Competition climbing is a form of regulated rock climbing competition held indoors on purpose-built artificial climbing walls. The three competition climbing disciplines are lead climbing, bouldering, and speed climbing. The result of multiple disciplines can be used in a "combined" format to determine an all-round winner. Competition climbing is sometimes called "sport climbing", which is the name given to pre-bolted lead climbing.
Sean McColl is a professional rock climber from North Vancouver, Canada. In competition climbing, he competes in the competition lead climbing, competition speed climbing, and competition bouldering disciplines, and has won major competitions in all three. He is also notable for his outdoor sport climbing and bouldering ascents.
USA Climbing is the national governing body of the sport of competition climbing in the United States. As a 501(c)3 non-profit, they promote Sport Climbing which comprises three competition disciplines: bouldering, lead climbing, and speed climbing, in elite, youth and collegiate formats.
Shauna Coxsey is an English professional rock climber. She is the most successful competition climber in the UK, having won the IFSC Bouldering World Cup Season in both 2016 and 2017. She retired from competition after competing in the 2020 Olympics., and continues to climb at a high level outdoors.
Brooke Raboutou is a French-American professional rock climber who specializes in competition climbing where she competes as part of the US National Team. She won the silver medal in the combined bouldering and lead climbing event at the 2024 Summer Olympics.
Janja Garnbret is a Slovenian professional rock climber who specializes in sport climbing and competition climbing. She has won multiple competition lead climbing and competition bouldering events, two Olympic gold medals, and is widely regarded as the greatest competition climber of all time. In 2021, Garnbret became the first-ever female Olympic gold medalist in climbing, and successfully defended her title in 2024. With two gold medals, she is the most successful Slovenian athlete at the Summer Olympics. She is also the world's first-ever female climber to onsight an 8c (5.14b) graded sport climbing route.
Competition climbing made its Olympic debut at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan. Two events were held, one each for men and women. The format controversially consisted of one combined event with three disciplines: lead climbing, speed climbing and bouldering. The medals were determined based on best performance across all three disciplines. This format was previously tested at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics. The Olympic code for sports climbing is CLB.
Jakob Schubert is an Austrian professional rock climber, specializing in competition climbing, sport climbing, and bouldering. He is a four-time World Champion and three-time World Cup winner in lead climbing. He is a two-time Olympic bronze medalist in the combined event.
Akiyo Noguchi is a Japanese professional rock climber who specializes in competition bouldering as well as outdoor bouldering and sport climbing.
Sport climbing at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics was held from 7 to 10 October. The competition took place at the Parque Urbano in Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires, Argentina. This marked the debut of the sport at the Youth Olympics.
Jan Hojer is a German professional rock climber specializing in sport climbing, bouldering, and competition climbing. He is known for winning one World Cup and two European Championships in competition bouldering. In May 2010, he climbed Action Directe, one of the most difficult sport climbing routes in the world. From 2013 to 2015, he sent several 8C (V15) boulder problems.
Jessica Pilz is an Austrian professional rock climber who specializes in competition climbing. She won the bronze medal in the combined bouldering and lead climbing event at the 2024 Summer Olympics.
Tomoa Narasaki is a Japanese professional rock climber who specializes in bouldering and competition bouldering.
Competitions in the sport of climbing, governed by the International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC), have been held at two editions of the Summer Olympic Games. First selected as one of the discretionary sports at the 2020 and 2024 games, sport climbing will be inducted as one of the mandatory sports at the 2028 games. Athletes compete in the disciplines of bouldering, lead climbing, and speed climbing. All three were contested as a single event in the 2020 programme, while speed climbing was spun off into its own event in the 2024 programme. Slovenia have won the most gold medals (2), while Austria, Japan, and the United States have won the most medals overall.
Ai Mori is a Japanese professional rock climber who specializes in competition climbing and the disciplines of competition lead climbing and competition bouldering. At the 2019 IFSC Climbing World Championships, she became the youngest Japanese athlete to finish in a podium place in the competition, third in lead. She has won Japan Cup titles in both bouldering and lead disciplines and has multiple IFSC Climbing World Cup podium finishes, including three gold medals in World Cup events in the 2022 season. At the 2023 IFSC Climbing World Championships, Mori won the gold medal in lead, becoming the first Japanese athlete to win a World Championships lead title.
The men's combined event at the 2020 Summer Olympics was a climbing competition combining three disciplines. It was held from August 3 to August 5, 2021 at the Aomi Urban Sports Park in Tokyo. A total of 20 athletes from 15 nations competed. Sport climbing was one of four new sports added to the Olympic program for 2020.
The women's combined event at the 2020 Summer Olympics was a climbing competition combining three disciplines. It took place between 4 and 6 August 2021 at the Aomi Urban Sports Park in Tokyo. 20 athletes from 15 nations competed. Sport climbing was one of four new sports added to the Olympic program for 2020.
Natalia Grossman is an American professional rock climber who specializes in competition climbing. She represents the United States at IFSC Climbing World Cup in competition bouldering and competition lead climbing. She won gold and silver at the 2021 IFSC Climbing World Championships, and has 19 podium finishes at World Cup events, including nine golds. In October 2023, Grossman qualified for the 2024 Olympic games in Paris by winning the boulder & lead combined competition at the 2023 Pan American Games.
Oceania "Oceana" Mackenzie is an Australian rock climber and competition climber who specializes in competition bouldering. She competed in the 2020 Summer Olympics, coming 19th, and in the 2024 Summer Olympics, coming 7th.
Competition climbing at the 2024 Summer Olympics took place from 5 to 10 August at Le Bourget Sport Climbing Venue in Saint-Denis, returning to the program for the second time since the sport's official debut three years earlier in Tokyo 2020. The total number of medal events was doubled from two in the previous edition because the boulder-and-lead tandem had been separated from the speed format. Furthermore, the number of climbers increased from 40 to 68.
