Wednesday 17 October 2018 11:07, UK
After nine months recovering from hand surgery, fit-again Molly Thompson-Smith is determined to make every second count - on and off the wall.
The 20-year-old Sky Sports Scholar has just wrapped up a very frustrating season on top of the podium at the British Lead Climbing Championships.
Taking it easy is not on the agenda.
My very short competition season is over and I'm pleased to have ended it with a national title! It was a year full of challenges - some would say it was character building!
Maybe it was, but it was a huge knock to my confidence. So I'm pretty glad to close the door on this campaign of injury and start preparing for next year.
With motivation levels through the roof I have high hopes for 2019 and lots of improvements in my climbing.
Coming back for the World Championships in Innsbruck in September was big for me. It was the first Worlds event hosting the new 'Olympic format' and it was also my first competition after injury.
I was quietly confident, but unsure I even had the right to be confident at all! I had no measure of my shape and felt a completely different climber to the one who won a World Cup medal last November.
I had spent the summer training in Innsbruck, which soon became my second home, a nice feeling to have at a World Championships.
I quickly became a local, spending every day at the wall perfecting my warm-ups, learning all the angle changes in the wall and working out how many training days/rest days were best for my 'new' finger.
It was several months full of learning and testing, and I think I made a lot of progress in finding out what worked for me.
I felt rusty for the competition and started to doubt all my hard work. I was full of emotion - I was nervous and wanted to come back strong but I also just wanted to have fun with no expectations, especially as most people were surprised I had even started climbing.
This crazy muddle of feelings was probably the best headspace I've ever had before a competition!
During qualification, I felt I was returning to something that was once familiar - a bit like riding a bike again. People even told me it looked like I was relaxed and like I knew what I was doing the higher I climbed.
By the semi-final, I was more excited than nervous and I knew there was a chance I could make the finals - what a way to come back into the competition world that would be!
I was a little thrown off though walking into the isolation area. When you reach the semi and final rounds in climbing, you are kept in isolation until it's your turn to climb, so you haven't seen anyone else climb the route.
I had to sit there, try to relax and not overthink. By the end of last year I believed in every World Cup there was a spot in finals that had my name on it.
This may sound arrogant, but I promise it wasn't - just self-confidence and proving myself I believed I could do it, that I needed to climb like the athlete I knew I could be.
In isolation it was tricky. I knew things were very different now and I wasn't the same climber. I knew I had restarted my journey in a different place.
I tried to remind myself this wasn't the competition, it was just the start of a new, healthy and injury-free, smart and long career. And I was excited.
I was soon standing in the doorway for the big stage. The camera was a ruler's length away from my face as strode towards the wall, smiling at the sea of people sat in the dark Olympiahalle of Innsbruck.
I'd been waiting for this moment, unsure if it would happen so many times during the previous months.
I climbed well, and found a flow, until the last section of the wall - the part I couldn't see from the floor when we had six minutes to observe.
I didn't panic. I realised my healed finger was still weak and I struggled to hold a grip other women crimped down on with ease.
The lactic acid in my forearms hit, and after latching the next hold with two fingers, pulling up and jumping for the next hold was all I could manage.
It was done and I was overwhelmed with happiness which may have looked strange when I fell off.
It showed that the injury chapter of my life, although never finished, was definitely something behind me and that I would be able to continue competing at the level I had worked so hard to get to.
I had been a mere move away from reaching a World Championship final! It was closer than I'd expected so I was happy and frustrated!
The off-season will be short, but full of climbing. After almost a year without climbing outside, I'm extremely excited for some rock climbing trips in Greece and France to build up endurance in a relaxing environment.
I'm also excited to up my cooking game and learn some new skills!
The biggest of thank yous to Sky for supporting me through this arduous injury, allowing me to access the best help and even still believing in my comeback.
And also to my parents and boyfriend, who were really there through all of it.
