Jonathan Siegrist does L'étrange ivresse des lenteurs (9a+)

Jonathan Siegrist, who previously has done over 80 routes 9a and beyond, has done the third ascent of Adam Ondra’s L'étrange ivresse des lenteurs (9a+) in Céüse. At 39 years old, he holds the #3 spot in the VL rankings, based on a new all-time high score. “One of the best, most demanding and scariest sport routes I have climbed. Easily 9b for me, quite obviously harder than the other 9a+ here... But I'll keep it a sandbag out of respect for Ceuse.” (c) Ryan White

How many sessions were needed and how cold was it?
Too many sessions to count. I tried the route last year, and had great progress but then fell at essentially the last move near the anchor on the final day before the weather came in. This year it was a big goal of mine to come back and finish the route. Unfortunately on the first day here in September I tore my LCL while trying the route, and needed quite a bit of time to recover before my knee felt strong enough to try some of the moves. Then when I was starting to recover from the injury, some insane weather arrived and a crucial hold in the bottom was wet for 5 weeks straight. I did my best to be patient and stay fit. Yesterday was the first time the hold was dry.

As for the cold, actually it is quite hot right now! The wall is in the sun until 4 or so. You really only have 1 or 2 tries before it's dark. Not the best time for Ceuse but in some ways I prefer the fall. You can be alone in the cliff even on a weekend and the autumn colors are amazing. We have made some great friends here in Gap, it really feels like locals only this time of year.

”Scariest sport routes I have climbed”?
Most of the route has normal Ceuse style run outs but the final 1/3 of the route is totally next level, with 15 meter fall potential still in hard climbing terrain. It’s one of the only times in my life I felt afraid on a sport route. Sylvain Millet had a very special vision for this route when he bolted it! The biggest fall was from the final moves really near the anchor (Megos took this fall also), even in the huge run outs it’s still pretty hard. I fell here last season - it was the last day of that trip. But the most terrifying fall was this year, I was trying to rediscover the moves in the run out sections and I took a massive fall at night with a headlamp.