Jorge Diaz-Rullo has been in Australia since mid September and has logged four 8c+ routes including one he upgraded and one he downgraded, each of which were Tom O'Halloran FAs. Last Sunday, Jorge flashed Tiger Cat (8c) in Blue Mountains. (c) Sasha Gerzha

On Insta, Jorge says it is his hardest flash ever. "A hard route with so much endurance, dynamics moves, technical moves and some holds that require so much precision."

Jake Bresnehan gave him the running beta. "I went up the climb in short sections (1 or 2 bolts at a time) and explained my beta and a few other options for the tricky sections I knew. We are very similar heights so my beta was pretty spot on. He was a little nervous with the first move and down climbed a few times to the ground to gather some composure. Once he committed he was in the zone and nailed everything. One of the most inspiring things I have seen."

Jonatan Flor reports on Insta that he has done the FA of Picasso 9a+ in . The Spaniard has previously done 60+ routes 8c+/9a and harder making it as #7 on that list. (c) Pau Alonso Prat

Camilla Moroni, who has climbed five 8A to 8A+ graded problems over the last six weeks, has sent Jack's broken heart (8A+) in Magic Wood. "I'm super happy. Right after the Italian Boulder Championship where I managed to defend my title, I went to Magic Wood for only one day. I sent it in a few attempts, then I went to One summer in paradise (8B) but I fell at the very top. I hope for a drop in temperatures in the next weeks to start the Ticino season."

Davide Picco has done in Arco, which according to FA Stefano Ghisolfi includes more than 100 moves that, "connects the first boulder of Underground, Reini's Vibes, downclimb some moves of Pietra Murata, the crack boulder of L'ultima Pietra with a crazy finger lock, and the last tiny crimps of Stonehenge."

What do you mean by your "Per il momento 🤣🤣🤣" comment on Insta?
It seems like recently it's become a fashion to downgrade routes, either because people find new ways of climbing them or because they try to diminish someone else's performance. But that's just my opinion, I still don't have the experience to grade these routes, I just know it was hard for me. That's what I meant with al momento, literally, it would be "9a+ until someone downgrades it" 😅.

How much time did it take?
I don't know, maybe 10/15 tries? But, I already knew the moves because the route is a connection of underground and thunder vibes, so I just needed to build up some endurance. I began trying the route on the weekends before leaving for my summer holiday trip in Rodellar. I needed a place with the same weather conditions I expected to find in Spain and Pueblo was the perfect match: hot, humid, and 40 degrees. I came back from Spain and trained mostly in gyms as the last competitions of the lead circuit were held here in Italy. Last week I went to check the moves and surprisingly found myself clipping the chain. 😁

What is your next/autumn plan?
Always in Arco! Currently, I'm trying a route in Padaro 😁

Abigail Humber, who last spring did her first 8c, has done Lawless Extra (8A) at Fayette Station. (c) Tara Bennett

"I’m super excited that I was able to send Lawless Extra, and get the second ascent, as well as the first female ascent! On the day I ended up sending it, I thought I’d sent this boulder in the morning, only to find out once I’d packed up and returned home that I had started in the wrong position… I decided to go back out to the boulder in the afternoon, and I managed to send even though it was far too hot and humid. I was able to get the send faster than I was expecting as well, only taking three sessions to climb the boulder!"

Chris Frick has done Stop Sika (8c) in Rawyl. It was equipped by Betrand Martenet and the FA was done in 2003 by Didier Berthod at 8c. The completely natural line – hence the name – became an instant classic and settled at 8b+. In 2019 Bertrand rebolted the route, establishing in the middle section a more direct and harder line. After Samuel Ometz Re-FA the consensus now it is back to 8c. (c) Isabelle Bihr

"What a journey! At age of 54, it’s still time to rock’n’roll! No need to give up, keep on living the dream! ‘Stop Sika’ is a beauty. Well, for my generation 8c still sounds like a journey to Mars! When I was already 20 years old this was the hardest grade at the time. So it’s intimidating. Anyway, I had to try! I said to myself better fail on a dream route at my limit than regret too late to have never really tried.

The starting point was one year ago by checking the moves. Couldn’t do the two cruxes. From there the process was underway. My last 8c send was in 2016 at age of 48. To regain experience and confidence I hopped on other 8c’s, foremost trying ‘Mind Control’ at Oliana that could be the sibling of ‘Stop Sika’. The wonderful Vanda Michalkova created a training regime targeting my weaknesses. For several months I lived a climbing monk’s life spending most of my free time training. I never took T-Level supplementals (unhealthy and dangerous!). I work 4/7 and I’m not sponsored."

Jana Svecová (Vincourková) has done Grotta Azzurra (8A+) in Moravský kras and Špekmen (8A+) in Petrohrad. The latter she thought was a soft 8A. The 25-year-old has published a longer video from two days of bouldering also including a 7C flash and some easier sends.

Jana, did her first 8B+ this spring and has in total done 15 boulders 8A+ and harder, since 2019, some of which she has chosen to downgrade. As a youngster, she was an active competition climber, winning a Euro youth cup in 2012, but burnout caused her to take a two-year break before taking up climbing again in 2019. (c) Markéta Nevělíková

How is your climbing life nowadays?
My climbing life nowadays is a bit different since we built our own bouldering gym. We really enjoyed building it, but the training routine changed a lot compared to when we did not have the TeePee gym. The previous two years we climbed only on Moonboard and did some fingerboarding. Now we also fingerboard a lot but whenever we can we go to TeePee, probably as it's new to us and it's a lot of fun. Weekends, as usual, we spent in the rocks, and Sunday evening, the gym again. Sometimes it´s hard for me to be motivated to do all this because I have a full-time job and sometimes I am very tired when I go to training, but luckily when I convince myself to go and have a session when I'm there I get psyched and have a normal session. It takes a lot of convincing some days, cause we climb a lot. 😃 So most days we spent like this just climbing in our new gym then do some additional specific training for finger power or some core training etc.

What is your full time job and do you also work in the gym? My position is HR in an IT company 🙂. And the gym is mainly maintained by my husband. He puts all the holds on the wall and do all the stuff around the wall. Teepee is not a commercial gym but some of our friends have free access so we have like a small commutiny there which is nice and motivational.

Do you have long-term dream in climbing?
I have some, like climbing 8B+ or 8C, but I'm just 158 cm tall and have only a +1 ape index, so it's really hard for me to find something with reachable holds. Sometimes I am not even able to send 7B when it's reachy. But there is one 8B+ in Austria that I should be able to send. With the 8Cs I think if I would find the right one, just on tiny incut crimps I would be able to send it. Any suggestions? For the outdoor climbing, it is quite hard, with the job to go somewhere further for more days, last two years we were just unlucky alot, whenever we went somewhere behind the borders, the weather was trash. So that's why we are going again for a trip to UAE in December, to further develop local boulder potential, which I am looking forward to the most even without any specific project there.

Stefano Ghisolfi has done in Arco, giving it a personal 9a grade. "Better beta was found in the upper part by some repeaters. So this time it is not a downgrade because of kneebars."

Will you go for Paris 2024?
I still don't know what to do next year, the main goal will be Silence (9c).