In Edinburgh!

I vividly remember the first time I competed in the Edinburgh International Climbing Arena in 2010. Back then, I was one of the youngest girls watching the Juniors who seemed so much older and way more experienced than I. And this year I already belong to the oldest athletes myself!

The Belgian Youth Climbing Team!

Saturday – Qualifications and Semifinal

I topped both qualification routes, but in the second one I made a little mistake…  Because the routes were quite slabby and technical, I had to climb more slowly and precisely than in overhanging routes. So before I started, I reminded myself that I had to be careful not to run out of time. But while climbing, I completely forgot to pay attention to my watch and steadily made my way up – too slowly. When I suddenly realised that I only had 6 minutes, I speeded up and rushed on to get as high as possible within the remaining time. I took the last hold, clipped the quickdraw and let go. When I came down, the judge showed me his stopwatch: 6 minutes and 1 second! As we only have 6 minutes to climb a qualification route, I didn’t get my TOP. I was a little disappointed with myself, but I had to focus on what was coming next: the semifinals that evening. The semifinal route was an overhanging one which I topped along with 4 other girls. That meant that this 1 second still counted and I was placed 3rd on the provisional ranking.

1 second…

The next morning all finalists returned to the climbing hall to climb their final route. Ours was a pink one in the middle of the overhang. As I climbed, the movements felt quite difficult and surely harder than those of the semifinal. But I was able to top out and clip the chain again! 🙂 Jessica and Salomé were both ranked first and I knew that they were capable of topping as well. Unfortunately one move was extremely far for Salomé who is a lot smaller than most other girls. She still managed to do it and climb on, but it had cost her so much power that she couldn’t top out anymore. Jessica did manage to top the route and she became 1st. Congrats to Jessi for her strong performance and to Julia Fiser for taking the bronze!

I had hoped that my 1 second wouldn’t make a difference, but eventually it did… How a small amount of time can have such big consequences! 😉

Jessi, Julia and me on the podium (photo: Tijl Smitz)