Chabot and Sarkany win in Aviles

Alex Chabot and Muriel Sarkany win the fourth stage of the World Cup Difficulty 2003 in Aviles, Spain

August 2003

Alex Chabot and Muriel Sarkany proved to be unbeatable once again in the fourth stage of Climbing Worldcup 2003, held on 22-23 August in Aviles, Spain.

Over 3000 spectators gathered on Saturday to watch the favourites proceed to the last round. Muriel Sarkany, Martina Cufar and Sandrine Levet all topped out in the Women’s Final, forcing a Superfinal which was won by the Belgian, ahead of Levet and Cufar, second and third respectively.

Sarkany now comfortably leads the provisional 2003 ranking with 355 points, over 100 points ahead of Chloe Minoret (only twelfth in Spain) and Martina Cufar.

In the men’s event, Eduard MarÃn, RamÃ³n JuliÃ¡n Puigblanque and Patxi Usobiaga made the most of their home crowd to qualify for the Final, together with CÃ©dric Lachat, Luca Zardini, Tomas Mrazek, Timo PreuÃler and, as always, Alex Chabot. The spectacular route traversed from one side of the immense wall diagonally up to the other, via a series of roofs. Chabot, Puigblanque and Usobiaga all fought their way to the top but, due to his superior Semi-Final result, Alex Chabot took home his fourth straight victory this season.

With 400 points Chabot’s lead looks unassailable, as second placed Puigblanque trails with 268, ahead of Mrazek with 175. But with a staggering five stages yet to come, the title race for 2003 is still wide open.

Results men
1.	CHABOT Alexandre
2.	USOBIAGA Patxi
3.	PUIGBLANQUE RamÃ³n JuliÃ¡n
4.	LACHAT CÃ©dric
5.	PREUÃLER Timo
6.	MARIN GARCIA Eduard MRÃZEK TomÃ¡s
8.	ZARDINI Luca
9.	MILLET Sylvain
10.	AUCLAIR FranÃ§ois
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Results women
1.	SARKANY Muriel
2.	LEVET Sandrine
3.	CUFAR Martina
4.	EYER Alexandra KNORR Damaris LAVARDA Jenny SCHÃPF Bettina
8.	POUGET Emilie
9.	CIAVALDINI Caroline
10.	BACHER Barbara

Muriel Sarkany on the road to victory, and Patxi Usobiaga climbing into second place Ph Diego Vega - Top 30
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World Cup Difficulty 2003
1.	Imst
2.	Yekaterinburg
3.	Lecco