Beast Fingers Youth Athlete, Hagen H., Takes 3rd at Youth Regionals!

USAC Regionals - 3rd Place

Hagen Hall takes 3rd at USA Climbing Youth Regionals at Denver Bouldering Club in Denver, CO

Last season was a rough season for Hagen, experiencing an almost career ending injury, and with the help of Denver Sports Recovery and KorperForce were able to help keep Hagen in the game, with a temporary rest from last season.  

Hagen cruised through the first four boulders, flashing each one. The last two, presented a little challenge, but he was able to push through to achieve 14.8 out of 25 points to put him in third place. 

Last and this season Philip and the great staff at Denver Sports Recovery, kept close eye on Hagen before, during and after his injury.

A common occurrence with youth athletes is growth plate fractures, which can end a youth athletes career in climbing. In Hagen's case, we were able to see the decline with our weekly measurements and KörperForce athlete assessments of the youth team, allowing us to see the decline, slowly dropping from being able to crimp 120lbs on both hands,  to a devastating 62 lbs on his left hand, and 80 lbs on his right hand over a span of 3 months,. Through all this, he crushed through regionals, divisionals, and qualified for Utah Youth Nationals.

At first his therapist thought it was a build up of scar tissue, and through more assessments, x-ray, and MRI, his middle finger tendons broke down his bone, almost completely separating the bone from the knuckle leading to him pulling out the USA Climbing and High School Climbing season.

After 6 months of rest, and crossing to other school sports, his fingers were able to heal to completion, and we are so thankful to Denver Sports Recovery for playing a crucial role in preserving his fingers.

Eric Horst wrote an amazing paper on his perspectives on youth athletes that we implement in our team, and how to prevent these injuries. "Youth cannot simply be treated as “little adults,” who are given a proportionally less serving of an adult training program. Youth climbers have unique strengths and limitations, and they are vastly different from adults, both physiologically and psychologically. Until puberty is complete, the training focus should be on skill and mental development."

Hagen H. on the podium, 3rd, standing near USA Climbing Regional Offical, JoAnne Carlli-Stevenson.

The remainder of the season, will still be busy! Next is divisionals, but he is also competing in the USAC National Cup as well, and in his recent competition at Battle of the Bay in San Diego, CA he missed qualifying by one spot! But the series is still going on, and he will be competing in the next Cup comp in the series at The Violet Crown - Crux Climbing Center in Austin, Texas. Stay tuned!