It has been a while since the rock climbing world and the competition scene could agree on one champion. In 2009 Adam Ondra climbed the most not only hard but also diverse rock routes and won the World Cup. There is nothing super human or magical about Adam, he just brings, for the time being, the most complete climbing skill set to the table.
It is the nature of human progress that we learn. By watching the clips posted here and elsewhere, we will learn about climbing and therefore improve. Somewhere in the world a talented girl or boy, say 12 years old, who watches Adam, Johanna, Chris and all the other great climbers of our time, will be a far better climber in five years time than those guys ever could be! So read on, watch those clips, watch them again, discuss them - we will keep on making them, for the future of climbing!
We all made a bet before the comp about who would win Kranj. While it was easy (but a bit boring) with the boys (at the moment only Adam can beat Adam as you can see above) we all had it wrong with the girls (below). I don't recall a female contest on such a high level with so many blunders! At the end only Mina Markowitch and Akiyo Noguchi (bouldering WC winner) climbed their best and took first and second.
above: it has been a long season for Johanna Ernst and of course for all the others too! As mentioned above, there are not so many occasions where a climber of Johanna's caliber looks so confused in a horizontal roof! Also, she misses the knee bar for a rest and therefore most likely the victory at Kranj. Still she won the lead WC 2009! talking of our bet before the finals: after watching the clip below, we all had Ja-In as the winner... Stay tuned for more clips analyzing the 2009 climbing WC on www.udini.com!
One more thing: on the way home from Kranj Jule Wurm and I watched some parts of our "Die 2te Lizenz zum Klettern DVD" and were impressed how smooth Patxi was back than. Check it out for yourself in this excerpt:
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