Petra Klingler (born 14 February 1992) is a Swiss rock climber and retired competition climber. Known as a versatile climber, she competed in a wide range of competitive events, including competition bouldering, speed climbing, lead climbing, and also ice climbing. She competed in the 2020 Olympics, finishing 16th.
Early life
Klingler was born in Switzerland in 1992. She was born with clubfeet, which required casting as an infant.
Klingler is a third-generation climber and began climbing multipitch when she was six years old. She and her brother would spend weekends outdoors, while her parents and grandparents climbed, typically with three adults climbing and the other watching them. As a teenager, she tired of climbing with her parents and began going to gyms and entering competitions.
She was good at horse riding as a youth, but outgrew local competitions at 13 and began focusing on climbing instead. She was also involved in gymnastics, athletics, orienteering and boxing.
Klingler initially competed in lead climbing, but has since moved towards bouldering.
Competition climbing career
Klingler was described as a "late bloomer" by climbing media after winning her first gold medal aged 23 in bouldering at the Haiyang leg of the 2015 IFSC Climbing World Cup. That same year she came third in lead climbing in the UIAA Ice Climbing World Championships, and second in lead climbing in the overall UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup.
In 2016, she studied Sports Science and Psychology at the University of Bern, while also training, typically doing 10 sessions a week. Klingler described her main gym as not ideal for bouldering, but perfect for systematic training. She pulled back from training a bit in 2018 to finish her degree, which she completed in 2019. Klingler won the 2016 IFSC Climbing World Championships for bouldering.
In 2017, she finished with a bronze medal in the UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup despite injuring her knee halfway up the final route. Klingler was in tears after stretching some ligaments and damaging her meniscus, but managed to continue up the route using only one leg.
In 2019, Klingler won the Swiss championships in all three competition climbing disciplines: lead, speed and bouldering, and qualified for the 2020 Summer Olympics during the 2019 IFSC Climbing World Championships. The Olympics was delayed until 2021 by the COVID-19 pandemic and she placed 16th of 20 competitors.
In 2022 she won the world Ice Climbing Championships, and took part in Red Bull Dual Ascent, an informal competition hosted by Red Bull on the Contra Dam featuring pairs of climbers on mirrored multi-pitch climbing routes. The next year, she announced her intent of trying to qualify for the 2024 Olympics as her last goal in competition, making the 2023 World Championships her last.
Outdoor climbing In 2024, she climbed one 8A and two 8A+ boulders in a day in .
Notable climbs
: Jacks Broken Heart – Magic Wood – 2024 Unendliche Geschichte 1 – Magic Wood – 2024
: Octopussy – Magic Wood – 2024
Television At the 2024 Olympics Klingler served as analyst for the English language broadcast of the Sport Climbing discipline.
Rankings Climbing World Cup Discipline 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 Lead – – – – – – – – – 57 Bouldering 41 26 13 25 16 11 4 8 5 15 6 Speed – – 31 – – 38 – – – 58 Combined – – 14 – – 11 – – 14 16
Ice climbing world cup Discipline 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 Lead – – 27 15 15 9 2 5 17 24 17
Climbing World Championships
Adult Discipline 2009 2011 2012 2014 2016 2018 2019 2023 Lead – – 27 15 – 13 29 – Bouldering 30 29 7 8 1 6 10 13 Speed – – 23 27 – 33 37 – Combined – – – – – 6 8 –
Ice climbing world championships Discipline 2015 2017 2019 2022 Lead 3 4 – 1
Medals in the Climbing World Cup Bouldering Season Gold Silver Bronze Total 2015 1 – – 1 Total 1 0 0 1
Ice climbing Season Gold Silver Bronze Total 2015 1 1 2 4 2016 – 2 – 2 2017 – – 1 1 2018 – – – – 2019 – – 1 1 Total 1 3 4 8
References
External links