Climbing the walls keeps him grounded

MORRISVILLE -- Climbing used to get 10-year-old Kai Lightner into trouble.

When he was a toddler, Kai's mom said, the Fayetteville boy was always trying to scale baby gates, trees, basketball poles, the side of the house, whatever he could find.

After a while, Connie Lightner realized that her son needed a way to channel that energy into something less dangerous, and that's when a friend introduced them to rock climbing almost four years ago.

Since then, Kai has developed into one of the top indoor rock climbers in the country in his age group, good enough to represent the United States in November in an international competition in Ibarra, Ecuador.

"When we first started, I wanted to burn the energy, and I made a bet with the owner at The Climbing Place in Fayetteville that they couldn't wear him out," Connie Lightner said. "They promised me that if I gave them two hours a day, they'd send him home exhausted, and I promised they wouldn't. I won that bet."

Instead of getting tired, the 7-year-old got more excited when he heard there were rock climbing competitions and chances to meet new people.

In February, he earned second place in bouldering - climbing with no ropes or harnesses - in the 11U male youth division at the American Bouldering Series Youth National Championships in Alexandria, Va. This month, Kai placed first in sport climbing - climbing while harnessed with a belayer giving the rope slack at the bottom - and fourth in speed climbing - reaching the top of a standardized route as fast as possible - at the 2010 Sport Climbing Series [SCS] Youth National Championship in Atlanta.

U.S. team berth

Placing in the top four in all three categories earned Kai a spot on the U.S. climbing team headed to Ecuador for the Pan American Youth Championship in the Male Youth D division. He is one of only six U.S. youth climbers to qualify in all three disciplines.

"Rock climbing was just love at first sight because it's a sport I can do without getting in trouble. I used to get in trouble for the trees," said Kai, who has qualified for the SCS National Championship every year since he started. "I meet a lot of people at competitions, and I talk a lot."

One of his talking jags helped him meet his climbing coach, Emily Taylor, who works with Kai once a month in Atlanta.

"I didn't know that at the competition [the 2007 SCNS National Championship], they'd lock them all up in a room for hours, then march them out one at a time to climb," Connie Lightner said. "He was just bouncing off the walls, and he just came up to her - he didn't know who she was - plopped in her lap and started talking. She thought he was strong but saw that he was completely undisciplined."

In addition to Taylor, Kai has another coach, Shane Messer of Morrisville's Triangle Rock Club, who works with Kai two to three times a week. Kai also climbs at The Climbing Place in Fayetteville and on his own angled climbing wall in his room.

"My first impression was that he's a crazy little kid that has a lot of energy," said Messer, who has worked with Lightner the last two years. "When he started, he was the epitome of what a beginner rock climber was: All he wanted to do was be tied in and get to the top. I watched him grow from being a small kid to literally being as tall as me, but seeing him warm up by himself, with nobody telling him or reminding him when adults don't even do that, just shows how far he's come."

Coming off his performances this year in Atlanta and Alexandria, Kai said he feels "really great" about all his hard work.

"All the yelling about stuff, the arguing with my mom, talking about how to do stuff that I'm supposed to do, everything. It just pays off. Rock climbing was a second hand before, but now it's very important to me," he said.

But perhaps the one who is the happiest is the one who watched him grow from climbing baby gates at home to walls all across the country.

"It's just something he's always wanted from the first year he went to nationals," Connie Lightner said. "To see him work harder and harder, the more he didn't reach it, the more he wanted to come in and practice. Finally accomplishing that goal this year is a great feeling. If my baby's happy, I'm super happy."