Martina Čufar

7 most important (most memorable or turning) points in my climbing career:

1. July 1988 – Summer Alpe Adria Alpin camp in Kötschach Mauten (AUT), when I first tried sport climbing on artificial and natural wall. Since then I was poisoned. Climbing became my passion and was constantly in my mind.
 
2. Spring 1993 – first climbing trip to Arco. I started from 5a and was setting personal records from day to day; from 6a to 7a+ on sight in one week. At that time I also went to first World Cup competition in Frankfurt and finished around 50th place – this was the beginning of gathering my competitition and rock climbing experiences.

3. July 1994 – I did my first 8a, Ekosistem on Bohinjska Bela (SLO). That was a really great feeling and the start of my long list of 8a and over routes, which now (June 2006)  includes 155 routes with the crown of Vizija 8c, which I did at the end of 2005. I think all the other routes were little steps towards Vizija, so all of them are important in a specific way. Maybe  I shall mention my first 8b+, Chiquita in Mišja peč, which was immediately downgraded to 8b (the men’s proud was hurt), but afterwards I did another route, Kaj di je deklica? (What’s up, girl?) 8b+ in 3rd attempt, and since then any route I did was downgraded. Some of the most memorable routes for me are also multipitch routes in Paklenica (Croatia) and Hotel Supramonte 8b (Sardegna), which are connected to stronger emotions due to the adventurous circumstances.

4. January 1996 – Tomo Česen became my coach. After five years of traninig alone, with a great help of my father, this was a step forward in the quality of training. He was my coach till 2002. I learnt a lot from him; about training and about life.

5. September 2001 -  I became the World Champion. However funny thing is that I don’t have such great memories from that victory, because I didn’t reach the top. My best competition memory, the memory of a kind of magical power, was certainly my winning climbing in Serre Chevalier super final 2002, where I just followed my intuition and was even asking myself if it was really me who held such small holds.

6. 3rd of February 2003 – my father died in a snow avalanche. This was a big shock for me. We were very close to each other, he really supported me through my career, belaying me all the time and driving me around wherever I wanted. After this big loss I realized that loosing a competition or not climbing one route is not such a big deal as I had perceived before. Of course I still cry when I am very disappointed after a competiotion but I don’t take this so serious anymore. I try to see positive things also in the defeats and so get stronger; if not in climbing, then in approaching the everyday life.

7. April 2006 – The book “With head and heart till the top – mental preparation of sport climber” was published. I wrote it together with my new coach Aleš Jensterle and Natalija Gros. Writing a book was a great challenge for me. I enjoyed it. There is some theoretical knowledge, that I got at Sport University, gathered with lots of experience and goings on in my head during competitions, isolations, rock ascents...

8. Probably this will be the moment when I will decide to stop competing and devote myself totally to rock climbing. But I am still trying and training hard to achieve some good results before… (Martina decided to retire from comptetition in November 2006 –ed.)