Chad Morgan – General Manager
Chad grew up in South Glens Falls, NY. After graduating from SUNY Albany, he traveled to Maryland to study acupuncture and oriental medicine. While there, he began bouldering indoors and outdoors, developing a fast affinity for climbing. After graduating with his Masters of Acupuncture and Oriental medicine, he moved back to upstate NY and embarked on his career in the climbing gym industry. Chad is actively working to build the local climbing community here in Syracuse by offering both members and guests a premier climbing experience. Along with managing the gym day to day, he partakes in setting the occasional boulder problem. Outside of work, Chad enjoys walking, hiking, and bouldering with his English Staffordshire bull terrier, Raven.
Julianne Valenti – Assistant Manager
Julianne is a lifelong fitness enthusiast from Southern California. She grew up enjoying tennis, water skiing, swimming and dirt biking before becoming a personal trainer in 2006. She started climbing in 2011 and was drawn to the mental and physical challenges the sport provides. She loves getting to know the local outdoor community and hopes to make lasting positive impressions the Syracuse area. On her days off, you can find her hiking, backpacking, fishing, cycling, testing new culinary recipes on her husband and entertaining their two dogs.
Evan Race – Head Route Setter & Coach
Evan Race started climbing at the age of 2. His mother ran a small gym in his hometown of Albany, New York. He’s lived throughout the northeast, including Buffalo, Boston, Worcester, and now Syracuse. Evan has been setting professionally for nine years and has been a head setter for seven. This picture captures Evan at his happiest, when he’s around climbing holds. He also enjoys his cats, gaming, snowboarding, and all the comforts of home.
Greg Sommer – Youth Programs Coordinator
Greg Sommer has been living in the Syracuse area for over 15 years. He is a NYS certified teacher with over 20 years experience working in both the private and public school sectors. He has also worked as an instructor and director in summer camp settings, playing, exploring, learning, and creating alongside all ages. Greg is passionate about getting humans excited about developing and sustaining healthy bodies, minds and hearts through natural learning and fitness experiences. The old hemlock and maple trees that surrounded his childhood home beckoned him at a young age, which led to feeding his innate love for nature and a reverence of climbing. It was later in life that he got into bouldering after building a climbing wall in a classroom for his students to engage in more kinesthetic learning. When he saw how much it impacted his students he started an after school youth bouldering club and he’s been set on wanting to get kids climbing and moving ever since. Greg, along with his wife, a middle school English teacher, is busy raising two teenage sons and a younger daughter. When he’s not climbing and working on programming, he can be found mountain biking sweet singletrack, on some outdoor family adventure or developing alternative education programming throughout the CNY area.
Sue Brumm – Private Instruction
Sue Brumm comes to Central Rock Gym with 10 years of climbing experience and over 20 years in the sport of swimming as an athlete and coach. She is excited to help the climbers at CRG Syracuse unlock their potential through clinics, private instruction, and coaching. She plans to develop teams for youth, college students, and adults who are interested in competing. Currently, her own climbing focuses on training for and competing in bouldering events. She also runs the Chalk Dust blog, www.suebrumm.com, which provides a list of upcoming climbing competitions in all disciplines and an archive of comp results for the northeastern US and eastern Canada. When not at a climbing gym, she enjoys museums, reading, music, cooking, board games, crafts, athletics, and spending time with her family.
Joe Gehm – Real Estate & Development
Joe Gehm, a Syracuse native, was introduced to rock climbing in 2010 when he and his wife traveled to Boulder. Early on, Joe traveled to numerous climbing gyms in the northeast – starting with Central Rock Hadley in 2012. Since then, Joe has been an advocate for a professional climbing gym in Syracuse. Joe is excited that Central Rock Syracuse provides a first class climbing experience in his hometown. During his down time, Joe can be found preserving historic buildings, traveling, cooking on his salt block, sampling craft beer, enjoying scenic drives throughout the Adirondacks, and most importantly spending time with his family. Joe and his wife Morgan reside in Syracuse with their two children.
