Sendtember, Roctober, November

The last few months have been quite busy with university starting again and still a few competitions left. Being part of the adidasROCKSTARS event was definitely my personal highlight. As an athlete you do get treated like a rockstar and I especially appreciated the reload center, where they offered free physical treatment and massages all day. I feel like recovery is a very important aspect of training and I can only perform at my best if I feel well rested. Unfortunately a lot of girls couldn’t compete due to injuries, so qualifiers were more of a formal round since we all made it to the next round anyway. I’m quite happy with my climbing in semi-finals, not so much with the result though, but that’s bouldering. I flashed the first problem but then needed a few tries to complete the second one. Number three was the hardest but I still managed to get the bonus hold thanks to my toe hooking skills. The last problem seemed to be the easiest for most girls, not for me though. I struggled with the volumes and didn’t even get the bonus hold. This left me in 13th place – too bad I couldn’t improve my placing from qualifications.

One week later it was already time for the Swiss Championships in speed climbing, the last national competition of the season. I surprised myself by climbing a lot faster than in the few trainings I did the week before, which got me the silver medal and a new personal best of 11.14 seconds over 15 meters.


Foto: SAC/ joelschweizer.ch
This also secured me 3rd place in the overall ranking of 2015! And yes, wearing high heels on the podium was quite a challenge ;)

Foto: David Schweizer
Beside that, I did some setting at the newly opened bouldering gym in Buchs (SG) and it’s definitely worth a visit! They have fantastic problems, very diverse angles and a friendly atmosphere, what are you waiting for?
www.sparta-bouldering.com

Other than that I simply enjoyed the great weather and climbed outside as much as possible. I even spent a few days on a rope and managed to climb Sonnenkönig (7c) in Ponte Brolla as well as the ultra classic Gandhi (7b/+) and Microchip (7b/+) in Cresciano, both first try. I got back on some of my bouldering projects in Brione and Chironico but I feel a little too weak to make good progress right now. Luckily my finger is finally getting better and I hope I can try hard again soon. Let’s hope the weather stays as nice and we still have the whole winter to climb in Ticino!