News

2003-03-17 Ice Climbing Championship
In March 15–16, Irkutsk Region Open Ice Climbing Competition was held in Irkutsk within 1st International “Winteriada–2003” — Baikal Nordic Games Festival. Participants included teams from Irkutsk, Angarsk Shelekhov, Usolye-Sibirskoye and Kemerovo. Ice climbing championship consisted of two types of events: difficulty competition and speed competition. 25 ice climbers competed on the first day. In the ladies division Eugeneya Bogdanova, a young climber from Angarsk, ranked first in difficulty competition. Svetlana Shulgina (Irkutsk, candidate for master of sports) ranked second. And Anastassiya Beletskaya from Kemerovo got the third place. In the men division Eugene Klepikov (Irkutsk) was the first-place winner in difficulty. Maxim Krivosheev (Irkutsk) ranked second and Sergey Ilyinyh (Kemerovo) got third. In youth competition 16-year-old ice-climbers from Kemerovo — Alexey Buldakov and Pavel Batushev — won gold and silver prizes. Bronze prize won by Eugene Glazunov would stay in Irkutsk. On the second day 30 ice-climbers participated in competitions. They competed in speed races this time. Svetlana Shulgina was the fastest and the most adroit climber. Anastassiya Beletskaya and Eugene Volovicheva (Kemerovo) got second and third places. Sergey Ilyinyh recorded the best result for men having reached the top of an ice tower for only 59 seconds. Young sportsman who was only 18 went ice-climbing for three years. He had been a prize winner at Russia Youth Ice Climbing Championship last February. "Physical strength and intelligence are the main qualities that make a good ice-climber," — Sergey told. Maxim Krivosheev and Kirill Kolchegoshev (Kemerovo) got second and third places. Ice-climbers form Kemerovo also won all the prizes in youth competition. While the closing ceremony Pavel Shabalin, vice-president of Russian Climber’s Federation, wished that ice-climbing officially recognized in Russia last year would become Olympic sport. “I hope we will have our own champions and raise Russian ice-climbing to international levels.” — he concluded. Pavel Kovalev, chief arbiter of the competitions, president of Irkutsk Federation for Extreme Sports, also indicated that ice-climbers from Kemerovo had achieved better results because of their frequent participation in Russian and international competitions.
Press centre of Winteriada Return to the list of news