EYC Imst, Austria - 4th/5th August

It was great to be back competing in Imst as it is one of my favourite walls. On the Friday before the competition we were able to go up to the Alpine Coaster, which is a 9 minute roller coaster down the mountain, it was great fun! On Saturday in my category there were 48 climbers. I climbed the first qualifier 23rd so had a couple of hours to wait, but then had a huge wait for the second climb. The team returned to our apartment to keep out of the sun and to have something to eat. It was not until about 6.30pm that I climbed my second route - it was a very long day!

The qualifiers were very hard and pumpy and I did well to qualify in 8th place. I was excited to be in the final.

The finals were held early on Sunday morning. Isolation opened at 7.30am. As I was climbing 3rd I had to warm up very early. Our final route was reasonably easy up the first 5 clips and then there was a very hard move. From there on it was much harder and pumpy until you came to a very hard and sketchy move around a volume. At this point you were very pumped and it was power endurance from here to the roof section. At the roof I couldn't get the clip in and fell dynoing to the next hold. I finished in 8th place. The two climbers ahead of me also fell at the same point and only time separated us. I was very pleased with my result.

At the Award Ceremony

I am now training really hard and looking forward to the World Youth Climbing Championship in Singapore.