Jaka Šprah has done his first 9a, Water world in Osp/Misja Pec. "Water world is an amazing 55m long line in the big cave of Osp opened by Klemen Bečan five years ago. I first tried it last September and did it with one hang after about 10-15 tries, but it eventually took me 46 tries to piece the whole thing together. This July we took a long trip to Rodellar and it was a great preparation for Water world with a similar style of climbing. Something that helped me a lot was visualizing the route every evening. It enabled me to come back to it after about five months and feel almost like I was on it yesterday. I did it with two different shoes because Adam Ondra does it that way and I want to be sponsored by both Scarpa and La Sportiva."

From a female Speed specialist perspective, the bouldering qualification results could not be better. From the complete results; #37 Anouck Jaubert, #49 Andrea Rojas, #57 Aleksandra Miroslaw, #65 Yiling Song and a total of just 89 participants, compared to 122 last year. Further more, as just half of them are god Combined climbers it will be relatively easy for the best Speed specialist to make it to the Top-20. As a matter of a fact, it could be two or in theory three, making it to the Top-20 Combined final. In reality, the winner of each discipline will most certainly make it to the Top-8 final and there finish at least Top-4. It should be noted that it says that only the Top-7 will get an Olympic ticket but with the max two country quota and four Japanese and five Slovenians Top-21, it just might be that even #10 will get a ticket. In practice this actually open up for two female speed specialists making it through. In theory, this means that we could end up with three or even four female Speed specialist in Tokyo 2020 and with a chance that one of them will get a bronze in the Olympics although being dead last among the boulder and lead specialist in every round. The one who loose with Speed specialist getting good other results is Miho Nonaka as she is the fastest non-Speed specialist. All the above speculations are based on the multiplication format that will be used in Combined. Finishing 1 * 20 * 20 = 400 is a better results than 7 * 8 * 8 = 448. In the final 1 * 7 * 8 is better than 4 * 4 * 4.

Janja Garnbret onsighted all five problems and also Akiyo Noguchi, Petra Klingler, Nanako Kura and Chaehyon Seo (15), in her very first international Bouldering comp, got five tops. In total, four from both Japan and Slovenia to the semi and Switzerland had three that made it through. The big surprise was that the best female from Austria was Jessica Pilz as #33. Last year she was #4 in Bouldering and #3 in Combined. Noteworthy is that the fifth and last Slovenian was #21 and that Anouck Jaubert, the Speed specialist, got her best ever bouldering result being #37. It should also be mentioned that 25 % of the 89 female ended up with no Top and no Zone. Complete results (c) Vladek Zumr

Over the past months, our team has worked on an enhanced navigation and menu structure, advanced filtering options, and a new training feature. With this upgrade, we're excited to introduce Vertical-Life Premium. At the same time, we’ve switched from single purchasing options for outdoor content to individual and premium subscriptions. This will enable you to have full access to the entire digital climbing guide library on the Vertical-Life platform and to the personalized training plans at one flat rate. You can choose from several monthly plans, or subscribe together with friends for the most advantageous price. Get your free update now!

The world championship will start tomorrow with the female Boulder qualification. Based on an 8a poll with almost 1 000 unique votes, Janja Garnbret is the favorite to win Combined. Surprisingly, 15 year old Chayheon Seo who never has done a Boulder World Cup is runner up in the voting. The Top-7, included a max country quota of 2, will qualify to the Olympics. Unfourtunately, she will start as #43 in her group meaning she will face worse conditions compared to the highest ranked. 78 % Janja Garnbret 07 % Chaehyon Seo 05 % Miho Nonaka 05 % Others 03 % Jessica Pilz 02 % Akiyo Noguchi

Marketa Janosova, who has been third in the last two Lead Euro Youth Cups, has done her first 8c, Pijane trójkąty in Podzamcze. (c) Krzysiek Przybysz This summer the 15 year old has also onsighted five 7c+' as well as her first 8a. In the Age and Gender bonus ranking game, she is #12.

Martin Stráník has done is eighth 8C, Ghost Rider in Moravský kras and he is #4 in the ranking game. (c) Jakub Konečný "5 sessions, super powerful climbing in cave, love this style of climbing, really fits my style! Another stunner for Moravia Carst, potential of hard lines here is endless!" Martin started out as a successful youth Led competition climber who later got the silver in the Boulder World Championship in 2007 at age 17. This year he took up Lead again and was #9 and #6 in the only Lead WCs he did. Speed, he has also tried twice but two false start so we do not know if he could be a dark horse for one of the Tokyo tickets.