O'HALLORAN Tom

Preferred discipline
Lead (tomohalloran.net.au, 26 Oct 2019)

General
LEAD STRENGTH
He believes his outdoor climbing experience gives him a strong skill base to work from in the lead event. "My strength I definitely feel is in the lead and boulder. I won the 2017 boulder nationals and that felt awesome. There is some big room to improve there in getting more familiar with the types of holds and movement that is specific to those comp boulders. Lead I definitely feel the most comfortable on. Leading outdoors is what I do every week at the cliff and getting my plastic eye in isn't too hard. But I can always be fitter and having to clip every draw is tricky when I get used to skipping them outside." (tomohalloran.net.au, 26 Oct 2019)

SPEED CHALLENGE
He believes speed climbing will be his most challenging discipline in preparation for the Olympic Games in Tokyo. "Being that the route is the same every single time is a plus, but also makes for a very unique challenge. It's actually quite hard to climb that route well. You need to know it so intimately and run on autopilot. There is no time to think. I didn't think I was going to like training speed, but I am really enjoying it and always looking forward to my next session." (tomohalloran.net.au, 26 Oct 2019)

OUTDOOR TO INDOOR TRANSITION
In 2011 he moved from Brisbane, QLD, Australia to the Blue Mountains in New South Wales to focus on rock climbing. He says the transition back to sport climbing competition in preparation for the Olympic Games requires a wider variety of skills. "Since moving I have very much been an outdoor climber. I love everything about the outdoors and it's very much where I feel at home. I did, however, spend a lot of time in gyms and competing when I was younger and I very much loved that time. The training will definitely be different. With my outdoor training I take a holistic approach to becoming better. I want everything to improve, however there is usually a lean towards what will get me up my next project. For the comps it's a much wider skill set required. You need everything to be tip-top all at once because you never know what you're going to get. Then you throw in the three different disciplines and the whole thing gets even harder. It's a super exciting challenge though. It really is a test of who is the best all-round climber." (tomohalloran.net.au, 26 Oct 2019)

TV APPEARANCE
He appeared on two seasons of TV show 'Ninja Warrior' in Australia and made the grand final in his second season. "The whole TV experience was pretty full on. We're a bit of a quiet bunch us climbers. The night after we were on, we were down at a shopping centre in Sydney and we got recognised in the change room changing our daughter's nappy and that was pretty full-on and strange." (abc.net.au, 11 Jul 2020)

In December 2020 he became the first Australian male athlete to qualify for sport climbing at an Olympic Games when he won the men's combined event at the Oceania championships. (ifsc-climbing.org, 20 Dec 2020)