Last weekend the 2014 IFSC World Youth Championships in Lead and Speed took place in Nouméa, New Caledonia. This annual event welcomed over 400 of the world's best youth climbers and saw some amazing performances set against the backdrop of an idyllic Pacific island. Despite the tragic destruction of the climbing wall last December when it burned down following an act of vandalism, the wall was rebuilt and ready in time to host the competition.

In the Lead event, Austria dominated the medal table by taking home five medals across the six categories. Hannah Schubert, younger sister of seasoned senior athlete Jakob Schubert, took Gold in the Female Youth A category. Continuing on the sibling theme, Bernhard Röck - younger brother of Magdalena Röck, Bronze medallist in the World Championships in Gijón last weekend - took Gold for the second time in the Male Juniors category. Bernhard previously took Gold in Imst in 2012, an acheivement matched by his sister Magdalena in the same event.

A variety of nations took the title in other categories, with Japan, Slovenia, Sweden and the USA all taking Gold. Aya Onoe of Japan called on her bouldering power and transferred it to lead climbing, winning the Female Juniors category after having made multiple finals in the Boulder World Cup last season. Janja Garnbret of Slovenia topped all of the routes in the Female Youth B category to become a stand-out winner. Kai Lightner of the USA - known for his hard outdoor ascents - showed his diversity in winning the Male Youth B event, also topping out on the final route with ease, whilst Sweden's Hannes Puman took Gold in the Male Youth A category and added to his European Youth Cup win in Imst this year. 

In the Speed event, Russia took four of the six Golds available across the age categories, with Ecuador and Czech Republic taking the remaining two top spots. Ecuador took Silver in the Female Youth A category and Italy, Austria and the USA also took home medals, showing that new countries are emerging in a discipline formerly dominated by Russia and Poland. The fastest time of the finals was recorded at 6.5 seconds by Junior Male winner Jan Kriz of Czech Republic. 

The GB Junior Climbing Team also had a very successful event with all six athletes making the semi-finals. The team consisted of William Bosi, Molly Thompson-Smith, Rebecca Kinghorn, Hannah Slaney, Alex Waterhouse, Jim Pope and Peter Dawson. William Bosi was the only GB competitor to make finals and finished a very credible 8th place in Male Youth A, not far from his personal best of 4th place in the same event in Singapore in 2012. In the same category, Alex Waterhouse and Peter Dawson both acheived 19th place and Jim Pope came 23rd. Hannah Slaney and Rebecca Kinghorn took 13th and 18th place respectively in their first ever World Youth Championship event in the Female Youth B category. Molly Thompson-Smith, GB Team Captain and winner of the 2014 European Youth Cup in Imst, also finished in 18th place. 

GB Team Manager Ian Dunn commented: "The GB Team had the most semi-finalists we have ever had at a World Youth Championships in the 23 year history of the biggest youth climbing competition of the year. All seven team members made semis and 6 made the top 20."

Full results here.

Replays of all categories can be found on Youtube, linked via the video below