Italian Championship 2013

Well, this was an interesting competition yesterday in Modena. The qualification went quite well and so I ended as first in the final. I didn't know who was joining me in the final and as I found out, that I was joined by other 14 people I was totally shocked. 10 people flashed one problem and so they all got into the final as 6th. 15 people in a final?? I had never seen something like this before.
The head judges decided to do the final with the semifinal formula, 4 min climbing, 4 min rest, because with the classical final formula it would have taken an eternity.
I started well by flashing the first two problems. The third one caused me some problems but eventually I did it in my fifth try. The last one was looking amazing but unfortunately it turned out to be too hard and so I couldn't climb it. With 3 tops in 7 attempts I thought I would be second, but immediately after the last boulder Steve told me that we both have the same amount of tops and attempts, and so I won because of count back to the qualification.
This victory is definitely one of the most amazing ones also because my amazing girlfriend managed to win too. Italian Champions. Yeah =)

EYC and Pontives

Yesterday I came home from L' Argentiere where we competed in the second European Youth Bouldering Cup. The comp went quite well and eventually I managed to win in front of my friend Alex Khazanov and Nathan Phillips.

For our little Tito

Even if I had no skin, today I decided to go to Pontives for a quick session on the roof project. I thought I would be too tired to climb the problem but somehow I managed to fight my way through the roof doing the first ascent of yet another amazing boulder in Pontives.

FA of "Regentanz"

Time to leave home!

Yesterday I was in Pontives again to finish off this project I've brushed and tried lately. Since I had the pads under the "Lose Yourself" bloc, I decided to quickly try a boulder on the right hand side which hasn't been climbed yet. It is just a little 5 move boulder and I managed to climb it after about half an hour.

FA of "Stehaufmännchen", to the right or "Lose Yourself" and "Creativity"

I then walked the way up to the project. After trying the topout and failing once from the start, all of my sudden my brother called me and said that he is in the forest searching me.
I explained him the way and so he reached me after a couple of minutes. With my brother watching me I set off for another try and I had success. Finally I was sitting on top of this amazing boulder problem which was in my mind since I saw it for the first time. I guess I will take my brother with me more regularly. Thanks bro for the support =)

nice view at the "Traumpfeiler"

Today I went back again to the "Traumpfeiler" to take some lessons in slab climbing =). I decided to try this route called "L Julon", which was supposed to be quite hard. The route consists of 4 pitches. The first one is an easy one; followed by the crux pitch and the third as well as the fourth are not as hard as the second one but still quite hard.
Eventually I managed to climb the second pitch on my second go and I fought my way through the third and the fourth pitch onsighting both, what made me really happy.  
As always it was really nice to climb on the Traumpfeiler and I'm hoping that I slightly improved my slab climbing abilities.

As you can read I'm just climbing around my home right now. For sure it is one of the most amazing places I know, but I'm slowly getting bored and I'm really looking forward to leave home and go climbing somewhere else.

Why I love climbing

Climbing is AWESOME.
Why, are you asking? Well I'll try to explain it to you.
A little more than a week ago I was in Sofia competing in the EYC, the past weekend I went bouldering in Pontives and today I climbed a multipitch route on the big Sella massif. All this things are pretty different. In Sofia I climbed in a competition with people from every different parts of Europe. In Pontives I worked on my project again, together with Ale and my little brother. And today I climbed 9 pitches alternating the lead with my father.
The one thing that combines these three different experiences is the climbing. But it's not the climbing itself what I love about climbing. What I really love about climbing is the combination of climbing as a sport and all the various possibilities that are connected to this amazing sport.
You get to see different countries. You get to climb with so many different people. You can go sport climbing, bouldering, multipitch climbing, in the gym, on little boulders, on 50 meter cliffs, on huge big walls. You can climb onsight, you can project things, you can climb toprope, if you are crazy enough you can also climb free solo. Whatever. There are so many options you can choose from, if you're about to go climbing. And exactly that's what I love about climbing.    

"Rock or plastic ?" Part II

The last few weeks have been quite busy so I had not that much time to update this blog but to be honest this is just an excuse for the fact that I've simply been too lazy. I just came home from one of the many competitions and because I've some time now I forced myself to write a new blog post.

Ale making the second ascent of this beautiful line in Schenna

Between all the competitions I took part lately, luckily I found some time to get to climb on some rock. I went to Schenna twice, where I am always amazed by the amount of climbed problems and projects that still have to be climbed. With a couple of friends we managed to do a few amazing first ascents and climbed some of the already existing boulders.

The new landing

Since the bouldering area in Schenna is kind of "secret" there is no guide book or no topo and consequently most of the boulders are not even graded. So basically you get there and you climb whatever is inspiring you. That's what makes Schenna so special for me.

Moreover I finally had the opportunity to go to Pontives again. Since I climbed "Lose Yourself" I've not been in Pontives anymore, perhaps also because I had no real project, and so I was motivated to brush some new lines and hopefully also climb them. Eventually I decided to finish cleaning this awesome, tall line, which my friend Martin Dejori and I started cleaning already about two years ago. After spending three days into building a decent landing and brushing off all the moss, I finally started trying the boulder. I haven't climbed the problem yet, but Rudi, who tried the boulder with me, managed to climb the left exit, adding a new 5 star line to the area.

As I already mentioned, I had a lot of competitions in the last few weeks, including an Italian Cup in Ivrea, the Italian Youth Championship in Arco, two World Cups in Kitzbühel and Log Dragomer, the European Youth Championship in Grindelwald and the Climbo. The last one was the European Youth Cup in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. Unfortunately there were missing most of the strong guys so I knew that it wouldn't be difficult to get into finals. After a good qualification round I was sitting in first place having done all the 8 boulders.
The finals on the day after where as good as the qualifications, and I managed to cope with the pressure winning in front of my friends David Firnenburg from Germany and Alex Khazanov from Israel.

Qualification round

Second boulder in the final

Rock or plastic?

The last weekend I went to Grindelwald for the first European Youth Championship in bouldering.
Since I felt quite strong in the last training sessions I went to the competition beeing confident and motivated to do a good performance. Unfortunately it turned out that I'm not that strong at all. I did an absolutely heinous performance on Saturday in the qualification and finished in 9th place.
So no final =(
On Sunday we watched our team mates, who qualified for the finals, and then we drove back home.
At about 18:30 we were in Merano and I wanted to do a quick session on my project in Algund. The conditions were actually perfect: around 15 degrees and a cold wind was blowing. Since there is no easy boulder on this bloc I had to get warm on the project. I climbed the topout once, tried the moves in the middle twice and then I did a try from the start. I didn't get the second hold well and I fell off. I gave a quick brush at the holds and then I already went for the next try.
Every move felt super easily and 15 minutes after we got to the boulder I was already on top of it. Actually it was supposed to be my project, but it felt more like a boulder on which I use to get warm. So apparently I am quite in a good shape, but just on rock. I definitely should not complain about this, but I still have to compete in some competitions and I want to climb well in them. Unfortunately the strength I have on rock doesn't help me much in those comps.
But ok. In the upcoming summer the main focus will be on rock climbing so it's ok if I am not feeling that strong on the plastic holds right now =).

Climbo 2013

Well, with the World Cup in Kitzbühel, this year's competition season has started.
This past Saturday the "Climbo", a traditional bouldering competition in South Tyrol, was held in the Salewa gym in Bolzano. The Climbo is always an amazing competition and a good opportunity to meet a lot of friends. So I was really excited to get to climb with many nice people and to give my best in the comp.
The last few years I've always been super motivated and confident to climb well, but this year it was a little different. Of course I was super motivated but actually not that confident to do a good performance. Why? Well, I'll explain you why.

About a month ago I found out that Sido, a super famous German rapper, would come to Brixen. Obviously I didn't want to miss out such an amazing event (which eventually turned out not to be that amazing at all) but as luck would have it, the date of the event was the 3rd of Mai, the day before the Climbo would take place. Consequently I thought that I would not be in a good shape the day of the competition and I had to accept that. Fortunately I was totally wrong.

I went through the qualification round feeling strong and not even a little bit tired. I made one stupid mistake which cost me the first position, but I also knew that I had the chance to make up for this little mistake in the final.
After hanging out in the sun, eating an awesome burger, drinking a beer and playing cards, my fingers started to sweat because I couldn't wait to finally climb the final.
The time in isolation was as boring as always. I did a good warm up session and felt ready to crush!

First boulder                                                                       (c) Egle Kirdulyte

First boulder: flash. Second boulder: flash. Third boulder: third go.
I was sitting in first place after the first three problems with one more top than Steve, who was in second.
When we went out to have a look at the boulders, before the final started, the last problem was looking quite easy. So I knew that I would just have to climb this last boulder to win, what made me even more nervous.

Second boulder                                                                 (c) Egle Kirdulyte

The time passed and finally it was my turn. I brushed the holds and went for a good flash go. All of a sudden I had to struggle with a move, which I thought would be easy, and fell off the wall. Oh no!! I absolutely had to climb this boulder problem. I thought to be sure that I would be able to climb it, but now I was struggling with a move which seemed to be an easy one. Ok, I just had to keep calm.

                                  (c) Egle Kirdulyte

The next go was as frustrating as the one before and the time was running out. I jumped onto the problem for the next try with a minute left on the clock. I fell off again on the same move but I found out a little trick to make the move easier. I had time to make one last try.

I was totally pumped and extremely tired. My fingertips were almost bleeding and my body was sore. Nevertheless I was happy. Yes, I was super happy. Sitting on top of the fourth problem in front of an amazing crowd, knowing that I had won, was one of the feelings I'll never forget. The last two years there has always been missing a little bit of luck to win the Climbo and now I had finally won this competition. What an amazing feeling!!

The winner in the girls category was Andrea Ebner and apparently it is a good idea to go out the night before a competition as she was at the Sido concert too =)

On the last boulder                                            (c) Egle Kirdulyte

The Climbo was a cool event and the next weekend I'll already be climbing my next competition, my second World Cup in Log Dragomer. It is nice to be allowed to take part at all these comps but what I'm really looking forward to is some rock. Hopefully I will find some time in between all the days I'm spending on plastic, to get to climb outside again.

First World Cup

Last weekend I had the opportunity to partecipate at my first World Cup, which was held in Kitzbühel, a well known village about 100 km east of Innsbruck.
As it was my first World Cup I set my expectations pretty low and thought that without any pressure I would climb quite well. As a matter of fact I did not climb well. Without beeing nervous I messed up everything I could and I can not even explain why. But ok, it was my first World Cup and hopefully the next ones will go better.
A part of my personal competition the World Cup was an amazing event. The organisation was perfect and it was awesome to see the worlds best competition climbers doing what they do best.
It's been an new and cool experience in Kitzbühel and I really can't wait to give my best in the next World Cup.

South France, Italian Cup and Algund

Hello everybody.

Well, I have to admit that I've been way too lazy to write anything on this blog in the last few weeks, even though I would have had to tell quite a lot of things!

First of all the one-week-trip to South France about a month ago.
We were lucky enough to have a week with perfect weather and so we got the opportunity to get to see a lot of different amazing crags.

                                                                                                                                                               (c) Martin Dejori

The first day we went to Castillon, a crag which is situated right after the Italian border. The climbing there is actually really good. There is a wide range of difficult routes and we had a nice day although it was a little bit too cold.

For the second day of our trip the weather forecast was really bad, and unfortunately the meteorologist was right. So what do you do on rest days?? Exactly! You spent the whole day eating everything you get. Our lunch consisted of: a big bread at the "Subway" restaurant, a Kebab and a Mc Flurry at Mc Donald's =)

                                                                                                                                                         (c) Martin Dejori

The plan for our next day was to drive from Nice to Marseilles and on the road we will have a stop at Cimai, a historical crag where Lynn Hill wrote history by doing the first female ascent of an 8b+ route (Masse Critique).
We had a beautiful day there and on the evening we moved on to Marseilles where we spent our next few days.

                                     (c) Marvin Kobald

                                       (c) Marvin Kobald

                     



















A part of all the traffic in Marseilles we also got to see the amazing amount of rock in the Calanques. We had the best weather you can imagine and we managed to climb some superb lines.

                                                                                                                                                         (c) Marvin Kobald

The last two days we went to Chateauvert. All in all I have to say that this was the crag which inspired me most. The rock quality and the quality of the routes there is just so unbelievably amazing, every movement is just perfect (except of some chipped routes. I really don't understand why you have to chip routes in such an amazing crag).

Unfortunately a week on a climbing trip is definitely passing to fast, and so the end of the trip came far too early. However, the short week in France was awesome and I'm really looking forward to another trip like this.

About three weeks ago I participated at the first Italian Cup of this season, which took place in Milano. I have not been competing for a really long time so I had no expectations for this comp.
In the semifinal round I managed to climb 3 of 4 problems, but as I climbed really bad I was sure that I would not make it into the finals. I was even more surprised as I saw the rankings of the semifinals. I was sitting on the second position right behind my good friend Rudi, who was the only one to climb all 4 problems. Not believing that I really made it into the finals I went into the isolation zone.
The finals were set a little bit too easy so it came down to the attempts. I did all 4 boulders but I messed up the last one, which took me 4 tries to climb it. I ended up in 4th position. Rudi won the competition easily by flashing all the problems. Congrats man =)


Competition climbing can be fun, but what I really love about climbing is still, and will ever be, the rock climbing. So I went to Algund last Friday with Alexandra to jump on some unfinished business. Unfortunately Ale could not climb because she has some problems with her wrist again. She has been injured for way too long the last years and I really hope that it is not that serious again. All the best Ale!
For my part I finally managed to climb this boulder called "The Opportunist". I had to try it for quite a while also because initially I didn't know where it exactly starts. Once I found that out it still took me some time to find the right beta.
This time I knew that I can climb it and with Ales support I fought my way through the 17 moves all the way to the top out. As this is kind of my anti-style boulder I was even happier that I managed to climb this cool line.

Well, that's all for this time. Hopefully I will be able to update my blog more regularly in the next time.
Cheers!    

Christmas holidays

 It's been a while since my last blogpost and a lot of things happend, but all I want to speak about now are the Christmas holidays.

My first goal of these holidays was the unfinished business in Pontives. I still had a project out there which I really wanted to climb because I was already trying it for a really long time. Since I found this boulder, cleaned it and started trying it back in the summer of 2011 this line kept always in my head. Last March, after a lot of work, I finally managed to climb the stand start wich I called "Lost Illusion". I was really happy about that, but I knew that, if I wanted to be satisfied and in peace with this boulder, I have to climb the sit. So I started working on it, but in the summer it was simply way too hot to even try it so I forgot it for a little while.
And then, after the long summer and the even longer fall, the temperatures finally dropped, the conditions became better and I could start trying it again.
It was the day of Christmas Eve and my family wanted to go swimming, but come on... swimming... on Christmas Eve???? No thanks!! I wanted to go bouldering. I wanted to go out into the forest and finally finish off this line I've been dreaming about since I saw this piece of rock for the first time. And that's what I did. Standing on top of this beautiful boulder, after investing so much time into it was the best Christmas gift imaginable.

FA of "Lose Yourself"

After all the Christmas celebrations it was time to leave home and go bouldering again. Destination: Cresciano and Chironico.
I've spent a week in Cresciano already last February and surprisingly I left without many unfinished projects, so I had nothing to finish with on this trip. But I had a ton of new stuff to try.
At the end of the trip I left Cresciano by having tried almost every single classic line. That doesn't mean that I have climbed a lot of them too, no no, quite the contrary... it means that I have climbed none of them. La Pelle, La Proue, La Boule, Gecko, Last Samurai, La nave va, Dreamtime, Le vent sombre... all boulders I tried and don't even got close on most of them.

Trying "The Dagger"

Another boulder I tried and had no success on was The Dagger. The Dagger is one of those lines I've always wanted to climb since I saw it for the first time. So I decided to put some effort into that one. Well, all in all I tried The Dagger for about an hour on our second day and for other fifteen minutes on our last day. I managed to find a good beta for the second part and the end of the boulder which felt quite easy but I didn't found a beta for the start. I'm quite confident to climb this boulder once I'll find the beta to climb the first few moves, so I'm pretty syked to go back to Cresciano and jump onto this amazing line again.
As I already mentioned our plan was not only to climb in Cresciano but in Chironico too. So we went to Chironico on the 31st (my birthday =) ) and on our penultimate day of the trip. In Chironico I felt stronger than in Cresciano, maybe because the climbing style fits me better or maybe because it was colder in there... I don't know. I also managed to climb a few nice lines in Chironico such as Souvenir, Komilator, Walker on earth, Serre moi fort, Les cliques a claques and La vent nous portera.

playing around on some easier stuff

 A boulder Rudi and I got close on and I really want to try again, is Freak Brothers. I tried this boulder already last year but I had no chance on it. I thought that this time I would be stronger and perhaps I would have a chance to climb it. As we started trying it I had to accept that once again I was to week for the boulder, till I tried this other beta with the heel hook. All of a sudden I managed to match the crimper and jump up to the lip. I had no chance to hold the swing but this step forward, just matching the crimper and pull on, was really important for my mind and my motivation. But as it was already really dark and we had no idea how to come back to our car, we had to start searching the way back to it before our phones and headlamps would stop working. Freak Brothers is for sure on the really top of the to-do list for our next Chironico trip. With many other amazing boulders I didn't managed to climb on this trip =)

Climbing "Walker on earth

Nightsession on "Freak Brothers"

Bouldering in Algund

Yes! I can climb again. The three weeks of rest are over! It's been three hard weeks but now I am even more motivated to climb than before. 

Yesterday I went to Algund with Alexandra Ladurner. Unfortunately she has been injured for way too long but now she is finally not feeling that much pain anymore and she can climb again. It is really cool to climb again with her and it is also cool to see that she is getting really strong again (she is getting close on her first 8A).
So we went up to Algund, as I said, and first we went to the boulder "Tragic waste of Power" which Ale wanted to try. She managed to do all the moves again (last time she tried it a foothold broke) and I'm pretty confident that she is able to put the single moves together the next time. 
Afterwards we went up to this boulder called "The Egyptian arete". I've tried this boulder already four years ago and I thought that it is going to be a really quick work. In fact it took me a little longer. I tried this boulder about twice a year over the last 4 years and I never managed to climb the topout because I was always trying it with the wrong beta. But then, about a month ago, I tried another beta and I was finally sitting on the bloc. I was so happy, even though I had just climbed the topout. 

Yesterday I had to finish it off, and I finally did. On my last attempt of the day (it goes always on the last try of the day or the trip) I was standing on the top of an amazing boulder which was in my head since I tried it four years ago.   

Last year... still not having found the beta for the topout                                                                      pic by Marc Zipperle

Few days in Osp

Almost two weeks have passed since we came back home from our trip to Osp. It has been a cool time down there and we got to know the "Bora" (a cold and heavy wind) quite well. All in all we were quite lucky with the weather even though it was raining one day and so the next days almost everything was wet. Nevertheless we have been climbing every day (5 days in a row) without any rest.

Tortuga                                                                    pic by Marvin Kobald

On our first day I climbed some of the routes on the really left side of the wall in Mija Pec and tried once a route called "Eagles" in the middle of the huge wall. 

The next days I have basically just been climbing on the routes in the middle sectors because I liked them way more than those on the left hand side. On my second day I managed to climb "Eagles" on my third go and a really amazing route called "Oktoberfest" on my second go. 

searching the most inspiring line                          pic by Marvin Kobald

On our third day I started to try a harder route which is about 20 meters on the left of "Samsara" (I don't know the name of this route). The route is really bouldery and so I was surprised as I was able to climb all the moves. Because of that I was really motivated to give a few more tries into this awesome climb. 

yes, we were in 5 to sleep here =)                              pic by Martin Dejori

Unfortunately the next day it was raining. Nevertheless the route looked quite dry but as I was hanging in there I found out that one hold on the crux move was wet. This one wet hold was enough to make it impossible to try the route seriously. 

would have been motivated to climb here...                           pic by Marvin Kobald

The following day was already our last one and the hold in my project was still wet, so I finished my trip to Mija Pec with a flash of the super classic "Samsara" and a few attempts on some other routes. 

It's been 5 funny days in Mija and I can't wait for our next trip (this time hopefully bouldering =) ). But for now I will be resting for the next 3 weeks without touching any hold. It is going to be a hard time...

Dreaming about going out climbing!

Well... I have not a lot to tell!
Lately I've just been training. After the WYC in Singapore I decided to concentrate on bouldering so I am basically just working on my bouldering strength.
In the film "Progression" Paul Robinson says: "I had sit in school and I'd wish I could be going out climbing" (I hope it's somehow right like this). Exactly the same thing happens to me now. I'm sitting in school and I'm dreaming about all the amazing crags around the world. I'm dreaming about just being out there bouldering. So of course I cannot wait for the next holidays.
The plan was to go to Fontainebleau from 26th Oktober to 2nd November. I was really excited but unfortunately we found no driver =( I'm still really disappointed that I cannot go back to Fontainebleau but I hope the next time I will find someone who is motivated enough to drive all the way up to this magical forest.

I'm really sorry, but we don't knew it: it is forbidden to climb on
this boulder because of the risk to break it down.

But I really don't want to stay at home during my holidays so I will go to Osp with a couple of friends. Osp is for sure really cool too, but as I've just been training for bouldering I will just be able to climb easy routes, or at least really short ones =) We will for sure have a lot of fun, but... yes, bouldering would have been more fun!

 

Singapore - a wonderful experience!

It was 27th August. I woke up in the morning being really excited because in a few hours I would start my journey to Singapore for the World Youth Championship.

After the last European Youth Cup in Imst (where I finished in 11th place, what means first out of finals) I was like really disappointed and I wasn't motivated to climb competitions anymore. You have to know that because of the lack of money in the FASI (Federazione Arrampicata Sportiva Italiana) this year we have to pay all the competitions we are taking part, on our own. In the special case of Singapore it would cost us 1000 € (without counting the food, which is quite expensive there). So after the comp in Imst I was not motivated anymore to go to Singapore and I thought it would just be a waste of money (I could rather spend this money on a trip to Rocklands or so), but the flights were already booked and so I had no other choice.

So, back again to the 27th of August. As I said I was really excited and I was also motivated again because since Imst some time had passed and I had the chance to train and built up some endurance which was still missing. I felt stronger now but I also knew that I was by far not strong enough to compete with the best, so my goal was to reach the semifinals.

I left home knowing that it would be a really long journey till we would finally reach Singapore but nonetheless I was excited. I met up with my friends Andrea Prünster and Andrea Ebner and the father of Andrea Ebner took us to the Milano Malpensa Airport where we met the rest of the Italian team (this team turned out to be a really amazing one). We checked in our luggage and went to our gate. Our first flight to Frankfurt was pretty short and after about an hour we were walking to our next gate where our next plane to Singapore was waiting. Since the airport in Frankfurt is the biggest one in Europe, we even had to take a train to come from one terminal to the other one!

This is not good...

Our plane to Singapore was an Airbus A380, one of the biggest planes and I was really impressed by how big this plane actually is. But all in all, as long as you are not sitting in first class, every plane is very much the same: pretty much uncomfortable. So we were sitting inside this big plane watching some films, eating some disgusting food and hoping that the 12-hour flight will pass as quickly as possible. I don't know why but unfortunately I'm not able to sleep on a flight, so it's been really hard for me sitting there for 12 hours, but at about 4 pm local time we finally reached Singapore.

Would have prefered to take this flight =)

As I stepped out of the airport I almost got kicked back in. The last time I felt something like this was in a 90 degrees sauna. I had to struggle to even breathe and it was so incredibly hot and humid. But it slowly got better and I had to live with it anyway. We had to wait for quite a while till our taxi came which took us to the hotel. After about 24 hours of travelling I finally lay down on my bed being really tired. But it was not time to sleep yet. We had to go to the climbing wall for the opening ceremony. After that we got a kind of buffet there with some typical food. We then decided to go for a walk but I just wanted to go to bed as quickly as possible because I was really tired since I had not slept for more than 24 hours and the competition was on the next day.

I woke up feeling quite strong and confident for the competition. I did not even feel anything of a jet lag, so I was pretty happy about that. But as I saw the breakfast my confidence fell immediately and I already knew that I would have to buy some Nutella and some bread. I didn't know what I should eat so I decided to take the "american breakfast" which was mainly some kind of toasted bread, an egg and two sausages. It was not really good but I had to eat something to gain some energy. We then went down to the climbing wall which was about 5 minutes away from our hotel. First of all I had a look at the starting orders. I would start as 51st so I had plenty of time until it was my turn.
As it finally was time to climb the first route I was warm and felt quite strong. I started my climb and had some trouble on the starting section but then reached easily a fairly good rest. I shook both my hands and was ready to climb on. But then, two moves after, I suddenly came off. I still have no idea why, I wasn't pumped and I hadn't even slipped off. It is still a surprise for me. So I was really angry about this kind of "mistake" but finished the first route in 26th place with some more guys in 26th (26 enter into the semifinals). Knowing that, if I wanted to climb the semifinal, I would have to climb much better the next day I finished my day swimming in our amazing pool.


On the second route I started much earlier (as 14th or so). I really like it to start early so I felt strong again but also knew that the route is was going to be harder than the first one. I climbed better but nevertheless I was definitely not happy with my performance. I was quite sure that I wouldn't make it to the semifinals but I had to wait until the last climber. In fact he went off before me and so I ended my second day again as 26th, and that meant that I had reached the semifinal. I was super happy but I also knew that once again I had to climb a lot better than these past two days.

I woke up in the morning of the finals and as I opened the curtains I couldn't believe my eyes. It was raining. It was raining heavily. Definitely way too much to climb, even though the wall was overhanging. Since the wall wasn't covered it got completely wet from the backside. The starting time of the semifinals was delayed and delayed. At noon it eventually stopped raining. Of course the wall was totally wet so the the starting time was set at 15.30.
I was the second to start (we were in two in 26th place) so I had to be prepared for 15.30. At 15.15 we went out to have a look at the routes. The first part of the route looked kind of strange but the second part of the route was looking really cool on a lot of crimps. We went back into isolation. The first two climbers had to be ready immediately, so I set down there on the chair and was waiting for my turn. The first climber went off quite early so I walked out my way to the route. I really wanted to reach the "cool - looking" second part of the route but the first part turned out to be way harder than expected. I climbed quite well and got the first sequences in the right way but then, exactly as on the first route, I suddenly just came off. Ok this time my foot slipped a little bit but that's no excuse for why I fell off again that early. Almost everyone of the climbers after me had some trouble at the start but most of them passed me, even though a lot of them climbed just one or two moves further than me. I finished in 23th place but if I had done three more moves I would have been in the final. But ok, now it was time to enjoy Singapore and I was really syked to watch the finals.

Singapore at night

The next day we spent just swimming and watching our team-mates in the speed competition.


We had now two days left in Singapore and we decided to visit the city, since we were living on an island (they were celebrating the birthday of the island: 40 years =) ) a little bit outside of the actual city. I really hate cities. You just walk around all the day, you enter in 1000 different shops and at the end of the day your legs hurt terribly. Despite that I went with the other guys into the city, because it's a kind of "must". So we took the "Angry birds cable car" and the metro to get in there. As I entered the metro I was impressed by how many people were sitting there staring at their iPhone or any other super big mobile phone. No one is reading a newspaper, or at least they are reading it on their phone. I felt like I was 100 years back in time with my old Nokia.

This guy is definitely cool!!

Angry birds cable car

So we took that metro to China Town. Basically we visited one big street which can be considered as one mega store where you can buy anything you want, faked or not! It didn't last long and I was totally wrecked. But it was still quite early and the other guys walked in and out in a million different shops, so the only option for me was to fight myself through this "nightmare" street following the other ones. And then we finally reached the end of the street and I just wanted to return back home and jump into the swimming pool but it was not time to go home yet. Some of us wanted to visit "Little India" and so we took the metro to "Little India". As we arrived there and walked through some streets we were surprised by how ugly this place actually is. We even saw two guys fighting on the street. Strange people there!
No one wanted to spend more time there and so we started our way back home (finally). I was just so happy when I jumped into the (a little bit too warm) water of the pool. I survived another city!

China Town

Little India

Little India

Since we were living on an island with a lot of adventurous attractions (wave house, sky diving...) we decided to spend our last day trying some of them. The first one should have been the wave house but as I saw the prices I changed my opinion. Some other guys of our team tried it nevertheless and I was really jealous watching them. I spent the rest of the day in the swimming pool and in Mc Donalds.

This is good =)

Our hotel with swimming pool!

At 6 pm it was time to start towards the airport. After quite a while in the metro we reached the airport where we visited Burger King for the last time and then we went for the check in. It would  be a long, long journey.

After the 12 hours flight over half of the planet we reached Frankfurt where we had to wait about 4 hours for our next plane to Milan. That plane should start at 9.30 am and when it was time to get on board they said the flight was canceled due to a strike of the Lufthansa. I was already destroyed from all the waiting and now we had to wait till 16.30 for the next plane to Milan. It was a nightmare!
Then, at about 4 pm, they called us for the boarding. I was so happy when I finally set down on my seat. Come on, just one hour was missing and we would be back in Italy.
After a "short" one-hour flight we walked out of the gate to get our luggage. We were waiting, and waiting, and waiting. But no luggage. All our stuff had probably got lost somewhere in Frankfurt. It was unbelievable. I was completely devastated. We had to give them our addresses and phone numbers so that they would be able to send us our luggage back home as soon as they would find it. I just wanted to go home!!!!!!!

My parents picked me up in Modena north and brought me directly to Merano because I had to go to school the next day. I was super tired when I finally lay down on a wonderful bed. I had one single thing in my mind before I fell asleep: despite this horrible journey back home it's been AWESOME!!