Weber State University’s Technical Training Center was the place to be on Nov. 18. The Outdoor Recreation training center held their 2nd annual Blacklight Bouldering Competition.

Walking into the Technical Training Center, students found the usually plain looking climbing wall was covered in neon tape. The climbing holes were a vibrant color due to the blacklights set up. Balloons hung above their heads as they climbed the wall.

Amy Knight, the outdoor program coordinator, said that the training center was closed from Nov. 14 to Nov. 17 in order to prepare for the event.

“We used the week leading up to the competition to put up blacklights, tape and balloons,” Knight said. “We also made sure to take the climbing holes out of the wall to wash them, let them dry and then reset the climbing routes the way we wanted them to be.”

This year’s Blacklight Bouldering Competition had 60 students participate. Students and attendees paid $20 to compete in the Bouldering Competition. The competitors received a white t-shirt and neon paint to paint themselves, according to Knight.

“I’ve been on a lot of backpacking trips and have always been interested in the outdoors, climbing is a relatively new thing,” Cameron Hart said. Hart decided to paint a humorous warning on his shirt, saying he was new to climbing.

While most of the event took place on the climbing wall, there was also a slackline available to competitors in the training center for tricklining.

Tricklining is where a person steps onto a slackline and tries to walk across the line without falling off. Oftentimes people try to do tricks on the line, hence the word trickline.

The winners of the competition got to choose between a variety of coffee mugs for their prize. The official winners of the Blacklight Bouldering Competition are posted in a list on the Technical Training Center’s website.