Interesting that even with the north-south split, LSE south is still a significantly bigger group than any other except SW. There are a lot of good climbers in the region, as shown by how many times LSE wins at the YCS finals, but because the region is nearly twice the size of most of the others, there are good climbers who don't get to the finals when if they lived in a different region they may have done. Admittedly this won't affect the results of the top placings at the finals, but it does affect who gets to benefit from regional and national academies. Last year in 4 of the categories, all 3 LSE competitors finished in the top 10 - where would the youngsters who came 4th in the region have finished had they been at the final? They would undoubtedly have been better climbers than many of the lower placed finalists, they may even also have been top 10, but because they were 4th they don't even get to go to regional academies.
My daughter was 4th in LSE region last year, didn't go to the finals, isn't even eligible for the regional academies, but subsequently went on to place higher at the BLCC's than all 3 of the girls who did go to the YCS final. This isn't about my daughter, though - my point is that the region is too big, and if you want the best youngsters at the finals, and you want to develop the best young climbers across the country, the region should be split properly into 2 so that it is nearer in size to the other regions.

Creating a further region would add a further 30 children to an already overcrowded event. What really needs doing is a radical reconfiguring of the regions. The children's comp scene does not need to fit with some archaic BMC regional set up but needs to more accurately reflect the siting of indoor climbing walls and the spread of children entering. Some other regions have very few walls and hence low numbers entering. It should be noted however that low numbers is not indicative of the calibre of the climbing.

In response to the previous poster's comment about BLCCs though, you should note that this does not compare like with like. There is also a route onto National Academy through the Open Youth lead and boulder events. Some children qualified for the National Academy without going to the National YCS final last year. In exceptional cases, your area co-ordinator can nominate for the regional academies too.

Does anyone know of any other open youth events inlondon and SE?

this is amazing