© Thomas Karlsson/DN
This year's La Sportiva Legends Only at Klättercentret in Stockholm turned out even bigger and better than last year's, with Canadian Sean McColl sealing the deal by doing the fifth and last problem exactly when he had to to beat Dmitry Sharafutdinov into second spot.
Legends Only is an "after work" competition where the athletes have a two-three hour work session to figure out the problems the night prior to the competition. The problems, set by a time of five with Shauna Coxsey as chief route setter, are all hard, probably in the 8A-8B range.
The work session didn't give many clues about who was going win, with all climbers looking strong and with decent chances of doing all five problems, and the competition turned out very close with small but crucial mistakes making all the difference.
In the end Sean McColl ended up first ahead of Dmitry, who blew his chances by making too many tries on the first problem of the night. Both did four out of the five problems.
© Thomas Karlsson/DN
If Sean hadn't done the last problem on his second try, Dmitry would have been the Legend of the year, but now, as last year, he ended up in second position.
The climbers were all very happy with the competition and really enjoyed themselves, as did the 700+ spectators.
Again, the route setters succeeded in finding the exact right level of difficulty on the very varied problems which challenged the full spectrum of the athletes' abilities, from slopey slabs to complex dynos.
The results:
1. Sean McColl, CAN
2. Dmitry Sharafutdinov, RUS
3. Jakob Schubert, AUT
4. Guillaume Glairon-Mondet, FRA
5. Adam Ondra, CZE
The whole competition can be watched at SVTplay. The commentary is in Swedish, but all the interviews with the athletes and Shauna Coxsey are in English.
Hundreds of photos Here
Now we are all looking forward to Clément Perotti/Sand Stones' behind the scenes video which should be out any day now. I can promise you some truly legendary footage.
La Sportiva Legends Only is sponsored by: La Sportiva, Klättercentret, Grönt Vatten, Entre Prises , Rokodromo, PsycoArtHolds, JM Climbing, E9, Bel-Air Limousine and Showlighters
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