Climber Spotlight: Jonah Waldbaum

The climber who helped start Crux Gear

Jonah’s introduction to climbing was almost accidental.
He came across a climbing gym while it was still being built, and something about it sparked his interest. When it eventually opened with a two-week free trial for new customers, he happened to be on school holidays.
So he went. A lot.

“I went very often and fell in love with the sport and community. I have been going to the same gym ever since.”

What started as something new to try quickly became part of his life. And while Jonah loves climbing itself, it is the community around it that has kept him coming back.
“I love everything about it, but the climbing community most of all. It’s so easy to meet new people in your gym, and there are so many social comps happening at other gyms that I never get bored.”
His interest in climbing also led somewhere none of us expected.
In 2022, when Jonah was still relatively new to the sport, his dad designed a portable grip trainer for his birthday.
There was no plan to start a climbing brand. It was simply an attempt to make something useful for a son who had become hooked on climbing.
That first trainer led to more ideas, more prototypes and, eventually, Crux Gear was born.
So Jonah’s Spotlight is a little different. His climbing wasn’t just part of the story that followed Crux Gear. It was one of the things that started it.

Learning to climb with more intention

Four years later, Jonah is still climbing at Bould Move where it all began.
Right now, he usually climbs twice a week. School has become more demanding, so climbing has to fit around it.
“If school wasn’t an option, I would probably have three or four sessions a week.”
The biggest improvement he has noticed recently isn’t simply strength or grades. It is the way he moves.
“I’ve been noticing my climbing is becoming smoother, and I feel the connection between my mind and every part of my body has improved.”
He describes the change in his own way:
“I’ve started climbing with purpose and intent rather than jumping around, ragdoll legs and no technique.”
That shift is becoming a big part of where he wants his climbing to go next.
He is paying more attention to body position, stability and the small adjustments that can make the difference between forcing a move and moving efficiently through it.

What competition climbing has taught him

One of the biggest lessons climbing has given Jonah is patience.
“You can’t expect to try something new—a route, a new hobby or something else—and have it work the first time. If you fail, take your time and give it another go in a different way.”
Competition climbing has reinforced that.
When time is limited, it can be tempting to jump straight back onto the wall after a failed attempt. Jonah has learned that sometimes the better choice is to stop and think first.
“Even with time pressure, the best thing you can do is stop, take a rest, and ask yourself, ‘Why didn’t that work? What part of that beta can I change or adjust that might work?’”
He says that way of thinking has started to carry over into other parts of his life as well.
Recently, Jonah won bronze at the Queensland State Lead Championship. His next focus is on his final Queensland youth competitions, where he hopes to perform well enough to earn a place at Nationals.
But results are only part of what he is working towards.
“I want to improve my mind-body relationship so that any small stability muscle or small positioning changes that have a big impact when climbing at a higher level become second nature.”

Training the weak links

Crux Gear now fits into Jonah’s training in a fairly practical way.
He uses grip trainers to warm up before sessions, and outside the gym he focuses on specific weaknesses rather than simply trying to make everything stronger.
Right now, that means pinch strength.
“I keep a Mag Board with me always, but recently I’ve found my pinch grip needs improvement, so I use the Pinch Rock on days when I don’t have a session.”
The Phone Stone has also become useful for something different.
Jonah uses it to record attempts so he can watch them back and analyse his movement—particularly useful when he is trying to understand small changes in positioning or technique.
“I always keep one in my bag because I use it quite often.”

His advice to newer climbers? Climb.

Given Jonah’s connection to a company that makes grip training tools, his advice to beginners might seem slightly inconvenient for us.
Don’t rush into finger training.
“The best thing beginners can do to improve is to just climb more. Focus on technique, body positioning and some upper body strength if you want.”
His view is that climbing-specific finger training makes more sense once you have enough experience to identify genuine weaknesses.
“Gain some experience or talk to an experienced climber before you do any climbing-specific finger training.”
Training tools have their place, but they aren’t a shortcut around learning how to climb well.
And that brings Jonah’s story neatly back to where Crux Gear began.
The first grip trainer wasn’t designed as the start of a product range. It was designed because one young climber had become interested enough in the sport for someone to ask:
Could I make something useful for this?
Four years later, Jonah is still climbing, still competing and still learning how to move better.
And that birthday project he helped inspire now travels in the climbing bags of thousands of climbers all over the world.

And we’re pretty proud of both of those things.