.jpg) Garnbret at the 2017 Boulder World Cup inMunich | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Nationality | Slovenian | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | (1999-03-12)12 March 1999 (age 26) Slovenj Gradec, Slovenia[2] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Occupation | Professionalrock climber | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.64 m (5 ft 5 in)[3] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Website | janja-garnbret.com | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Medal record
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| Updated on 27 September 2025 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Janja Garnbret (born 12 March 1999) is a Slovenian professionalrock climber who specializes insport climbing andcompetition climbing. She has won multiplecompetition lead climbing andcompetition bouldering events, two Olympic gold medals, and is widely regarded as the greatest competition climber of all time.[4][5][6] In 2021, Garnbret became the first-ever female Olympic gold medalist inclimbing, and successfullydefended her title in 2024. With two gold medals, she is the most successfulSlovenian athlete at theSummer Olympics. She is also theworld's first-ever female climber toonsight an8c (5.14b) graded sport climbing route.
Garnbret won her first international title at the 2014World Youth B Championships in lead. In July 2015, after turning 16, she entered the senior category of theIFSC Climbing World Cup in lead climbing. In 2016, aged 17, Garnbret won the World Cup seasonal titles in lead and combined,World Championships in lead climbing, and World Youth A Championships in both lead climbing and bouldering. From 2016 to 2018, she was awarded the seasonal title in both lead climbing and combined disciplines. In both 2018 and 2019, she won the World Championships in bouldering and combined and also reclaimed the lead title in 2019. The same year, Garnbret became the first athlete to win all bouldering World Cup events in a season.
As of September 2025, Garnbret haswon the most IFSC gold medals of any competitive climber in history. In the lead climbing World Cup, she missed the podium only four times, winning 31 events. In addition, she has won 18 bouldering World Cup events for a total of 49 victories at the World Cup level.[7]
Garnbret started climbing at the age of seven and first competed in the national competition at the age of eight. She won her first major competition at the 2013 European Youth Championships, where she won in bouldering.[8]
In 2015, her first year of eligibility for theIFSC Climbing World Cup, she placed seventh in the overall lead climbing standings.[9][10] The same year, she also placed first in a Swedish bouldering event, the "La Sportiva Legends Only", ahead ofShauna Coxsey,Mélissa Le Nevé,Juliane Wurm, andAnna Stöhr.[11] She also won the bouldering gatheringMelloblocco in 2015.[12]
In 2016, she won most of the IFSC competitions in which she participated. She won the World Cup in lead and combined disciplines, the World Championships in lead, and the World Youth Championships in lead and bouldering.[13] Garnbret also won the Adidas Rockstars 2016 contest (an invitational contest for the world's best bouldering athletes), defeatingJessica Pilz in the superfinal.[14] She also wonRock Master in 2016, and then again in 2018.[15]
In 2017, she won the World Cup in lead and combined disciplines, the combined title in the European Championships, and ranked second in bouldering in the World Cup and the European Championships.
In 2018, she defended her World Cup titles in lead and combined disciplines and placed fourth in bouldering by winning two golds and one silver, after participating in just 3 out of 7 events (due to school commitments). Moreover, she won the World Championships in both bouldering and combined. She was close to also winning the Lead Climbing World Championships, where she earned the silver medal by topping the final route in 4 minutes and 38 seconds, just 11 seconds slower than Jessica Pilz, who won the Championship.
In 2019, she dominated the bouldering World Cup by solving 74 problems out of 78 and winning every event throughout the season.[16] Throughout six events, she placed first in six qualifications,[17] four semifinals[18] and six finals.[19] This feat had never been achieved before in the history of competition climbing. The same year, Garnbret won three out of four disciplines at the2019 IFSC Climbing World Championships, taking gold in lead, bouldering, and combined.[20] Her win in the combined event qualified her for a spot at the2020 Summer Olympics.[21] Towards the end of 2019, she hiredRoman Krajnik as her personal coach.[22]
In 2021, she began the2021 IFSC Climbing World Cup season with a win in bouldering atMeiringen in April before finishing second inSalt Lake City, ending her streak of bouldering World Cup wins at nine.[23] In the same year, she became the first ever female Olympic champion in sport climbing, taking gold in thewomen's combined event at the 2020 Summer Olympics.[24]
In April 2022, after her first bouldering World Cup victory in the2022 IFSC Climbing World Cup season at Meiringen, Garnbret announced that she would skip the remaining bouldering events to focus on the European Championships and the lead events of the World Cup.[25] At the 2022 European Championships inMunich, Garnbret won gold in all three events – lead, bouldering, and combined – with the first two being the only titles she had never won before, thus completing the feat of winning every possible major title in sport climbing.[26][27]
In August 2023, Garnbret qualified for the combined event at the2024 Olympics by winning the combined title in the2023 World Championship.[28] She also won the gold medal in the individual boulder event and the silver medal in the individual lead event, bringing her World Championship medal tally to ten, including eight gold.[29]
In August 2024, she successfully defended her Olympic gold after winning the boulder and lead combined event at the 2024 Olympics for her second Olympic victory.[30]
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In 2015, GarnbretonsightedAvatar, an8b (5.13d) gradedsport climbing route in Pandora, Croatia.[31] The same year, she successfully climbed her first8c+ (5.14c) graded route byredpointingMiza za šest at Kotečnik in her home country of Slovenia.[32]
In 2016, sheflashedLa Fabelita inSanta Linya, an8c (5.14b) graded sport climbing route. She was givenroute beta by her countrywomanMina Markovič, and climbed the route in less than 15 minutes.[33]
In 2017, she went a step further and clipped the anchor of her first9a (5.14d) graded sport route,Seleccio Natural, in Santa Linya, Spain.[34] Just a few days later, she climbed her second 9a graded route,La Fabela pa la Enmienda, also in Santa Linya.[35]
In November 2021, she onsightedFish Eye inOliana, Spain, which was theworld's first-ever female onsight of a consensus8c (5.14b) graded sport route in history.[36]
In March 2022, Garnbret made thefirst female ascent ofBügeleisen, an8B+ (V14) gradedbouldering problem inMaltatal, Austria.[37] On 12 May 2024, she returned to Maltatal and made the first female ascent ofBügeleisen SDS, asit start variation that is graded at8C (V15).[38]
| Discipline | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | 7 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 8 |
| Bouldering | — | 17 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 18 | 8 | 5 | 23 |
| Speed | — | — | — | 58 | 48 | 12 | — | — | — | — |
| Combined | — | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | — | — | — | — | 6 |
| Discipline | 2013 Youth B | 2014 Youth B | 2015 Youth A | 2016 Youth A |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Bouldering | — | — | 1 | 1 |
| Speed | — | — | 23 | 28 |
| Combined | — | — | 2[40] | 2[41] |
| Discipline | 2016 | 2018 | 2019 | 2023 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| Bouldering | — | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Speed | — | 47 | 23 | — | — |
| Combined | — | 1 | 1 | 1 | — |
| Discipline | 2013 Youth B | 2014 Youth B | 2015 Youth A |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Bouldering | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Discipline | 2015 | 2017 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lead | 2 | 4 | 1 |
| Bouldering | — | 2 | 1 |
| Speed | — | 32 | — |
| Combined | — | 1 | 1 |
As of 6 September 2025, Garnbret has won 49 World Cup events and has a total of 69 podium finishes.[7]
| Season | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 2 | 1 | 3 | |
| 2016 | 4 | 2 | 6 | |
| 2017 | 6 | 2 | 8 | |
| 2018 | 4 | 3 | 7 | |
| 2019 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 2020 | 1 | 1 | ||
| 2021 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 2022 | 5 | 2 | 7 | |
| 2023 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 2024 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 2025 | 2 | 2 | ||
| Total | 31 | 10 | 5 | 46 |
| Season | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 1 | 1 | ||
| 2017 | 3 | 1 | 4 | |
| 2018 | 2 | 1 | 3 | |
| 2019 | 6 | 6 | ||
| 2021 | 2 | 1 | 3 | |
| 2022 | 1 | 1 | ||
| 2023 | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| 2024 | 2 | 2 | ||
| 2025 | 1 | 1 | ||
| Total | 18 | 5 | 0 | 23 |
