Ice Climbing World Cup 2018, Han Na Rai Song, Alexey Dengin win in Saas Fee

The coldest car park in Switzerland hosted the first of five stages of the Ice Climbing World Cup 2018 last weekend. As usual spectators had prime views from the various storeys as the competition unfolded, and while the Speed event took place on Friday, the Lead went down to the wire on Saturday.

The fastest to sprint up the 16 meter ice piste were Russians Nikolai Kuzovlev and Ekaterina Feoktistova. With his time of 8.56 Kuzovlev beat his teammate Anton Nemov who stopped the clock after 8.81, while Vladimir Kartashev took bronze. Feoktistova beat Ekaterina Koshcheeva (10.79) and Natalia Belyaeva (11.47), silver and bronze respectively.

In the Lead event last year’s World Cup winner Han Na Rai Song immediately revealed her intention of defending her title, and even though she failed to climb to the top she nevertheless won the first stage, beating her teammate Shin Woonseon and Russia’s Maria Tolokonina. In the men’s event Alexey Dengin beat multiple champion Maxim Tomilov while third place went - for the first time in his country’s history - to Iran’s Mohammadreza Korouyeh Safdarian.

The Swiss stage was also used to officialise a £25.000 donation made by the not-for-profit charity founded by John Ellison Climbers Against Cancer (CAC) to the Swiss Cancer Research Foundation.

The second stage of the Ice Climbing World Cup 2018 will take place this Friday and Saturday at Corvara - Rabenstein in Val Passiria, South Tyrol, Italy.

Lead
Female
1 Han Na Rai Song KOR 15.202
2 Woonseon Shin KOR 14.200
3 Maria Tolokonina RUS 12.180
4 Ekaterina Vlasova RUS 11.140
5 Sina Goetz SUI 7.091
6 Zeinabkobra Moosavi IRI 3.070
7 Laura Von Allmen SUI 1.040
8 Petra Klingler SUI 0.021

Male
1 Alexey DenginRUS 17.292
2 Maksim Tomilov RUS 16.290
3 Mohammadreza Safdarian Korouyeh IRI 16.272
4 Alexey Tomilov RUS 16.261
5 Aleksei Marshalov RUS 11.210
6 Lukas Goetz SUI 7.141
7 Tristan Ladevant FRA 7.130
8 Nikolay Primerov RUS 4.120

Speed
Female
1 Ekaterina Feoktistova RUS
2 Ekaterina Koshcheeva RUS
3 Natalia Belyaeva RUS
4 Maria Tolokonina RUS
5 Alena Vlasova RUS
6 Nadezda Gallyamova RUS
7 Ekaterina Glazunova RUS
8 Marion Thomas FRA
9 Maryam Filippova RUS
10 Zeinabkobra Moosavi IRI
11 Mira Alhonsuo FIN
12 Kendra Stritch USA
13 Olga Kosek POL
14 Vivien Labarile SUI
15 Shabnam Asadi IRI
16 Enni Bertling FIN

Male
1 Nikolai Kuzovlev RUS
2 Anton Nemov RUS
3 Vladimir Kartashev RUS
4 Leonid Malykh RUS
5 Mohammadreza Safdarian Korouyeh IRI
6 Maxim Vlasov RUS
7 Ivan Spitsyn RUS
8 Kirill Kolchegoshev RUS
9 Rad Beheshti Mohsen IRI
10 Egor Trapeznikov RUS
11 Pauli Salminen FIN
12 Andreas Gantner LIE
13 Alexey Tomilov RUS
14 Mahdi Taghikhani IRI
15 Samuel Clavien SUI
16 Nathan Clair FRA