Nathan Phillips, who the last year has sent his two first 8C’s, has completed Beautiful Mind (8C) in Peak District.

Can you tell us more about the ascent?
Really psyched to climb this one as it’s probably the hardest boulder I’ve finished. It climbs the start section of Trance Trance (8C) which I climbed back in June. This section is maybe hard 8A/V11 then 2 or 3 new moves of around 7C/V9 to link into all the hard climbing of Dandelion Mind 8B+/V14 which I climbed about 8 years ago.

It took me 14 sessions since climbing Trance to complete it. About twice as many as Trance took. I started off re-learning the moves on Dandelion Mind as it had been years since I’d climbed it, then as the sessions went on it was just about making bigger and bigger links until eventually getting it done before the end of the limestone season.

What is coming up next?
I’m heading back to Switzerland in November to try to finish a 6 year project.

Which project is it and how many sessions have you put in?
The sit project to Fake Pamplemousse (8A) in Brione. I honestly have no idea… in the hundreds.

How will you prepare for your next trip and how close have you come?
I have a replica to train on and I’m doing very specific conditioning exercises. I’ve climbed it in 2 overlapping halves but haven’t got into the stand. I’ve done the stand 100’s of times so I’m reasonably confident I’ll do it when I get into it. All the difficulty is getting to the stand. 2 hard hand moves and a hard foot move.

Alex Honnold, with seven 8c+' under his belt, has done Manphibian (9a) in Mt. Charleston, giving a personal 8c+ grade. This is the first 8c+ and beyond for the 39-year-old since 2021. "Psyched to get this done in between life stuff - too much work travel. Used kneebars in several places that surely make this much easier than 9a - I could even imagine hard 8c the way I did it. But it's still a great route and I really enjoy the upper part." (c) Rollin Grimmett, who sent Arrested Development (8c+) the same day, comments.

"We both sent first try of the day, first me and then him. Lovely day at the crag with surprisingly no crowds. I have been trying Arrested since I moved to Vegas in June, gave it about a month of effort before it got too hot. I trained a lot in July on the TB2, and was psyched to put it together as soon as it started cooling off. The middle crux for me is very friction dependent, so it was nice not to not slip off anymore".

Leo Bøe, who since 2023 has done a dozen 9a's, has during the last three weeks in Flatanger sent three 9a’s. (c) Adri Martinez

Little Badder (9a); "Was hard for me to complete this climb as it had 1 stopper move in the last crux. I fell in the top crux 6 tries in a row. I had to be fully rested to do the span-move, and in the end it went when I had optimized the rests before. Cool to finally send this athletic climb!!"

Illusionist (9a); "Fun to solve this puzzle and find the perfect beta. I almost only fell in the big span move before the roof, but when I finally stuck that I climbed Illusionist to the top! Was cool to share this with a motivated crew!!"

Valhalla (9a); ”Finally dared to try this endurance test. Thanks to a good crew and sharing betas it went down so quick! Doug & Josh also sent the two following days! 💥”

Domen Škofic has done Little Badder (9a) in Flatanger and now he has started working on Move (9b). ”I’m enjoying the process of working on Move. It’s going amazing at the moment:)”

With Jorge Diaz-Rullo (who took the picture), Stefano Ghisolfi and Seb Bouin at the scene, it is an amazing line up in the cave, although Alex Megos just left.

Can you tell us more about Little Badder?
It’s incredible that this route is not that much endurance based even though it’s approximately 50 meters long. It has so many good knee bar rests that it’s more challenging to stay focused on doing two very cool athletic cruxes perfectly with a nice flow. The only thing I disliked about this route is that it gets wet quickly and can stay wet for a long time. I basically send it the first good/dry day since arriving here. The other days I could focus on working the Move which stayed dry most of the time so I took adventure of every day :)

Loic Zehani, who earlier in 2024 has sent 15 routes 9a to 9b, has done the FA of La voie lactée (9a) in Baume canouille. (c) Lunar Fox

”35 powerful movements in the big overhang. "Grotte de l'Ours" style! Hard first part with a nice dynamic move and some crimpy movements, then the second part is very resistant and physical. There is no rest between. About 15 tries in way too hot, that it is so good north wind "mistral". Not soft I think.”