Highs and Lows in Tokyo

Highs
1. The audience that the Olympics brought to climbing loved it, both commentators, media and spectators feedback was positive.
2. The Men's last medal being awarded to the last climber out who topped the route (Schubert), and his excitement after finding out about his podium finish (c) Jon Glassberg/Louder Than 11
3. Janja Garnbret showing a fantastic performance in Bouldering when it mattered the most.
4. The pressure of the Olympics did not take away any of the great sportsmanship and friendly collaboration between the athletes, especially on display during observation. For commentators and media, this was one of the most noticeable differences between climbing and other sports.
5. Adam Pustelnik's team set 4 amazing routes, where every participant could show their best.
6. Few ties and excitement until the end in all rounds.
7. Aleksandra Miroslaw set a new speed world record (6.87) in the most important run of the competition.
8. Commentators really followed the action and were emotionally engaged. The Eurosport commentator did an especially great job with keeping the audience informed about the possible outcomes as the competition went on
9. Excellent photography from Daniel Gajda, Leo Zhukov, Jon Glassberg and Jess Talley. Overall the IFSC provided much better photos this year than any previous season.
10. Great live score updates on Olympics.com.
11. Akiyo Noguchi ending her amazing career with a Bronze medal.

Lows
1. Bassa Mawem biceps injury and its implications
2. Slips and micro-seconds with huge implications due to multiplication format: Iuliina Kaplina slips on last foothold missing WR and the final.
Colin Duffy would probably have gotten the gold if he had not done a 0.005 false start and beaten Alberto Gines Lopez, who then would have switched the #7 position with Duffy.
Tomoa Narasaki slipped in Speed final, one hold in Lead from getting silver.
Jessica Pilz missed the silver by one hold in Lead, instead, she was #7.
While small glitches with big implications are normal in sport, the issue here was that it was often not clear to anyone what the implications were.
3. The implications of only having 7 athletes in Speed final stage were not considered prior to the event and so there were no rules for this situation. If an adjusted pairing would have been in the rules, Bassa missing finals would have made a much smaller difference.
4. One zone, three boulders only, and apparently not enough testers that are not part of the setting team: the challenge of setting great rounds in bouldering was almost impossible to overcome. Testing boulders and routes should be a fully paid task with the right people selected for the job at big events.
5. Speed specialists performance in Lead and Bouldering, with the exception of Anouck Jaubert (and maybe Bassa Mawem?)
6. TV Production not as good as for example Innsbruck or Moscow events. No live scoring and no prediction on the screen. The commentators were quite critical towards this (the production was done by one company for climbing for all countries).