Watch Tom Randall climb Bassline, the longest urban roof crack in the UK

Ever since Robbie Phillips climbed a perfect hand crack below a bridge in Edinburgh, Scotland, there has been a surge in bridge roof crack climbing across the UK. At present the longest roof crack is located above a canal at Warwick and was climbed by Tom Randall in 2020 and graded somewhere in the region of 5.11+/5.12.

While this might seem nothing more than a game to some, this form of buildering is actually extremely effective for climbing outdoors. Randall explains that this type of training "… can be converted into the next level of crack climbing outside. This is just a whole other world that’s opened up in this form of climbing. It’s pure, it’s technical, there’s no compromise and it’s really, really pumpy." Words worth noting from the man who with Pete Whittaker in 2011 established one of the hardest offwidth roofs in the world, Century Crack.