Gill, John

As a child, Gill lived in several cities in the south of the country, including Atlanta in Georgia , where he graduated from high school in 1954 and entered the technical faculty of the University of Georgia , who graduated with a degree in mathematics in 1958 and entered the U.S. Air Force as a junior lieutenant . He took part in a special meteorology program for graduates at the University of Chicago in 1958-1959, and then was transferred to the air base in Glasgow , where he served until 1962. He retired from the Air Force with the rank of captain several years later. After receiving a master's degree in mathematics at the University of Alabama in 1964, Gill worked as an instructor at Murray State University in 1964-1967. In 1967, he entered Colorado State University to defend his doctoral dissertation in classical complex analysis in 1971. In 2000, Gill retired as a professor of mathematics from the University of Southern Colorado. While working as a teacher in his free time, he wrote and published about 30 individual research papers on the analytic theory of continued fractions and related topics. He also founded a small math journal called Communications in the Analytical Theory of Continuous Fractions, along with John McCabe of the University of St. Andrew.

John Gill began climbing and climbing in 1953 in trade climbing. By the mid-1950s, he began to specialize in very short, acrobatic routes on rock outcrops and stones, opening boulders in the 1950s and 1960s, which were much more complicated than those existing at that time. As a gymnast and considering climbing as a continuation of gymnastics, in the mid-1950s, he proposed the use of gymnastic chalk in climbing. The use of chalk (modern magnesia ) spread very quickly in America and around the world. At the same time, he presented jumping on the rocks, recommending them as a kind of technique that is inevitable in bouldering.

Gill's style was strongly influenced by gymnastics . He emphasized the shape and grace of movement with the simplicity of efficiency, which is now the cornerstone of climbing. Its performance, documented in the film when he was 40 years old (Disciples of Gill, 2009), demonstrated the simplicity of lines and minimal contact with the rock. He preferred the use of force and sometimes neglected technical movements, such as laying the heels, which he considered not aesthetic. Gill's approach to bouldering - an artistic style along with complexity - was rarely used by climbers of his generation and is considered common today, despite the fact that complexity remains paramount. He also practiced bouldering as motor meditation .

Although, of course, he was not the first serious boulderingist, his famous predecessors - Oscar Eckenstein (1859-1921) and Pierre Allan (1904-2000) - Gill was probably the first climber who made bouldering his main specialization and advocated for approval bouldering as a full-fledged sport, which can be practiced in any suitable place. His focus on bouldering and the high level of difficulty that he established inspired many thread climbers to pay closer attention to the sport, which was more regarded as just training for long routes. ^[2]

In Grand Teton, in 1958, John Gill climbed a somewhat short Baxter's Pinnacle route of approximately 6c complexity level even before such a category was officially introduced - one of the first such routes in America. In the late 1950s, Gill reached a level that is currently rated at 7s / + on several restricted boulders, but there are also suggestions that he never reached that level. Two such boulders are located in Teton - 7b +, which he climbed in 1957 and 7s in 1959 - set a new level of difficulty in bouldering, and his 1961 route Thimble 10-meter 7a + in the Black Hills of South Dakota (according to another assessment of highball 6b + / s), which he climbed free solo without prior preparation, is one of the most classic modern routes. And if we consider the novelty of the passage, then this may be the world's first route 7a +. Gill climbed routes without using the advantages of modern climbing, which significantly increased the difficulty of climbing.

John Gill received the Robert & Miriam Underhill Award of the American Alp Club in 2008 for outstanding achievements in climbing.

In the 1950s, Gill introduced one of the first, if not the first, bouldering categorization system not tied to a specific area. The system (B1, B2, B3) ^[3] included two subjective levels of complexity and one objective and was based on existing standards used in trade climbing. Highlighting climbing difficulties 20 years later and more intense competitions revealed the weaknesses of the philosophical foundations of the three-level system, although some climbers, such as Jim Halloway , used their own three-level grading system based on the Gill system. Today, the B-category scale is rarely used, replaced by an open scale of difficulty.

As an amateur gymnast with a height of 1.87 and a weight of 81.5 kg, John specialized in competitions in rope and ring climbing , achieving a result of 3.4 seconds on a 20-meter rope from a sitting position on the floor, only hands on a rope and could perform many difficult stunts on the rings, including the reverse and Olympic cross and the slow exit from the vis into the rack. As part of gymnastics, he also did weight-lifting exercises that are now practiced in gyms, having achieved 7 pull-ups on his right hand and 5 on his left, as well as several pull-ups on one arm on one finger, pull-ups on one arm with 7 kg of extra weight, pull-ups on one hand on a 1-cm pololche and holding the horizon on one hand. At the age of more than 75 years, Gill still enjoys doing moderate strength exercise ^[4] .

After the end of his climbing career, Gill devoted several years to researching the origin of climbing, especially bouldering. He also compiled a chronological list of climbing achievements. The results of his research work on climbing, as well as gymnastics are presented on his personal site ^[5] .

• Personal site
• Dad bouldering