It started as an interest sparked in a summer camp.

Then, a coach encouraged her to join a class.

Now, sophomore Isabella Ong rock climbs on the competitive team for Momentum Indoor Climbing.

Ong has been rock climbing for four years, working up from a summer camp to now climbing three times a week for three-hour-long practices. She was first approached by then-Momentum Climbing director and coach, Dylan Stone at a summer rock climbing camp she took four years ago. Stone convinced Ong to start rock climbing as a sport.

“He asked me to come back a second week [after the camp], and then he asked me to join his class, and then after a year, he encouraged me to join the competitive team,” Ong said. “He’s always been a good mentor.”

Stone worked with Ong for a year, but he recently moved away from Houston. Ong currently trains with different coaches, focusing on two of the three disciplines of sport climbing: lead climbing and bouldering. One of Ong’s coaches, Jody Allen, has known Ong since her first class with Stone.

“Climbing is mostly about overcoming adversity and failure,” Allen said. “We fall a lot. As an artist, [Ong] has a very creative way of visualizing things and coming up with her own solutions. She’s stronger and more capable than she gives herself credit for.”

As part of the competitive team, Ong participates in competitions beginning at the local level and advancing to zone, regional, divisional and finally, national competitions. The highest level Ong has made it to was regionals for two of the three disciplines this past season, placing fourth in the competition.

“I took some pretty big falls from the wall, I almost hit the ground,” Ong said. “But I had a lot of fun, and I felt very proud that I did really good.”

Placing at competitions isn’t the only reason why Ong enjoys climbing, though. As a kid, she tried multiple sports, including Jiu Jitsu and gymnastics. However, none of these sports “clicked” as well as rock climbing did.

“It just felt like it was more me than any of the other sports,” Ong said. “I did all of [the other sports], but after a while I felt like I didn’t enjoy them. But for rock climbing, I felt like it’s something I enjoyed going to, and still enjoyed just climbing.”

Ong feels that rock climbing is a part of her identity, and expresses gratitude for the lessons she has learned in terms of not just climbing, but also her own personality.

“To me, [rock climbing is] almost like a part of me, if that makes sense,” Ong said. “Like this is something I identify as. I’m a rock climber. It’s a big part of me.”

Recently, Ong has been working through a mental block while climbing. A minor finger injury earlier last year made it difficult for her to grip onto certain holds, leading her to hesitate while climbing, something she is working to get over.

“I guess I kind of developed a fear toward those holds,” Ong said. “It just set that mental barrier for me, where I was like, ‘Well, my finger’s gonna hurt when I climb XYZ, so I shouldn’t do this, or I won’t be able to do it,’ and it just kind of held me back.”

To manage mental blocks while climbing, Ong has a system where she breaks down the climb step-by-step before getting onto the wall, figuring out what moves she has to perform, something another one of Ong’s coaches, Ben Jensen, admires.

“My favorite moments are when we’re working on a skill she’s been struggling with and she finally has that ‘lightbulb’ moment where everything starts to click,” Jensen said. “Over the past couple of years, it’s been amazing to see her develop those skills, gain confidence in her abilities, and execute those same movements during competitions.”

Ong also has another, less conventional, method of dealing with challenging moments while on the wall, especially when working on slab, a climb she isn’t as comfortable with.

“It’s kind of embarrassing, but sometimes I will just yell out, ‘I hate slab,’” Ong said. “Eventually, I would have to do it, but to get all of it out helps a little bit.”

Yelling out that she doesn’t like something has become a way for Ong to off-set her feelings at moments when she’s climbing at certain angles she doesn’t enjoy.

But despite these moments, Ong is motivated to keep on going, pushing herself to become a good rock climber. She finds support from not just her coaches, but also her teammates and classmates. Her teammate and friend sophomore William Salthouse climbs for Team Momentum as well, and they have come to support each other in both climbing and school.

“We support each other to push [ourselves out of] our comfort zones [when] climbing,” Salthouse said. “We talk about the different assignments we have to do and our different teachers as well.”

For now, Ong plans to continue rock climbing and can see her climbing as a hobby in the future, even if she wouldn’t necessarily be on a competition team.

“It’s more than just the sport, it’s the community,” Ong said. “I’ve made good friendships in the sport and I have a lot of fun. I’ve done a lot of sports before, but none of them really clicked like rock climbing. I just found that it was my sport.”