Matt Fultz has had a great start of his Ticino trip. Five days ago he did 28 boulders up to 8A in order to celebrate his 28th birthday. Yesterday, he did his first 8B flash, Steppenwolf in Magic Wood. (c) Freddy High In total, he has done 11 boulders 8A and harder including two 8B+' in the first ten days. In the 8a ranking game, he is now #6 after having had ten years of almost straight progress.

In 1995, fred rouhling put up Akira at Le Périgord as the world's first 9b in 1995, when 9a+ did not exist, after several months of projecting. It starts with an horizontal 12 meter boulder roof and then you tie in and finish an eight meter 8a, video. Previously he had done some 9a and 8B+ out of which some are still not repeated. Back then and until Climbing.com presented an article in 2004 most thought he was a liar, although 8a had backed him up. Still, he has not gotten the full credit for taking the biggest grade step in the history of climbing. Insta with pictures from his work as an artist. Chatting with him you understand that possibly it would have been best to suggest 9a+ or even better 8C in 1995 and indicate that it could be harder waiting for an upgrade. "For sure now it’s obvious but at that moment there was nothing comparable. There was not even any crash pads and no roof boulders in Fontainebleau or elsewhere. Fred Nicole open the first 8B+ Radja in 1995 the same year of Akira. If I have said 8C+ it would have been the same problem." Fred has done a total of six FA 9a or harder including Salamandre 9a+ and the three unrepeated; De l’autre côté du ciel 9a, Mandallaz drive 9a, pictured, and Empreintes 9a+. "I was quite obsessed with the limit between the possible and the impossible. It’s only in the first ascent that we can have this sensation. It is not funny to have detractors but on the other hand to have done things that other consider impossible it’s a consecration especially if these climbers are supposed to be among the best." Many of the best including Alex Huber (who was right about that 9b+ for Bernabe Fernandez) and Dani Andrada, said they did not believe Fred. Today he thinks he is more poet than a sport climber. "I enjoy spending time in contemplate nature, reading books and picking stones. I kept a lot of strength and I can still do 8A without training or tiredness, just happiness! I prefer do small boulder with only one or two hard moves. There are not so many in this style which are more than 8b. La Proue, one move 8B, is incredible. It was a nice opportunity to open Akira and I'm grateful for that."

Adam Ondra did the first three boulder first go and it seemed he had secured the win. Then Jakob Schubert did the fourth boulder putting some pressure on Ondra to at least get the zone but he did not get very close actually. This was the third WC Boulder victory for Schubert who also has won 18 Lead WC's. (c) Eddie Fowke 1. Jakob Schubert AUT 34 - Janja Garnbret SLO 44 2. Adam Ondra CZE 33 - Fanny Gibert FRA 44 3. Jan Hojer GER 24 - Mia Krampl SLO 33 4. Aleksey Rubtsov RUS 23 - Julia Chanourdie FRA 22 5. Anze Peharc SLO 14 - Ievgeniia Kazbekova UKR 13 6. Jongwon Chon KOR 13 - Katja Kadic SLO 12 Complete results Among the female, Janja Garnbret won her seventh straight Boulder World Cup by just needing five attempts for the four final boulders. Runner-up was Fanny Gibert needing eight tries to top them all. It most be mentioned that the five best male Japanese who all where in the Top-7, two weeks ago, did not participate as they are training and competing at home as a preparation for the WCH. Among the female, six of the Top-8 in Wujiang, out of which the four best from Japan, did also not participate.

Sean McColl from Canada, who has won the Combined WCH three times, has had a bad start in the World Cup in 2019 as well the whole male USA team. Nathaniel Coleman is #22 in the Bouldering WC and Sean is #32. The rest of the male from Canada and USA have in total not once been in Top-25 although competing with normally 3 + 4 guys, during the five events. Among the female it is better with Alannah Yip from Canada #12 and for USA, Alex Johnson #13 overall, followed by Kyra Kondie #22. On the other hand, big names like Ashima Shiraishi, Brooke Raboutou and Margo Hayes have not done performed according expectations. In two weeks, the last Boulder World Cup in Vail takes place. If there will be any Americans in the Olympic Top-20 qualification event in Toulouse in November it is time to step up. As it stands, Nathaniel Coleman and Allanah Yip have the best chance as they have done some relatively good results in Speed. However until now, no American have been Top-6 and this is crucial as the Combined ranking is based on just multiplication of the two best results. In order to qualify to Toulouse, you are better off with one or two really good results in each discipline, instead of being multiple times around position #15.

Janja Garnbret must have set some kind of superiority record in the semi in Munich by doing all four boulders in eight tries at the same time runner up Ievgeniia Kazbekova did just get one top and no extra zones. Imagine how the route setters felt as it took 300+ attempts until the first top! Half of the field did at most do one zone out of which four no zones at all. Among the male, Adam Ondra won being the only one to top all four boulders. Strangely enough, the Japanese who were among the best in the qually were all among the last in the semi. Complete results

Counting four out of five before the last WC in Vail in June. 1. Adam Ondra CZE 284 - Janja Garnbret SLO 400 2. Tomoa Narasaki JPN 260 - Fanny Gibert FRA 243 3. Anze Peharc SLO 193 - Akiyo Noguchi JPN 240 4. Kokoro Fujii JPN 190 - Jessica Pilz AUT 194 5. Jakob Schubert AUT 184 - Petra Klingler 180 6. Jernej Kruder SLO 182 - Futaba Ito JPN 178 7. Alexsey Rubtsov RUS 180 - Katja Kadic SLO 147 8. Rei Sugimoto JPN 171 - Shauna Coxsey 145 Complete results In practice, the overall male title is a battle in between Adam Ondra and Tomoa Narasaki although all Top-5 can in theory win. If Tomoa wins in Vail, Adam need to be runner up.

Slovenia with two million inhabitants dominated the qually in Munich when Japan had nine of their Top-10 absent. Anyhow, three of the Top-7 male were from Japan. The winners of the respectively groups were Janja Garnbret, Urska Repusic, Yoshiyuki Ogata and Anze Peharc. Complete results

Last week, we reported that Daniel Woods became the first boulderer to reach 12 000 points in the 8a scorecard ranking game. Now, with the FA of Primitivo 8C in Valle Bavona, James Webb has gotten 12 040 points, only 3 points below Daniel. On the other hand, only counting flashes, James is kind of superior with 14 8B flashes. (c) Keenan Takahashi

According to the Munich starting list, the Top-4 female and Top-6 male from Japan (but Yoshiyuki Ogata) are not scheduled to compete in Muncih. These nine boulderers have made it to the semi 28 out of 31 times in 2019. (c) Eddie Fowke In the last event in Wujiang, the four female were all Top-7 and the five male were all Top-7! Shauna Coxey as well as Stasa Gejo are also missing. This means we will see many new faces in the semi and in the finals at the same time this will be the most important WC in 2019, to get a good combined ranking score.