Tarragona in Catalonia, Northeast Spain, is one of those destinations a climber must know. Whether world class climber or ambitious amateur, sooner or later you should pick a project and go for it. Right on time for high season in the area, the new edition of „Tarragona Climbs“ with more than 3800 routes is now available. Especially the content on the world-class zones such as Siurana, Montsant and Margalef has been considerably expanded compared to the previous edition. The guidebook is written by Pete O’Donovan in collaboration with Dani Andrada, who opened hundreds of routes in the area. For the first time, this guidebook is also available in the Vertical-Life App. The combination of printed book and digital content, that can be unlocked through a code inside the book, is available exclusively on orders via the Vertical-Life online shop.

Instagram is a great communication tool but it can also create pressure that can be hard to handle. It might be wise for especially youngsters to not report/show of with good training and keep saying, on a daily basis, that everything is so good in order to get many likes, as this could build up anxiety. Sooner or later there is a competition coming up and what you have been saying on social media might feel like pressure. On the other hand, if you are a very experienced and successful climber who will not loose your sponsors just because you fail once or twice, you can do as Jorg Verhoeven. Use social media to put pressure on yourself so you have to commit 100 %. Some months ago, the World Cup winner 2008 who is a high class climber in all disciplines from bouldering to big-walls, declared that his goal is to do an 9b. If you do not have such a broad climbing background as Jorg, you better avoid such Instagram posts but I am sure it works for Jorg :) "The idea is to come back in Febuary, and send in March (or even April) when conditions are prime. That means not a whole lot of training time left, but it for sure is possible. I feel like power endurance (20-40 moves) needs to increase, but also pure power (so that I'll need lees endurance). I put the odds at 75:25!"

Holding your arms above the head, as you are doing most of the time when you are climbing, improves the blood circulation. Once your are lowered down, your forearms are at risk to be flooded which will reduce the blood circulation. In order to get better endurance and reduce the time until your next burn, you better stay at the top jug and rest for a minute. Make your partner take most of the load in the rope and shake out as normal. This will reduce the risk for the fore arm to get flooded and optimize the blood circulation. If you fall, you could immediately grab the rope with straightened arm pretty hard and once you are at the ground, you can shake out by grabbing some jugs you can reach from the floor.

Eric Hörst has made some interesting analysis of Margo Hayes ascent of Biographie 9a+ in Céüse. From the video, it can be seen that she climbs the 30 m route in five intervals, around one minute of fast climbing followed by a rest in between one to three minutes. This goes in line with old previous training articles here on 8a and also how Adam Ondra climbs. In practice, this means that you are going for an indoor onsight, you should try to climb very fast and then do full stop and rest every six meters or 45 seconds as you are probably not as fit as Hayes and Ondra. In the video we can also see that Margo finishes off every session by first clipping and the start to rest. In theory, she could have saved some energy by actually first rest and midways in her resting, clipped the quick draw. This would have means shorter intervals with intense climbing and more time spent in a resting mode.

Jakob Schubert's flash of Catalan Witness the Fitness got reported as 8B+ (C) by us, as all five repeaters who had done it before had called it 8C, Chris Sharma 8B+/8C but Jakob gave it low end 8B+. Is it not strange that the other two big Euro websites did chose to report it as either 8B+ or 8C in both the headline as well as in the article. The media needs some kind of guidelines so we will stop misleading our readers. How do you think Schubert's flash should be reported.

Jakob Schubert reports on Instagram that he has flashed Chris Sharma’s Catalan Witness the Fitness in Cova del Ocell, giving it a personal, ”Low end” 8B+ grade instead of 8C. (c)Eddie Fowke - The Circuit Climbing During the last week Jabob also did Stoking the Fire 9b and Catxasa 9a+ in Santa Linya. Previously, Daniel Woods has flashed an 8C, Entlinge which nowadays are considered a soft 8B+. Also Adam Ondra has flashed a boulder which in the beginning was considered 8C, Jade.

Stefano Ghisolfi has done his third 9b the last 12 months, La Capalla in Siurana which Adam Ondra put up six years ago. Vertical Eye - Matteo Pavana Last year, the Italian was #2 in the World Cup after a steady progress in the ranking and as a matter of a fact, his scorecard shows the same up going trend. In the latest 9a and harder overall statistics, the 24 year old jumps to #4 and including his scorecard, he should be considered the second best sport climber in the world right now. Interesting is also that he did win the Italian Speed Championship some years ago, and has been #6 in a Boulder WC, so Stefano is one of the contenders also for a medal in 2020.