'Disappointed at the threshold of the quarterfinals' Sports Climbing Speed Shin Eun-chul Ends His First Olympics

Aug 06, 2024

The preliminary seed for the men's speed event at the Paris Olympics, held at the Saint-Denis-les-Burge Sports Climbing Stadium near Paris, France, on the 6th (Korea time). Shin Eun-chul is greeting the crowd before climbing. Saint-Denis (France) = Reporter Jung Jae-geun cjg@sportschosun.com /2024.8.6/

The preliminary seed for the men's speed event at the Paris Olympics, held at the Saint-Denis-les-Burge Sports Climbing Stadium near Paris, France, on the 6th (Korea time). Shin Eun-chul is about to play. Saint-Denis (France) = Reporter Jung Jae-geun cjg@sportschosun.com /2024.8.6/

Shin Eun-chul (25, The Shield, North Face) unfortunately wrapped up his first Olympic stage.

Shin Eun-chul was eliminated from the men's qualifying round for the 2024 Paris Olympics at Le Bourget Climbing Stadium in Paris, France, on the 6th (Korea time).

Sports climbing speed events compete with who climbs the artificial rock wall at a height of 15 meters and a 95-degree slope faster. In the speed preliminary round, 14 men and women will participate, and in the seed match to determine the match table, all athletes climb twice to determine the ranking based on the better record. Based on this ranking, seven groups will be drawn from 1-14th, 2-13th, and 3-12th, with the winner getting a ticket to the quarterfinals.

Among the seven losers, the player with the best record gets the last ticket to the quarterfinals.

Shin Eun-chul, who climbed alongside Matteo Giuloni of Italy in the first period of the qualifying seed, got off to a good start early in the game, but slipped in the middle and hit the top touchpad at 6.52 seconds. In the second period, he finished the game without making a mistake and reached the top in 5.25 seconds, and the final result of the seed match was 5.25 seconds.

Shin Eun-chul, ranked 10th out of 14 as a result of the seed match, faced Wu Feng (China), who ranked 5th in 5.01 seconds, for a single round ticket to the quarterfinals.

Shin Eun-chul hit as soon as the start signal sounded. It started better than Wu Feng, but unfortunately, it slipped in the middle. Shin Eun-chul, who did not give up until the end and took a touch pad, finished the competition with 7.24 seconds left in the final record.

At the previous Tokyo Games, Sportsclimbing gave medals by summing up the scores of three events, including bouldering, which has to solve problems with speed and difficulty, and lead, which has to go as high as possible. However, from this year's competition, only speed events that are most intuitive and finish faster have been separated.

vanbasten@sportschosun.com