"It is our ice, and everything that
is on it is ours too!"
Mikhail Yarin
Ice Climbing
World Cup Final of 2001,
March 7 - 10. Kirov, Russia.
Some results of the 5th Final Ice-climbing World
Cup.
The place: .Kirov city, stadium "Lokomotiv", 5
minutes from the railway station.
Time: 07-10.03.2001
Responsible organizations: Ice-climbing Committee of the
Russian Climbing Federation.
Type: difficulty, speed (not included in ranking).
Participants: 24 women and 59 men.
Countries: Austria, the U.K., Germany, Italy, Russia, Slovenia,
the Ukraine, France, Switzerland.
Head Judge: Max Berger.
Secretary: Kavunenko Rimma Vladimirovna.
Head routes-prepare expert: Konstantin Zhdanov.
Information: Ivan Yakimov.
The winners.
Difficulty.
Women:
1.Liv Sansoz (France)
2.Ines Pappert (Germany)
3.Ksenia Sdobnikova (Russia)
Men:
1.Daniel Dulac (France)
2.Dmitry Bychkov (Russia)
3.Anthony Lamiche (France).
Speed.
Women:
1.Yakimova Nadezhda (Kirov)Киров)
2.Kolodkina Margarita (Kirov) (г. Киров)
3.Polina Pakhomova (Magnitogorsk)
Men:
1.Nikolai Shved (Magnitogorsk)
2.Vlasov Maxim (Magnitogorsk)
3.Alexandrov Alexei (Beloretsk)
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March, 6th.
It was snowing and drizzling in the evening
in Kirov, the streets were dirty and muddy. The weather was definitely
not for sports competitions. The icicle stood wet and dirty without banners
and barriers. At least it looked like this to me when I got off near "Lokomotiv"
stadium from a half-broken bus which brought us from a remote Petropavlovsk
to Kirov. My acquaintance with Kirov began with "The bomb" -
Kirov ice-climbers Mecca. "The bomb" - is a bomb-proof shelter,
where people rest and actually live while preparing the icicle for the
competitions, besides it is the place where the ice-climbers society gathers.
It's only 30 meters away from the icicle, people work in shifts: one works
on the ice, the other one sleeps. If you haven't been to "The bomb",
it's difficult to understand the reverse side of the beautiful show called
World Cup - hard night toil (during the day there are the competitions),
sleeping all together on the wooden benches, eating only from time to
time. Devotion to their ice on the brink of fanaticism. The technology
of preparing ice and routes for the competitions - is a large topic requiring
a separate article, but the technologies won't work without people who
are doing all this.
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March, 7th.
The morning of the 7th of March was completely
opposite to the previous day - frost, sun, bright-blue March sky. The
day of hustle, bustle, and making acquaintances. The anticipation of the
festival. Slowly and reluctantly the sportsmen drag to the registration
deliberately trying to postpone it till the last moment. The judges are
running around and trying to push them into the judges' house. Somebody
is exercising on the icicle, but there are no queues. I climbed as well.
The ice is very different in structure and color from the one in Petropavlovskoe.
May be it's the water that is to blame for it - it's running water here,
and in Petropavlovskoe it's from the river. May be the temperature regime
and the last thaw can account for the difference. The ice is covered with
small icicles. They will clean it during the night taking away the whole
fragile upper layer and get it ready for the competitions, but now it
looks like a good natural cascade. There was no ice of such structure
in Petropavlovskoe.
Pavel Shabalin - one of those who made ice-climbing
in Russia
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At 17:00 press-conference. Judging by the level
of the representatives is obvious that the World Cup in Kirov is being
in the center of attention: here present the vice-governor of the region,
the head of the railroad department, the chairman of the regional sport
committee. In an hour the sortition of the numbers and the briefing will
start - instructions about what is allowed, what is prohibited, when to
wake up and when to leave the restaurant in the morning. The latter is
especially for the foreigners - they are not very easy to deal with. Only
Mikhail Yarin is able to cope with them - he uses very simple but expressive
army language. Even the French can understand this sort of language.
The planned evening banquet was rather humble but
for the Russian folk songs and dances. Everybody's thoughts are occupied
with the coming competitions - all are concentrated and dull. Everyone
left quickly.
Press-centre
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In the evening after the banquet I got acquainted
with Vince in the press-center (which was at the same time the headquarters
of the competitions in Kirov). Vince is one of the joint owners of Hoehenwerkstatt
GmbH company, which owns IWC trade mark and organizes the World Cup. Vince's
ability to work is amazing: after the banquet when everybody went to sleep
he went to the press-center to report the news for the Western informational
agencies, struggle with the Russian Internet and checking if everything
was ready for tomorrow's opening ceremony. We left the headquarters only
at 1 a.m. The most interesting fact is that being one of the organizers
of the Ice-climbing World Cup, Vince doesn't do ice-climbing himself,
and half of his life he spends glued to the computer. And still his judgements
in ice-climbing are precise and objective.
Opening ceremony
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March, 8th.
On this day it is always good weather
in Kirov. And it's absolutely fair that the World Cup took place in Kirov
and not in Moscow. It becomes clear when you approach the place where
the Cup is held. In the nearest future it will be impossible to draw so
many spectators and so much attention of the authorities as it was in
Kirov. The square near the ice-tower during the three days of the competitions
has been the place of the national festivities with shashlyk, hot tea,
beer and crowds of the spectators, who have become almost experts in ice-climbing
during the two years of the competitions. The opening ceremony took place
at 9:30. It included everything that the most important winter championship
in Kirov should have: parade of the participants, the line of the beautiful
girls with bread-&-salt, the speeches of the officials. But the participants
neither listen to them nor looked at them - behind the row of the officials
one could see the "Open" route "B" for men where later
the most dramatic events of the day took place.
Дм. Бычков стартует
по отборочной трассе "А"
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"Open".
"Open" is held without isolation zone and all the sportsmen
can look at the performance of their rivals. If because of the large
number of participants Open has to include two or more routes, the
routes have to be identical, the sportsmen with points should be
evenly divided between the routes, all the rest are divided randomly.
Usually Open among men is held in two groups "A" and "B",
in each of the groups the first 9 qualify for the next stage. It
is considered that in case of identity of the routes and even distribution
of the sportsmen with the points, this method is objective in choosing
the pretenders for the semifinals. With women it is usually enough
to have one route and 18 sportsmen qualify for the semifinal.
The task of those who prepare the routes, especially for the Open,
is, on the one hand, not to make it too difficult - otherwise both,
strong and weak, would fall at one and the same point and it would
be difficult to objectively judge the participants. On the other
hand, the route shouldn't be too easy - otherwise too many participants
would reach the top and the places would be distributed according
to the time which is against the difficulty climbing ideology (this
problem cost Liv Sansoz the first place in the World Cup). Only
those participants who qualify for the semifinal get the points
in World Cup ranking.
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Men started first on routes "A"
and "B". When looking with a naked eye it seemed that the routes
were not equal in difficulty, route "B" seemed more complicated,
but later it became clear that everything was vise versa. Notwithstanding
the outward difficulty, the lower part of route "B" was climbed
by much more people than the lower part of route "A", where
the participants fell down at the very beginning having touched the tricky
forbidden zones. The results of the qualification were a bit astonishing.
Erik Svab loves Russia very much and he had some grounds to hope for a
good performance in Kirov thinking these competitions to be very important
for him. In the middle of the route Erik firmly hammered the pick of his
ice-axe behind the bend not noticing a hidden red line, and for several
minutes he didn't agree to get down not being able to believe that the
competitions in difficulty in Kirov were over for him. The Ukrainian Evgeny
Krivosheitsev, who was the fourth after four World Cups thus having all
the chances to win both in the Final World Cup and in Kirov, finished
route "B" with the result 10 1/3 and it looked like he wouldn't
have any problems. Yet he became the tenth in his group and dropped from
participating in the semifinal. On route "B" the semifinal's
line happened to be on mark 9.33, while on route "A" - on mark
3.66! And unexpectedly for everyone - except may be the Kirov team - Maxim
Tomilov, 15-year-old sportsman, who was allowed to participate in the
competitions by a special decision of the International Committee, qualified
for the semifinal in group "B". As it turned out a day later,
it wasn't accidentally that he got into semifinal. Everybody counted on
his brother - Alexei - who has just won the Russia Championship, but Alexei
made a disappointing mistake in the very beginning of notorious route
"A".
Тим Емметт после
первого карниза
отборочной трассы "А"
Дуэль.
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Duel & Progress.
Konstantin Zhdanov, one of the leading routes-prepare specialist
in Europe, says that modern sport ice-climbing is a duel between
the sportsmen and those who prepare the routes. With every competition
the route-prepare specialists invent new puzzles, new types of routes.
Every year there appear new forms of relief. This year in Kirov
it was the flat ice ceilings which decided the fate of the semifinal
and final. And each time the sportsmen invented new variants of
solving the problems, sometimes passing the route in the manner
different to how they were expected to do it. With each competition
the equipment is changed, the understanding of the peculiarities
of its application grows. Nowadays it seems the main progress is
in using the spurs on the crampons. Every one has his own ideas,
shapes, techniques of application.
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As usual the team maintaining the routes is up to the
ears in work. They have to redraw the red lines, clear the routes from
the broken ice. This is why from time to time they announce the technical
breaks. The men qualification took too much time, so as usual women had
to start later in the evening on the simplified men's route "B".
The route was made with competence: the starting traverse checking general
technique, slant ascent inside a limited area revealing technique and
physical endurance, a long simple piece where in fact a sportsman wastes
a lot of time realizing this loss only at the end, strength-consuming
roof and a series of limited spots near the top. Here everything was calculated
right with the difficulty, and the only unexpected surprise was Rita Kolodkina's
touching behind the red line. Too low to qualify for the semifinal and
very annoying! Rita was in a very good shape, exercised the support of
her home-town spectators, stood a good chance of winning the bronze medal
in the Final. It was really a pity - for it is the second bad luck within
one week (the first one occurred in the Russia championship). As for the
rest, all who were expected to qualify for the semifinals lived up to
the expectations.
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March,9th.
Kirov fans - this is s a separate subject.
In the first place, their number is great - I've never seen so many supporters
at the ice-climbing competitions. It is especially astonishing for the
foreigners - for them 100-200 people from a near-by ski resort is a crowd.
In the second place, there are a lot of children, families, almost no
drunkards in the evening. And in the third place, what really matters
is that they support everybody, not only the Russian sportsmen. Though
there are the favorites even among the foreigners - people remember them
from the last year and they come especially to watch them climb: Erik
Svab, Urs Odermatt, Tim Emmett who bears the title of "Her Majesty
servant". When Urs, who was called only "Ursik" by the
Kirov fans, used to come closer to the public to give his autographs,
the shrieks of the girls were louder than the microphone and far from
being quiet voice of the judge informant Mikhail Yarin. As for taking
autographs, it seemed to become a separate kind of sport with the Kirov
teenagers. They asked for the autographs from everyone with a helmet or
a badge, who looks like an ice-climber or a foreigner. The most important
was the number of signatures made on the ads booklet which made you a
respectful member of the society.
Crux of the men's semifinal. Those who passed it are struggling
for the right to start last in the Final
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March, 9th was the day of the semifinals and "Open"
in speed. Semifinal is something very serious. It's the struggle for the
points in IWC ranking, the routes are more difficult than the Final of
the Russia championship. The result was unexpected and very pleasant for
us. And again there was a surprise from Maxim Tomilov who slowly and surely
qualified for the Final (what will be his place in the Final?). Another
nice surprise was Alexander Lastochkin getting into the Final. And of
course our enthusiasm was increased by Dmitry Bychkov winning the semifinal.
The beginning of the women's route was very difficult
and besides they had to unclip the top rope on a very complicated traverse.
This helped to select the strongest ones.
From inside out
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Modern routes are made very complicated which
creates certain problems in organizing the correct belay. Nowadays a sportsman
usually starts the route with a top rope and unclips it from the runners
on his way up. As soon as he reaches a certain safe zone he switches on
to a lead climb.
Only four women were able to overcome the cornice
at the beginning. Four more got a little further than half the way. Even
Stefanie Maureau , who was third in the total World Cup ranking, didn't
get to the Final. As a result four our women qualified for the Final -
and it wasn't a surprise. The dominating duet Sansoz - Papert was broken
by Ksenia Sdobnikova, getting higher and higher with every competitions.
She became second in the semifinal. Ines Papert who became third simply
ran out of time given her for the attempt. The semifinals are the best
school for the new generation of Russian ice-climbers because they make
it possible to compare our level with that of the world - or to be exact
- European elite. For many young sportsmen the experience gained in Kirov
is highly important, because participating in the World Cup gives a unique
chance to examine the technique of the leading ice-climbers, to see the
modern level of routes' difficulty.
Misters organizers are working with the press:
Vincent (to the left) and Mikhail (to the right)
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In the evening of March, 9th, the "Open"
in speed took place. All the spectators were very eager to see this event.
In spite of the fact that among the best western sportsmen very few take
part in speed and this kind of competition is not included into the ranking,
competitions in speed are very popular among the fans. And no wonder -
the rules are simple, the action takes little time and each performance
doesn't bore the spectators, emotions are in abundance, the audience grow
excited as well as the competitors themselves. And there were only 18
sportsmen left to think about tomorrow's competitions - all the rest could
do whatever they wanted. The western climbers perceived the speed as an
exciting show and they were not upset when they fell from the route, and
yet in the heart of their hearts, may be, each of them wanted to win in
this almost purely Russian kind of sport. But as usual they failed. The
Russian school of speed and the advantage of ice-fi-fis over the ice-axes
was obvious. Let's see if this state of the matters will last till the
next year.
Judge-informant Mikhail Yarin. "There was
ice in his eyes".
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March, 10th. The Day of the Final.
"Euronova" team
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I don't know why, but women's finals always go before
the men's, though in the "Open" and semifinals everything is
vice versa. The last day of the last 5th stage of the World Cup of 2001
in Kirov was opened with a women's difficulty. Eight beautiful ladies
were crashing the ice trying to snatch their ice-axes from the ice and
places in the top ten of the World Cup. The basic intrigue is simple.
Professional sportsman, twice the world champion in rock-climbing Liv
Sansoz secured herself for the second place, but if she wants to be the
first she has to win this competitions. But nothing depends on her even
in this case. It's the price of her failure in one of the World Cup stages
in Saasfi. She has won all the rest competitions! Ines Papert, extremely
charming 28-year-old German, mother of a 4-months-old baby and a well-known
climber in the West, also provided for the second place. But in order
to be the first in the total ranking she has to come fourth in Kirov.
And everything depends on her. And as for the third place - there are
several sportsmen who can fight for it, and only mutual results will define
the bronze winner of the World Cup.
Ines Pappert has won the World Cup. And
she knows it already.
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Liv Sansoz (to the left) against Ines Pappert
(to the right).
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A very strength-consuming limited overhang requires
the precision of movements. The beginning of the final was discouraging:
Olga Shkurenkova - 1.76, Anna Torretta (Italy) - 1.76, Olga Epiphanova
- 0.66, Kirsten Buchmann (Germany) - 1.66, Nadezhda Yakimova - again 1,76!
There seems to be a spell on the route. And here comes Ines Pappert -
third from the end - and everything quickly takes its due place - 5.25,
which means at least the third place in Kirov and the golden medal in
the World Cup! Alas, Ksenia Sdobnikova finishes the route again at 1,76,
but here comes the arithmetic of places' distribution according to the
results of the semifinal, and Ksenia wins the first medal among the Russian
women in The World Cup of 2001! Everybody starts calculating the rating
points - Nadezhda Yakimova becomes the third in the total rating! She
left Kirsten Buchmann behind only by 4 points. So Buchmann came fourth.
When Liv Sansoz came to the route everything had already been decided.
There was only one question left: who was stronger today. When I looked
at Liv Sansoz's face through the camera, it seemed that every movement
was painful for her. But she is a first class professional and she managed
to prove this with her absolute victory in the Final - 6.33! Ksenia Sdobnikova
from Moscow came third and it's a great success. It's only her first year
in World Cup competitions and in ice-climbing on the whole, she qualified
for the finals twice before Kirov: she was the 7th in Pitztal and 5th
in Saasfi.
Maxim Tomilov - the opening of the Kirov
championship - on the Final route
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As for the men, almost everything has already been
decided in the previous competitions. On the whole the French took the
leading positions (a rear exception - were competitions in Saasfi, where
Krivosheitsev won and Bychkov became the second). The following season
promises to be more interesting (the competition becomes harder and the
number of the sportsmen claiming to win medals is growing). In Kirov after
Krivosheitsev's disappointing failure to enter the semifinal, Byshkov
was left alone against the excellent team of Petzl Charlet Mozer. A certain
intrigue was created by Maxim Tomilov, "Brother-2", who got
to the Final, but has never taken part in the competitions of such level.
But having calmly and surely passed the lower part of the route, he fell
at the beginning of the ice ceiling, thus becoming the sixth. And still
it's a wonderful result for the first experience when you are 15! In fact
the ice ceiling was the moment of truth and its passing decided the fate
of the medals. But to be honest the fate of the Kirov competitions was
at stake - as for the total World Cup results - everything was already
clear. The French trio would hardly let anyone pass ahead of them.
On the ceiling the difference in the approaches
to this kind of relief was obvious, again there started an argument between
the supporters of different techniques. All the Western sportsmen decided
to pass the ceiling with the help of the so-called "figures".
From beneath it looks very artistically, but in fact it takes much strength
and is very risky. Hanging on the ceiling with one tool and intertwined
legs and arms - is a very unbalanced position with little freedom of movements.
Only Daniel Dulac could pass the ceiling using this technique, with the
result 5.50. All three - Alfred Dvorak, Anthony Lamiche, and the Cup leader
for that moment - Stephane Husson - fell from the cursed ceiling. Dmitry
Bychkov, who had won the semifinal and was the last to start in the Final,
demonstrated that everybody should use his wits and imagination. With
the help of his spurs he did that what turned to be next to impossible
for the others, and he saved much of his strength. But… nobody knows why
such things happen: after the roof Dmitry falls exactly where fell Dulac,
thus dividing the first and second places. The judges need the time for
discussion and they announce 30-minutes break. And after that - Super
final! Alas, Daniel Dulac proved his right to be the winner of the World
Cup of 2001, having won the Super final with great advantage. The second
place in Kirov enabled Bychkov to take the fourth place in the total World
Cup. But what really matters is that he proved that it's quite possible
to compete with the French.
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After men's Super final the square before the icicle
roared in anticipation of the Speed Final. It was getting dark but the
crowd grew bigger. Imperceptibly the police was substituted by the soldiers
and they put more barriers. The preparations were very serious. Last year
the excited crowd broke the barriers, so this time the guards were ready
for such turn of events. And from behind the ice tower one could hear
the sounds of the hammer, where they were preparing - no, not a scaffold
- stage for the winners. The men's Super final broke the planned schedule
- for there was no time planned for this event. As a result the schedule
of the last evening was so overcrowded with different events that it was
not clear how it would be possible to finish in time for the train. The
darkness fell and than it started. As usual Mikhail Yarin was starring
as the judge-informant, the citizens of Kirov as the spectators, the participants
- as themselves.
Erik Svab is happy
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It's useless to describe the speed in words, it's
like a carnival - the action, where you should participate to feel its
spirit and sense. The foreigners were gradually giving up - "Her
Majesty servant" Tim Emmett climbed the route with ice-fi-fis (frankly
speaking, he'd rather climb it with his regular tool for when in the train
he took off his clothes his legs were terrible - wound instead of the
legs). The results were as usual predictable. Among women the everlasting
argument between Nadezhda Yakimova and Margarita Kolodkina ended in favor
of the first one this time. At the present moment Kirov duet is considerably
stronger than all the rest: 4 seconds divided them from the third place
- Polina Pakhomova from Magnitogorsk - and that is really a lot. To compare,
the results of the first six men were within the limits of 4.6 seconds,
and the struggle for the medals was again between the sportsmen from Magnitogorsk.
The best among them was Nikolai Shved this time who came ahead of the
Russian champion Maxim Vlasov by one second.
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To shoot from above I climbed to the
top of the icicle - the men's route was very long and ended just beneath
the top. Suddenly everything was changed and acquired an unexpected foreshortening
- the well of the light, with the climbing sportsmen, alive and shouting
darkness around, the silence of the cold night sky above and the red finish
pot on the boundary of light and darkness like the world focus, the sense
center of this action. The pot got the worst of it, everybody hit it from
above, from beneath, with joy and relief. Some didn't hit it but tenderly
patted it on its red beaten sides. Sergey Rashitov wasn't satisfied with
the pot - he climbed up and greeted me, but I don't think he recognized
me. Then he hung for a long time, with stretched arms posing in front
of the camera. Sorry, Sergey, but my batteries discharged in the cold
and your happy face wasn't left on my film.
Sergey Rashitov, Yuri Oleinikov, Urs Odermatt
and Tim Emmett.
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And then everything came
in a turmoil. One hour before the train, the stage, ceremonial speeches
of the city officials, awarding prizes - fur-coats, strong drinks, World
Cups, Marseillaise in honor of the French, who won all the three medals
of the World Cup. Ines Pappert, who not only won the World Cup but, with
Mountain.Ru assistance, also received the prize from "Vertical"
cinema Festival as being the most photogenic ice-climber of the World
Cup. She was a bit embarrassed by this choice.
30 minutes before the train
departure, closing ceremony, the last views of the darkening icicle, the
car of the Kirov photographer Pavel Sherstennikov, a quick run to Fastudio,
where they managed to develop and print all the films from the Russia
Champiomship and the World Cup in half a day. Thanks to Pavel and the
whole team of Fastudio the quality was excellent and the work - professional.
10 minutes before the train - we are rushing to the railway station, where
a nice thing is ready for us - a special carriage in the train Kirov -
Moscow. We were in time, put all the things inside, said good-bye and
started. I won't tell you what happened in the train. It's a separate
story with too many heroes with suddenly unbalanced psychic. Moscow met
us as usual with cloudy gray morning. The festivity was over. But it will
come again next year.
Author: Yuri Leonov, Mountain.RU.
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