Yannick Flohé fires Brixen Boulder World Cup 2022

After Natalia Grossman’s victory on Saturday night, the fifth stage of the Boulder World Cup drew to a close last night in Brixen, Italy, with the highly hard-fought men’s final in the splendid Vertikale Climbing Stadium. 6 athletes representing 4 different nations competed for the top spot and it was combined world champion Yannick Flohé who - after having dominated both the qualifiers and the semis - really set the arena on fire with his 2 tops and 4 zones. Silver-haired 21-year-old Maximillian Milne from Britain placed second after securing the only to on problem #2 and, with a score of 2 tops and 4 zones, won the medal that matched his hair colour. 2019 Boulder World Proof of how difficult the problems were came from 2019 Boulder World Champion Tomoa Narasaki from Japan who came in third with just 1 top and 4 zones.

Flohé shook the stadium to the corre on problem #1, from the first block, sending it third go after Meichi Narasaki had needed 2 attempts and Milne just 1. Problem #2 proved impossible for everyone except for Milne who, uplifted by the crowd, topped out fifth go. Flohé needed to do something special to keep in the running and problem #3 proved to be his Mesiterstuck: where everyone else failed, he topped out second go. A zone on problem #4 secured overall victory, as Milne failed to make any headway whatsoever here."The final went really well - explained Flohé - topping out on #1 gave me a lot of energy, while on #2 I battled hard but failed. Then I surprised myself when I did the third problem which wasn’t my style at all. I really think that 3 is my lucky number, I don't know why! While on the last problem I wasn't very sure what I was doing". Britain’s Milne stood on his first World Cup podium, too."It was intense and fun. I don't even know how it happened, I think thanks to some strange magic. The crowd was magnificent, and it’s here in Brixen that I won bronze at the European Youth Championships. Now another podium, fantastic."

Japan’s Narasaki never gave up trying and battled to the dying seconds of each 4-minute slot. ”It was really difficult, the boulders were very tough. I was also particularly tired after the semifinals. That's why I didn't manage to reach all the tops, but I'm happy anyway.” stated Narasaki. 19-year-old Dohyun Lee from Korea settled for fourth place, in what was the first final in his career. The provisional leader of the 2022 Boulder World Cup Yoshiyuki Ogata had to make do with fifth place, while Meichi Narasaki, Tomoa’s younger brother, finished sixth.

It was late in the evening when the spotlights were turned off at the wonderful competition venue, while the music continued to play in the background celebrating the long World Cup weekend organised by the local AVS committee and the Italian Sport Climbing Federation. Organiser Ralf Preindl expressed his satisfaction: "The result is certainly positive, from Friday to Sunday a lot of people came to enjoy the competitions". The success of this event is also thanks to former Lead world champion Alexandra Ladurner: "Everything went well and a huge shout out goes to the 150 event volunteers, all wearing their cool new blue shirts.”

The World Cup continues in Innsbruck, Austria, from 22 to 26 June. As to the future of Brixen, it’s still to early to discuss it. Enjoying the spectacle from the stands was IFSC president Marco Scolaris, who most certainly will have understood how efficient the Brixen world cup organisation is.

1 Yannick Flohé GER 2t4z 5 9
2 Maximillian Milne GBR 2t3z 6 9
3 Tomoa Narasaki JPN 1t4z 4 9
4 Dohyun Lee KOR 1t4z 4 22
5 Yoshiyuki Ogata JPN 1t4z 7 13
6 Meichi Narasaki JPN 1t3z 2 8
7 Jan-Luca Posch AUT
8 Jakob Schubert AUT
9 Kokoro Fujii JPN
10 Alexander Megos GER
11 Jongwon Chon KOR
12 Mickael Mawem FRA
13 Simon Lorenzi BEL
14 Rei Kawamata JPN
15 Hamish Mcarthur GBR
16 Yuji Inoue JPN
17 Max Kleesattel GER
18 Nimrod Marcus ISR
19 Philipp Martin GER
20 Mathieu Ternant FRA
21 Edvards Gruzitis LAT
21 Anze Peharc SLO
23 Sascha Lehmann SUI
23 Sam Avezou FRA
25 Christoph Schweiger GER
25 Nathan Phillips GBR
27 Alex Khazanov ISR
27 Alex Waterhouse GBR
29 Nicolai Uznik AUT
29 Yufei Pan CHN
31 Sean Bailey USA
31 Matic Kotar SLO
33 Jernej Kruder SLO
33 Gholamali Baratzadeh IRI
35 Keita Dohi JPN
35 Zach Galla USA
35 Benjamin Hanna USA
38 Michael Piccolruaz ITA
39 Nicolas Collin BEL
39 Zan Lovenjak Sudar SLO
41 Nils Favre SUI
41 Colin Duffy USA
43 Yotam Ben Reuven ISR
43 Tomoaki Takata JPN
45 Gregor Vezonik SLO
45 Victor Baudrand CAN
47 Thilo Jeldrik Schröter NOR
47 Michele Bono ITA
49 Nikolay Rusev BUL
49 Nino Grünenfelder SUI
51 Kento Yamaguchi JPN
51 Marcello Bombardi ITA
53 Ross Fulkerson USA
53 William Ridal GBR
55 Emil Abrahamsson SWE
55 Hannes Puman SWE
57 Oscar Baudrand CAN
57 Amiad Lipman ISR
59 Chi-Fung Au HKG
59 Minyoung Lee KOR
61 Alejandro Crespo Cobos ESP
61 Jesse Grupper USA
63 Fedir Samoilov UKR
63 Michael O'neill IRL
65 Guy Mcnamee CAN
65 Hannes Van Duysen BEL
67 Pietro Vidi ITA
67 Mark Scanlon IRL
67 Felipe Ho Foganholo BRA
70 Leonid Osadchyi UKR
70 Yongchen Chen CHN
72 Sergii Topishko UKR
73 Julien Clémence SUI
73 Roman Batsenko UKR
75 Ben Abel AUS
75 Dohyeon Kim KOR
75 Ka-Chun Yau HKG
75 Cheung-Chi Shoji Chan HKG
79 Anton Young Hong Nielsen DEN
80 Theis Lindegren Elfenbein DEN
81 Campbell Harrison AUS
81 Axel Lindfors FIN
83 Hossein Familrohani IRI
83 Ethan Hoffman CAN
85 Oleksii Tytarenko UKR
85 Tsz-Kiu Lau HKG
87 Chase Gatland NZL
87 Mateus Rodrigues Bellotto BRA
89 Ignas Kisielius LTU
89 Nicolas Salaberry ARG
89 Zach Richardson CAN
89 Joris Leipus LTU
89 Gustavo Gabriel Suarez Munne ARG
89 Joaquin Piriz ARG
89 Jim Zeimes LUX
96 Rodrigo Iasi Hanada BRA
97 Matias Ochoa Marcos ARG
97 Thomas Waldin NZL
97 Rosen Ruev BUL
DNS Cheuk-Hei Ho HKG
DNS Manuel Cornu FRA

Info: www.suedtirol-climbing.it