Tall or short: what's better for climbing hard?

This seems to be a controversial topic, probably because the answer is not as simple as in many other, especially well established, sports (and because climbers love excuses to why they didn't send). Virtually all of the athletes in, for instance, high jump are tall. In gymnastics you retire already during the puberty, if you grow over a certain height. Still, even in the long-established sports the outliers sometimes can perform surprisingly well - before the first victories of Usain Bolt everyone thought that being short and muscular (not that he isn't muscular, but other sprinters are often more muscular) is the optimal body type for the 100 m dash. And probably it is the optimal body type - one or a small number of outliers don't flip the rule, they weaken it. Nevertheless, in running disciplines, be it a sprint or a marathon, athletes tend to have quite similar stature, seemingly less diverse than in climbing.

 

Bouldering World Cup podium, Meiringen 2021. Photo by Petr Chodura from press release at Adam Ondra's website.

 

It is obvious that tall climbers can reach further skipping some bad holds, or keep their feet lower when shorter climbers have to bring them up. That can be a huge advantage on some routes, no doubt about it. But it's often presented as if tall climbers had a choice between the tall beta and the short beta, which is not the case. Using high feet and getting some intermediate small crimps is as accessible for tall climber as reaching past the crux for the short ones. There are  always different methods of doing a climb and which one is the easiest depends on your body type. However, the asymmetry comes for the fact, goes the usual argument, that a tall beta can be sometimes physically impossible for a short person, for example when it's a static span, but the short beta is in theory always possible for a tall climber. In theory, in practice it's often virtually impossible. Bunched up positions, bringing feet very high, keeping hands close to each other - all of those situations get significantly harder with growing leverage of your legs, arms, and torso. Using the same heel hook might require putting it at the chest level for one person or at the neck level for another. In a small-box position a climber might have the knees in their chest or in their face depending on height. It's a big difference.

Another repeated argument is that tall climbers can get to the top of the route doing fewer moves. Fewer moves, it states, equals less energy used, therefore it's easier. The problem is that any climber has to elevate their body weight to the same height and this is what dictates the energy expenditure. Moreover, the bigger the weight the more work it requires and taller climbers are heavier. That's why bigger, more muscular athletes can do well in bouldering, but rarely can we see them redpointing long endurance routes. This seemingly paradoxical outcome is similar to the situation in the 100 m dash. Tall runners have longer legs, one could think, so they have to do fewer steps to run 100 meters. But it just doesn't work like that, since tall sprinters like Usain Bolt are  an exception, not a rule. Again, taller athletes have to carry more weight, have longer leverages to work with, and different ratios of muscle strength to body size. That's what I imagine makes the difference, I don't know much about running. 

I hope I convinced you that it's not clear what body type is the best for climbing hard. Well, I focused so far on disadvantages of being tall, but disadvantages of being short are obvious. So, is there a perfect stature for our sport? In the following paragraphs I will look at it from various angles. It turned out to be a bit lengthy article, so grab a drink, seat comfortably, and enjoy, maybe you will find a perfect excuse for why you didn't send!

When does the height matter?

An excellent climbing ability is an outcome of a complex interplay between several factors or skills, which can be generally grouped as:

• technique
• strength and endurance
  
• tactics
• mental game

It's hard to say what is their relative importance, but there is no reason why the last two would depend on height. Strength and endurance, not absolute but relative to the body weight, are easier to develop for shorter athletes. This statement shouldn't be controversial. Shorter people have, on average, smaller hands (meaning shorter fingers) and shorter arms giving better leverages. They can get more out of every kilogram of their muscles. The most difficult to pin down it technique. Who is at an advantage when learning and performing different skills from the movement library of climbing? I say, it depends on the movement. The most obvious difference is that all reachy hand moves or long dynos will be easier for taller, and all bunched up positions and high feet will be easier for shorter climbers. Also fat pinches are easier for people with bigger hands and those tend to be tall. On the other hand, thin pinches feel better with smaller hands. Shorter people also have smaller feet, which together with weight plays a role when using tiny footholds on slabs. But then again, especially on slabs it's easier to reach past the bad holds. Other moves or techniques, in my opinion, can't be classified as easier  or harder for a particular body type and the perceived difficulty will depend on the route and the layout of footholds and handholds. There is no reason why a heel hook, toe hook, drop knee, kneebar, flagging, deadpoint, double clutch etc should be easier for a tall or short person. Again, unless the arrangement of holds makes it reachy or squeezed in a small space, which goes back to the fundamental difference between short and tall climbers explained above.

"The most obvious difference is that all reachy hand moves or long dynos will be easier for taller, and all bunched up positions and high feet will be easier for shorter climbers."

We know the general influence of height on the difficulty of a climb, but everything really depends on the route and the movement options that it provides. There are routes virtually unclimbable if you are too short. In 2020 Adam Ondra (186 cm) made the first ascent of Bohemian Rhapsody 9a+ and commented that for climbers below 170 cm the route is probably impossible (you can convert all the heights to the Imperial system here, and all the grades to other systems here). Boulders like Power of Now 8B+ are definitely easier for tall climbers - if you check its ascents logged on 8a.nu you will see climbers over 180 cm on average. Surprisingly, its direct, harder variant was opened by Simon Lorenzi who is only 168 cm, although with an impressive +12 cm ape index. Another iconic first ascent by Adam Ondra, La dura dura 9b+, has not only a super long crux move to a crimp which Chris Sharma (184 cm) could only get with two fingers, but also a wide pinch in the second crux, which is most likely easier for people with big hands. Maybe that's the reason why we have never seen a third ascent, although much shorter Janja Garnbret (164 cm) reported doing all the moves. I can even imagine a 7a sport route which would be impossible for climbers below a given arm span regardless of their strength and other attributes - just include a traverse section on a rounded pillar which you have to hug fully extended in order to get from one juggy pocket to another, with a few spare footholds on an otherwise blank wall. You can't jump around a corner without getting away from the wall, so there's no way of doing a dyno instead of a static span.

I could give much more examples of routes with a beta easier for taller climbers, as they are clearly visible. Just find a very long move with no intermediates. But there are also many routes harder if you have more limbs and trunk to squeeze in a small box. A great example is Excalibur 9b+ first ascended by Stefano Ghisolfi (170 cm). The best option for the upper crux, according to the climbers who tried it, is a high right heel hook. Just compare the frames of Adam Ondra on this move with Stefano. Adam has much harder time getting his body close to the wall and generating from a heel at the level of his chest, while Stefano and also Will Bosi (175 cm) do the move almost statically. In the end Adam decided to give up on this project. Similarly, the left heel hook and bunched up position at the beginning of Roadkill 8C look heinous for Giuliano Cameroni (181 cm) and Jimmy Webb (183 cm) as you can see them struggle, while the first ascensionist, Shawn Raboutou (168 cm), looks almost relaxed (I know, he always looks relaxed). According to Will Bosi also Alphane, one of the few 9A boulders, is harder for taller climbers. Or boulders in a Moonboard style, where you have to jump and then use the lower handhold as a foothold, are harder if you are long, but not long enough to just skip the jump. And then there are the sit starts...

What does the data say?

Competition climbing

EDIT:  I wasn't satisfied with the data on competition climbers I found, so I decided to look for it myself. I ended up downloading and analyzing the IFSC rankings of the last ten years. There were several interesting results, which are impossible to squeeze in here - I describe what I found in the post "What is the average height of the best competition climbers?". My numbers were not far away for men, but women were slightly taller than the average I reference below.

In climbing competitions, bouldering and lead, we see athletes of completely different body types and height often in the same final. On one hand, we have relatively tall Adam Ondra (186 cm) who was often on the podium 10 years ago when he was skinny and is still among the best now with visibly more muscular shape. We have even taller Jan Hojer or Meichi Narasaki (both 188 cm). On the other hand, there is Sean Bailey (163 cm), Sascha Lehmann (164 cm), and Sorato Anraku (168 cm), all three successful climbers and all very short. The difference between the tallest (Paul Jenft at 198 cm) and the shortest (Shion Omata at 162 cm) climber in the top 20 ranked in the IFSC 2023 World Ranking is 36 centimeters! We have tiny and skinny Laura Rogora (152 cm), more muscular Jain Kim at the same height (152 cm), strong looking Janja Garnbret and Vita Lucan (both 164 cm), and tall Staša Gejo (175 cm). In the IFSC 2023 World Ranking there is Julia Kruder (175 cm) and 25 cm smaller Chaeyeong Kim (150 cm). That's the beauty of this sport - different athletes can use different assets corresponding to their style, strength, and body type. But it might well be that one set of traits is more advantageous than the other in the long run.

If there is so much variety among the athletes, is there the best height for climbing? In competition climbing the answer can be found easily, just take the highest-scoring athletes and compute the average height among them, right? Well, it's not that straightforward, but more on that later. The calculation has been done for the 2022 IFISC World Cup finalists by Tony Dang on his blog. The result was: 175 cm for men and 162 cm for women in bouldering, 174 cm for man and 161 cm for women in lead climbing (later I will give examples of scientific papers providing this data for competitions much longer time ago).

Whether it is tall or short depends on where you stand, but interestingly those numbers are not far away from the average height worldwide. Leaving aside the small sample size, does it tell us something? If the average of a trait (like height) of the best performing competitors is the same as the population average, it might indicate that this trait does not actually matter. In other words, if height is irrelevant to climbing performance at competitions we should see the same height distribution among the winners as in the general population. Hair color is certainly inconsequential to the climbing ability, so we expect to see people with all hair colors in the finals. But the distribution being the same is the crucial part - if all the competitors were exactly 175 cm tall, it would be a clear indication that this height is for some reason hugely advantageous. Even if it happened to be the population average as well. The same argument works, if the height of the competitors was always between 174 and 176 cm, and for any distribution with a significantly lower standard deviation than in the general population. Therefore, just by knowing that the averages are similar it is impossible to tell if this height is optimal for competition climbing or whether the athletes simply represent the whole population and the height doesn't really matter.

Additionally, we have to be careful comparing the average height to the world average, because climbing, although rapidly getting more popular, is not equally developed across all the countries. The cultural factor is important in this case. To give an example from a different sport, Poland and Czechia have similar populations, but Czechia is much better at ice hockey - people just play it and train it on a larger scale there, it is a much more popular sport in Czechia. Countries where climbing is popular will produce more athletes and skew the average height towards the one of their society. 175 cm is tall in Japan, but short in many European countries. On the other hand, Americas, Europe, and Asia have quite different height demographics and all have a good representation in competitions. It would be probably better to compare the height statistics of the best performing athletes taking country-specific participation into account, not to draw wrong conclusions. Since we don't have such data, it's impossible to say whether 175 cm is short or tall, it's just the average height of the best male competition climbers in 2022.

 

Rock climbing

We could see how difficult it is to draw a strong conclusion analyzing competition data, but it's even harder to say something decisive about rock climbers and their attributes. In a competition all climbers compete under the same conditions on the same route or boulder problem. It's their ability to climb against the challenge prepared by the routesetters - the challenge is the same for everyone. In rock climbing it's difficult to test all climbers on the same route, although people keep track of ascent of recognized test pieces. Nevertheless, the usual comparison of abilities of different climbers is the grade. And grades are not objective (perhaps it's a topic for another post), they represent the difficulty as perceived by the majority of ascensionists, they can differ from crag to crag, from country to country. For that reason comparing climbers based on the grades they climbed is tricky, but that's the only possibility (unless we make a competition on an outdoor route).

If you want to find the optimal height through statistics, one way to do it is to analyze the average (or median, or other measures) height of climbers who can climb a certain grade, for example 9a. Higher grades are better to indicate the optimal body type, because you need not only a lot of training, dedication, and experience to get there, but at certain level also genetic potential. With enough of the former three everyone can climb a 7a endurance route, even if they start climbing at an older age (with some limit of course). Can everyone who starts climbing at 7 years old and trains mindfully with a lot of dedication for years redpoint a 9a? I don't know, but one of those higher grades is certainly unreachable for most of the people, despite hypothetically dedicating their life to climb it. Those who do get to such level possess something more, which can not be obtained through training. Short fingers of equal length? A certain ratio of slow and fast-twitch muscle fibers? Perhaps a height within the optimal range?

The worst way to determine the optimal height, without a doubt, is to cherry-pick climbers by hand and look at their height. There is a lot of this type of "analyses" on the internet. Taking just a few top-performance athletes in a sport as young as climbing doesn't make much sense. I have seen tables combining professional climbers such as Dean Potter, Nathaniel Coleman, Tom Randall, Dan Osman, and Nalle Hukkataival. I mean, we could as well throw some alpinists and speed climbers in there. Or a climber who got a sponsor thanks to the number of followers on social media. Professional climber can mean a lot of things, here we are of course interested in sport climbers and boulderers.

Does science answer our question?

Despite the fact that climbing is a relatively young sport there has been scientific research done to discover determinants of success in sport climbers, investigating influence of strength and endurance, body composition, and anthropometric parameters (including height). The first publication I found was from 1993 (!), where they studied profiles of "competitive sport rock climbers" (keep in mind that competition climbing changed a lot during the last 30 years).

The research in this area usually compares different traits and physical tests' results of a group of climbers with a group of non-climbers. In most cases there are significant limitations, mainly a small sample size (typically a few dozen climbers) and all subjects coming from the same country or even the same university. I used tools like Google Scholar and elicit.com to find the publications, but I don't follow the scientific literature on this topic and definitely could have missed some. Many of the studies provide other intriguing results, for example on physiological adaptations or predisposition of elite climbers, but I focus here on height (I will give you a few nuggets at the end).

Watts 1993 studied 39 World Cup climbers and concluded that "elite sport climbers are of small to moderate stature and exhibit very low % fat", although the average height was close to the population average for male and female athletes. The same author studied also junior athletes - 90 competitive young climbers from the Junior US National Championship were studied together with a control group of 45 children actively pursuing other sports. "Climbers were significantly smaller in stature and had a lower body mass than the controls" by almost 10 cm. To be fair, the control group might have been particularly tall, but still. However, in Physiology of difficult rock climbing Watts reviewed several studies and also concluded that "the modern elite rock climber tends to be a relatively small individual with a low percentage of body fat". He wrote further that a "greater height may enable longer reaches between moves; however, there may be biomechanical disadvantages associated with longer moment arms relative to resistance forces. Taller climbers would also tend to be heavier. Higher body mass would increase the muscular strength requirement for maintaining contact with holds and increase the workload of moving along the climbing route", which is a direct answer to the argument of "doing more moves".

But there is no consensus in scientific research regarding the height of climbers. In other publication no difference in height was found between elite climbers, recreational climbers, and individuals doing other sports, although with only 10 participants in each group. This result was confirmed in a very similar analysis with just 2 participants more. Another study of 44 climbers stated that "findings do not support the belief that a climber must necessarily possess specific anthropometric characteristics to excel in sport rock climbing", in agreement with this review summarizing "it could be suggested that both height and ape index are not a prerequisite for climbing success".

This study of 20 climbers (6 elite defined as 8b and above, 14 advanced for 7c+ and above) also found that "elite climbers had an average height". Another one of 21 climbers and a big control group reported "no between-group differences were found for body height". Interestingly, it also stated that "the climbers exhibited significantly lower pelvis-to-shoulder ratio, longer lower extremities, and greater arm length and arm span compared to untrained students". Maybe the optimal body for climbing is a tiny short torso, widening from narrow hips to massive shoulders, and with unnaturally long limbs? But being serious, longer limbs is something that didn't show up in other studies. A more recent publication with 55 female climbers didn't find significant differences in height among groups with different climbing ability (although the average and the standard deviation were decreasing with increasing ability). Finally, a review of 18 articles reported significantly lower height among elite climbers, but only for female athletes and only in one of the articles, with the rest obtaining average height.

"It's hard to come up with a strong conclusion based on available scientific papers. They mostly report no influence of height on climbing performance or a slight tendency towards shorter individuals in high-level climbing."

It's hard to come up with a strong conclusion based on available scientific papers. They mostly report no influence of height on climbing performance or a slight tendency towards shorter individuals in high-level climbing. In some (most?) topics a survey of peer-reviewed research should be the way of settling the discussion. In climbing, however, it's not so simple. There is not as much research as in well-established sports and the studies that exist, as we can see, have a major flaw of very small sample size and highly homogeneous groups (students of one university, athletes of one competition, participants from a single country etc). For that reason, I believe that looking at other resources (as those mentioned in this blog post) is still worthwhile. Sure, they don't have the rigor of scientific publications, but they can have much larger and much more diverse datasets.

Ok, the research doesn't indicate any optimal height, but is there any meaningful correlation between climbing ability and other anthropometric parameters or physical traits? Yes there is, and the outcome is not very surprising. Generally, the better performing groups of climbers (e.g. elite compared to advanced, advanced compared to recreational etc) tend to have higher grip strength and endurance to body mass ratio (surprisingly the absolute grip strength doesn't differ from the general population), lower body fat, greater shoulder girdle endurance, better hip flexibility, and smaller calf circumference. There you have it, before using your height as an excuse try getting stronger fingers and iron shoulders, loosing unnecessary fat, stretching your lazy ass, and skipping the leg day.

Self-reported data

There are quite a few analyses of the effect of height on climbing performance based on the self-reported data from 8a.nu. It's not a perfect dataset. If you log your ascents you are probably a keen climber, perhaps more driven than a normal climber. The data is self-reported and most likely the website is more popular in certain geographical areas than others. But it is the biggest available dataset of over 4 million ascents with some basic information about approximately 15 thousand climbers, and what's important for us it includes height. Yes, the self-reported data is not optimal, but the publications I discussed can not get anywhere near those numbers. And if there is a significant difference among the most motivated climbers (if those are the users of this website), perhaps it's even more important indication of a predisposition for climbing?

I found three analyses of 8a.nu data worth mentioning: an article on Medium by Mark Dodd, and two blog posts, one on Alessandro Masullo blog, and one on Climbstat by Arne Jonas Warnke. There are two main conclusions coming from their work. One is that the average height of climbers decreases with grades, or in other words, a typical climber who can redpoint a 9a route is shorter than a typical climber who can redpoint a 7a. Second, the optimal height for climbing hard is between 160 and 170 cm for men and around 150-155 cm for women, which is well below the average of the general population.

"a typical climber who can redpoint a 9a route is shorter than a typical climber who can redpoint a 7a"

When looking at the height vs. grade plot in the first article we can see that  the average height of climbers fluctuates around 178 cm up to the maximum sent grade of 8a, after which it drops. From the same article it follows that 8a.nu is the most popular in Europe, North America, and New Zealand. What does it tell us? That the average height of climbers up to 8a is the same as the average height for the general population in these regions. Ergo, climbing is equally popular among people of different heights and all are equally likely to progress up to this grade. 8a is often mentioned as the maximal grade that everyone can climb. Of course, after years of dedicated training, but in principle, they say, there is no minimal threshold of natural talent or genetic potential up to this point. Interestingly, this data would more or less support such statement, given that 8a is also the most common max grade logged (well chosen name 8a.nu!).

After 8a the average height starts to decrease, meaning that there is fewer tall climbers using the platform who can achieve harder grades. For 9a the average height is around 173-174 cm and we know from a histogram on Climbstat that a wide range of heights is represented in the data. For women there is fewer entries, hence the relationship is more noisy, but the decrease in the average height for harder grades is equally clear.

However, a more compelling figure is obtained when plotting the maximal grade climbed for different heights. In all three analyses there is either a consistent decrease of the max grade with increasing height or an inverse U-shape behavior with the highest grades achieved by men between 160 and 170 cm and women between 150 and 155 cm tall. Climbers of the optimal (according to the plots) height climb up to two grades harder on average. One analysis additionally suggests that the progression rate is slower for taller climbers, but it doesn't look like a significant discrepancy. In the same post there is a pretty big increase in the maximal grade for people above 200 cm tall, especially for 215 cm, but it's not reproduced elsewhere. People that tall are generally considered to be at a huge disadvantage and you won't see many of them at the gym, crag, or in climbing media. Maybe these few outliers who logged such hard redpoints found those mythical routes where you have tiny crimps only at the crux, which can be totally skipped going from one jug to another if you are 215 cm...

Performance coaching datasets

The last resource we are going to take a look at are measurements performed by coaching companies. They often test clients with various exercises and try to explain their climbing ability with obtained results. Note, that the highest grade sent is still self-reported, but other measurements are done with a coach supervision and their datasets are relatively big.

Lattice Training in an episode of the trainingbeta podcast shared some findings of their own study of 500 individuals, where they tested various performance markers for climbers of different abilities. Inclusion criteria aside, this certainly is a great data with more than just the height and hardest grade sent and that's why it's often referenced in online discussions. Lattice training sometimes publishes in peer-reviewed journals, for instance one of the co-authors of this paper that I described before is a Lattice associate, but I couldn't find the particular study they discuss in the podcast published. And I find their results intriguing but their logic flawed.

The main finding they share is: shorter climbers have more finger strength than tall climbers at the same grade (I assume they look at the single hardest route sent), about 2.5% more finger strength per 10 cm of height. Actually, they say that short climbers need more finger strength to climb the same grade, because it's harder for them. In other words, tall climbers have an advantage, and not only here but, as they report, in every single performance marker, except for core strength (they don't say what they mean by core strength). Although, when asked why there are so many short and successful climbers they say it's easier for short people to learn good technique, coordination, and dynamic movement. How's that, if true, not an advantage? Anyways, their point as I understand it is: being taller is better for climbing, because you can climb the same grades with less strength.

"shorter climbers have more finger strength than tall climbers at the same grade, about 2.5% more finger strength per 10 cm of height"

In my opinion, they make an error in identifying causal relationships when drawing their conclusions. They even go down the rabbit hole of having to do more moves on the same route when being shorter as a reason for the higher effort for those climbers. Let's take a step back to see what their results actually mean. Let's consider an analogues situation - imagine that they test 500 sprinters and see that shorter athletes have more leg strength that tall athletes who obtain the same time in the 100m dash. For example they squat higher percentage of their body weight. I don't know if that's the case, but it's certainly realistic. What would it mean? That shorter runners have it harder? They need more leg strength to run equally fast? And therefore being tall is an advantage in sprinting? No, we can discover the genetic predisposition for fast running by comparing large groups of people who dedicated their life for getting as good as they can and looking at attributes of those who win. If we know that shorter runners, in general, obtain better results their height might be a predisposition. And having more leg strength might be not an obstacle to overcome, but an adaptation which is easier to obtain if you are short.

Going back to climbing, Ollie Torr and Tom Randall from Lattice Training give another interesting result of their investigation in the podcast - a comparison between male and female climbers. Females who can climb the same grade, they say, have on average 10% lower finger strength. That's really interesting finding on it's own, but following their logic they should say that male climbers need 10% more finger strength to climb the same grade, hence they have to try harder and females have an edge, right? Not really, although the performance difference between male and female climbers is relatively small, compared to other strength-based sports, male athletes still obtain better results (i.e. higher grades).

So, where does the difference in finger strength come from? Finger strength is not a linear predictor of climbing ability (it's the best correlate, though), you can use many assets to increase your performance. Perhaps it's easier to get stronger for men? Or maybe men enjoy pure strength training, like hangboarding and campusing, more, while women have easier time getting flexible? I don't know, but certainly you wouldn't say that women are at the advantageous position in climbing, regardless of they scores on a fingerboard. Equally, it's erroneous to say that tall climbers have an edge, just because they have less finger strength. After all, the result was to be expected. If you take a group of equally experienced sportspeople and test them at any body-weight exercise - be it a pull up, iron cross, front lever, or hanging from your fingertips - shorter people will score higher, because of shorter leverages and greater ability to develop good strength-to-weight ratio. They sure have done a great job at collecting all the performance markers of so many climbers. Unfortunately though, they didn't publish the data and without it it's impossible to verify their methods and perform an alternative analysis.

Another coaching company, Power Company Climbing, shares their data from an analogous assessment of around 600 climbers. There are two very similar analyses of the Power Company Climbing dataset published on Kaggle, one from a year ago and one very recent. Although they use similar methods the results are slightly different. I'm guessing this is because over the year that separates the two publications Power Company Climbing updated their dataset with new clients and different approach to data cleaning. Without going into much detail, it looks like in general there is a very small positive correlation between height and maximum climbing grade, however it can be also negative depending on the sex and the type of correlation (Pearson or Spearman). For sport climbing the correlation is just below the threshold of statistical significance and for bouldering just above (for α=0.05). In their machine learning / statistical prediction models height is insignificant. In short, height is not a good predictor of the maximum grade sent, based on the data collected by Power Company Climbing (surprisingly, neither is weight).

Putting it all together

Given all the aspects of climbing ability discussed above, scientific publications, results of data analyses for competition and rock climbing, anecdotal evidence from professional climbers, and my own experience (the least important factor) I can come to the only reasonable conclusion: height does not matter much in climbing (unless you are a giant or a dwarf). Sure, there are routes where it makes all the difference, but we are talking about climbing in general, not about redpointing a particular route that you find morpho. For competing it's best to be of average height or on the slightly shorter side. For getting as high as possible on the ladder of grades it's mostly irrelevant. If you want to be a generalist, it's easier to be of the average height, because routes you climb are graded by the average climber in a sense (a consensus of the majority doesn't represent well the height outliers). But if you want to get a high number in you logbook it doesn't matter much, since you can choose a route or boulder problem that suits your body type and style and you might find it easier than it was for the average climber.

 

 P.S. I am tall.