Eric Hörst has published a video of Bassa Maẃem's catastrophic muscle/tendon failure in his left biceps, on his Insta, Training for Climbing. Eric says that "this bicep tear is likely the result of excessive speed/power training making the tendon too stiff (i.e. stiffer than the bicep is strong)."

Alexey Rubtsov had a similar injury for two years and shares some of his knowledge. "I tore my biceps in competition and next week I wait for surgery. It is not possible to do anything. In a good scenario, it is 2-4 months of rehabilitation and a year before the start of serious training. I returned to strength training in June of this year, i.e. two years after the injury. I will never repeat most of the strength training.

I tore my biceps because I was training wrong. I started to prepare for the Olympics, ran speed, climbed difficulty and did not reduce the amount of bouldering. I was always overtrained, did not do rehabilitation exercises for the shoulders, only trained strength. And at one point my strength crippled me."

Bassa has confirmed that he has suffered a complete rupture of his lower biceps tendon meaning he will not compete in the final.

Team Ondra has sent out a press release with some interesting comments from Adam: "Boulder has probably been the weirdest in recent times. Just after I finished the last boulder, I thought that I did not perform well and I would end up somewhere in the middle of the starting field. But in the end it was third place."

Here he comments on his Lead performance: "As I really wanted to be sure with every single step, I burned a lot of energy. You can't climb like that in such moisture and I am sure it is a good lesson for me for Thursday. I have to take more risks."

IFSC has published their male qualification report including comments by Adam Ondra. “It's a big step for Sport Climbing. In the world of the competition, it's been a big dream for years, and climbing deserves to be here as a sport. Unfortunately there's only one set of medals, but it will be a good stepping stone for the future where hopefully it will be all three single disciplines."

Offical Speed personal best rankings: (It should be noted that most of the athletes have made faster times during practice and non-official competitions.)

6.96 Iuliia Kaplina RUS
7.10 YiLing Song CHI
7.12 Alexandra Miroslaw POL
7.32 Anouck Jaubert FRA

7.91 Janja Garnbret SLO
8.19 Miho Nonaka JPN
8.43 Kyra Condie USA
8.45 Oceania Mackenzie AUS
8.59 Petra Klingler SUI
8.73 Julia Chanourdie
9.11 Akiyo Noguchi JPN
9.12 Brooke Raboutou USA
9.14 Shauna Coxey GBR
9.16 Viktoria Meshkova RUS (8.64 in training)
9.16 Alannah Yip CAN
9.43 Mia Krampl SLO
9.56 Jessica Pilz AUT
10.51 Laura Rogora ITA
10.70 Chaehyun Seo KOR

12.04 Erin Sterkenburg RSA

The screenshot is from www.Olympics.com which also has a very good live reporting.

The route setters were almost spot on creating an interesting route, although half had a tied score. From a spectator point of view, it was a bit sad that after a rather good start, the performance declined until the very end. The biggest surprise was that Adam Ondra was #4 but it looked more like a technical mistake rather than being pumped out, although he looked a bit tense. Youngsters, Colin Duffy (17) and Alberto Gines Lopez (18) made possibly their best Lead performance ever. Interesting is that Lopez has competed in almost double as many IFSC comps in 2021 compared to all other Olympians and he has actually been beaten by several in Euro Youth Cups earlier in 2021.

Jakob Schubert, the most experienced competition climber in the field, could, just like in the Bouldering event, handle the extreme pressure and win. It should be mentioned that Nathaniel Coleman also made his best Lead route ever, which took him to the Top-8 final.

On a spectacular lead route, Colin Duffy (USA) (c) Jon Glassberg, Jakob Schubert (AUT), Adam Ondra (CZE), Alberto Ginés López (ESP), Nathaniel Coleman (USA) and Bassa Mawem (FRA) have qualified for finals at the Olympics along with Mickael Mawem (FRA) and Tomoa Narasaki (JPN).
The lead stage was won by Jakob Schubert (AUT) who looked quite fresh all the way to the top section, reaching the same hold as Colin Duffy (42+). Alex Megos and Adam Ondra did not have their best day. While Megos seemed to have issues with the heat and struggled early on, Ondra appeared to be motoring right along until he missed the rhythm change and suddenly fell off, looking surprised. Megos missed finals, being ranked 9th. For Ondra, a score of 39+ was enough for finals. Sadly, Bassa Mawem injured himself on the biceps after only a few moves and probably won’t be able to start in finals. Link to official Qualification results

The first half of the route was relatively easy, so everyone climbed up fairly high apart from Bassa who fell due to his injury. Like in bouldering, the routesetters set the stage for a great show. All unused bolts were removed from the wall, and those remaining were protected by plastic covers. The TV presentation was much better than in Bouldering.

Lead Stage Results
1 Schubert Jakob (AUT) 2 42+ (4:02) - [Combined Rank: 4]
2 Duffy Colin (USA) 42+ (4:44) [3]
3 Ginés López Alberto (ESP) 41+ [6]
4 Ondra Adam (CZE) 39+ [5]
5 Coleman Nathaniel (USA) 39 [8]
6 Megos Alexander (GER) 36+ [9]
7 Pan YuFei (CHN) 36 [14]
8 McColl Sean (CAN) 35+ [17]
9 Hojer Jan (GER) 29+ [12]
10 Cosser Christopher (RSA) 29 [16]
11 Mawem Mickael (FRA) 28+ (2:24) [1]
12 Piccolruaz Michael (ITA) 28+ (2:33) [15]
13 Khaibullin Rishat (KAZ) 28+ (3:09) [11]
14 Narasaki Tomoa (JPN) 26+ (2:11) [2]
15 Rubtsov Aleksey (RUS) 26+ (2:29) [13]
16 Chon Jongwon (KOR) 26+ (2:34) [10]
17 Harada Kai (JPN) 25+[18]
18 Fossali Ludovico (ITA) 25 (2:48)[19]
19 O'Halloran Tom (AUS) 25 (3:58) [20]
20 Mawem Bassa (FRA) 7 [7]

Michael Mawem and Tomoa Naraski will climb in finals on Thursday independently of Lead results and Bassa Mawem has almost also secured a position. It is also looking good for Colin Duffy (USA), Adam Ondra (CZE), Alex Megos (GER) and Jakob Schubert (AUT). It is predicted that a score of around 400 will get you into the Top-8 final. We have added a speculated result in Lead, getting as close to 400 as possible, in order to see what more or less is needed. Remember that time will be used to split all tied result. (c) Jon Glassberg
Link to official results
1 Mawem Mickael (FRA) 3 (3) | 5.95 1 (1) | 3T4z 4 5 3 pts
2 Narasaki Tomoa (JPN) S: 2 | 5.94 B: 2 | 2T4z 6 7 4 pts
3 Mawem Bassa (FRA) S: 1| 5.45 B: 18 | 0T1z 0 4 18 pts( * 20 Lead speculation for making finals = 360)
4 Duffy Colin (USA) S: 6 | 6.23 B: 5 | 2T2z 17 12 30 pts * 14 = 420)
5 Chon Jongwon (KOR) S: 5 | 6.21 B: 10 | 1T3z 3 10 50 pts ( * 8 = 400)
6 Ondra Adam (CZE) S: 18 | 7.46 B: 3| 2T3z 7 11 54 pts ( * 8 = 432)
7 Rubtsov Aleksey (RUS) S: 16| 7.23 B: 4 | 2T2z 7 4 64 pts ( * 6 = 384)
8 Khaibullin Rishat (KAZ) S: 4 | 6.19 B: 17 | 0T1z 0 3 68 pts ( * 6 = 408)
9 Schubert Jakob (AUT) S: 12 | 6.70 B: 7 | 1T3z 2 13 84 pts ( * 5 = 420)
10 Ginés López Alberto (ESP) S: 7 | 6.32 B: 14 | 1T1z 12 4 98 pts ( * 4 = 392)
11 Hojer Jan (GER) S: 11 | 6.63 B: 9 | 1T3z 3 8 99 pts ( * 4 = 396)
12 Piccolruaz Michael (ITA) S: 8 | 6.33 B: 13 | 1T2z 5 7 104 pts ( * 4 = 416)
13 Coleman Nathaniel (USA) S: 10 | 6.51 B: 11 | 1T3z 4 6 110 pts( * 4 = 440)
14 Megos Alexander (GER) S: 19| 7.47 B: 6 | 1T4z 2 15 114 pts ( * 4 = 456)
15 Cosser Christopher (RSA) S: 9| 6.48 B: 16 | 0T2z 0 15 144 pts
16 Pan YuFei (CHN) S: 20 | 7.59 B: 8 | 1T3z 2 15 160 pts
17 Harada Kai (JPN) S: 15 | 7.08 B: 12 | 1T2z 4 8 180 pts
18 McColl Sean (CAN) S: 14 | 6.93 B: 15 | 0T2z 0 3 210 pts
19 Fossali Ludovico (ITA) S: 13 | 6.71 B: 19.5 | 0T0z 0 0 253.5 pts
20 O'Halloran Tom (AUS) S: 17 | 7.34 B: 19.5 | 0T0z 0 0 331.5 pts

Sensational bouldering by Mickael Mawem getting three tops in four tries and all four zones in five tries. In 2021, his best bouldering WC results, out of four, was #10. On the other hand, he was #4 in the World Championship in 2018 and in 2019, he won the Euro Championship, so he is used to delivering when it really counts.

Jakob Schubert was #18 coming into the third boulder having just made two zones in 12 attempts. Then with just 2.5 minutes left on the clock, he pulls it together and we get the biggest (relief) scream of the night, after Mawem going full-on after each top.

In general, it must be said that the boulders were too hard as the 20 Olympians did only manage to get 20 tops altogether. I have hard times thinking the non-climbers audience appreciated this. However, all four boulders were topped out but only three athletes manage to make the zone on the second boulder. Furthermore, continuing on the positive side, there were no ties.

In a very technical Boulder stage, Mickael Mawem had an amazing round with 3 Tops in four attempts on the first three problems and won ahead of Tomoa Narasaki(JPN) and Adam Ondra (CZE). It also happens to be Mawem's 31st birthday! (c) Jon Glassberg
Alex Megos had a good round, finishing 6th. Jakob Schubert was under pressure after only having 2 zones before the last problem. He kept his cool and claimed a top on the last problem, finishing 7th.
All boulders were extremely technical and all were topped at least twice, with no ties. M1 one was a slab, M2 consisted of a very difficult shoulder/stemming move into a shoulder press. M3 was a jump into a strange press move to hold the top. M4, the steepest problem, feet first started facing the crowd, then a crack move led to the top.
It must be mentioned that the camera work and directing was very poor throughout the round, often focusing on climbers on the mat while key moments were happening on the wall.

Results
1 Mawem Mickael (FRA) 3T4z 4 5
2 Narasaki Tomoa (JPN) 2T4z 6 7
3 Ondra Adam (CZE) 2T3z 7 11
4 Rubtsov Aleksey (RUS) 2T2z 7 4
5 Duffy Colin (USA) 2T2z 17 12
6 Megos Alexander (GER) 1T4z 2 15
7 Schubert Jakob (AUT) 1T3z 2 13
8 Pan YuFei (CHN) 1T3z 2 15
9 Hojer Jan (GER) 1T3z 3 8
10 Chon Jongwon (KOR) 1T3z 3 10
11 Coleman Nathaniel (USA) 1T3z 4 6
12 Harada Kai (JPN) 1T2z 4 8
13 Piccolruaz Michael (ITA) 1T2z 5 7
14 Ginés López Alberto (ESP) 1T1z 12 4
15 McColl Sean (CAN) 0T2z 0 3
16 Cosser Christopher (RSA) 0T2z 0 15
17 Khaibullin Rishat (KAZ) 0T1z 0 3
18 Mawem Bassa (FRA) 0T1z 0 4
19 O'Halloran Tom (AUS) 0T0z 0 0
19 Fossali Ludovico (ITA) 0T0z 0 0
Link to full results The lead stage begins at 2PM Euro Time.

Mawem brothers were the big winners in Speed. Bassa won with 5.45 which means he will most probably be #4 or #5 overall. Younger brother Michael set a new PB with 5.95 and was #3 after Tomoa Narasaki with 5.95, as both the Speed specialists Ludovic Fossali and Rishat Khaibullin slipped. If Michael is Top-8 in Bouldering there will almost certainly be two Mawem brothers in the final.

Several personal bests where Jongwon Chon 6.21, Colin Duffy 6.23, Michael Piccolruaz, first 6.46 and later 6.32, stick out. Also, Nathaniel Coleman made a PB, 6.51 but he actually made a mistake just in the end and could have been #4 instead of #10, with a perfect finish.

The biggest setback happened for Kai Harada who was #15 after 7.08 after one slip and one fall. He was predicted to be at least Top-5 so now he needs to be Top-3 in Bouldering to make it to the final. Sure a big disappointment also for the Speed specialists Rishat Khaibullin and Ludovico Fossali who did not make clean runs. Rishat had one perfect run, until the last three moves, that could have challenged Bassa.