We have previously reported that Illya Bakhmet-Smolenskyi has done the first repeat of Pirmin Bertle's Chromosome X in Chamery becoming the youngest person to have climbed 9a. "My first try of the grade. Perfect route. My beta is totally different from Pirmins." Illya has also presented a video describing graphically how their two betas deviated. Pirmin has checked the video and is very impressed saying Illyas (160 cm) lower new sequence to the right is harder but the upper one to the left is easier. - Chromosome X (soft 9a) is kind of an elimination and that is why we took it out of the topo. Using Illyas holds and sequences are possibly as hard as the original one and a very impressive ascent. We will see what future taller repeaters think of the grade if you keep left all the time? The 13 year old has been very open with how he did and says he can not suggest a grade of his beta due to lack of experience of these grades. - This trip was full of surprises. I did not expect this crag to be so beautiful and diverse. I also did not expect the routes and even parts of the routes to be so different by types of climbing. Based on this, I don’t understand why that area is still not popular because, in addition to everything that is mentioned above, there is huge amount of fabulous hiking tracks and landscapes. In addition to, there is a big range of grades, which is acceptable for family vacations. Speaking of the route, it astonished me. Although I could do every move in the lower part, (using Pirmins beta), I couldn't combine it. Quite the same situation happened with the upper part.One move I could not do. So that is the reason why I made a totally different beta.

Rock & Ice report that Lonnie Kauk has once again repeated his father's Magic Line in Yosemite, upgrading it to 8c+ as he placed all gear on lead. Ron Kauk did the first ascent in 1996 and Lonnie did the first repeat in 2016, both with preplaced gear, i.e. pink point. (c) Lonnie's Insta. The logic with the upgrade is basically that it is harder to climb a trad route placing the gear also because sometimes some of the holds are blocked. Back in the days when sport climbing was created, you were also supposed to place the quick draws on lead and as a matter of a fact, until like 15 years ago, this was for many the way to go for onsights. One of the reason why a trad 8c+ is considered as harder than a sport 8c+ is because of this. Until now, no 9a trad route has been established and there exist only a couple 8c+ in the world, out of which two in Yosemite, including Beth Rodden's Meltdown.

David Firnenburg has done the second ascent of Fred Nicole's boulder route L'isola che non c'è 9a in Amden from 2009 after some eight days of work. (c) Lars Scharl "Fred didn’t give it a grade, just said it lies somewhere around the 9th french grade. David proposes 9a for a powerful Fb 8A boulder (so called “Cavernicole”) at the start, a Fb 7th graded traverse into a horizontal rest on a mini jug with heel-toe cam followed by a long and powerful Fb 8A+ boulder with spectacular swing and feet forward sequence at the very end. You sit start on crash pads and finish with a rope approx. 10 meters above the ground." More comments on Insta.

Katie "Lamb" Ledecky has done her third 8A+, A maze of death in Bishop which just took her three sessions. "Very technical movement on bad feet. The hardest part is figuring out the foot beta." The 21 year old has been climbing since she was 8 years old and being a teenager she did win the nationals a few times. Her next goal is to do Mandala.

Jonathan Siegrist has done his 29th 9a, Spicy Dumpling in Yangshuo. "Fickle boulder problem to an amazing endurance finish without good rest. Finding acceptable conditions is still the crux!" (c) Tara Kerzner In the 8a ranking game, Jonathan is #4 also including Jumbo Love 9b.

A Nordic Voyage • Bouldering in Vastervik, Sweden • Part 2 from Eliot Stephens on Vimeo.

Adam Ondra has described his onsight of Just Do It 8c+ at Smith Rocks with a great picture of Bernardo Gimenez. Good news is that they also got it on video. "It was freaking windy, but I was hoping that down at the base it would be less windy than up in the pass from where it is really nice to check the route. I was trying to convince myself by seeing the no quickdraws moving in the lower bit (well, those quickdraws are in vertical wall so it is clear they were not moving so much). At base it was too obvious that it was freaking windy. But I just set off." Full story at his Insta.