Jonathan Siegrist, one of the top climbers the last ten years who did three 9a+' this year, has signed up to 8a with 270 recorded ascents, including several personal grades. He is also active on Instagram. In the 8a ranking game J-Star is #4 and Rock & Ice has done a 2017 summary interview.

That are several ranking games which do not normally get any attention. Here are some of the high ranked climbing very hard almost under the radar. Gender & Age ranking #5 Bernhard Schwaiger - 75 Boulders #11 Moritz Welt - 01 #2 Chuck Odette - 55 Routes #6 Franz Fackler - 60 #7 Jolly Lamberti - 64 #8 Beppe Castellini - 52 11 Steve Crowe - 57 #17 Anna Enrich - 62 Onsight & Flashes #4 Daniel Moreno #2 Fanny Dong #3 Alex Khazanov #1 Katie Lambert Combined ranking #2 Jorge Diaz-Rullo

Baptiste Dherbilly did the first repeat of Fred Rouhling's Salamandre 9b from 2007 this October. As his personal previous best was 8c+ he could not comment on the 9a+ FA suggestion. "I like the sensation when I climb at my supra max level because I have to be really focus on the present moment and all the other thing about the life are leaving my head. I am just thinking about my movement and my climb. This route was a myth for me because the poster of Fred was my first climbing poster when I began climbing."

Adam Ondra has been some days in Sperlonga outside Rome where he did the FA of La Teoria del Gest 9a. "Climb most of Grandi Gesti, keep left all the way to the Cavalieri Selvaggi anchor. Unfortunately good kneebar before the final crux, which is reachy and all about strange fingerlock." The original and often repeated Grande Gesti he gave a personal 8c+ grade. He was also trying another variation that could be. More great pictures atLivellozero.net

In our database there are now 4.6 million rated ascents that could help you to find the best crags and routes/boulders in the world. Selecting the next destination, you can search the crag list and analyze average stars and onsight rating etc. In the Ticklists, you can select a grade and a sector and make a list of the routes or boulders you would like to try.

Sachi Amma reports on Instagram that he has done the FA of Maturity 9a+ in Gozen Rock after two months of work. The crag was recently opened again after being closed for 30 years because bad manners of climbers. (c) Hiroki Hori Sachi stopped competing after he won the World Cup in 2014. Next year he reached his goal to do ten routes 9a or harder. In 2016, he has slowly been shifting again and just stopped doing hard routes after a 9a+ in Flatanger. One year ago we made an interesting interview with him where he sad he had totally lost motivation doing hard routes.

Last year, we wrote about extreme progress in 2016 and it continues in 2017. Until 2015, the progress had been quite slow so the new levels reached by the climbing community is just remarkable. It started with Margo Hayes making the first ever female 9a+, which later also Anak Verhoeven managed to do, and Angela Eiter did the first female 9b, (c) Red Bull Contenpool/E. Holzknecht. Bear in mind that only two guys (Ondra and Sharma) in the history have climbed harder grades. Adam Ondra reached a new level by establishing the first 9c and also Steve McClure's (45) 9b FA is another new level. We can copy what was said in 2016, "More guys than ever have done 9a+ and 9b's routes." And the same goes for the girls doing 8c+ and harder. Charles Albert 8C+ barefoot is also a new standard. The only discipline where we do not see progress is in onsight of routes and flashes of boulders. The top level for onsights are 9a but apart from Ondra, very few 8c onsights in 2016.

Michaela Kiersch arrived to Hueco Tanks ten days ago having done just one 8A three years ago. First she flashed one 8A and did her first 8A+. Yesterday she did Crown of Aragorn 8B. In total she has done seven boulders 8A to 8B and is now #2 in the 8a ranking game. (c) Petzl "I went into my trips to Hueco Tanks with no expectations because I had never been there before and I don't consider myself to be a "boulderer." I have just graduated from university and in 2018 I am looking forward to seeing what happens when I focus more energy into my climbing."