What the BMC Website Covers: Outdoor Activities and Learning Resources
The BMC website (thebmc.co.uk) is the online home of the British Mountaineering Council. It covers four main activity areas — indoor climbing, rock climbing, hill walking, and mountaineering — and pairs each with learning resources such as courses, workshops, coaching, and videos. It also publishes safety guidance, destination and hut information, competition calendars and results, and GB team news. If you are looking for a single starting point to plan a climb, book a course, or check access conditions, the site is organised around those purposes.
Activity areas covered
The site groups its content by discipline, and each area repeats a similar structure of news, learning, events, and safety:
| Activity area | What the site offers |
|---|---|
| Indoor climbing | News, coaching, workshops, resources, associate walls, national competition calendar and results, videos |
| Rock climbing | News, courses, events, huts, Regional Access Database (RAD), safety resources |
| Hill walking | News, walks and events, courses, destinations, huts, safety resources |
| Mountaineering | Live winter conditions, events and courses, news, safety resources, expedition reports, huts |
This structure means you can go straight to your discipline and find the same categories of information rather than searching across the whole site.
Learning resources
Learning is one of the most developed parts of the site. Depending on the activity, you can find:
- Courses — listed under each activity area (rock climbing, hill walking, mountaineering).
- Workshops — including coaching workshops under indoor climbing.
- Coaching — indoor climbing has a dedicated coaching section.
- Videos — indoor climbing hosts a video library.
- Expedition reports — under mountaineering, useful for learning from others' trips.
The site also runs a GB Climbing Performance Programme with published selection policies and pathways, which is relevant if you are interested in competition climbing rather than recreational learning.
Safety, access, and conditions
Safety and access information is treated as a resource in its own right, not buried in news:
- Safety resources appear under rock climbing, hill walking, and mountaineering.
- Regional Access Database (RAD) — the access and conservation tool for checking where you can climb.
- Live winter conditions — under mountaineering, for judging current conditions.
- Access and conservation — news, campaigns, BMC-owned crags, volunteering, and trusts and charities.
- Wild camping and an All-Party Parliamentary Group page sit under access and conservation.
Events, walks, and volunteering
The homepage features upcoming social walks and conservation events, for example:
- Holme Fell Lake District Social Walk (7th October)
- Geology Peak District Social Walk (10th October)
- Red Deer Rut Peak District Social Walk (24th October)
- Sphagnum Moss Planting, Burbage Moor (25th November)
There are also area meetings, such as the BMC Lakes Area Meeting and the BMC Cymru (Gogledd/North) Wales Meeting & AGM. Access news includes volunteer path repair work, such as the Eryri path repaired below Tryfan and Yr Wyddfa by BMC volunteers.
Competitions and GB teams
For competitive climbers, the site provides:
- National competition calendar
- National competition results
- Meet the GB Teams
- Selection policies
- GB Climbing Performance Programme
- Skimo racing performance
Membership, huts, and travel
The site includes huts under rock climbing, hill walking, and mountaineering, plus travel insurance and a Become a Member option. It also lists clubs, local areas, and a My Profile area, and is available in both English and Cymraeg (Welsh).
How to use the site
- Pick your activity from the main menu (indoor climbing, rock climbing, hill walking, or mountaineering).
- Within that area, choose what you need: news for updates, learn/courses for skills, events for organised activities, or safety/resources for guidance.
- For access questions, go to the Regional Access Database (RAD) rather than general news.
- For winter trips, check Live Winter Conditions before you travel.
- For competitions, use the national calendar and results, and check selection policies if you are aiming for GB teams.
The main limitation to be aware of is that the site is broad rather than deep in any single topic — it points you to courses, events, and resources, but the detail often sits with the course provider or the linked resource rather than on the page itself.