I do not know what to write or say anymore about these past world cups. But I am very glad that I can repeat myself: I won the world cup and I am more than happy about it. The one in Kitzbühel was a huge mental battle for me. I was able to qualify for the final in second place, which is amazing. I really wanted to be in this final round, because I love climbing in front of my home crowd. Yet it is not easy to qualify since no mistakes are allowed in the previous rounds. Unluckily Kilian had to watch the final due to one little mistake in the qualification.
This last round was a "flash-final". I knew that Akyio had flashed the first three problems and I was also aware that Alex had done all three in very few attempts. I did not feel any pressure on the first three problems. I climbed well and was able to flash all of them. But when I found myself in front of the fourth one, I knew that this could be the gold medal- if only I flash it.... Well, this was everything but easy. I had gone through the problem with Alex and Akyio and wanted to use the same beta. Somehow I did not use the same method and ended up matching a little crimp, while jamming my foot really hard. I just did not want to let go. When I grabbed the finish hold I knew that I had won! It was a very close fight and I do not hope that we will have to have count-backs again this season. Akyio got the second place due to more attempts in our semifinal. I think this is not a good result for the route setters, since three girls climbed four problems in very few attempts.
In the men's field it was not a "flash-final" at all. In fact, only three tops were made. Jakob climbed two problems and therefore won the competition in front of Guillaume Glairon-Mondet and Dmitrii Sharafudtinov.
Here is a little video about the final in Kitzbühel:
