Image: (GEPA pictures)
The 26-year-old was third best in bouldering in the final on Friday evening before she improved to second place in the subsequent lead climb. The world title went to the Slovenian favorite Janja Garnbret, bronze to the Japanese Ai Mori. For Pilz it is the fourth World Cup medal of her career, which also means her Olympic ticket for Paris.
The Lower Austrian, who lives in Innsbruck, had reached the final of the top eight in sixth place and showed top performances there. In the bouldering part, the ÖKV athlete achieved two tops and 69 points, in the lead she managed a 48+ rating or 88.1 points. “It couldn’t have gone better,” said Pilz. Her total score of 157.1 was only topped by Garnbret (177.0), who had already won bouldering gold and lead climbing silver.
During the competition, Pilz didn’t immediately notice that the dream of the Olympics in Paris would become a reality. “The trainers have always shown me the circles. Normally I wasn’t that bad at math in school, but I couldn’t do math anymore. It’s still kind of surreal.”
In Innsbruck 2018, Pilz had won world championship gold in the lead and bronze in the combination, three years later combined gold was added in Moscow. With silver she now completed her set of medals at world championships. The men’s final will take place on Saturday (4:00 p.m.) with Jakob Schubert.
Source: Nachrichten
