World Cup Boulder Chamonix

Rakhmetov and Choumilova win third stage beneath downpour

July 2000

Rain practically stopped play at the Bouldering World Cup 2000, held this weekend in Chamonix, France. Last weekend's Difficulty was disturbed by rain, but this third event was literally thrown into disorder due to the downpours.

In the hope of better weather Saturday's qualification was postponed to Sunday: the entire program had to be compressed into a single day and the athletes were therefore allowed just 4 minutes for each of the 4 boulder problems. Climbing in two groups, the best 10 athletes qualified quickly for the Final.

But their efforts were to no avail, for there was no escaping the rain. Nevertheless, the Finals went ahead, and the Russian Salavat Rakhmetov prevailed considerably over the rest of the field to win the men's event. Second place went to the Ukrainian Serik Kazbekov, thereby inverting the order of the recent Masters in Gap. Stephane Julien, winner of the first World Cup event in Konitsa, Greece, placed third and therefore leads the provisional World Cup ranking. Fourth place went to the Ukrainian Andrei Vedenmeier, winner of last week's Speed Competition. Fifth, sixth and seventh place went to the Frenchmen FrÃ©dÃ©ric Tuscan, Daniel Dulac and Alexandre Chabot respectively.

Elena Choumilova consolidated her lead of the provisional World Cup ranking by winning the women's event, but unfortunately finished the competition with a knee injury. Cecile Leflem from France beat Myria Motteau to second place, ahead of Sandrine Levet and Vera Kotasova fourth and fifth respectively.

Â Â	Results men
1	Salavat Rakhmetov
2	Serik Kazbekov
3	Stephane Julien
3	Andrei Vedenmeier
5	FrÃ©dÃ©ric Tuscan
6	Daniel Dulac
7	Alexandre Chabot
8	Tomasz Oleksy
9	JÃ©rÃ´me Meyer

	Results women
1	Elena Choumilova
2	Cecile Leflem
3	Myria Motteau
3	Sandrine Levet
5	Vera Kotasova
6	Natalia Novikova
7	Olga Bibik
8	Delphine Martin
9	Elena Repko
10	Renata Piszczek