Norway; my first European Final

I had a fantastic weekend recently in Norway, my aim had been to get in the Finals.

Stavanger harbour 

Friday was spent  shopping for provisions, recovering from the traveling and sight- seeing in Stavanger;  a pleasant city, complete with docks and city centre park. Friday and Saturday nights we dined with the Swiss team, in a Greek/Italian restaurant in Norway….

Qualifier day, I was drawn to be first up on the first route, so I had to really rely on my route reading. After watching the demo I realised there was a better way to climb the route for me than the demo had shown, and it worked a treat, getting quite high before I fell. Annoyingly as I had been first up, my beta was out and most of the others used it. Pretty impressive first climb as I was now7^th.  Second round did not go quite so well, however I found myself in 9^th place overall and in the finals.

Stavanger wall (qualifiers)

It was a pretty amazing day as all the other GB climbers had made the finals as well.   First time ever all the team had made a final.  

Finals day we were up early, and I was pleased to see the route was on the more overhanging section. I just had to wait about 2 hours in isolation for my go on it. Everything went as I planned on the route, until my hand popped off. I was really disappointed as I felt I could have climbed much further, and I had messed up.  However I then watched in amazement as a number of the finalists then fell fractionally below my high point, and so I ended up in 6^th place! 

Final route

I was very pleased with getting in my first final and coming 6^th. This was the second round of the European Youth Cup (first round was just after my AS exams), and my two scores have given me an overall ranking of 10^th in the European Youth Cup!


By Connor Byrne.