First Ascent Block 37

My favorite First Ascent location. The setting is the best in the city by far. There’s a lot of variety of holds and it is challenging. The setting forces technique and tension when a lot of commercial sets these days can be solved with brute strength. The wall structures are beautiful. The system boards are convenient. Kudos to the setters. I think the sets at block were a HUGE contributor for me sending my first v9 outdoors so thank you!!! The commercial sets translate well which is rare for gyms. Nice facility. Only one big con is the kilter board is not set up properly and can be unpleasant to climb. It’s also a little embarrassing that FA doesn’t have a Tension Board 2 in any of the locations in Chicago. I’ll give Block 5 stars anyways due to the good setting.

Great place to stop and climb! I was visiting and ended up in rental shoes. Will say that the rentals are garbage, as is expected from hard, durable rubber. Even good feet slipped if you didn't have extreme tension all the time. I felt soft capped at V3 because of no footwork potential. Once I realized that more muscle would probably overcome the rentals limitation, I was able to knock out some V4s and get progress on a couple of V5s/V6s. That said, poor fitting rentals shouldn't get a mediocre climber like me past V2 or so, so I think this gym is pretty soft on grades. Or I'm just traumatized from upstate NY grading. In any case, friendly staff, cool and interesting problems, decent size facility and walls, garbage rental shoes. Highly recommend if you have your own shoes and want an ego boost on grades!

Been to this gym a good handful of times and the setting here is definitely the worst of the Chicago bouldering gyms. It feels like they don’t take into account anyone unless you are a big man. It is shoulder move after shoulder move here. Prices are the cheapest in the city but it shows. I love everything else about this gym. bathrooms are clean, cardio and gym equipment all works, The desk staff are incredibly helpful. I want to love this gym but the setting here is making it really hard.

I want to give a huge shoutout to Vincent at First Ascent Block 37. A couple of months ago, he took the time to walk me through some climbing techniques that completely changed how I approached a V4 route and noticeably improved my ease and confidence on the wall. I ended up pausing my membership for a bit to explore other gyms, but during that time I realized just how rare Vincent’s level of attentiveness, kindness, and knowledge really is. I didn’t encounter staff anywhere else who were as genuinely invested in helping climbers improve. That experience ultimately brought me back to First Ascent and led me to restart my membership. Kudos to FA for staffing such talented people like Vincent (also referred to as V I think?) who truly care about their fellow climbers. He makes the gym a better place to climb.

Got a 10 passes punch card for 250 dollars. I like it, it is big: has a lot of boulders, a good gym space with machines, and a yoga room to stretch. The boulders are quite fun, and they don’t use color gradings, just directly refer to the routes per their grading system (i like that)