Though the temperature neared a muggy 100 degrees in Minneapolis on Sunday, July 30, Bernd Strasser remained cool and calm during this year's International Tree Climbing Championship at Loring Park. While spectators sought shade around the Masters' Challenge tree, Strasser soared with great ease to each bell station, finishing with a score of 269 points.

As a result of his efforts in the Masters' Challenge and other competitions, Strasser has once again climbed to the top in the ITCC, making him the first climber to win six times.

This German crowd-pleaser is known for his fluid movements and instinctive confidence in trees.

In Minneapolis, Strasser glided around the towering maple with ease and grace unparalleled by any of the other competitors. Leaping from branch to branch without any hesitation and scurrying up rough-barked limbs, Strasser's movements resembled those of a swift gray squirrel.

With such success in climbing, one would think Strasser goes to great length to prepare. In reality, all of his preparation comes from his daily work, which involves collecting seed and leaf samples for research with his company, Baumkletterteam, and teaching advanced climbing, aerial rescue, and rigging techniques. Currently he is working with his colleagues at Baumkletterteam on a cone-picking contract. They are working to fulfill a contract for 50 tons of Douglas-fir cones!

Between seed collection projects, Strasser has traveled to various countries in Europe to conduct climbing and tree care workshops. His most recent was in Stockholm, Sweden, for Nordic Treecare.

"Maybe the good Swedish air and being on the ocean helped me during the competition this year," Strasser commented.

The Swedish air might have helped, but Strasser may owe more credit to skill and a new climbing harness-his self-designed, Treemotion.

Almost four years ago, Strasser bought an industrial sewing machine and, with the support of Chris Cowell and the input of climbers from all over the world, has produced the new harness. This is one of the few products developed by Treemagineers-a cooperative training team with Baumkletterteam.

With all Strasser's experience and passion for trees, he continues to climb and to awe spectators, fellow climbers, and competitors. He continues to break climbing records and is adamant in his beliefs regarding ethical tree work. Strasser believes it is important to do everything possible to help trees live better.

"We need trees to survive … they don't need us."

In his interview, Strasser offered this bit of tree philosophy: Bäume sind Gedicht, die die Erde in den Simmel schreidt-"Trees are poems that the Earth writes into the sky."

Even though she could not ever imagine winning the Women's International Tree Climbing Championship, Eléna O'Neill stays true to what her parents taught her: "Believe in yourself. Do your best, and you can do anything."

Eléna won the New Zealand championship last November, but this was her first time competing internationally. In the midst of a blazing Twin Cities' (Minneapolis/St. Paul) record heat, Eléna-with the support of her spouse, Leith, and her proud parents-competed in the Women's Masters' Challenge with confidence and perfectionist art. The speed and precision she showed when placing the throwline were amazing.

Last year, Eléna's fellow Kiwi, Chrissy Spence, won the women's ITCC. What is the secret of these remarkable Kiwis? Eléna says they are fortunate that New Zealand offers a great variety of tree species to climb.

Eléna started climbing in her twenties and has not stopped since. An ISA Certified Arborist since last year, Eléna has worked as a climbing arborist for seven years and now works as a climbing/ arboriculture tutor at Otago Polytechnic in Dunedin, South Island, New Zealand. At Otago Polytechnic, she teaches climbing, rigging, plant ID, and other aspects of practical arboriculture. As a tutor, Eléna says that good climbers "need to be open-minded and willing to try new things." She also has come to find that the more methodical a student is the better climber she or he will be.

"The ability to see ahead is a major advantage in climbing," she adds.

Being extremely methodical herself (at this point in the interview, Leith grinned at the characterization), Eléna enjoys looking back at a tree after she has worked on it and feeling that she has done what was best for the tree. Her favorite thing about climbing is "the freedom from gravity," as she puts it.

She considers footlocking a challenge, especially when speed is crucial in jobs such as those near busy highways or in storm-damaged trees. She says that "it's nice to work in parks or city trees where time is not such an issue-because the client is more interested in the look of the finished job than the time it took."

Eléna studied horticulture at the Waikato Polytechnic in Hamilton, North Island, New Zealand, in a two-year program. It was there that she discovered tree climbing.

"As soon as I saw someone climbing a tree, I decided that was what I wanted to do," Eléna says. She remembers that when she was only seven years old, she saw a mature tree be properly pruned, which made her think to herself, "I want to be an arborist when I grow up."

When asked about the state of arboriculture in New Zealand, Eléna explains that it is relatively new and that the authorities are becoming more aware and starting to see trees as assets and not as liabilities; therefore, they are more willing to spend money on trees. Councils (state governments) are hiring more tree workers to show the population that they are concerned about proper tree care.

One similarity between tree climbing in the United States and in New Zealand is that it's still a male-dominated profession in both countries. "Only a few women climb, even though the numbers have been growing," she says.

Eléna, and other female climbers, reports that a major hindrance is having to "prove herself" every time she works in a new job with a coworker who doesn't know her abilities.

As for her future, Eléna says that she likes to "take things as they come," but she absolutely plans to continue climbing and is up for the challenge in Hawaii next year.