If you blink, you’ll miss it: speed climbing is considered the most exciting sport at the Paris Games. The 100-meter sprint? In comparison, a running workout that takes almost twice as long.

Speed ​​climbing is in many ways similar to the Olympic supreme discipline, only vertical.

The participants climb a 15-meter-high wall with a gradient of five degrees, giving their all to be the first to press the red button at the top.

In the knockout round, which took place on Wednesday, two climbers run side by side up an identical course, using 20 holds and 11 footholds to help them reach the top.

US sprinter Noah Lyles showed in the men’s 100-meter final that Olympic glory can come down to thousandths of a second.

It is no different in speed climbing: China’s Deng Lijuan made it to her quarter-finals in 6:369 seconds, six thousandths of a second faster than her rival.

With so little difference between the climbers, one tiny slip-up could mean the end of their Olympic journey.

In the match for the bronze medal, Indonesian Rajiah Sallsabillah lost her footing for a fraction of a second and thus her chance of a medal.

‘The sky is the limit’

Aleksandra Miroslaw from Poland is the undisputed queen of speed. Like Swedish pole vaulter Armand Duplantis, she keeps breaking her own world record and has achieved this feat eight times in her career.

In qualifying for the Olympic quarter-finals, the 30-year-old broke her old world record again and set a new time of 6:06 seconds.

The number one seed and absolute favorite Miroslaw got through the quarter and semi-finals relatively easily, but had to face a tough challenge from Deng in the final.

Gold was won with a delicate touch. Deng started slightly faster, but Miroslaw hurried after her and was the first to stretch for the siren, which she caught in 6:10 seconds. The Chinese athlete finished in 6:18 seconds.

Overwhelmed by her emotions, Miroslaw sank to her knees, sobbing, then ran into the crowd to embrace her family as a sizeable Polish crowd waved flags and shouted her name.

“I never thought about time. I only had one thing in my mind: just run. I didn’t even look at the other side, I didn’t even know it was close,” Miroslaw told reporters.

Could she break the six-second mark? “I really don’t know how fast I can go. There are no limits,” she said.

An overview shows Indonesian Veddriq Leonardo taking part in the preliminary round of men’s speed climbing during the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris on August 6, 2024 at the Le Bourget sports climbing stadium in Le Bourget. (AFP/Michael Reaves/Pool)

“Gen-Z Sports”

Sport climbing was first introduced at the Tokyo Olympics to attract a younger audience. It proved an instant success and will be held again in Los Angeles in 2028.

“It’s a sport for Generation Z,” said Fabrizio Rossini, spokesman for the International Federation of Sport Climbing.

“You can pack all the action into what would be the highlight reel of another sport, so it’s perfect” for the shorter attention span of the younger generation.

In Tokyo, the competition consisted of three elements: speed, boulder and lead. The latter two were more methodical and difficult climbs in which athletes competed to get as high up the wall as possible.

For the Paris Games, the organizers have decided to separate the speed part, undoubtedly the most spectacular climbing discipline.

This meant that the medals awarded on Wednesday were the first in Olympic history and Miroslaw became the first Olympic champion in speed climbing.

The 6,000-seat crowd at the sun-drenched Le Bourget stadium north of Paris cheered wildly and stamped their feet after each climb as hits by Coldplay and Taylor Swift blared.

“The finale was fantastic. It was absolutely amazing,” said Brandon Blaser, 49, a real estate developer from Salt Lake City in the USA.

“Those six seconds alone are the culmination of all their efforts. It was really, really fun to watch them,” he told AFP.