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We're over halfway through the 2025 IFSC Climbing World Cup, and things are getting interesting.
Last week's competition was full of action. The bouldering and lead climbing round lasted for five days, in which the bouldering series winners were crowned and a familiar favorite returned to the lead climbing podium.
Read on for our rundown of a thrilling competition in Innsbruck, Austria.
Not sure how it works? Jump to the bottom of this article for a handy IFSC World Cup explainer.
Men's bouldering competition
This was the final bouldering event of the 2025 season and, as a result, crowned this year's bouldering world champions.
Climbing fans won't be surprised to hear that Japan's Sorato Anraku secured a series victory with a silver medal in the men's competition. The 18-year-old won the first three bouldering competitions of the season and has been miles ahead of his competitors on the leaderboard ever since.
His convincing series victory is his third in three seasons, marking an unheard-of beginning to the teenager's young career.
He was pipped to the competition gold in Innsbruck by Olympic champion Toby Roberts, who's struggled through a tricky start to the 2025 competition but now appears to be finding his feet. The 20-year-old British climber took on a tricky boulder with resiliency in the final and topped the leaderboard with 69.8 points.
Speaking to the IFSC, Roberts said: "I'm at a loss for words, I don’t really know what just happened."
“This season has been quite hard, but going into this event, I wanted to give everything, and to be honest, I’m a little bit starstruck. I’m just so happy.”
Women's bouldering competition
This year's women's bouldering competition has been a tense affair, with six different winners in six rounds.
In the end, the series win went to a deserving victor in the form of France's Oriane Bertone, who climbed consistently throughout, winning one gold and three silvers in this year's event. Bertone, 20, secured her place atop this year's leaderboard with another plucky second-place finish in Innsbruck, but was beaten on the day by returning titan Janja Garnbret.
Slovenia's Garnbret is a 47-time World Cup winner and modern-day competition climbing legend. She's missed every other event in the 2025 competition while taking time out to rest.
She returned to the wall in spectacular fashion over the weekend, climbing with aggression and topping each round of the final to finish with an untouchable score of 99.3. Her final, faultless climb was met by an eruption of applause from spectators and other climbers alike.
After securing the gold, she told the IFSC: "It feels amazing. I didn’t know how I would feel coming back, but this amazing Innsbruck crowd welcomed me back.”
“You never forget how to compete, but being back after nine months, in the middle of the season, was not the easiest thing. I had a lot of doubts: ‘Am I ready? Am I not? Am I even motivated?’ But I’m so glad I came back, I enjoyed it so much."
Men's lead climbing
While one event has drawn to a close, another is only just heating up.
We're now over halfway through the 2025 lead climbing World Cup competition, and still none the wiser as to who'll win the men's series when it concludes in September.
The latest round was another close affair, with five different climbers topping the challenging final route, meaning the winner was decided on countback. Roberts came close to completing a historic boulder-lead double, but it was Japan's Suzuki Neo who took the gold, thanks to a bold, fast, and faultless climb in the semi-final.
Gold in Innsbruck represents the first victory of the 20-year-old's young career, but he doesn't want to stop there.
“I’m very happy with my first gold medal,” he told the IFSC.
“I believe the route was a bit easy, but I found it difficult in the middle section, that's when I felt tired. Innsbruck is an awesome venue, there were so many people supporting me. My season is going very well, I would like to win the overall title".
Women's lead climbing
If you thought Janja Garnbret was content with just one gold medal on her return to competitive climbing, you'd be wrong. With bouldering victory secured, she raced up the wall with yet another dominant display in the lead climbing final.
Her final score of 41 was way ahead of anyone else in the competition, and reminded fans why she's been so successful for so long.
Incredibly, this is the third time in three years that she's won the boulder-lead combo in Innsbruck, a venue she's evidently very fond of.
"I love Innsbruck," an admittedly tired Garnbret told the IFSC.
"That’s why I chose this competition for my return after the Olympic year, the crowd is fantastic, they give you fuel, they give you energy to climb, I just love it. And I hope Innsbruck loves me too.”
Although she didn't win the gold, it was another impressive competition for Great Britain's Erin McNeice. The 21-year-old has enjoyed a great start to the lead climbing season and won the previous two lead climbing events in Wujiang and Bali.
Her third-place finish is enough to keep McNeice at the top of the leaderboard going into the final two lead climbing rounds in July and September.
What is the IFSC World Cup?
The IFSC World Cup is a year-long climbing competition that pits the world's best climbers head-to-head in lead climbing, speed climbing, and bouldering competitions.
It takes place across 14 different World Cup stages, held across the globe and throughout the year.
Points from each competition are tallied up, and climbers are ranked on separate leaderboards for each discipline. These rankings decide the eventual world champions.
What's next?
The next round of the 2025 IFSC climbing World Cup takes the world's best speed climbers to Kraków, Poland, where they'll compete over two days of hard climbing.
Qualification begins on July 5, and you can catch all the build-up here on Advnture.
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