Welcome to Behind the Wall, your weekly update on the climbing competition world.
This week, I look back at the World Cup in Keqiao from last weekend (there are spoilers). I then look forward to the next one in Wujiang, which starts on Friday.
As usual, I recap the latest news and my favourite media from the last week. I also recap where to buy tickets for upcoming international competitions and what you can watch this weekend.
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Teething issues as the comp season restarts in China
Keqiao felt like the first competition of the season it was. Everyone was raring to go, but there were some teething issues to begin with.
The rain didn't impact the venue, but nearby storms altered the conditions on Saturday. The humidity rose to nearly 60%, and the temperature stayed high at 28º. The weather made the women's boulders harder than the route setters had planned. The final had the lowest number of tops per competitor in a final since Munich in 2010. Keqiao saw no boulder being flashed in a final, for the first time ever. Special thanks to Tyler Norton from Plastic Weekly for the stats.
The women's rounds had problems with the production quality of the coverage, which made the competition even harder to watch. There was no split screen for either round. In the final, they used a wide-angle shot to show both athletes climbing together. There were bad cuts to close-ups and a lack of replays. In the women's final, we missed seeing some athlete's reaching the top because of the lack of a split screen and good replays. The production quality improved greatly for the men's rounds on Sunday. The men's semi-final had a 4-way split screen, while the final featured a 2-way split screen. The camera work and production were also much improved.
We also got to see the first instance of the new format, with 24 athletes advancing to semi-finals and 8 to finals. Watching two athletes climb together in the final kept the competition exciting. However, the difference between the women's and men's rounds showed that split screens and good replays are needed.
Three hard rounds for the women
All the women's rounds were hard, and that took a toll on the athletes. In the qualification round, one boulder had no score in either qualification group, while another was topped by lots of athletes in both groups. This meant that the five boulder round was decided on 3 boulders.
The weather made the semi-final and final rounds harder, and the scores showed it. There were only 13 tops in the semi-final and 5 in the final. In the semi-final, most spots were decided by how fast athletes reached the zone holds on the boulders. 15 athletes were within 1 point of each other, between 10th and 24th place.
Annie Sanders won her second gold medal in Keqiao. She was the only athlete to score in all zones and to top the third slab boulder. She joins Alex Johnson, Alex Puccio, and Megan Mascarenas in the US Double Boulder World Cup medal club.
Oriane Bertone won her 8th silver medal in Keqiao. She had a difficult year following the Olympics in 2024, but seems happy to be back competing.
Erin McNeice won her second bronze medal 0.1 points behind Bertone. She joins Shauna Coxsey as the only other British woman to have won more than one World Cup medal.
Miho Nonaka was the only athlete to top the first boulder. However, she couldn’t take advantage of it and finished 5th in the final. It took her seven attempts to reach the zone on boulder three.
Specialists shine as Narasaki, Schalck, Lee, and Anraku fight for the win
By Sunday, the weather had cooled, and the men's rounds were better to watch.
Toby Roberts had a tough day, coming in 15th in the semi-final. He struggled on the first boulder and never seemed to find his rhythm. Colin Duffy and Hannes Van Duysen had a tough time in the semi-final. They placed 18th and 24th.
The surprise of the semi-final was Oren Prihed, who finished 4th to qualify for the final in his first World Cup. Dayan Akhtar improved from last year. He was one of three athletes to top Boulder 3 and finished 10th.
The final felt a bit like Japan vs France with three Japanese and three French athletes competing in it.
Sorato Anraku took an early lead on attempts ahead of Dohyun Lee on the second boulder. Lee took 4 attempts to Anraku's 2. None of the French team topped the first two boulders. This left them behind the Japanese trio of Anraku, Meichi Narasaki, Tomoa Narasaki and Lee.
The 3rd and 4th boulders were really exciting ones. Athletes used many different methods to top the boulder. The 3rd featured a dynamic spin around on large volumes. The 4th involved lots of pressing and complicated body positions. Mejdi Schalck's flash of boulder four was the most impressive. He ended up facing out towards the crowd the whole way.
Keqiao was Anraku's third gold medal. This seems surprisingly low since he won the Boulder Series overall in 2023 and 2024. Only Jérôme Meyer and Kilian Fischhuber have won more than two World Cup Series. Meyer won three World Cups and Fischhuber won 21.
Lee dominated the competition, winning every boulder. However, he lost to Anraku in the final by 0.4 points.
Meichi Narasaki rounded out the podium thanks to topping the first three boulders. Keqiao was his fifth World Cup medal.
Lead and Speed start in Wujiang
Now we turn to Lead and Speed. The Lead and Speed World Cup circuits start on Friday in Wujiang, at the second competition of the Asian leg of the World Cup. 216 athletes are registered for the competition: 124 for Lead and 93 for Speed.
Speed
In Speed, all the talk has been about whether someone will break the World Record of 4.74 seconds. Sam Watson has been posting videos of sub 4.7 second times, but we don't know much about the other athletes' times.
Olympic Champion Veddriq Leonardo will compete in the event alongside Kiromal Katibin. They kicked off a wave of breaking the Speed World Record in 2021. They lowered it from 5.47 seconds to 5.2 seconds in 2021. Now 5.2 isn't fast enough to guarantee you a final's spot.
Noticeably, the Olympic silver medal winner Peng Wu is not competing.
Wu is one of the few athletes to consistently run sub 4.8 seconds, beating Watson in Wujiang last year. Six of the 10 Chinese athletes registered have not competed at the World Cup level. Jianguo Long is the only Chinese man competing who has won a World Cup.
Watch for top European speed climbers including Matteo Zurloni, Ludovico Fossali, Amir Maimuratov, and Yaroslav Tkach.
Olympic finalist Julian David from New Zealand is also attending. Zach Hammer, Noah Bratschi, Aidan Goddard and Ben Jennings join Watson from the US.
On the women's side, we might see an Olympic final rematch between Aleksandra Miroslaw and Lijuan Deng. Deng pushed Miroslaw in the Olympic final to set a World Record of 6.06 seconds. Miroslaw has held the last 10 World Records. Will she become the first woman to break the 6 second barrier?
A strong Chinese team will compete in Wujiang. Shaoqin Zhang and Yafei Zhou, who made a name for themselves last year, are signed up for the event. So is 2023 World Champion Desak Made Rita Kusuma Dewi and 2024 bronze medal winner Jimin Jeong.
World Cup winners Natalia Kalucka from Poland and Emma Hunt from the US are also attending. Olympians Leslie Romero Pérez and Beatrice Colli are also registered for the event.
Lead
In Lead, some big names are missing from the women's field again. This includes Brooke Raboutou, Janja Garnbret, Ai Mori, and Natalia Grossman.
Jessica Pilz, the 2023 & 2024 Lead series winner, is registered as part of a strong 6-women Austrian team. Mattea Pötzi and Flora Oblasser join her. Both had standout seasons last year.
Update 24 April 2025: Jessica Pilz will not be competing in Wujiang or Bali as she rests up after getting finger inflammation.
We also have a full Chinese team of eight, including Olympians Yuetong Zhang and Zhilu Luo.
Even without Janja Garnbret, Slovenia is sending a strong team. This includes World Cup winner Vita Lukan, medalist Mia Krampl, finalist Rosa Rekar, and Youth World Champion Jenny Buckley.
There is also a strong Japanese team led by Mei Kotake. Both Natsuki Tanii and Natsumi Oda reached the final last year in Wujiang.
On the men's side, we have the next battle in the rivalry between Sorato Anraku and Toby Roberts. Last year in Lead, Roberts beat Anraku at the Olympics and in many World Cups to win the series.
Even though we won’t see "old guys" like Jakob Schubert, Adam Ondra, and Alex Megos, many specialists will return to Lead.
World Cup winners and lead specialists Luka Potocar, Taisei Homma, Sascha Lehmann and Jesse Grupper are all registered to compete. As are world cup medalists Alberto Ginés López, Sam Avezou and Yannick Flohé. Flohé has shared that he plans to focus on Lead this year.
News
Not much happened this week between the World Cups.
- Keqiao Boulder World Cup results
- Women: 1. Annie Sanders (US), 2. Oriane Bertone (France), 3. Erin McNeice (UK)
- Men: 1. Sorato Anraku (Japan), 2. Dohyun Lee (South Korea), 3. Meichi Narasaki (Japan)
Media Recommendations
Hannah Morris examines how social media has changed climbing and how we experience the sport.
Louis Parkinson talks about his experience at the toughest bouldering competition in the UK: the Climbing World International Festival (CWIF).
Kyra and Allison talk about how Kyra felt the new boulder format was to compete in at the US Team Trials. They also talk about the news that Sport Climbing will have 3 medals at the LA28 Olympics. They finish by celebrating Brooke Raboutou, who is the first woman to climb 9b+ (5.15c).
Matt Groom and the IFSC are back with a new season of the World Climbing Club. This season takes us behind the scenes and shares highlights from each day.
Ryan Devlin has a MoonBoard session with the famous Ravioli Biceps in his garage.
Competition Tickets
With the season approaching, I’ve gone hunting to find out where and when tickets will be available.
- 25th–27th April, Wujiang IFSC Lead & Speed World Cup. Tickets are available locally through the "kan ge bi sai" (Watch-a-game) app. Details are in the event information document.
- 2nd–4th May, Bali IFSC Lead & Speed World Cup. The competition will be free to attend. It is not yet known if tickets are required for entry.
- 16th–18th May, Curitiba IFSC Boulder World Cup. Ticket information still to be announced.
- 22nd–25th May, Salt Lake City IFSC Boulder World Cup and IFSC Paraclimbing World Cup. Tickets are available through Eventbrite.
- 31st May–1st June, Denver IFSC Speed World Cup. Tickets will be released around 2nd April through USA Climbing.
- 5th – 8th June, Prague IFSC Boulder World Cup. Tickets are still on sale.
- 12th–15th June, Bern IFSC Boulder World Cup. Tickets are still on sale.
- 23rd–29th June, Innsbruck IFSC Boulder and Lead World Cup & IFSC Paraclimbing World Cup. Tickets go on sale in April and June:
- 7th April: World Cup Passes for the whole event [Sold out]
- 28th April: Single Day Tickets - early phase.
- 16th June: Single Day Tickets - late phase.
- 5th–6th July, Krakow IFSC Speed World Cup. This event is free of charge, and no tickets are required for entry.
- 11th–13th July, Chamonix IFSC Lead and Speed World Cup. This event is free of charge, and no tickets are required for entry.
- 17th–19th July, Madrid IFSC Lead World Cup. This event is free of charge. It is not yet known if tickets are required for entry.
- 28th July–3rd August, IFSC Youth World Championships in Helsinki. Tickets are for:
- 4th–6th September, Koper IFSC Lead World Cup. Tickets will be made available here.
- 19th–28th September, Seoul IFSC World Championships. Tickets will be needed for the following (All indoor events):
- Paraclimbing Finals
- Speed Qualification & Finals - Women and Men
- Lead Semi-finals & Finals - Women and Men
- Boulder Semi-Finals & Finals - Women and Men.
All other events are free of charge. Access to the venue is limited. Entry is restricted to first-come, first-served.
- 23rd–26th October, Laval IFSC Paraclimbing World Cup. Ticket information has not been announced yet.
What to Watch
The 2025 IFSC Climbing World Cup circuit continues in Wujiang, China, this weekend.
As usual, you can watch in Europe and the UK on Eurosport, Discovery+ or Max, depending on your country. You can watch outside of Europe on the IFSC YouTube channel, but some local restrictions may apply.
All times are local times (UTC+8).
Friday, 25th April
- 09:00 – 15:00 Lead Qualification
- 19:00 Speed Qualifications
Saturday, 26th April
- 15:00 Lead Semi-Final
- 19:30 Speed Final
Sunday, 27th April
- 19:00 Lead Final
