behind her and they did. Hugely actually.

Angie Payne  03:30

 Right, right.

Kris Hampton  03:30

You know, and then she still didn't do the problem.

Angie Payne  03:32

 Yeah.

Kris Hampton  03:32

 And that's one of the things I actually think is really cool about climbing is that all those climbers out there in the audience know what that's like. 

Angie Payne  03:42

Yeah, exactly. 

Kris Hampton  03:43

Like to have everything going your way and still not do it

Kris Hampton  03:46

And climbing is is all about trying, you know. It's all about trying as hard as you can. 

Angie Payne  03:46

 And still not do it.

Angie Payne  03:52

As hard as you can, yeah.

Kris Hampton  03:53

 And, and that's what we were stoked to see with Petra.

Angie Payne  03:56

Yeah, people appreciate the effort. And that's kind of why, you know, it's just another example of like, other people don't have these expectations for you. Like, they just want you to try hard and they enjoy watching you try hard and watching you enjoy trying hard. You know, that's what people love to see.

Kris Hampton  04:15

Yeah. And when it goes well, it's great. 

Angie Payne  04:18

Right.

Angie Payne  04:18

Right. 

Kris Hampton  04:18

You know, we saw it with Shauna, we saw it with Jongwon.

Kris Hampton  04:22

 You know who, obviously, I mean, the guy climbs with so much emotion and so much passion and was so stoked, you know.

Angie Payne  04:31

Yeah and so psyched on the getting the crowd involved. 

Kris Hampton  04:33

Yeah. And it's so it's amazing to see when that goes well.

Angie Payne  04:38

 Yep, exactly. 

Kris Hampton  04:39

And it's hard not to feel bad for the competitor when it doesn't go well 

Angie Payne  04:44

Oh yeah

Kris Hampton  04:44

Because you want them to do well. You're not, you know, as as a as a spectator, I'm not upset with the competitor for not doing it. I feel bad for them, like I wanted that so much for you 

Angie Payne  04:56

Right. Like you wanted to share that moment with them 

Kris Hampton  04:58

Right. 

Angie Payne  04:58

Yeah. Like you wanted and that's just an amazing thing about sports is like you want to have that moment of victory with the person, you know. You want to feel like you were involved in it somehow and, and they want to do it, you know. It's like everybody wants the same thing. We all want everybody to do well. 

Kris Hampton  05:15

Yeah,

Angie Payne  05:15

 But then yeah, you feel like sad when it doesn't happen for that person and that you couldn't be a part of it, you know?

Kris Hampton  05:21

Yeah. And you feel nervous for them. 

Angie Payne  05:22

Sure

Kris Hampton  05:22

You know, there were, there were moments, you know, where we were talking about Shauna and, you know, this idea that she maybe she actually doesn't think about failures and but there were times during the comp that I felt nervous for her. 

Angie Payne  05:33

Right. Like when she was about to timeout on

Kris Hampton  05:35

Yeah, yeah

Angie Payne  05:37

And almost not do number one.

Kris Hampton  05:38

Yeah. And you have that photo of her obviously feeling pressure. You have several where she's obviously feeling pressure. It's not that she's immune to it somehow. You know, there's, there's the moment where she's in the photo, you have her sitting down with her arms crossed, and you know, her head rested on her arms, where you can see that she's trying to tap into something.

Angie Payne  05:59

 Yeah, for sure. 

Kris Hampton  06:00

She knows that it's a pressurized situation. She's tapping into something. And then the the photo of yours that I really love of Shauna is when she's turned around, looking at the clock, you know, it's on her last attempt. She knows it's her last attempt. She wants to know, do I have enough time to make this last move, you know?

Angie Payne  06:19

Yep. Yeah, I love those moments. Because I know what it feels like as a competitor and I love seeing it from the other side now, too. Because just like, you do feel that pressure for the person and you feel the nerves that they must be feeling. And yeah, I think that's when the crowd like really connects with, with things, those kinds of feelings. And I mean, even just...um...gosh, when people get super emotional, like, you can feel that, you know. You feel their frustration of like, oh, my gosh, that person is devastated.

Kris Hampton  06:51

Yeah, yeah, no matter what the emotion is, I think we all take it on a little bit. Yeah, you know, whether it's Jongwon, who's emotional in a very positive way at that comp

Angie Payne  07:02

 Right

Kris Hampton  07:03

You know, or it's Alexey, who you have this amazing

Angie Payne  07:08

Oh man

Kris Hampton  07:08

 Series of photos that, that I've looked at, over and over because it shows this whole range of emotion on a seasoned competitor, who's obviously putting a lot of pressure on himself.

Angie Payne  07:20

Yep. Yeah, I love that. I mean, for me, those are the moments now that like, looking through the cameras, those are the moments that I like to try to capture the most, because I know what that feels like, you know. Like, he's just, he looks just devastated. 

Kris Hampton  07:35

Yeah, it's almost stressful looking at these things.

Angie Payne  07:37

 It is stressful. It's like the worst....god...somebody, you know, to feel that way, what could have happened to that person? 

Kris Hampton  07:44

Right.

Angie Payne  07:44

If you just saw them out of context, like, "Oh, my gosh, what happened? Did his dog die?" 

Kris Hampton  07:49

Yeah, 

Angie Payne  07:49

It's, you know, it's just this utter devastation of like, the worst thing just happened. 

Kris Hampton  07:53

Totally.

Angie Payne  07:54

Well so he just fell off the top of the boulder problem, you know, fell matching the finish or whatever it was and that can feel super devastating in the moment. And the crowd feels that too, like, "Oh, no!".

Kris Hampton  08:03

Yeah, I mean, I was standing pretty much right in front of him when he had this, this moment that you captured here. And Annalissa and I were texting back and forth, because she was at home watching and I got a text right after it was happening, where she's like," Oh, my God."

Angie Payne  08:20

Yeah,

Kris Hampton  08:21

"That guy was about to lose it!" Yeah. I think he did lose it.

Angie Payne  08:24

He did. Yeah, for a moment, he definitely lost it.

Kris Hampton  08:27

I mean, you can you can very plainly see in these photos, where there's, he's hit the ground...there's rage. You know, he is he is angry at the entire world for a minute. 

Angie Payne  08:41

Yep, yep. 

Kris Hampton  08:41

And then he goes very quickly into "What did I just do?"

Angie Payne  08:46

 Yeah, 

Kris Hampton  08:47

Like, my life is over. You know, that's how it looks. 

Angie Payne  08:49

Yeah exactly.

Kris Hampton  08:49

He looks totally dejected and devastated. 

Angie Payne  08:50

Totally devastated, yeah.

Kris Hampton  08:53

 So, I mean, that amount of pressure, I don't even understand it frankly. I don't I don't know that I've ever put that amount of pressure on myself.

Angie Payne  09:01

Yeah, that that's definitely the extreme, I would say.

Kris Hampton  09:03

Yeah. And I don't know how healthy that is, you know. We see these people doing really well who are very, very happy.

Angie Payne  09:11

Right. 

Kris Hampton  09:14

But I don't know where you know, which came first the happiness or the you know, the doing well?

Angie Payne  09:20

Right. Yeah.

Kris Hampton  09:21

It's so hard to say. 

Angie Payne  09:22

They are so, yeah, they are really hard to seperate.

Kris Hampton  09:26

Because I did talk to people before who said, "I just want to have fun" and then they did really well but I also talked to people who said, "I just want to have fun" and didn't do very well. 

Angie Payne  09:34

Right and then you want to ask them how much fun did they have? 

Kris Hampton  09:36

Right 

Angie Payne  09:37

Right.

Kris Hampton  09:37

But I can't, you know, and that's why I'll never be like this journalist, this you know, hardcore journalist. Like when Ty, after qualifiers, Ty didn't have the greatest qualifier round, even though he made it through, you know, he wasn't pleased with his performance. 

Angie Payne  09:59

Yep. 

Kris Hampton  10:00

By not pleased, I mean, he was very pissed off. 

Angie Payne  10:02

Yeah, he was not happy. 

Kris Hampton  10:04

He came out outside of the barriers and was throwing things and laying on the ground and it was just me and him.

Angie Payne  10:13

 Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  10:14

And I'm like, if I were a real journalist, 

Angie Payne  10:18

You would go ask him a question.

Kris Hampton  10:18

I would go over right now and talk to him, you know, but I couldn't do it, you know. I had to let him go through that on his own.

Angie Payne  10:24

 Right. Let him go through his process. Yeah, I mean, he's really hard on himself, I can definitely relate to that.

Kris Hampton  10:29

Yeah, you said you and Ty are similar.

Angie Payne  10:31

I think that we are in the in our, in the way that we compete. He is just incredibly.... he's very hard on himself, he puts a lot of pressure on himself. He's an incredible climber. So much skill, so much talent, and expects a lot of himself. And I have, you know, I can relate to that. And I can also relate to how frustrated he gets when he doesn't perform as well as he thinks he could. And I, you know, I'm friends with Ty and I know, I know these things like as a you know, as a friend, but also if you just watch him compete you can tell these, you can you can tell that like he's putting a lot of pressure on himself

Kris Hampton  11:14

 Oh yeah, it's fairly obvious. 

Angie Payne  11:15

He gets really frustrated with himself when he doesn't perform well.

Kris Hampton  11:18

 Yeah. 

Angie Payne  11:18

Yeah, he's he's pretty intense. And I always like it when Ty does really well because he is so talented and he just is, man, such a good climber, such a good climber. It's always a little painful to watch when he when he doesn't, because I know how hard he is on himself.

Kris Hampton  11:38

Yeah.

Angie Payne  11:38

 And that's always hard to see. 

Kris Hampton  11:39

And you can see it in these photos that you've got and, and we had a brief conversation with his mom during qualifiers and I wish I would have talked to her. But she was nervous for him. 

Angie Payne  11:52

Oh she gets so nervous for him. 

Kris Hampton  11:53

Yeah, yeah.

Angie Payne  11:54

 So nervous.

Kris Hampton  11:55

 And it was it was really interesting to watch. And then in semis, or finals, I guess it was semis. He wasn't in finals, right?

Angie Payne  12:03

Right. Yeah, it must have been in semis,

Kris Hampton  12:04

Where he, his knee was bleeding, his hand was bleeding 

Angie Payne  12:07

So much blood

Kris Hampton  12:08

And they stopped him and made him tape it up and he was furious.

Angie Payne  12:12

He was so mad. Oh, my gosh, he was so mad. 

Kris Hampton  12:15

Yeah and it, you know, it broke my heart watching it. And then you see him accept it. And you can see in your photos where he's accepting it.

Angie Payne  12:25

Yeah.

Kris Hampton  12:26

 Not happy. 

Angie Payne  12:27

No, not happy to accept it.

Kris Hampton  12:28

 But he's accepting it. 

Angie Payne  12:29

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  12:30

But that, you know, that changes your whole demeanor that

Angie Payne  12:32

It does. I mean, that's like, man, it is just a perfect example of you just gotta like, roll with the punches in these competitions and that happens, that kind of stuff happens. And, and actually, there's a photo of Akiyo sitting on the pads and that's another example of that, when the clock just stopped working. 

Kris Hampton  12:51

Right. 

Angie Payne  12:51

And everybody had to sit down in the middle of their attempts.

Kris Hampton  12:54

 Yeah. 

Angie Payne  12:54

And, and just roll with it, you know, and just sit out there on the pads while they fix the clock, in front of the crowd. You know, like, you're just sitting there and you've been trying a problem and you have to stop, like somebody says, you have to stop. Now you have all that time to think about the problem. Think about the fact that you haven't done it yet.

Kris Hampton  13:12

Right. Yeah.

Angie Payne  13:12

 If you're still out there on the pads, you haven't done it yet. 

Kris Hampton  13:14

Yeah.

Angie Payne  13:14

 And yeah, just stuff like little things like that happen in these competitions and you just have to be able to adapt really, really quickly. And, and you just never know what it's going to be either. It could just be some little curveball, it could be a big curveball and you just have to go with it and that's pretty hard to do sometimes. 

Kris Hampton  13:37

Yeah. And I didn't know that's where the photo of Akiyo was from, that it was while they were sitting there waiting for the clock to be fixed. 

Angie Payne  13:45

Yeah.

Kris Hampton  13:46

 Now that you put that into context, I can see it on her face. Like she's, you know, it's a contrast for sure with the rest of the photos you have of her.

Angie Payne  13:55

 Yep.

Kris Hampton  13:55

 Because she looks visibly frustrated.

Angie Payne  13:59

Yeah because she's like, stuck in the moment, I think. 

Angie Payne  14:01

Of like this intensity, you can't let it down. You can't, you know, you don't want to lose it. You don't want to snap out of it. But it's hard to keep yourself in that place for an undetermined amount of time because they didn't know how long it's gonna take, you know?

Kris Hampton  14:01

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  14:16

Yep. And I, you know, I, I think experience goes a long way to overcoming that frustration, you know, and I know that Ty's very experienced and Akiyo is very experienced, but you know, those things are just going to happen. Your routine, your "This is how I wish it was" is going to get broken.

Angie Payne  14:35

 Yeah.

Kris Hampton  14:36

 You know, and, and a one person in particular that I'm thinking about was Katha Saurwein and her, her experience really shines through that in that. And it's interesting, I heard her saying, I think I'm the only person who's been to Vail all 10 years. 

Angie Payne  14:54

Yeah, she's been there a lot

Kris Hampton  14:56

 you know, so here she is, the most experienced person there, at least at this specific comp and you know, possibly overall, and she looked unflappable. 

Angie Payne  15:11

Yeah.

Katha Saurwein  15:12

I think it's a lot about experience. I've done, been here like 10 times already actually and I try to just enjoy the comp and have fun and try the problems and nothing can change my climbing. It is just about me and what I do, and that's what I try to focus on.

Kris Hampton  15:26

She's probably the one person I saw the least change in, from how she competes to how she just hangs out when she's done.

Angie Payne  15:36

Yeah, yeah, she, I think the fluctuation in her motion is very minimal, which, which is really interesting to me. I do wonder how she like, what's the secret? 

Kris Hampton  15:47

Have you climbed outside with her at all?

Angie Payne  15:49

I have. She's an incredible outdoor climber.

Kris Hampton  15:51

Is it the same outdoors?

Angie Payne  15:53

From what I've seen, yeah, yeah. She's, like, very level headed. I guess it's a really, you know, she's just very even keeled. She's really good at climbing outside. 

Kris Hampton  16:05

Yeah

Angie Payne  16:05

 I mean, she's great competitor as well. I think that I'm even more impressed when I climb outside with her. But yeah, she's just so.... she just doesn't let it get to her. It's really cool. And it's been cool, like, she's, she's had a great year, I think it's this year, so far. But it's a good example of like, she just kind of goes with the flow of it. Like, she knows that some of these competitions are gonna be great and she knows that some of them aren't  going to be as great. She's gonna have these ups and downs and she just seems like she's really good at accepting that, and just carrying on and doing her thing. And, yeah, it's super cool that she's been there as long as she has because, I mean, I have a lot of respect for that because that's, that's hard to come back that many times. 

Kris Hampton  16:51

Yeah, for sure.

Angie Payne  16:53

 And, you know, as as the field changes, as your climbing changes, as your life changes, like, that's...it's cool. It's a big accomplishment, I think.

Kris Hampton  17:02

Yeah, no doubt. And there's one photo you have that I think really speaks to her experience in kind of a strange way. And, you know, it's her mantling up onto this, this ball and, and she's pulling her her foot up onto the ball. 

Angie Payne  17:23

Yeah

Kris Hampton  17:23

You know, and I saw her do something similar, where she was trying to rock over onto a foot and, and there was no right hand to pull herself over with, so she put her right hand on her knee and pushed on her knee until she was able to get her weight over.

Angie Payne  17:41

Right. 

Kris Hampton  17:42

And, you know, those two things, in the heat of the moment, when there's all this pressure on you, those simple little things could very, very easily get lost.

Angie Payne  17:52

Right. 

Kris Hampton  17:52

And she was so calm and collected. And, and then she came off, she's standing there, and I'm watching her, Jorg is, you know, her husband, is competing and I'm watching her watch him. 

Angie Payne  18:08

Right, right, right. 

Kris Hampton  18:09

And she's wringing her hands, and she's getting nervous, you know. So as soon as he was off the mats, I walked over and said, you know, "Do you get more anxious watching other people, especially the people you care about, or your teammates?" 

Katha Saurwein  18:25

Totally. It's alway the worst for me to watch other people climb actually. So much more nervous than when I climb myself.

Kris Hampton  18:33

And I wonder how much of that has to do with the fact that she doesn't feel the pressure because she knows Jorg is there, her teammates are there, whatever else she's got all these people to back her up/

Angie Payne  18:46

Yeah. Backing her up.

Katha Saurwein  18:47

It is always nicer with friends or your husband with you, of course. Yeah. That makes it...I don't know it makes the whole travel nicer being here and it's just always nice having people in the background while you're climbing.

Angie Payne  18:58

Yeah, I think that's that probably has a lot to do with it. And I mean, just the experience too, of doing it so many times. I think you get used to the pressure, at least. You know, on some level, you get used to it. And I don't know.... she she's just a great example of calm under pressure. She's really, really composed. 

Kris Hampton  19:23

It was really interesting.

Angie Payne  19:23

Yeah, she is she's really composed. She's a resourceful climber. She's...yeah, she's she's cool competitor that kind of flies under the radar. I don't think she gets a lot of as much attention as she deserves for her just like consistency. She was just consistent.

Kris Hampton  19:42

Is she one of the older competitors? 

Angie Payne  19:44

At this point, probably. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, she's definitely been in it for a long time.

Kris Hampton  19:49

 Yeah the first thing I noticed about her was, everyone else when they filter out of behind the wall, when they're done competing, they sort of flit about nervously.

Angie Payne  20:02

Yeah. Yeah, 

Kris Hampton  20:03

Talking to a bunch of people, and they're not really sure where to go and she came out and just sat down on Jorg's lap and hung out.

Angie Payne  20:09

Right. Like, "Okay, I'm done".

Kris Hampton  20:11

Yeah, like, totally chill. Another day at the office. 

Angie Payne  20:14

Exactly, yeah.

Kris Hampton  20:15

That's how it looked. And I didn't see anyone else react that way, you know, not even the people who are doing really well. They were all still sort of nervously moving about.

Angie Payne  20:24

Yeah, yeah. No, she's just, she's got a really, really great head on her shoulders there with the competition approach. It is funny that she gets so nervous watching other people but I totally get that because when you don't have control over it, I think it's more nerve wracking, like when you you can't control what that person is doing. When you're out there yourself you feel like you have a certain amount of control. But to watch other people is often that way.

Kris Hampton  20:55

Yeah, I was I was actually pretty excited to talk to Jule Wurm for that reason, because

Angie Payne  21:01

Oh yeah, she was watching.

Kris Hampton  21:03

 She's been there as champion.

Angie Payne  21:04

 Yeah.

Kris Hampton  21:05

She was there as a coach this year. 

Angie Payne  21:08

Yeah. Which is cool.

Kris Hampton  21:09

With the German team and with with Jan. 

Angie Payne  21:12

Right.

Kris Hampton  21:12

So she's got all this pressure built up watching everyone else is what I guessed. 

Angie Payne  21:19

Yeah,.

Kris Hampton  21:20

You know, but her response to that was pretty much

Jule Wurm  21:23

Well, I don't exactly tell them anything. I'm just try to be there if they need anything, then I let them know they can ask me anything and stuff. But yeah, actually, they are so experienced and they did so many comps already, they know what to do and they know what to do to get in their zone and to climb well.

Angie Payne  21:42

Yeah. And just having somebody there like that, I'm sure, I mean, that does go a long way just to have people there that you know and that know your climbing and know you, know how you're going to react and know what you need. Yeah, also like, I don't know, it's cool, though, because she's, she's obviously really experienced but then when you asked her about....about....

Kris Hampton  22:03

Well, what I asked her and most of the other competitors that I talked to as well, was how, if they have a tough Boulder #1, do they get it all back together in that short window of time, so that they can perform better on their next boulder?

Jule Wurm  22:23

Well, that's actually mentally kind of the hardest thing that could happen to you in a comp, that the first boulder is easy apparently, because you see all the others and you didn't climb it. So actually, I don't really have a good solution. I mean, I always try to convince myself mentally that it's not over and that I stil could climb all the other problems. But then I don't know... it's the hardest thing, I guess.

Angie Payne  22:48

There's not really a magic bullet. There's not like a secret that one person's figured out and the other person hasn't.

Kris Hampton  22:54

Right.

Angie Payne  22:54

 And that's the truth of it. It's like everybody has their own approach and sometimes you don't really have an approach. Like there's gonna be moments when you're like, I don't know what to do. I don't know how to get over this. I don't know how to let this go.

Kris Hampton  23:07

Was there anything you ever tried to tell yourself? 

Angie Payne  23:09

Probably

Kris Hampton  23:10

 Did you have like little mantras or...?

Angie Payne  23:13

Ummm...I tried all sorts of different things. Yeah, I mean, I would try to think about like, something completely unrelated, unrelated to the competition, a lot of the time, like in between problems. I would think about like, "What am I going to do after this?" "What's gonna be dinner?"  "What's, what am I going to do tomorrow?". I tried that approach, like sometimes.

Kris Hampton  23:31

Haha "What's gonna be dinner?"

Angie Payne  23:31

 Like, okay, I need to take my mind away from here. 

Kris Hampton  23:34

Damn I didn't do that last boulder.

Angie Payne  23:36

Yeah, I don't think and I don't think many people had good answers. But this is what Alex Puccio, our 10 time bouldering National Champion had to say.

Angie Payne  23:36

Haha. Yeah, exactly. I tried to take my mind away from it completely. Sometimes I just tried to think about the next problem. Or, you know, because if you've previewed problems in the World Cup format, especially, you've previewed the finals, so and in Nationals or Nationals finals format, so you can think about the next problem or try to think about nothing. I mean, I've probably tried just about everything that exists. I've never found one way that that really like works every time. it just depends.

Alex Puccio  24:12

I think everyone gets in their head like once in a while, especially if they can't get off the ground. And every athlete has like certain tricks, or I guess like quotes or sayings or whatever they tell themselves in their head. So you always have this like internal dialogue and it's like, you know, trying to stay at a certain, not get too excited and not to get like, you know, too worked up about things and try to let things go. But everyone I'm pretty sure has the same feelings that pop into their head right away, especially like if they didn't do the first boulder and you're sitting in your chair and you're like, crap, I didn't do that boulder. Like, is everyone else doing it? You start thinking these things and then you tell yourself Okay, stop thinking that. Like you don't know what's gonna happen. You have four more boulders to go, like, just have fun and just, you know, see how it ends up going for you.

Kris Hampton  24:51

And Jan Hoyer, who is a 2015 European Bouldering Champion and five time World Cup bouldering event winner

Jan Hojer  24:59

Um...well, not really. It's, I think everybody tries to focus at a problem at a time and even if you can't do one. And of course you realize that other people did, once you're in isolation, and it's it's much harder to stay focused on the next one, but I think I'm, well, I think I'm doing kind of a good job at taking a problem at a time. I think some athletes struggle more and have a harder time like staying concentrated if they don't do as well on the first couple. But today was tough. I couldn't do number two. Number three, I did with two seconds left on the clock, so I'm really glad I did this one, otherwise, I might have had a harder time on number four. 

Kris Hampton  25:39

And Janja Garnbret, the 2016 lead World Champion and two time World Cup bouldering event winner,

Janja Garnbret  25:47

Well I always, after a boulder if I don't do well, I always try to relax and forget that boulder and focus on the next one. So I'm just trying to relax and fully concentrate and try to top the next one. Because you never know till the end. You never know what can happen. So I tried to stay focused.

Kris Hampton  26:06

And Meagan Martin, former youth sport climbing National Champion and multi time winner of both the Dark Horse and Dominion River Rock bouldering events.

Meagan Martin  26:14

Um so I definitely try to like focus on not doing too many tries and like really step back and like assess the boulder a bit and see if I miss anything. Like I've definitely missed holds before and like silly stuff like that, so I have to like, take a step back, breathe, and then just, you know, not stress out and like know that I can figure it out.

Kris Hampton  26:32

Megan Mascarenas, two- time Vail World Cup winner, defending champ going into this event and former Bouldering National Champion. Also Youth Continental Champ in both lead and bouldering, had this to say

Megan Mascarenas  26:48

Um...I kind of comes from practice. The more comps I do, the more level headed I can be going into the next climb.

Kris Hampton  26:55

And finally, Sean Bailey, our top American male this year in 11th place and 2016 sport National Champion.

Sean Bailey  27:06

Yeah, I think it's a it's tough to articulate because when you say it's like so trivial most of the time, right? It's like, you'll say stuff like, "Oh, it's okay, you'll be fine" and that's literally all I'm doing. But if you say that to some, like random person, they're gonna be like, "Thanks for the advice." But it really is that simple. Man like, most the time it just comes down to like taking a few deep breaths and kind of deciding that you're gonna make it okay, and it's all gonna be alright and at the end of the day, it's all gonna be alright so.

Angie Payne  27:35

Yeah, no, I think that's one of the interesting things. You know,

Kris Hampton  27:37

And I think I think Lily's answer was probably, Lily and Sean, I think said it the best, which I think again, speaks to that coaching we talked about.

Angie Payne  27:44

 Yeah, yeah, the the coaching is....

Kris Hampton  27:46

But even the best competitors, their answers were more like, I just tried to forget about it.

Angie Payne  27:51

 Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  27:51

Well, you know, obviously,

Angie Payne  27:52

Try to leave it behind. 

Kris Hampton  27:54

Yeah.

Angie Payne  27:54

 It's like, sometimes you succeed, and sometimes you don't, in trying, you know. So yeah, it's, it's fascinating. And I mean, obviously, like, I think everybody can relate to it. Anybody who has climbed can relate to it, because climbing is pretty much about failing and the whole struggle of it is learning how to deal with that, and then move forward and move past it and then eventually, like succeed, only to find another thing that you can fail on, and try to succeed on. 

Kris Hampton  28:22

Yeah, 

Angie Payne  28:23

It's a cycle.

Kris Hampton  28:24

I think it's interesting that these, even these really experienced competitors haven't really worked through all these mental issues, you know, or confidence issues, or whatever. And I think we all sort of expect ourselves to be able to, but it was it was actually really important for me to go there and talk to these super experienced climbers and these great climbers, and realize that they don't necessarily have the answers, you know. They don't really know. I talked to Ja  Hoyer and he said something that I thought was really interesting. He almost contradicted himself in back to back sentences when he said,

Jan Hojer  29:02

Well, usually I enjoy starting early in semi finals, so even if I qualify in 20th place for semis, I'm confident that can get all the way through to finals, and even when, so I think it doesn't bother me as much. But today, I felt like I climbed super well, actually. But when I finished I realized I'm in sixth place already and all the Japanese guys beat me so well, they are obviously super strong. So 

Kris Hampton  29:28

But then I realize I'm in sixth place and all the Japanese beat me. 

Angie Payne  29:30

Like he's bothered by it. 

Kris Hampton  29:31

Yeah. And I'm like but you just said a sentence ago that being a 20th place is fine, because you're confident, you know. So they, you know, they're battling with this all the time.

Angie Payne  29:42

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's a lot of what competition is, just like a lot of internal dialogue, a lot of internal battles. I mean, I guess climbing is is that for, for most people, at least, but yeah, competition just takes that whole experience and condenses it down into a really short period of time. It makes it way more intense, in my opinion.

Kris Hampton  29:42

 Yeah.

Angie Payne  29:49

 And you just go through the same exact process and the same exact cycle just in fast forward, basically.

Kris Hampton  30:15

Yeah, that's a good, that's a really good way to put it.

Angie Payne  30:16

 Yeah. And that's one of the I think that's one of the coolest things, when I really think about competitions is, it is just the same process that I really do enjoy about, you know, projecting boulder problems. Competitions are the same thing. They are just, in, you know, fast, fast forward times four, or times 10, or whatever, they're just a super fast version of that same thing.

Kris Hampton  30:40

Right. 

Angie Payne  30:40

So it's the same skill set, you just have to be able to do it, you have to add in the skill of being able to do it all really quickly.

Kris Hampton  30:47

Yep. And I didn't really realize, you know, the, the amount at which that was a thing, you know, until I was there, watching it, and really trying to pay attention to that, you know, and I'm so glad that you had the idea of talking about talking to the competitors about the pressure, and how they handle that, because it's something I hadn't really thought much about. I'm not a competitor, you know. I've been to a lot of comps, but they're usually as MC. My job is to keep people stoked and hype everybody up and have a great time, so I don't feel that pressure at all. You know, I don't see it and, and sometimes I might even make it worse.

Angie Payne  31:31

 Right. 

Kris Hampton  31:31

You know, looking at it now. It's a good thing if Michaela falls on the last problem, because I can get a crowd reaction. 

Angie Payne  31:42

Yeah, right right.

Kris Hampton  31:43

 I can get people stoked over that, you know.

Angie Payne  31:47

Yeah totally.

Kris Hampton  31:47

And it's not that I'm doubting the competitor at all, I would never do that but I don't know how helpful that is to the competitor.

Angie Payne  31:55

Right. Well, but it's just another aspect of the competition that you have to deal with as a competitor.

Angie Payne  32:00

You know you are gonna have to deal with it, 

Kris Hampton  32:00

 Exactly.

Kris Hampton  32:01

Exactly.

Angie Payne  32:01

Like you are part of the experience for the crowd and you know, that, like your failure plays into that sometimes. 

Kris Hampton  32:08

Yeah. 

Angie Payne  32:08

And I've come to accept that. Like, sure it's, it's kind of annoying in the moment sometimes when, when you hear that, you know, "Oh, yeah, that person fell. Now the next person has to do the problem to win." And you're like, "Aw, man", like just being reminded of your failure, but that's part of the whole thing. I mean, it's, it's that's part of like the sports action of it all, you know,

Kris Hampton  32:28

 Right. Right. And it's part of the whole, climbing as a whole, not just competition.

Angie Payne  32:32

Right. Exactly. Like everybody can relate to the failure of it. And I mean, everybody can relate to the, to the success as well, but I think since most of climbing is falling, and failing, that's the part of it that I'm the most fascinated by. 

Kris Hampton  32:46

Yeah

Angie Payne  32:47

Is how you deal with it. Like how you get past it.

Kris Hampton  32:50

Are there any things that you saw from competitors this year, since you were looking at it from a different perspective or that you've seen in the past that you try to put into action, that you try to apply, whether it be comps or outdoors?

Angie Payne  33:06

Oh, man, there's so much that I try to...yeah, there's so much that I tried to put into my own climbing. I'm always just blown away by people's ability to like, "flip the switch" is what I always say. Like Kilian and Anna used to be, yeah, like the incredible examples of that, I thought. Like, they would have one more attempt on, you know, finals problem #4 to win the competition 

Kris Hampton  33:32

And they were able to pull it together.

Angie Payne  33:33

And 9 out of 10 times they could do it. And I was always just blown away by that, that consistency of being able to perform under pressure. And I mean, sure, I tried to put that into my climbing. I don't know how much I succeeded, but I was always inspired by it, and wanted to figure out like, how do they do that? You know, and I don't... I don't know, I still don't know how they did it. I've done it sometimes, you know, I've performed relatively well under pressure but I haven't found the secret either. I don't know if there is one.

Kris Hampton  34:03

Yeah, maybe there's not one thing, 

Angie Payne  34:05

That's the thing.

Kris Hampton  34:05

Maybe that's like what this is all about.

Angie Payne  34:07

There's no secret.

Angie Payne  34:08

 It's just like, you know, everybody has their own way and, and you can definitely learn little, you can get little tips here and there and incorporate them into your own climbing for sure. But it's always gonna be like your own approach, no matter how you do it. It's gonna be your own special combination of all the things. 

Kris Hampton  34:08

You're gonna feel it.

Kris Hampton  34:28

Yeah, 

Angie Payne  34:29

Everything that you're dealing with.

Kris Hampton  34:30

Well, I think that's a good a place as any to wrap this up. 

Angie Payne  34:34

Yeah. 

Kris Hampton  34:34

You know, maybe there is no secret. 

Angie Payne  34:36

No secret.

Kris Hampton  34:37

Maybe it's just something we continually deal with and maybe that's part of why we love it.

Angie Payne  34:42

It's definitely.... I think that's a huge part of why we love it.

Kris Hampton  34:45

Yeah. So thanks, Ang. I really, really appreciate you

Angie Payne  34:49

 Yeah, it's been fun

Kris Hampton  34:50

 Taking on this, you know, nebulous, impossible project with me.

Angie Payne  34:54

Thanks for inviting me. It's awesome.

Kris Hampton  34:55

It's been a good time. 

Kris Hampton  34:55

And that it came out like it has

Kris Hampton  34:58

Thanks. 

Angie Payne  34:59

Thanks.

Kris Hampton  35:01

And thanks to you guys a ton for listening and for sticking with us for two hours of, you know, discussing something that's really hard to pin down. You know, I, I learned a lot, frankly, from talking to these competitors and from talking to Angie and looking through her photos and discussing, you know, all of these things that we we saw and we heard and I think it's pretty important to know that, you know, none of us have the exact answer. We all feel this pressure. You know, when you're stepping up to your next project, it doesn't matter if it's V2 or if it's V14, and you're feeling the pressure, and you're not alone. We all get it, you know, we all feel it. Some of us may even say that we don't, but the proof is right there on the photos. And if you haven't looked at those, go to Powercompanyclimbing.com right now, check out Angie's photos. Like I said, she's got a really unique perspective on what these competitors are dealing with. And I think photos, particularly the ones of Alexey, the the photos of the Japanese team, and the photos of Shauna I think are incredible. So go check those out. And special thanks to my old friend Angie Payne for not only for helping out with this project, but for just lending so much of her, her creative energy to it. I really, really appreciate that. And you can you can see more of Angie's work and learn more about Angie over at Angiepayne.com. You know, she's a Midwestern girl with a really unique eye and I'm glad that she's started documenting her her travels in her life and her surroundings the way that she has. And please, if you enjoyed this episode, definitely let us know over on Facebook or Instagram, or on the blog. Shoot us an email, whatever you want to do, please just let us know we'd love to continue exploring these ideas and talking to climbers at other events. And of course, you know, keep in mind that these things take time and money to produce and you know, you can help support us a little bit over at patreon.com/powercompanypodcast. You can get extra episodes, you can get t shirts, training plans, all sorts of rewards for helping to support the podcast over there. And if you're on iTunes, or if you're an Apple podcast user, please go in and leave us a rating and a review. I'm told that it helps people find us. I don't know but I would certainly appreciate it. I love reading what you guys have to say. And you know maybe the best way to help us out is to share us on the social medias. Share Angie's photos from the blog. Share the the podcast. You can you can share us on the Facebooks. You can share it on the Instagrams. You can share it on the Twitters if you want, but you won't find us there because we don't tweet. We scream like eagles.