McNeice finishes fifth at the Boulder World Cup in Keqiao

Erin McNeice reached her first finals in an IFSC World Cup competition today, which saw the 20-year-old secure a personal best result with fifth place in the Boulder competition in Keqiao, China.

Semi-finals 

After finishing fourth overall in the qualifying round by placing second in group A behind Olympic gold medallist Janja Garnbret, the 20-year-old started the semi-final round strongly by topping the tough coordination bloc. Keeping the momentum, she maintained focus through the final three super physical boulders, achieving all zones and coming close to topping a couple more, resulting in her advancing comfortably to the final with another fourth-place finish.

Finals 

The first problem of the women’s final was a coordination boulder. Erin’s hesitation on the left sequence meant she didn’t reach the zone. Finding her flow with boulder two, she flashed the problem which put her into fourth place behind France’s Zélia Avezour. Boulder 3 was a slab problem; with 20 seconds left on the clock, she reached the zone after recovering her balance on the red slab volume. The final problem was powerful with brutal pinch moves that required lots of body tension. Unfortunately, McNeice couldn’t crack the beta and failed to reach the zone, putting her in fifth position overall.

Janja Garnbret took the gold medal after flashing three of the four problems, while Camilla Moroni of Italy took silver and Zhilu Luo of China took bronze.

Erin’s first-ever World Cup final demonstrated that she is a real contender on the world stage. This is McNeice’s best result to date and good preparation for the Olympic Qualifier Series in May of this year. 

Click here to view the full results

The Men’s competition continues tomorrow (10 April 2024) for the semi-final and final rounds. This follows the competition being rained off on Monday 8 April and will see all athletes competing. The GB Climbing athletes competing are: Dayan Akhtar, Jack MacDougall, Max Milne, and Toby Roberts. Erin will continue on to Wujiang for the IFSC Lead and Speed World Cup starting on 11 April.