Ernst, Schubert Win Boulder World Cup; USA's Matty Hong 6th, Sasha DiGiulian 7th (new photos)

Written by Christopher Parker |

Jakob Schubert powered through the crux of the men's finals route this evening to pull off a near-unbelievable sixth World Cup title in a row.

"I keep thinking that someday this has to end," he said after the event. "But then I win again."

Schubert climbed confidently on the finals route at the lead climbing World Cup in Boulder, Colorado, making several moves past the other competitors' high points before falling. The orange holds of the route required a powerful and bouldery sequence complete with jumps and upside-down beta trickery that drove a crowd of 1200 psyched fans at Movement Climbing + Fitness into a frenzy.

Boulder's own Matty Hong had climbed first among the eight male finalists, and pulled smoothly through the opening boulder problems before giving the crowd its first view of the crazy sequence through the route's crux. Hong executed the initial moves into that section, and then fell just below the seventh quickdraw, finishing the World Cup in sixth place. The Frenchman Romain Desgranges also climbed fluidly into the crux, falling several moves higher than Hong, thus making it on the podium for third place. Japan's Sachi Amma made rapid progress on the route, falling a few moves below Schubert's high point and tying Desgranges in the finals to clock second because he was ahead in the semifinals. The current World Cup Champion Ramon Puigblanque of Spain fell low on the route when he missed the big dyno below the fourth clip; the Canadian Sean McColl also fell low, slipping unexpectedly from the holds just after sticking the dyno. Solid efforts by both Manuel Romain of France and Jorg Verhoeven of the Netherlands landed them in fourth and fifth place respectively.

[Top: Ernst for the win! Age 18 now, Ernst won her first lead World Cup in 2008 at age 15, and won three such in 2009. Hitherto this year, she had yet to make a World Cup podium—until now topping one. Photo by Jacek Giecold. Second photo above: Schubert may have been fourth in semis, but in finals he took his customary place: at the top. Photo by Christopher Parker. Immediately above: Sean McColl, who was generally smooth and confident, is shown just before unexpectedly falling. Photo by Christopher Parker.]

While the event was sadly absent the defending women's World Cup Champion, Jain Kim of Korea (see explanation here), the women's final started off with a bang as Japan's Akiyo Noguchi moved quickly up the sustained finals route, even, while pausing at a rest, gesturing to the crowd to cheer her on. Noguchi fell at a long move to a slender pinch that was the key to turning the roof to the finishing headwall, and placed sixth. Strong performances from Austria's Angela Eiter and Japan's Momoka Oda, who each climbed to the same crux, placed them in fifth and third place. The USA's Sasha DiGiulian, 18, also climbed well, moving confidently through the extremely steep boulder problem just under the seventh clip before eventually falling at the same very hard sequence. Charlotte Durif of France fell at the sixth clip and finished in eighth place while Maja Vidmar of Slovenia climbed just under Oda's high point to finish fourth. Mina Markovic of Slovenia, who had been first after semifinals, looked very strong on the route, causing the event's announcer to comment that she was "shredding." She static-ed the long move and fell on the headwall above it, finishing on the podium in second place. The night of the World Cup finals belonged to Johanna Ernst, however. Ernst, 18, floated powerfully past the high points of all the other women finalists. Gaining the pinch hold that spit off all the other women except Markovic, Ernst secured a proud World Cup win in Boulder, Colorado.