Zach Galla and Drew Ruana, who have done most of the WC's this year, have made good use of all their hard training and sent Squoze 8C in Red Rocks. Zach, in the picture, did actually do it on his first try on his second sessions and furthermore, he has done three 8B+' the last three weeks. "I’ve been thinking about climbing outside all competition season and I finally have the time to get out a bit. Just trying to enjoy climbing on some good boulders and put all the comp training to use!"

Alex Totkova, who did her first 8c this January, has done her third 8b+, A muerte to the top in Vratsa. It did just take her four sessions. Next plan is to go to Italy or Spain and to do a 9a. In August, the 14-year-old Bulgarian got the silver in the Youth WCH in Combined. Earlier this year she has won two European Youth Cups in Bouldering. Noteworthy is also that Totkova was the only one to beat Oriane Bertone in a comp this year.

Jakob Schubert reports on Insta with a great pic by Johannes Mair that he has done the third ascent of Alex Megos' Perfecto Mundo 9b+ in Margalef, which was bolted by Chris Sharma. "What a day, after failing four times after the crux, two days ago even on the very last hard move above the lip it was an incredible relief to clip the chains of this amazing line today!" Jakob Schubert has been one of the very best competition climbers in the world for the last ten years. Including also his amazing track record on the rock, the Austrian is actually the only one that could challenge Adam Ondra of being the best climber in the world the last ten years.

Anak Verhoeven report on Insta that she has done Joe Mama in Oliana. (c) Ezra Byrne In 2017, the Belgian was #3 in the World Cup and won the European Championship, has had got an elbow injury in September 2017 which has forced her to skip most of the comps in both 2018 and 2019. Her first 9a+, the FA of Sweet Neuf she did just before she got the injury. Please tell us about the process taking it down and what about your injury and the Olympics? I had never tried the route before this trip and it took me 10 redpoint attempts (so 10 tries after I had tried and memorized the moves). The key to climb it was finding the exact beta that suited me. I am not fully recovered unfortunately. The muscles in my arm are still more contracted on one side than on the other and that bothers me while climbing. The cause of that is still unclear. I have never tried to get an Olympic ticket actually, so I won’t try to get one via the European Championships either.

Séb Bouin, who just did a Patanics suggesting a down grade to 9a+, has done No Pain no Gain in Rodellar thinking it is 9a. (c) Julia Cassou Once the French have recorded the last two ascents in his scorecard, he will be #1 in the ranking game. In total, he has now done some 40+ routes 9a and harder including two 9b+' he did this summer.

Keenan Takahashi has done his fourth 8C, Asagimadara in Mizugaki put up by Tokio Muroi. On his Insta he reports, "A dream line completed!!! Despite not being a climbing trip, my only goal was to try Tokio Muroi’s legendary highball.⁣⁣⁣ ⁣⁣⁣ Once I saw it, I vowed to do what was necessary to climb it at some point. Fortunately, that moment came quickly! ⁣⁣"

Nomura Shinichiro has done two 8B+' in one day, Ukiyo and Utsushiyo in Ena. The former competition climber has previously done four 8C's and amazingly he did them within having bouldered outdoors one year. "Half a month ago I injured my pinkie. Since then I have changed how to use fingers and this has given me various climbing moves. My traditional style is 4 finger crimp but due to the injury I trained to be able to crimp powerfully with 3 fingers. My next target is Mandragora ~after break~ (project). I have already tried for more than 20 days. In my opinion Mandragora will be over V16 (8C+).

Moritz Welt, #3 in the Combined 8a ranking game, has done his fifth 9a, Victimes del Futur in Margalef. (c) Simon Weisser "Perfect. The amazingly logical line up the yellow streak. ~30 moves 8b+ route into very physical two move 7C+ boulder problem. Something around 10 tries after Passat (an 8c+ he did two weeks ago)."