Angela Eiter

Eiter (AUT) and Crespi (ITA) confirm last year’s leadership, sixteen years old David Lama (AUT) claims 2nd place at his first worldcup. Chloл Graftiaux (BEL) climbs up the ranking with a nice 4th place.

Take an amazing set of routes set by five times winner Frans Legrand and top Belgium team of Michel De Vogel and Christian Rolfs,

Sandrine Levet

a fantastic group of over 90 international competitors who gave their all, and combine it with an enthusiastic crowd out to chear on both the home team and those from further afield and a very technical wall perfectly designed to show what is great and wonderful about competition climbing, the first lead worldcup of the season took place at Puurs in Belgium on Friday 28th and Saturday 29th of April.

Caroline Ciavaldini

The women’s event was won by very strong Angela Eiter from Austria, with the French Sandrine Levet coming second in tied place with Caroline Ciavaldini, all three women reach the top (Angela’s semi-finals results were better than those of Sandrine and Caroline).

Chloe Graftiaux

The young Belgian Chloй Graftiaux, welcomed by a tremendous applause, opened the finals very strong and took a superb 4th place, her highest result ever reached in a Worldcup.

The climbers reaching the finals were the French climbers Charlotte Durif, Florence Pinet and the Slovenians Maja Vidmar, Natalija Gros. The home based Muriel Sarkany opened very strong in the semi finals but climbed unlucky beyond an obligatory clipping point halfway the route and therefore had to cease her attempt taking the 19th place.

Flavio Crespi

The Italian Flavio Crespi was better than ever in Puurs and outperformed by being the only one able to finish the final crux after a very hard traverse at the end of the men’s final. We can well say that the most remarkable performance was of the nearly 16 years old Austrian youth champion David Lama, who competed for the first time on a Worldcup with the big boys. He was the only climber able to finish the semi finals and ended only one grip lower that Flavio in the finals.

David Lama

The Czech world champion Tomas Mrazйk took the bronze medal. Jorg Verhoeven from the Netherlands reached the fourth position in front of over 100 compatriots from Holland that came over to push him to his limits.

Thomas Mrazek

We can well say that this was a successful weekend for the Benelux taking the 4th place for both men and women’s rounds. Other climbers who made it to the final round were Luca Zardini, Cйdric Lachat, last years winner Ramуn Puigblanque and Fabien Dugit.

All climbers enjoyed Stefan Glowacz’s show about his extreme alpine ascents across the globe and dived into the famous Goldfinger party sponsored by the local brewery till early in the morning.

The Worldcup Puurs was very well organized and had full live streaming video coverage on the Internet. More good news from Puurs was the official preview of the semi outdoor mega climbing wall that will be attached to the existing hall. It will be finished by next years Worldcup as promised to the audience by the Flemish minister and the town major, this will make this low countries climbing center one of the biggest in Europe. The UIAA Climbing board representatives Marco Scolaris, Reindert Lenselink, Helmut Knabl and Alexander Piratinski were witnesses of this remarkable milestone.

Podium men

Podium women

More info, pictures and video’s on www.worldcuppuurs.com

All rezults