Just eight days after the Chamonix stage, Briançon played host to the Lead Climbing World Cup, which took place on the town’s brand-new climbing wall. The atmosphere was fantastic, with two French climbers, Camille Pouget and Manon Hily, making it all the way to the final and Manon the third place. Vita Lukan from Slovenian and Sorato Anraku won the first place. Some of the top climbers were absent, due to a busy schedule.
It’s one of the world’s climbing capitals: Briançon, which every summer organizes the Mondial de l’escalade, an IFSC world cup competition, under the auspices of the french federation – FFME. This year, the town inaugurated a brand-new wall in the Parc des Sports: a speed wall, on the left, and an overhanging wall of difficulty, on the right, sheltered by a canopy. It was on this wall that the qualifying rounds and semi-finals were held, before the final on Saturday evening.
On Saturday, the crowd was out in force to cheer on the 8 women and 8 men – including 7 Japanese – in the final. And all the more so as two French women were in the final, the young Camille Pouget (20), whose first World Cup final it was, and Manon Hily (29) who won the bronze medal at the end of a suspenseful, wide-open final, contested on a remarkable, spectacular route… the opposite of the men’s route. Here’s how it went.
Sorato Anraku, the only man to reach the top of the