IFSC has in their latest report said that the Olympic qualification process will have to be concluded within 2020. This means that the result from the Combined Championship in Hachioji will decide the remaining quotas if not the Continental Championship will take place in 2020. Continental cancelations would then mean that Jernej Kruder, Ievgenia Kazbekova, Jongwon Chon and Chaehyon Seo would get European and Asian tickets. Furthermore, from Oceania and Africa, Harrison Campbell, Oceania Mackenzie, Curtis Calrin and Rachelle De Charmoy will make it.

Jernej Kruder, the Boulder WC 2018 winner, reports on Insta to have had very productive days doing eleven routes 8a and harder including the FA of Peščena ura 9a. (c) Martin Zorko The Slovenian is famous for often climbing outdoors as preparation for doing competitions. Last year he won one Bouldering WC and then he focused on Tokyo. His last chance qualifying is during the Euro Championship but if that is also cancelled he will get the last Euro ticket as he was #16 in the Combined World Championship.

Julia Fiser, Top-21 in the last four WC's, has come out the lockdown in great shape. Instead of preparing for Lead World Cups she is climbing outdoors and has done her first 8c, Der schwarze Schwan in Ötztal. (c) Katerina Fiser "The lockdown in Austria started on March 15th. We were only allowed to leave the house for basic human needs. So I spent a lot of time hanging on my hangboard on the balcony and doing different exercises to stay fit. One thing that helped me a lot to stay motivated was that the whole Austria climbing team did these sessions together online via live stream. A few weeks ago restrictions loosened up a bit, which meant we were allowed to do sports outside again. Since then, I’ve been spending a lot of time climbing outside, mostly trying to avoid crowded crags. I was surprised how good and confident I felt after a few climbing days so I decided it would be cool to try something hard, now that I have a lot of time to climb outside instead of preparing for the Lead world cups in the summer. It was always a dream of mine to climb 8c and this route seemed the most logical because it’s basically a wall with just this route and one 8a next to it, so there are never many people around. In the first session I just checked out the moves and although I did all the single moves, I felt really uncomfortable on the wall. I have not done such hard moves in a very long time, so I guess that was the reason for that. But I made some really fast progress and felt better and better every try and yesterday, on my 4th session on the route this year (and 5th sessions in total), I managed to send it first try."

In Sweden, it has been reported that in the trad area Bohuslän, some climbers have started to leave their gear and top rope overnight. One reason for this is that there are no bolted anchors and that the routes are being used for training instead of going to the gym. Many are complaining about this saying that it could create access problems. This behavior might spread. What do you think about this?

Ale Zeni, who last year put up the world's first 9a+ slab, comments his passion for slabs, his 9b FA Cryptography from January, and his big MP project. He woks in the military section of high mountains. "I love climbing on the slabs for some reason. The first one is because near my house in Primiero (Dolomites) there are just slabs and I grow up with the Manolo's routes. Also because I love the feeling of my body when I search the perfect balance, and I love looking for the really small crimps on the walls that in the beginning seems like a mirror. For Cryptography I made on my wall the crux of the route (replicas). Where I try it with the wight west to improve my finger power. I don't know exactly how many attempts I did. But approximately something like 40 attempts, during 14 trips, I including the attempts on Bain the Sang and Bimba Luna. The mp project is in Val Nuvola a beautiful 250 mt wall. Riccardo Scarian and I started bolting this new route from the ground with long runouts some years ago. We have already completed the first 4 pitches that could be: 7c+, 8b (8a obligatory); 7c, and the last one 8c. Then there are more 3 pitches that could be harder.

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Emily Harrington, Kai Lightner and Beth Rodden have recently talked about how they got eating disorder due to climbing. They speak openly about how trainers, the community and their performance drive forced them to eat as little as possible. Everyone know that this is a problem in climbing and it is very good some of the famous athletes have taken it up. In 2014, IFSC measured the BMI in the WCH and sent out a message to male below 17 and female below 18. Many federations like Austria and Norway monitor this and you are not allowed to compete below certain standards in regards gender and age. In 2008, 8a first addressed the problem asking the community, Should we make a recommendation of BMI > 17, for scorecard users?. In fact it started a storm of criticism but anyhow other media took it up. The biggest dilemma witheating disorder and climbing relates to youth and lead competitions. Possibly IFSC could do more monitoring the situation and actually ask the route setters to focus more on power instead of hanging around in big roofs. As a matter of a fact, limiting the climbing time as have been done should most probably favor more healthy climbers.

Angy Eiter, the only female who has done a 9b, started bolting in Leonidio in 2015. The last year, the four time Lead World Champion, took it to a new level and made the FA of Schatzinsel after four days of bolting and in total four months of projecting. (c) Claudia Ziegler "It was such a great experience to bolt this steep and long line. It was tough work and at the same time, a wonderful thing to free it and give it a name :-) The route has a mixture of different moves (crimps, slopers, pinches, underclings, shoulder moves, etc.). It begins on a slightly overhanging wall, then it traverses to the left into a roof and finishes with a slightly overhanging wall. Altogether the route is about 40 meters long, with mostly hard moves and three crux sequences. My husband Bernie regularly lives out his passion for bolting and is already quite experienced. I made the most of this knowledge and asked him to coach me in bolting my own line. We searched for a virgin wall and after some time, found a place not far away from my home region Imst. In the beginning, I was worried about the bad quality of this rock there, but at the same time, I loved this place. Bernie was ready to help me bolting. It took me a while until I found the ideal beta for me and could start real attempts to complete the line. I failed many times, but on one day I could put enough effort into the line, I found my flow and found myself overjoyed as I clipped the chains. I managed to complete my line that I called „Schatzinsel“. Concerning the grade, it’s not my hardest route but belongs amongst the hardest ones I have climbed. Repetitions are needed to find a consensus."

Climbing Canada have decided to not send any youth team to the Youth WCH in Russia in August. They do not think their athletes will be able to prepare good enough and, " logistics to travel to Russia in August are very difficult and health and safety concerns in Moscow are significant." They have also listed several criteria in order participate in World Cups like, "Medical advice indicates health risks to athletes and staff related to COVID-19 and the travel/logistics of the event are zero."

Jana Vincourkova has come back stronger than ever after the lockdown with two 8A+', Rigger in Blansko (video) and the FA of Dab Police in Zelená Hora (video) In 2012, she won a Euro Cup and last year she started climbing again after two years break. "Since there is the lockdown and I am working from home already for two months. I had/have quite some time to do hang boarding. We have the PUC series and it is way harder than the fixed ones like Beastmaker for example. It improved my core by miles. And finger strength for sure to. A lot of pizza helps as well. We started to visit less frequented granite areas that offers small crimps, which is the thing that suits me the most. One of them I managed to do in a day only. It is a variation of a 7C+ in a roof where you skip the biggest jug, creating even harder crux-moves in super tiny finger crack. It is really hard to avoid any dabs. It was a project and since I saw it I knew I had to try it, so that is my first 8A+ FA."