Sean McColl and Megan Mascarenas Win Adidas Rockstars

Canadian Sean McColl and American Megan Mascarenas have won the fifth edition of the Adidas Rockstars.

Sean McColl has competed in the past four Adidas Rockstars and this is his third win. He took first place against a strong field of competitors.

In second place for men was Rei Sugimoto from Japan, in third was Jernej Kruder from Slovenia and in fourth was Alexey Rubtsov from Russia.

For the women, Megan Mascarenas took home a strong win over Akiyo Noguchi from Japan. In third was Janja Garnbret, in fourth was Stasa Gefo and in fifth was Miho Nonaka.

With four of the six female competitors being under 18 and one being 18 years old, the final featured the next bouldering generation.

Mascarenas who participated in the invitational contest for the first time and won both, the qualification and the semi final round, lived up to her great performance by defeating Noguchi in a thrilling super final.

“At first attempt in the super final, I thought I’d have to go fast, but then I realized that the boulder was rather hard so it was more about getting to the top rather than speed,” said Mascarenas.

Despite her young age, the American has been climbing for 15 years, which explains her impressive strength and technique.

“I’m sure seeing climbing with young eyes while having a lot of experience gives me a different point of view, which helped me a lot in the final. I got stuck close to the top and I didn’t know what to do so I decided to toe-hook the top.”

Three-time overall World Cup champion Akiyo Noguchi, who is eight years older than Mascarenas, agrees that the super final was really tough.

“I’m very happy that I was able to get here once again, I would really like to congratulate Megan on her win,” said Noguchi.

Defending champion Sean McColl, who won the event in 2012 and 2014, achieved his goal of a threepeat.

“When I got through the first cut I kind of had to laugh at myself about assuring the podium again as I have won in 2012, got thirdrd in 2013 and won again in 2014,” said McColl.

“It’s always very exciting to be on the superboulder. Honestly, I didn’t really know how it was going to go. I thought we would both make the jump at the first try and that it was going to be a race for the buzzer, so when I did the jump it was quite hard.

“Then when I heard the crowd’s reaction to Rei falling I looked over and checked, he definitely fell. I knew that it’s really hard to catch up on that type of boulder so I took my time, I relaxed and used more time than normal to the top, but I didn’t fall and that was it.

“I was pretty sure I wouldn’t fall if I could just get through it, so I was just trying to not make any errors.”

Asked about his secret of success, McColl replied, “That I’m able to come back and perform so well every year has probably got something to do with the fact that I train for lead right after the bouldering season finishes while some of the competitors might stop climbing, because they have to have an off-season.

“Generally they will have an off-season just after the last world cup which was two months ago, whereas me, my off-season is in December after both seasons.“

For full results, see here, and for more photos, see here.