This weekend sees the start of the IFSC Bouldering World Cup for 2014 and marks the beginning of a hectic few months for the GB Bouldering Team. Dave Mason previews what’s sure to be an exciting season.
The IFSC Bouldering World Cup schedule is punishing this year: eight rounds taking place over ten weeks in a whistle-stop tour around the globe. Luckily, the GB Bouldering Team is probably in its strongest position for a number of years.
The first round takes place in Chongqing, China. After that they will fly to Baku in Azerbaijan and then onto Grindelwald, Switzerland and Innsbruck in Austria. This concludes the first half of the season and the athletes will then get a well=deserved rest week before jetting off to Toronto, Vail, back to China and finally to Laval in France for the last round of the season. I hope they all collect airmiles!
Representing Team GB at all the events this year will be Shauna Coxsey (also a BMC ambassador) and Mina Leslie-Wujastyk. Both had great seasons last year finishing in fourth and ninth in the IFSC world ranking.
Earlier in the week I spoke with the girls. After all the hard work over the past few months they both seemed ready for the off.
“I’ve done tons of training for this season. Using last year as a marker, I knew I had to up the ante, and I’ve focused on getting more powerful and stronger on big wide moves and slopey holds. These were the areas I felt I was weakest on, and it also seems that the setting for the women is going more and more in the direction of those kinds of climbs,” explained Mina.
“Anna Storh is still the person to beat,” said Shauna. “But I think the level of the women is only going to continue to increase, so it will be interesting to see the improvements we have all made over the last few months.
Over the course of the season, other GB athletes will join the girls at events they have been selected for by the team management.
Dave Barrans, Michaela Tracy and Diane Merrick will be attending all the European competitions and Diane will also be heading to Toronto and Vail. Stew Watson will be in Innsbruck, Jon Partridge will be competing at Laval and Jen Wood will make her international debut in Baku.
Nathan Phillips, fresh off a win in his last EYC (European Youth Cup) event in Laval last October, was supposed to be joining the girls at all the competitions but unfortunately sustained a finger injury on a recent trip to Fontainebleau. He has been working with Team physiotherapist Rick Webber and will hopefully be back for the later part of the season.
And finally, just a quick mention that this season it would not have been possible to send as many athletes to the competitions without the help of the climbing community. After a key financial sponsor ceased trading, they could not maintain their contract with the team. This meant one of three options: athletes would have to self-fund even more than they currently do, a new sponsor would have to be found or the athletes would have to pull out of the competitions.
Luckily with the help of crowd funding the Team found a new, rather unexpected sponsor for this year: the climbing community. So once again, a huge, huge thank you from everyone who is involved with or who represents the GB bouldering Team.
Watch live
For all information on competition dates, starting times or to watch the live streaming of the semi-finals and finals go to www.ifsc-climbing.org.
Semi-finals: Saturday. 9:30 (GMT+8)
Finals: Sunday 14:30 (GMT+8)
Read more:
Second 8b sees Coxsey set for World Cup season
British Bouldering Team: crowdfunded
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