Schalck's Revenge and Ondra's Farewell: Boulder Finals Day at Štvanice Island

The loudest moment in Friday's men's boulder final at Štvanice Island did not belong to the winner.

When Adam Ondra stepped onto the boulder final isolation wall with the Prague crowd filling the riverside venue behind him, the Czech Republic's most decorated climbing athlete was competing in the last boulder event of his career. He had announced it in advance — the campaign hashtag was #lastboulderdance, the merchandise was printed, the national TV cameras were at angles they don't normally bother with for a semifinal. Ondra is 33 years old, unquestionably the greatest lead climber of his generation, and a man whose shoulders have been ending his relationship with the jumping, dynamic style that modern competition bouldering now demands. Prague was his final boulder competition, and Prague gave him a full house.

He finished 15th in the semifinal. He topped one boulder, reached zone on two others. He did not advance to the final.

The crowd met that with everything Prague had left to give on a June evening: extended applause, standing, the kind of noise that a result on paper cannot explain but that everyone in the venue understood. Ondra acknowledged it from the wall and from the floor after, briefly and without theatre. He will be back next week for the lead event, which is his discipline and where he remains among the best in the world. As of Friday evening, his boulder career was complete.

The Men's Final: Schalck Breaks the Run

The men's boulder final ran after Ondra's semifinal exit, in a competition that the season's dominant force — Sorato Anraku of Japan — arrived at having won the previous three boulder events on the World Climbing Series calendar.

The first climber to top all four boulders was Mejdi Schalck of France.

The 21-year-old topped problem after problem with the methodical precision that defines his bouldering when it is working at its best, and by the time the final scores resolved, Schalck had 99.1 points against Anraku's 84.1. It was not close. His compatriot Samuel Richard took third place, giving France an unlikely sweep of the podium's top two positions against a field that included the season's most dominant athlete.

Schalck, when asked, was direct: "This victory really means a lot to me. I didn't qualify for the Olympics last year, so I see this success as revenge."

The context behind that sentence matters. Anraku has been the story of the World Climbing Series boulder season — three consecutive wins, a semifinal that he dominated even when he missed problems that should have troubled him less — and Schalck arriving in Prague and ending the run is exactly the kind of competitive disruption that sets up the rest of a season. Whether Anraku reasserts at Innsbruck next week and whether Schalck can reproduce this form are now the questions the season carries into its next event.

The French climber also carries the emotional weight of a result delayed. Missing Olympic selection — for an event in a discipline you had prepared years for — is a specific kind of professional setback that most competitive climbers never discuss in public. Schalck said his piece and then climbed four boulders better than anyone in the field.

Today's Women's Semi-Final: Moroni's Perfect Run

The women's boulder programme sits one session behind the men's at Prague, which means the semifinal is running today at 17:15 CEST with the final following either this evening or tomorrow morning, depending on the competition schedule.

Camilla Moroni (ITA) is the athlete the Prague crowd should have on its radar. In qualification, Moroni was the only climber among the 85-strong women's field to top every boulder on her first attempt — a perfect 125-point score that separated her from a group of seventeen who solved all five problems but required more attempts to do so. In the semifinal, that form held: Moroni continued to flash and top consistently, maintaining the pressure on a field that includes the current Madrid winner Erin McNeice of Great Britain.

McNeice won the previous World Climbing Series boulder event in Madrid less than two weeks ago. She arrived in Prague with the confidence of recent form and the qualifying scores to match. The women's final — whenever it runs — will carry the specific tension of an athlete on a perfect run meeting a defending-champion-level opponent in the form of her career.

What the Prague walls will set for those problems, and whether Moroni's flashing ability holds under final conditions, is the question that the rest of today answers.

Sunday's programme brings the lead semifinal and final for both genders — the discipline that marks the first time Prague has hosted lead competition at all. The city has run the boulder event for years; the 2026 edition added a 17-metre lead wall built specifically for this event, making Štvanice Island one of the more impressive temporary climbing venues anywhere on the current World Climbing Series calendar.

For Ondra, Sunday also marks a return. He entered the lead qualification earlier this week. His position in the field, and whether Prague gives him the kind of result his home crowd is hoping for, is a different story — one that begins tomorrow.

For outdoor climbing accessible from Prague — Bohemian sandstone towers, Czech Paradise, and the unique ethics of sandstone sport — see our Czech sandstone climbing guide. For the lead qualification field report from June 4 and Central European limestone destinations, see our Prague lead climbing guide. For the World Climbing Series Bern report from May, see our Bern boulder opening field report.