It was a birthday party several years ago where Emily Scott discovered she loved climbing. The Canberra teenager is now one of the best sports climbers in Australia and has her eyes set on the Olympics.
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00:00 It's a normal afternoon for Canberra local Emily Scott.
00:05 She puts on her climbing shoes and powders her hands, then she's ready to scale the wall
00:09 in front of her.
00:11 But this time, the stakes are higher than ever.
00:13 I'm now ranked as the third in Australia for the upcoming event, the Oceania Championships.
00:20 And the winner of that will be going to the Paris 2024 Olympics.
00:24 The fast-growing sport was first introduced to the Olympics in 2020.
00:28 If gaining selection in an Olympic team wasn't hard enough, the quotas make it even harder.
00:33 Just one female athlete in the Oceania and 20 in the world are picked in Emily's climbing
00:39 discipline known as the combined boulder lead.
00:42 It makes it really challenging when it's just the winner because it means that you have
00:45 to be in absolutely perfect shape in terms of training, in terms of preparation and your
00:51 mindset going into the competition.
00:53 The ACT has the highest participation rate for climbing in Australia, according to government
00:58 data.
00:59 Participation is easy for people who are not particularly athletic through to people who
01:03 are quite athletic.
01:04 Everyone can join in and have a try.
01:06 So the participation rates are quite high.
01:08 But not many people make the jump to the competitive level.
01:11 With low numbers comes less funding and less reason to raise quotas for what's still a
01:16 new Olympic sport.
01:18 Come on.
01:20 These girls are so impressive.
01:22 Well done Australia.
01:23 If a sport starts to prove itself, its popularity, boosts viewer numbers for the Olympics, for
01:28 the IOC worldwide, then you would start to see an increase in those quotas.
01:33 While the Olympic quotas are up in the air, Emily is happy to be in contention for Paris.
01:38 It's really kind of cool to see that, wow, okay, maybe I could one day go to the Olympics
01:44 or at least try to.
01:45 A young athlete reaching new heights.
01:47 [BLANK_AUDIO]