Bouldering World Cup 2008 and Speed: Fischhuber, Stöhr, Vaytsekhovsky and Ropek victorious in Moscow

The last round of the Bouldering World Cup 2008 started with a mathematical certainty: after their victory in Montauban, both Kilian Fischhuber and Anna Stöhr had already won the overall 2008 Cup one stage ahead of schedule. But this didn't stop the two Austrian talents from competing superbly, in particular Fischhuber who placed second and confirmed his impressively long leadership. His third overall victory – after 2005 and 2007 (and second place in 2006) came about with a commanding score of 2 victories, 4 second places and 1 seventh place.

World Champion Anna Stöhr impressed too and despite being first excluded from the final and placing seventh in Moscow, she crowned an important year with 4 victories, one 3rd place, one 7th and one 8th. Hats off to both of them and to the Austrian team which reigns supremely in both the Bouldering and Lead disciplines. Overall second place is proof of this, as Austrian phenomenon David Lama gained 2 victories, one 3rd place and one 23rd, meaning that he didn't even need to compete in Moscow to take silver.

In reality the Russian capital was braced for a completely different battle. The main focus was on the duel between Italian Gabriele Moroni and Russian Dmitry Sharafutdinov, as the former was keen on defending his lead for third overall. In the end Moroni could do no better than 10th while the 22 year old Russian placed 4th and therefore took bronze overall.  It has to be said that Sharafutdinov is not only the reigning world Champion, but also one of the strongest competitors on the planet: his bronze medal came about from 4 competitions with a stunning 2 victories, one 2nd place and one 4th.

The women's bouldering Cup was won by  Anna Stöhr as mentioned previoulsy, while 19 year old  Akiyo Noguchi placed second overall (1 victory, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th and 10th place) just 3 points clear of eternal Yulia Abramchuk, who failed to make the final hurdle here in Moscow and placed 6th to win bronze in 2008.

The Moscow final stage was won by 20 year old  Rustam Gelmanov, who sent all 4 problems in the final, unlike king Fischhuber whoe sent 3. Third place went to the relatively unknown climber  Stanislav Kleshnov. In the women's event Austria confirmed its overall supremacy with Katharina Saurwei's victory, ahead of the extremely strong Slovenians Natalija Gros and Katja Vidmar, unsurprisingly 5th and 5th overall in 2008.

Moscow was also the scent of the final World Cup Speed event; Russian ace Evgeny Vaytsekhovsky beat all rivals to clinch his third title, ahead of teammate Sergey Sinitsyn (silver) and Qixin Zhong who took bronze without taking part in the Russian capital. After a great duel the women's 2008 title went to  Edyta Ropek from Poland; her second place in Moscow was all that was needed to beat  Olena Ryepko from the Ukraine.

The next competition is scheduled for 15-16 November in Slovenia's Kranj which, as tradition has it, is also the final stage of the World Cup Lead 2008.


Results men boulder - Moscow
1 Rustam Gelmanov RUS
2 Kilian Fischhuber AUT
3 Stanislav Kleshnov UKR
4 Dmitry Sharafutdinov RUS
5 Jonas Baumann GER
6 Klemen Becan SLO
7 Loïc Gaidioz FRA
8 Vasily Kozlov RUS
9 Tsukuru Hori JPN
10 Gabriele Moroni ITA
11 Vincent Baudrier FRA
12 Alexey Rubtsov RUS
13 Mikhail Chernikov RUS
14 Lucas Preti ITA
15 Viktor Kozlov RUS
16 Benoit Heintz FRA
17 Alexander Nikolaev RUS
18 Konstantin Saveliev RUS
19 Alexander Kalina RUS
20 Mykhaylo Shalagin UKR
complete results

Results women boulder - Moscow
1 Katharina Saurwein AUT
2 Natalija Gros SLO
2 Katja Vidmar SLO
4 Yana Chereshneva RUS
5 Yulia Abramchuk RUS
6 Akiyo Noguchi JPN
7 Anna Stöhr AUT
8 Sabine Bacher AUT
9 Chloé Graftiaux BEL
10 Anna Galliamova RUS
11 Angelica Lind SWE
12 Ksenia Alexeeva RUS
13 Barbara Bacher AUT
14 Olga Bibik RUS
15 Olga Bezhko UKR
complete results