Davide Picco, who started 2024 by sending Sanjski par extension (9a), has made the first repeat of Silvio Reffo’s Musa (9a) in Covolo.

Can you tell us more about those 9a ascents?
Let me start with Sanjski par: I've always had a weakness for this line, since the first time I visited Misja Pec. I think that might be because it is located in a 3-meter-high cave 😂. Anyway, during my Christmas holidays in 2019, I was able to send the first part but failed to connect the extension. I came back one weekend in December last year and was nearly able to make the ascent after the third day of trying. I was close but didn't expect to be that close 😅. When I came back again during Christmas time I warmed up, I did one go to brush the route and then I was able to make it to the top.

Concerning Musa: I chose this line because no dry caves were nearby 😂. It is a bouldery route (bolted and climbed by Reffo some years ago), that never gets wet. It seemed the perfect solution as in November it'd been raining a lot and there weren't any dry crags where I live. So we started going back and forth from Rovereto to Covolo every weekend of that month but I couldn't connect all those hard movements, 14 in total. To be fair the first three moves were the ones that made me trouble the most, those right before entering the main crux. Finally, on Christmas Eve I understood how to pass through and when I returned last weekend I succeeded. I would have never thought to send it soon after going past those three movements, usually, I'm the one who falls right in front of the anchor at least one time 😂.

Speaking on the Testpiece Climbing podcast, Sean Bailey reports that he has added a low start to the highball boulder Evilution Direct (8A) at the Buttermilks, calling it Devilution (8C+). The 8A goes from stacked pads and Sean basically added two super hard moves from a stand start. (c) John Kasaian

”Everyone that comes out of the Milks normally walks through that boulder, we were trying it late in the day, we brought like twenty pads out there to do it so I'm already like a little stressed. I really don't want to have to get all these pads out here again, and I turn around and I'm like oh my goodness, there's like thirty, forty people out here. I want to get this thing done, it's getting dark...”

Earlier in the winter season, Sean flashed Slasher (8B), did the FA of The Doors of Perception (8C) and repeated Lucid Dreaming (8C). More details can be found on Sean's Instagram. The 27-year-old has been an active IFSC competition climber for over ten years and in 2021, he won one Boulder WC and two Lead WC's.