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Ice Climbing

Image: UIAABern YouTube channel
Ice Climbing is an activity of climbing through ice structures or formations. These formations may be in the form of frozen waterfalls, icefalls, ice slabs or rocks covered with frozen water or ice, or artificial structures.

Ice climbing is a crucial part of any mountaineering activity or training.

What makes Ice Climbing beautiful is that it is nature in its raw form and routes are not always the same after a first climb. These unique characteristics drive the strong Ice Climbing community all over the world.

UIAA recognises Ice Climbing as a competition sport and is responsible for the organisation of events and promotion. 
 

World Cup competitions

World Cup events of this exciting sport take place annually. Lead and Speed competitions were held across Europe and in Korea in 2011. Dates and venues for the 2012 season are now available. See both Lead and Speed competitions explained on our YouTube channel.


Results and Rankings 

The UIAA governs Ice Climbing as a competition sport and is responsible for its organisation and promotion.  Go here for the 2011 results and rankings. Previous results can be found in the left column "results and ranking". Or see the UIAA calendar of events.

Rules and Regulations

UIAA Ice Climbing competitions are organised as per the UIAA Ice Climbing Rules & Regulations handbook. The rules and regulations, for both athletes and event organisers, are approved and enforced by the UIAA Ice Climbing Commission.

History and Future 

Even though the first known ice climbing competition was organised in Italy in 1912, ice climbing as a sport is considered fairly new in terms of worldwide competition and participation. Read more about the history of this dynamic sport.


Ice Climbing World Cup 2010




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Ice Climbing Commission

UIAA’s Ice Climbing Commission is responsible for framing the rules and regulations for Ice Climbing competitions. It also ensures quality of the competitions as per UIAA terms and standards. Learn more


Ice Climbing Videos

Basic Ice Climbing, lead: Ines Papert



Basic Ice Climbing, speed: Urs Odermatt

The videos were produced with funding from ARISF.

Check our YouTube Channel for more videos



Ice Climbing events

02 Feb 2012 to 04 Feb 2012
UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup
Vanoise, France
10 Feb 2012 to 11 Feb 2012
UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup
Busteni, Romania
03 Mar 2012 to 04 Mar 2012
UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup - CANCELED
Moscow, Russia