(c) Olympic comments by Leo Zhukov, Jon Glassberg and Daniel Gajda

Jon Glassberg/Louder Than 11, 8a member and 8C boulderer, Daniel Gajda/IFSC and Leo Zhukov/IFSC have been shooting and sharing superb pictures from the Olympic Games, among others. They were also kind to share some of his experiences from behind the scene. Gajda and Zhukov are in the picture.

Zhukov: "The most thrilling moment was for sure the women’s podium when the girls stood together, and then at some moment put the heads on each other shoulders and started to cry!! When speaking not about competition - there was a very cute moment, when a Taxi driver (was special taxi for media) made a present for me and Dimitris (another IFSC photographer) - a Japanese paper fan with some origami on it and good wishes. The driver had a bag full of those little gifts for her passengers. At this moment I really felt, that at least part of the people is happy about this event, and they would love to share their happiness and hospitality with all other world!

As climbing is a ‘true’ sport, it fits pretty well into Olympics. F.e. curling 🥌 doesn’t fit. To my opinion, it’s a kind of game like billiard or darts, but not an Olympic sport ))) And climbing is very well-balanced between male and female performance, comparing f.e. to BMX freestyle, where the girls are riding way lower. But in this combined format it might be hard to watch, because of the duration. So, in Paris B+L competition will go at least one hour faster, because Speed is separated."

Glassberg: ”Most thrilling moment for me behind the scene was feeling the energy from the medalists. These guys worked so hard to earn this podium spot and hanging with Nathaniel after the event, the US climbing team and just soaking in Climbing’s big moment was a dream come true.

I was shocked at how many people were there combing the event as press. I would guess there were 100 photographers from all over the world and a variety of international reputable magazine and newspapers. There were very few endemic climbing photographers so I felt lucky to be a climber documenting this moment for climbers in an authentic way for our sport.

Overall the reaction seemed to be very positive from everyone. In the end, the IFSC and IOC put the best climbers of the night on a podium and hung medals around their necks so that’s a huge win for climbing as well as the winners of the competition.”

Gajda: ” I think the most thrilling moment behind the scenes for me were just all of the emotions involved in qualifying for the final and winning a medal. Emotions were for sure high this comp! I think climbing fit into the games very well! It’s an exciting sport and it’s visually amazing to watch. I think everyone is excited to have speed be a discipline of its own next time though!

From what I saw it definitely seemed like there was a lot of buzz around climbing being in the Olympics. The IOC President came and watched the final and the amount of media there was pretty crazy!”