Here are a list of old-school guys that are still world class. Fred Nicole is of course number #1 and has been on the cutting edge for more than 30 years. Does it exist any other physical sport where an athlete has been world class for over 30 years? What is unique with runner-up Yuji Hirayama is that he has been world class in so many disciplines from winning six World Cups to having set the Speed Record on El Capitan. 1. Fred Nicole -70: 8b+ in 1987 2. Yuji Hirayama -69: #4 in a WC 1991 3. Dani Andrada -75: 8c in 1993 4. Muriel Sarkany -74: #5 in a WC 1993 5. Dani Andrada -75: #1 Speed WCH in 1997 5. Dai Koyamada -76: #4 in a WC in 1998 Other climbers with a long successful career who are still going strong are Ben Moon, Martina Cufar, Beat Kammerlander, Alexander Huber and Maurizio Zanollo. Is there somebody that we have missed?

Kairn.com, the biggest french climbing website the last 14 years, will stop publishing news. They hope that somebody is interested to continue and otherwise, they will just shut down.

Fanatic Climbing reports that Adam Ondra has flashed Alex Megos Supercrackinette 9a+ in St Léger and Ondra confirms the grade on his Instagram. This means that Ondra has once again raised the standard in climbing. In 2012, Adam flashed Southern Smoke direct 9a+ in Red River Gorge, giving it a personal 9a grade. "According to witnesses, the Czech phenom was very easy on this route of resistance, guided by the bolter of the route himself, Quentin Chastagnier. Ondra has given him a belay and checking the moves while Quentin was putting the draws." (c) Bernardo Giminez

Hayato Naka-Bayashi has done his first 8B+, Chilled out Midnight in Mukogawa. What makes it a unique and a nice story is that Hayato started climbing when he was 30 years old and now he is 38 years old. Does it exist any other physical sport where you can start being 30 and anyhow almost reach world class level.

Eveningsends presents Paige Claassen's one hour a day training recipe to prepare her to do Necessary Evil 8c+: Moonboard, Rings, Beastmaker Hangboard, Dumbbells, TRX and Therabands. Other than that, she actually worked 14 hours a day six days a week during two months before she started working of the route again. "Fortunately, with a decent base, I think that endurance is relatively easy to build in just two weeks."

99boulders.com has presented a comprehensive list: 8C 123, 8C/+ 6, 8C+ 10 and Burden of Dreams 9A. Also all ascents have been added so Alex Beale have been working hard. The most repeated 8C and 8C+' are: 16 Practice of the Wild - FA Chris Sharma 15 The Big Island - FA Vincent Ponchon 13 Monkey Wedding - FA Fred Nicole 13 The Story of Two Worlds - FA Dave Graham 11 From Dirt Grows the Flowers - Dave Graham 11 The Wheel of Life - Dai Koyamada 08 Catalán Witness the Fitness - Chris Sharma (Most probably not 8C any longer but as the diagram include these ascents, we have not taken it out from the list) 04 Creature of the Black Lagoon 8C+ FA Daniel Woods The picture shows the extreme development the last years with over 100 ascents the last two years. In total, 116 climbers have done at least one 8C including the only female, Ashima Shiraishi. Charles Albert have done six, all of them barefoot. It should be mentioned that grades are subjective and Alex says, "I’ve tried my best to be as comprehensive as possible with this list. However, I’m still human. If I’ve made any mistakes or left off any problems or people you think should be added, let me know in the comments. I get most of the info from 8a.nu and HardClimbs.info."

Pirmin Bertle put up Meoise in 2015 calling it 9b. Two weeks ago Adam Ondra made the first repeat giving it a personal 9a+ grade and part of the explanation was a no-hands rest he found. Pirmin has written a blog saying, "I clearly refuse a downgrading of Meiose." Using it as a 9a+ reference for Switzerland would mean to block the way further up for almost every actual 9a climber of the country. Pirmin arguments that Adam's suggestion must be considered a highly personal grade as without his length and knee-bar skill and his length it is more difficult for others. 8a has for several years said Adam is a role model as he is the top climber in the world that most frequent gives personal grades. Without climber like him and some few others, the grade inflation would have been much stronger. Bertle seems to say that repeaters should give community, meaning that Ondra should take into account that he is super good at knee-bars and that he is relatively tall, i.e. give it 9b. On the other hand, it would be very hard to ask all repeaters to not base their grade suggestion or confirmation on how difficult they personally thought it was. Instead, they should make a scientific estimation on how difficult they believe the whole climbing community would perceive it. Grades are the number one criteria, for the media, deciding which ascents should be reported. At the same time, grades should not be so important for the climbers that instead should focus on the challenges. Although in theory, it could work as Pirmin suggests, in practice, this type of community grading might get the climbers confuse. When am I allowed to give a personal grade and when should it be community based? Possibly, Bertle sets the bar too high? A third way of grading is to use the Time Comparison Grading, meaning that you could base the grade on how much time you have invested, using the best sequence and in good conditions etc. The 8a stand here is that we are grateful towards all like Pirmin and Ondra that help us to present as accurate grades/news as possible at the same time, we fully understand that most want to stay away as long away as possible from suggesting or confirming grades.

When Dave Graham put up The Story of Two Worlds as an 8C in 2005, 8a had for years talked about grade inflation. Graham's name related actually to the two grading worlds that existed at the time. Many thought 8C was just a sand bag grade and when Paul Robinson did the first repeat, one big website actually first reported it as 8C+. Sebastian Cotting did the 14th ascent the last week, using the lay down start which Dai Koyamada invented and suggested 8C+ for, and presented a video showing some new sequences he found. Here is his comments on the grade. "There’s always a way to do it better - Find it!“ And I found it. Enough to climb Dave Graham’s masterpiece „The Story of Two Worlds“. 3.5 years of trying and specific training. It was a crazy journey. After all the Betas we found (kneebar, heel-toe-lock), I think "Story" is closer to 8B+ than to 8C. Thanks to everybody, who helped me, to find all this crucial micro-betas. Regarding the low start: It basically adds only one more move. The first move and to put the knee bar is harder too. But no, there is almost no difference to the normal start (it's just nicer :). But keep in mind: With the NEW Betas. The low start was for sure harder for Dai. Not to mention how insanely difficult his Beta is for the whole "Story". My greatest respect to Dai!"

Keenan Takahashiand Ethan Pringle has done The Nest 8C in Red Rocks after having worked it for a long time. Daniel Woods put it up in 2013 and it has previously seen five ascents. Keenen's Insta, including picture: This one was quite a journey; I don't know if there's any other move I've tried more than the one pictured. So much microbeta, self-doubt intertwined with self-belief, existential crises in full effect, and finally the strangest and most wild sensation of place in the world. Many huge mental and physical battles but the war is finally over! From Ethan's Insta we see that he got inspired by Keenen's beta and fired it of on project day #50.

Ryuichi Murai, #3 in the 8a ranking game, comments the Japan Bouldering Cup where he sensationally got the silver which made him qualify to the national team going for the World Cups. "I spent only one month to training for BJC2018. I mainly trained my weak movements. For example, coordination and triple dyno. Additionally I also did pull-up with Beastmaker2000." 1st Kokoro Fuji - Akiyo Noguchi 2nd Ryuichi Murai - Ai Mori (14) 3rd Tomoa Narasaki - Futaba Ito (15) Interesting is that it was basically only this competition with 160 participants where new athletes could qualify for the national team and the World Cup 2018. "An athlete who have high world ranking last year, and an athlete who won in Bouldering World Cup last year, could already be qualified." Futaba Ito won the Youth World Championship where she was accompanied by two 14 year olds. Ai Mori was #7 in that World Championship but she is to young to do WCs this year. Some coaches said last year in Innsbruck that these Japanese girls are the future. Bear in mind that these young girls did actually beat Miho Nonaka #4 in the WC last year as well as Aya Onoe and Mei Kotake, #10 and #11 in the WC 2017. Remember also the fast positive trend for Japan and that they had five guys in Top-8 last year. With so many new faces winning over some of the best boulderers, we just might see the Japanese domination increase in the future.