Leo Winfrey, 12, of DeLand, is on his way to the 2024 USA Climbing Youth National Championships, which will be held in Salt Lake City from July 7 to 14. 

Winfrey, a rising seventh grade student at Southwestern Middle School, is excelling in the sport of climbing, and Winfrey’s mother, Crystal Garcia, could not be more proud to see her son reach great heights. 

In Winfrey’s most recent fitness pursuits, those lofty achievements are becoming quite literal, as he scales walls and climbing courses that range from 13 to 70 feet in height. 

“Leo has been super active and really confident in whatever he’s interested in. Before he went into climbing, he did Crossfit competitively for two years,” Garcia said. “Now he’s on his way to Nationals [for climbing] in Utah, and we’re really proud of him. He’s working really hard for it.” 

Winfrey started climbing with DeLand based DynoClimb, located at 528 S. Woodland Blvd., just about a year ago. Winfrey described how he and his family stopped by DynoClimb on a whim, and how the fun he had that day has swiftly evolved into a competitive drive and goal of reaching the 2028 Olympics for Climbing.

“One day, we thought, ‘Hey, let’s stop by this DynoClimb place, it sounds fun.’ People are always going there for birthday parties,” Winfrey said. “So we just stopped by one day and started climbing,” Winfrey described of his introduction to the sport.

“We kept going back for a couple of weeks, and I ended up going back with my mom a lot too … I ended up joining the team at DynoClimb, and ended up doing competitions.”

As he spoke with Beacon staff, Winfrey’s enthusiasm and knowledge of the sport was apparent, and he provided a succinct description of the three categories of climbing competitions.

“Climbing is mainly three different things, competition wise. Speed, bouldering, and ropes. The walls — indoors or outdoors — can be anywhere from 30 to, I’d have to say 70 feet,” Winfrey described. 

“[Ropes] can be … pretty scary sometimes, but it is safe because …  you have a harness on, you’re connected to a rope, and someone else [is present] to give you slack on the rope — which allows you to go up or down. So even if you fall, you can’t necessarily fall all the way down,” Winfrey said.

“Bouldering … is shorter walls, just like 13 feet to 15 feet, with soft mats underneath. There is no rope, it’s just free fall … if you jump off, you’ve just got to land safe. Bouldering is more dangerous … but nothing in climbing is too dangerous unless you’re outdoors, so it is still a very safe sport,” Winfrey said.

“Speed climbing is basically … a version of ropes where … it’s the same route, the same holds every time. You’ve got to go up as quick as you can, and you are connected to a rope, but it pulls itself up,” Winfrey described. “You just go up as quick as you can, and you have to hit a buzzer at the top of the route, and someone checks your time, but I don’t do speed.”

Over the weekend of June 15-16, Winfrey secured a position to compete in the national competition for “Ropes” at a divisional competition held in North Carolina. This is in addition to previously qualifying for “Bouldering” at the national level.

“What inspires me? I guess I would have to say … I always enjoy competitions. Yes, I enjoy the crowd, but I’m not much of an attention seeker in that sort of aspect,” Winfrey said humbly. “I like seeing the routes and what I actually have to climb … I’m more inspired by the challenge. [It’s] definitely a passion — I don’t know a bigger word than that really. It’s something I really want to stick to, I’m not going to quit on this anytime.”