Canadian Makes Semis at First Lead World Cup of 2021
The first Lead World Cup of 2021 has begun in Innsbruck. Canadian Victor Baudrand has advanced to semis
The First Lead World Cup of 2021 has begun. Although the IFSC has hosted three World Cups this year, Â Innsbruck will become the first to offer Lead in competition. The event kicked off with the qualification round this morning.
Although the events of these next five days will not precisely reflect the Olympic format, World Cup athletes will compete between disciplines between rounds, making for an action-packed week of climbing.
For those aiming to make predictions about the upcoming Olympic Games, this week’s lead results will help form those final podium-predicting opinions. While some have made predictions regarding the upcoming Olympic results, the absence of Lead from these last competitions have made it difficult to know of any dark horses that might perform well enough to make finals despite poor bouldering results.
Although the qualification round in Innsbruck has offered little in the way of surprises, it did bring in Italy’s Laura Rogara. While Rogara has struggled in bouldering both is Salt Lake and Meiringen, she comes equipped to the lead competition with numerous 5.15 ascents to her name. She has taken second position, moving into semi-finals. It will become interesting to see whether she can hold that position.
While Slovenian Janja Garnbret may not have won her last bouldering World Cup, she has entered into semis in Austria in first position. Her powerful style, even on lead, will become difficult to overcome for Rogara or Team USA’s Brooke Raboutou. Raboutou took third position heading into Semi’s.
Raboutou has quickly become a favourite for finals with her increasingly consistent results at World Cup Events. Without taking first, Raboutou’s placement in finals in Tokyo is far from certain, but her consistency will pay dividends. Many will watch Raboutou and her performance in Austria to measure her prospective Olympic performance.
Although not in the top three, Akiyo Noguchi has climbed consistently well in each of the disciplines. Far from the best in either Lead, Boulder or Speed, Noguchi’s sixth place position into semi-finals could reveal her strength in the roped discipline. Team Japan’s Miho Nonaka and Team USA’s Kyra Condie also made semis, although the Slovenian team dominated the qualification round.
For the men, Adam Ondra maintains his superior position. Qualifying in first, only Ondra offers more consistent results than Garnbret. Not to be outdone, Japan’s Tomoa Narasaki qualified for semis in seventh place and will look to improve his result in order to remain competitive for the first-place position in Tokyo.
While Austria’s Jakob Schubert has had mixed results in these last few competitions, he did take third in the first of the two World Cups in Salt Lake City. This addition to his second-place qualifying position in Innsbruk has built Schubert into a competitive Olympian. He appears to get more consistent with each round of competition.
Similarly, Germany’s Alex Megos had a difficult start to the competitive season. He made up for it today, qualifying in third going into Semi’s. Although his results were strong, they came as less of a surprise than America’s Colin Duffy who claimed sixth position into Semi’s on Lead. Depending on how he manages the Semi and Final round, Duffy could become more competitive than previously ascribed. His results have also trended toward greater consistency.
And Canadian Victor Baudrand qualified in 24th at his first Lead World Cup, so will be roping-up first in semis. In 2017, he finished 12th at the Youth World Championships in Innsbruck, 7th at the PanAmerican Youth Championships in Montreal in Lead, 10th in Speed, 16th in Boulder, and 6th at the 2018 Youth World Championships in Moscow, and 14th at the 2019 Youth World Championships in Arco.
A little throwback post by Baudrand, and watch semis on June 25 below.
Semis
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