Stefan Scherz, who won the Lead and Combined Euro Champ and was runner-up in Boulder last year, has done his first 9a, Kraftplatzl in Berglsteiner See. "6 sessions. 4th try of the day after falling 3 times at the last move like an idiot. rained all day so it was pretty humid. first in this grade. SOO PSYCHED!" (c) Florian Murnig The day after, the 18-year-old did The Source 8c+ in Zillertal. "WOW. 1 day, 4 tries. did the jump beta. Kingline! it felt like i was climbing in a dream. sendtrain is on. Yesterday Kraftplatzl, today this gem. living the dream. The last few weeks, I tried to stay fit by doing some power and mobility exercises, which seemed to have worked out pretty well. Now, as the situation in Austria gets more relaxed, i decided to have a few rock days."

Adam Ondra has done the FA of Bohemian Rhapsody in Roviste which is is #41 9a+. "The longest and hardest linkup in this beautiful granite area. Climbing wise absolutely amazing." (c) Martin Pelikan In total, the 27-year-old has now recorded 174 routes 9a and harder. Without all his personal down gradings, he has done close to 200 routes originally graded 9a.

IFSC reports that Anouck Jaubert from France and Michael Piccolruz from Italy have qualified to Tokyo 2021 as they were #11 and #14 in Hachioji WCH last year and as there were no tripartite allocations. According to the rule, the quotas had to be assigned before March 30 without taking into consideration that the Moscow Combined Euro Championship has been postponed to October. This means that France and Italy have filled their female and male quota. In other words, Fanny Gibert and Stefano Ghisolfi can not make it even if they win in Moscow. (c) Eddie Fowke The Tripartite idea is to allow athletes from minor Olympic countries to qualify. The only criteria were to participate in the Combined WCH but this info was not spread around and no athlete from a minor Olympic nation made the criteria. Zàhéér Ahmád from Pakistan got an invitation from IFSC who paid part of his ticket but they did not mention the tripartite possibility so he participated in just two disciplines and lost the Olympic dream. In theory, if Fanny Gibert had won in Moscow in March, Anouck had not gotten the tripartite allocation and instead Di Niu from China had made it to Tokyo, unless Yue Tong Zhang had filled their quota in the Asian CH. In theory, Jernej Kruder from Slovenia and Ievgeniia Kazbekova from Ukraine could also have gotten the Olympic ticket if all results went their way.

Stephan Schibli, who started climbing in 1989 has made the FA of Frittenbude 9a in Ibergeregg. The picture is from another route. "Since I couldn't go to Bleau because of the border closings, I was able to send the route. Holidays are often project killers, since a week of vacation means 3 weeks of absence in the project. I was able to climb the lower part of Fritierte Neutronen (8c+) in 2011. At that time I had no solutions for the upper part. Last year I figured if I wanted to climb the route I should start slowly. I found the solution for the lower key train again in late autumn. Thanks to the early spring and the dry weather, I was able to get into the route regularly this year, which made the climb possible."

Based on a poll with almost 1 000 unique votes, Who is the male climbing legend? Wolfgang Güllich, who made the FA of Action Directe 9a and who also was the first to do 8b, 8b+ and 8c, got most votes. 30 % Wolfgang Güllich 22 % Chris Sharma 20 % Adam Ondra 12 % Fred Nicole 05 % Yuji Hirayama 03 % Alex Honnold 09 % Other (Alex Huber, Alex Megos and David Graham most mentioned)

Gymclimber has presented an interesting interview with Adam Ondra not just reflecting on climbing. In any case, here are some of his thoughts on climbing and improvement. (c) Alvaro Susena captures Ondra's flexibility. "Flexibility in climbing is totally underestimated by most of the people. And it’s actually one of my key ingredients in climbing." "People think of climbing in too physical a way. For sure, it’s very important. Just by climbing, you will improve physically. But I think most people just don’t climb on the level they might be able to climb physically because they just don’t climb well enough." "I like climbing with perfection and I think on the way to get there being open-minded helps a lot. Because even if you have the best coach in the world, if you are not able to reflect on your own climbing based on your own feelings, it is really hard to be the best."

Treadstone Coloumbus Climbing Gym in Georgia has reported on their Facebook that they have reopened. "We are taking all reasonable measures to maintain a reasonably safe space here. I believe we are also the cleanest climbing gym in the world today."