Janez Svoljšak with gold in...

Janez Svoljšak with gold in the World Cup also European champion in ice climbing.



The Slovenian sports fairy tale continues. Janez Svoljšak, in recent years the most successful Slovenian competitor in ice climbing, won the final race of the World Cup in competitive ice climbing in South Tyrol today after a silver medal a week ago and also claimed the title of European ice climbing champion, which is a new milestone for Slovenian ice climbing. The Škofja Loka native ended the season in third place in the overall World Cup standings 2016 in lead.



Janez Svoljšak (AO PD Kranj), a member of the Slovenian national team in competitive ice climbing, who on January 23, 2016, achieved the success of his career and the first Slovenian medal in this sport after seven years with second place at the World Cup event in Swiss Saas Fee, moved his personal bar even higher with today's victory at the final World Cup event in Rabenstein in South Tyrol - and became the European champion in ice climbing lead. With this success, Svoljšak achieved the first Slovenian ice climbing victory in the lead category. In 1997, Janez Jeglič - Johan had won both in lead and speed at the unofficial world championship, which marked the beginnings of the current World Cup, and in 2008 Matevž Vukotič won an individual event and claimed the World Cup in speed.



"I started today's day very well with the top of the route and first place in the semifinals, so I competed last in the final. The final route was long, some moves difficult, but endurance prevailed. I climbed to the top, the second-placed Swiss fell from the top, so the differences were small at the end, unusually, after a long time, there was no Russian among the top three in the men's competition," satisfied Svoljšak summed up his impressions after the competition, who ended this year's season in the best possible way: "I feel phenomenal because this is my first World Cup victory, and it also counts for the European champion title. Everything clicked in one day, so this is really an excellent season finale for me, which I ended as third in the overall World Cup standings."



In Rabenstein, where the fourth - and at the same time last - event of this year's World Cup in ice climbing took place, which was also the European Championship, the 22-year-old Škofja Loka native showed excellent fitness and incredible focus in all three competition rounds and, as the only one, reached the top of the semifinal and final routes and won for the first time in his senior career among 70 ice climbers from around the world; in 2014, he had already become the world youth champion. Second place went to Swiss Yannick Glatthard, third to South Korean HeeYong Park.



VIDEO You can watch Janez's climbing at this link. A short clip of the climbing at 2:55:00, medal ceremony with Zdravljica and footage of Svoljšak's climbing in the upper part of the final route from 3:16:10 onwards.



"Janez's systematic approach and dedication to the sport have finally paid off. Unfortunately, there were only four World Cup events this year, in which Janez improved his results; after the event in Korea, he said he still had reserve and thought he was capable of better results, which he confirmed with a silver medal in Saas Fee, and ended the season as the winner of the Rabenstein event and European champion! This week he was chosen as the most successful ice climber of 2015, and he deservedly confirmed the title with silver and gold medals," Jasna Pečjak, head of the Mountaineering Sports Commission of the Alpine Association of Slovenia, accompanied Svoljšak's exceptional success.



Svoljšak reached higher from event to event this season - after an opening seventh place in Bozeman (USA), he finished the second World Cup event in South Korea in sixth place, at the third in Swiss Saas Fee he stepped on the podium for the first time in his career, and in Rabenstein ended the season in grand style - with gold in the World Cup and the title of European ice climbing champion. Today's success also brought him third place in the overall World Cup standings 2016 in ice climbing lead. This season, only Russian Maksim Tomilov and South Korean HeeYong Park were better than the young Slovenian competitor.



"As we have mentioned several times, we Slovenians are among the pioneers of competitive ice climbing with events in Bohinj at the beginning of the 1990s, with the national cup from 2000, competitors at the highest level from 1997, international judges from 2002, and now with a gold medal and, last but not least, with the active participation of a representative of the Alpine Association of Slovenia in the Ice Climbing Commission of the International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation and the Ice Climbing Subcommittee in the Mountaineering Sports Commission of PZS," Pečjak highlighted the Slovenian story in international ice climbing.