Dorothea Karalus, who previously has done four 8B's, did Santoku 8B in Ticino, six weeks ago. (c) Simon Weisser "The past weeks made me appreciate how lucky we are to experience these intense adventures, to travel freely, to be healthy. I'm for sure more grateful than ever for this. Looking forward to more climbing experiences like this, but for now let's figure out how to get through this together! Staying healthy physically and mentally, being there for others (while #physicaldistancing) and maybe even getting a bit stronger with all this training going on." More info of the 34-year-old working full time as a software developer on her wordpress website.

Stretching is probably the easiest way to progress for most of us. Here are some advice we published in 2018 from Klaus Isele, MSc D.O. Physiotherapeut and Osteopath of the Austria National Climbing Team, formerly working with Adam Ondra on Silence 9c in Flatanger. "If it’s the case that you always fall off your slab project just because your hips can’t stay close enough to the wall stretching exercises could maybe help. If you do proper stretching you might achieve your goals faster and better. Bodyweight and stretching have something in common. You might not have the perfect body weight for climbing. Nature puts you somewhere but with some effort, you can gain or lose some kilograms. What I still monitor is that some climbers believe that it is enough to stretch for 40 seconds in order to get “longer” = forget it. You need to hold a stretching position for two minutes (I often recommend three times the same position with that holding time). That works! To really gain length you have to repeat it every day. Your results will be visible after approximately 14 days. Afterward depending on what you want to achieve keep going. If you’ve forgotten to stretch one day, you are thrown back for about four days, especially at the beginning. The so-called hysteresis phenomenon is the base of this, if you want you can say that it is the “supercompensation” of stretching. CONCLUSION: There is no wrong or right stretching, it just depends on what you wanna achieve with it. If you prepare yourself for climbing it might be sufficient for you to stretch for 30 seconds. But if you are really interested in gaining length in some muscular areas then you need to work on every section for two minutes in every stretching position."

In France, you are allowed to go out doing short walks in your close neighborhood but you need to have to carry a paper saying where you live, when you left your home and why etc. It is thus strictly forbidden to go out climbing. Nevertheless, some do and some have got caught having to pay 135 Euros in both Fontainebleau and Céüse and as other crags. There are several controls and it is said that Verdon is controlled with drones, see the picture. When the police see cars parked in the forest they check them and tickets of Euro 135 are given out. Please respect the restrictions in each country so not climbers get a bad reputation. It should be mentioned that in some countries like Sweden, there are almost no restrictions at all and there are more climbers outside rock climbing than normal. The recommendation is however that you should not travel during Easter.

Little Eden is located some 35 min walk or 5 min with boat from Vathy. It is in the shade from 12 o'clock and currently, there are some 25 routes bolted primarily 6a to 7b but there are more potential for easier routes. Aris Theodoropoulos, who took the picture, says that there are no activity at all in Kalymnos as you are just allowed to take short walks in Greece. He is currently working on a new topo of Greece covering 31 sport venues including 2 600 routes.

Eric Hörst. one of the leading climbing trainers the last 20 years, reports from the current situation in USA. "All gyms are closed in the USA. There will be no outdoor climbing for us this in April (and perhaps May) due to stay-at-home orders. Luckily we have a well-equipped home gym with bouldering wall, treadwall, campus board, more than 12 different hangboards, free weights and more. So we are training like it's winter. Sad that we are losing the Spring climbing season, but happy that we are healthy and able to train at home together. Praying this COVID-19 plays out quickly and the world (And climbers) can return to normalcy sometime this summer. Here in Pennsylvania we can only leave our house to get food and medicine...and to exercise. Each USA state has slightly difference restrictions, but 80% of the country has stay-at-home orders...so most climbers are following this order and staying home (but unfortunately there are some climbers still going outside to climb)." 16GMT (18.00 Euro Time) he will run a live streaming talking - Hangboard training protocols....and planning for a positive future beyond COVID-19, through his Coffee Training Talk.

Whether you are an enthusiastic newcomer or an experienced indoor climber, the Innsbruck region is the perfect place to make the move from indoor climbing routes to rock. The 500 climbing routes and 200 boulder problems on the colourful climbing walls at the Innsbruck Climbing Center are ideal for practising and training, while the around 1,200 single-pitch routes in the region's 29 sport climbing areas give you the chance to try your hand at the rugged rocks. The free SAAC Climbing Camp Zirl-Innsbruck on 12 and 13 September 2020 provides the perfect opportunity to try climbing on rock for the first time led by a mountain guide. Climbing professional Anna Stöhr is also familiar with the advantages of climbing outside surrounded by nature. Born in Innsbruck, she knows the rocks in the region like the back of her hand and plans on increasingly using her muscle power for rock climbing projects in the future. The World Bouldering Champion will be at the SAAC Climbing Camp Zirl-Innsbruck where she will share her climbing tips with participants! Registration for the camp is now possible (from 15 March) at www.saac.at www.saac.at. Detailed information about the region can be found at www.innsbruck.info.

We’re almost there! Huge thank you goes out to the hundreds of climbers who have helped so far. We've improved and added features based on your feedback and would like to put the site through a final round of testing before going live. To give you some insight, our biggest challenge to date has been retrofitting the original data for the new interface. Like any data migration project we’ve encountered some big challenges and have done our best to strike a balance between preserving the old and setting up the platform to be more flexible to accommodate more users and to support new features. If you’re stuck at home, like many of us, we would really appreciate your help by signing up and checking out the new site. Once you’re in you can leave your feedback quickly and easily by opening the widget on your screen. We’re as eager as you to get the new site live and excited to finalise the finishing touches with your help. Sign-up and help us go live.

Irina Kuzmenko has done Super Djin in Triangular lake. As it only took an hour, she gave it a personal 8A grade. (c) Leo Zhukov "It’s more quiet here in Russia with Covid-19. Today our government made something like a quarantine but it’s not so strict." It should be mentioned that in many countries like Italy, Spain and France it is not allowed to go out rock climbing. In some countries like Sweden there re very few restrictions. Also the gyms are open.

In sport climbing, compared to most other sports, there are few written rules or use of referees. Instead, the climbing community creates and circulates their own Practice & Ethics. Beginners are sometimes struggling to understand what is "normal" behavior and what's allowed and what's not. Over time, the general procedure has been modified and in different subcultures different ethics apply. We thought it would be a good idea to discuss and define good style as of today and also give some amusing examples of violations that are practised in order to receive sponsors, glory and points. We're not saying there's a definite line between right and wrong but the fundamental idea is: don't systematically push the border of ethics towards more subjectivity, instead, keep the spirit alive. Here is a list of what 8a thinks are practices within sport climbing that are frequently interpreted in different ways; Green, Yellow and Red card are given. We estimate that about 1/3 of all ascents would not pass community approval. What do you think? Practice and Ethics in rock climbing

All 30 male and female already qualified for Tokyo 2020 will hold their spots. There are still five male and female yet to qualify.