Stefan Scherz, who won the Lead and Combined Euro Champ and was runner-up in Boulder last year, has done his first 9a, Kraftplatzl in Berglsteiner See. "6 sessions. 4th try of the day after falling 3 times at the last move like an idiot. rained all day so it was pretty humid. first in this grade. SOO PSYCHED!" (c) Florian Murnig The day after, the 18-year-old did The Source 8c+ in Zillertal. "WOW. 1 day, 4 tries. did the jump beta. Kingline! it felt like i was climbing in a dream. sendtrain is on. Yesterday Kraftplatzl, today this gem. living the dream. The last few weeks, I tried to stay fit by doing some power and mobility exercises, which seemed to have worked out pretty well. Now, as the situation in Austria gets more relaxed, i decided to have a few rock days."

Adam Ondra has done the FA of Bohemian Rhapsody in Roviste which is is #41 9a+. "The longest and hardest linkup in this beautiful granite area. Climbing wise absolutely amazing." (c) Martin Pelikan In total, the 27-year-old has now recorded 174 routes 9a and harder. Without all his personal down gradings, he has done close to 200 routes originally graded 9a.

IFSC reports that Anouck Jaubert from France and Michael Piccolruz from Italy have qualified to Tokyo 2021 as they were #11 and #14 in Hachioji WCH last year and as there were no tripartite allocations. According to the rule, the quotas had to be assigned before March 30 without taking into consideration that the Moscow Combined Euro Championship has been postponed to October. This means that France and Italy have filled their female and male quota. In other words, Fanny Gibert and Stefano Ghisolfi can not make it even if they win in Moscow. (c) Eddie Fowke The Tripartite idea is to allow athletes from minor Olympic countries to qualify. The only criteria were to participate in the Combined WCH but this info was not spread around and no athlete from a minor Olympic nation made the criteria. Zàhéér Ahmád from Pakistan got an invitation from IFSC who paid part of his ticket but they did not mention the tripartite possibility so he participated in just two disciplines and lost the Olympic dream. In theory, if Fanny Gibert had won in Moscow in March, Anouck had not gotten the tripartite allocation and instead Di Niu from China had made it to Tokyo, unless Yue Tong Zhang had filled their quota in the Asian CH. In theory, Jernej Kruder from Slovenia and Ievgeniia Kazbekova from Ukraine could also have gotten the Olympic ticket if all results went their way.

Welcome to Jamrock + Mustur - FontaineBleau '19 from niky_ceria on Vimeo.

Stephan Schibli, who started climbing in 1989 has made the FA of Frittenbude 9a in Ibergeregg. The picture is from another route. "Since I couldn't go to Bleau because of the border closings, I was able to send the route. Holidays are often project killers, since a week of vacation means 3 weeks of absence in the project. I was able to climb the lower part of Fritierte Neutronen (8c+) in 2011. At that time I had no solutions for the upper part. Last year I figured if I wanted to climb the route I should start slowly. I found the solution for the lower key train again in late autumn. Thanks to the early spring and the dry weather, I was able to get into the route regularly this year, which made the climb possible."

Based on a poll with almost 1 000 unique votes, Who is the male climbing legend? Wolfgang Güllich, who made the FA of Action Directe 9a and who also was the first to do 8b, 8b+ and 8c, got most votes. 30 % Wolfgang Güllich 22 % Chris Sharma 20 % Adam Ondra 12 % Fred Nicole 05 % Yuji Hirayama 03 % Alex Honnold 09 % Other (Alex Huber, Alex Megos and David Graham most mentioned)

Oriane Bertone, living in Reunion outside Madagascar, has been in quarantine near Fontainbleau and have not seen her twin sister, Margot, and mother since two months. Together with her father Stefano and brother Max the plan was to do the French Youth Boulder Championship and continue projecting her first 8C in Fontainebleau when the lock-down started. Stefano reports he thinks they all got Covid-19, from a supermarket, a month ago but without any major impact. "Our friends have a very good private wall that allows us to keep the level, until May 11 when we hope to be allowed to go out again on the projects started before the confinement. Oriane was very well on 2 or 3 hard (or very hard) boulders :-). We also manage to climb in a private little sector, which is not prohibited. Oriane and Max alternate bouldering sessions and resistance training, by doing circuits on the private wall. On the rest days, we try to go outside around the house to do some exercises and stretching. The rest of the time, the children do their homework and we connect on a video call with Margot, who climbs on our wall in Reunion Island. So I can see and encourage her." They do not know when they will be able to fly back home and possibly they will stay the whole summer in Europe and if so, the plan is to have the twin sister Margot joining them. The twist of the situation is if also the Euro (Olympic qualification) Championship in October is postponed to 2021, Oriane might have a chance to qualify to Tokyo, as she turns 16 the next year. Last year, Oriane won all Youth competitions but one she entered, and she also managed to challenge some of the best seniors. At age 12, she did her first 8B+ and she is #3 in the 8a ranking game.

Christof Rauch has done the FA of Total Blackout in Zillertal, meaning he has now done eleven 8C. Quite impressive as he is working full time. (c) Thomas Lindinger "A dream came true! For sure the hardest line in my home valley and a real power-endurance testpiece! Started the journey 5 years ago with the FA of Nussknacker sit (8B+). Back then the start from further left wasn‘t possible due to a lot of stuck driftwood. Last year most of the driftwood was finally gone. I put away the rest and found some perfectly shaped holds. After two sessions I did the FA of Black Water (8A+) but linking this into Nussknacker wasn't realistic at that time because of a lack of fitness after my finger injury. Nevertheless I was willing to put in the necessary work. I did a few sessions last autumn and a few more this spring. From the middle of March till the middle of April there was no climbing at all, in Tyrol we were not allowed to leave our town and we wer only allowed to leave the house for important things. After that the restrictions got a little less and I was able to climb again in my home areas. In that month of no climbing I trained at home on some fingerboards."