Jon Cardwell, who previously has done three 9a+' and often gives personal grades, has done the FA of Z Nation in Rifle, calling it a hard 9a. (c) Bearcam "It's actually a link-up between three existing routes; Zulu, The Crew, and Bad Girls Club. I envisioned the link because another project I have in the canyon had some wet holds and I figured it would be a nice endurance challenge in the meantime. After climbing the first few bolts of Zulu, which is pretty bouldery, you get a good rest and then connect into the Crew via a pretty difficult boulder problem. After that, it's a pure endurance challenge to the end with the most difficult section coming at the last bolts of Bad Girls Club.

Based on some 1 800 unique votes, Female Climbing Hero?, with 2017 figures in brackets, Margo Hayes were voted #1. Here is a short 8a interview after she did La Rambla 9a+. Later she has also done Biographie. (c) Matty Hong. 18 % Margo Hayes (15) 14 % Angela Eiter (11) and Lynn Hill (35) 13 % Alex Puccio (10) 10 % Barbara Zangerl 08 % Janja Garnbret (9), Akiyo Noguchi 04 % Shauna Coxsey (6), Josune Bereziartu (8) 02 % Sasha Digulian 05 % Other

Katrin "Kaddi" Lehmann has done Franz Widmer's Kryptos in Balsthal becoming the second women to do 8C. It has previously been repeated by Fred Nicole and Kevin Heiniger. She discovered it 15 months ago and since the end of last year she has been projecting it hard. More info on Black Diamond “I knew in May I wouldn’t have much time. Since it was so warm already, I drove to the area after work late in the evening. I only arrived at midnight. Slept there, got up at 6am, had coffee and some breakfast, cycled or walked up to the boulder, tried some moves, cycled down to the car, drove back and went straight to work. It was hard to get up so early and try hard. People who know me, know that I am not really an early morning person. But all that effort was worth it. I thought even if it didn't work out, I had a nice time outside. And then on the 14th of May I was able totop out this boulder”. (c) Michael Steimle FA video.

In 2013, Japan was runner up in the Boulder World Cup ranking with 1 523 points behind Austria at 1 946. In comparison to the total Top-5 countries score, Japan got 21 %. This figure has been on a steady increase over the years and in 2018, they are 43 %.

It is impossible to say how many have done an 8a. One way to come up with a guess is to use factor 3.5 for every grade. In practice, a factor 4 fits better for the the somewhat official stat we have for 9a to 9c but the history shows that many of them will probably get down graded. Anyhow, in one way, such calculation helps us to understand the width of the grades and how the grading system works. 1 = 9c (Ondra) 3.5 = 9b+ (Ondra, Sharma and Megos) 12 = 9b (Some 16 guys) 43 = 9a+ (Around 70 guys) 150 = 9a 525 = 8c+ 1 838 = 8c 6 433 = 8b+ 22 519 = 8b 78 815 = 8a+ 275 854 = 8a

The seventh and last Boulder WC will take place in Munich 17-18/8 and it is a two + two person battle. Jernej Kruder and Miho Nonaka are in forefront. Tomoa Narasaki needs to be #9 or better and beat Jernej to win and Akiyo Noguchi needs to be #2 and beat Miho to win. Complete rankings

karoline sinnhuber has done two 8A's in Silvretta; High Society and X-Ray, "FINALLY! Took my Silvretta nemesis boulder down! Shitty conditions in the hole, kinda slippery and dampy next stop: Rocklands!" In the 8a ranking game, the Austrian is #7 with a perfect score of 10 000 points, having done ten 8A's the last 12 months.

Magnus Midtbo, #4 in the WCH in 2011 and famous vlogger from Oslo Climbing Center, tries out Vertical-Life gym ranking challenge in order to get #1 in the annual global ranking in just one day. VL plan to set up such one day challenges during the autumn. There are now 65 gyms world wide connected to the system, having a digital updated topo. The scoring is a copy of the 8a ranking game and you can filter it in many more ways. Invite your gym to join Vertical-Life.

Nalle Hukkataival in Rocklands - The Realm from Kevin Takashi Smith on Vimeo.

1. Alex Puccio USA 33 - Rei Sugimoto JPN 34 2. Miho Nonaka JPN 23 - Sean Bailey USA 24:2 3. Akiyo Noguchi JPN 13 - Tomoa Narasaki JPN 24:3 Complete results Alex Puccio, doing her first WC in 2018, was last out and flashed the boulder and secured the victory in front of her home crowd. All boulders were topped out. Among the male, Rei Sugimoto was in the lead before the last boulder which he could not top. Then it was Sean who on his flash attempt could not hold the swing on the top hold and the same situation later ocurred for Tomoa. (c) Eddie Fowke