Laura Rogora, who did her first 9a this spring, being 14 years old, has made an one day ascent of Redbull 8c in Collepardo, where she also onsighted an 8a. The 15-year-old is in the #1 in the female ranking game as well as in the overall Age & Gender ranking where Adam Ondra is #2. "On my second go I fell on the last move. The next try I felt more tired but fought until the chain sending my first 8c in a day. The route is about 20-25 meters long with a hard boulder in the last meters. Now I am training for the world championship in November in China. it will be the last competition of the season and then I hope I will be able to climb on rock and to find a new hard project."

Martina Cufar Potard, the World Champion 2001, has done her second 8c, Max Power in Bionnassay. "Hard for me (crux being a long move)!!! I didn't count the tries...but I knew the moves before I even tried it, when belaying Nico 5 years ago (pregnant) when he did the FA. He told me I am supposed to do the first female ascent...it took me one summer of serious tries:-)" The Slovenian did her first 8c in 2005, at the same time as she finished her very successful competition career, which started some 20 years ago. Martina was the first world class competition climber from Slovenia. It is also interesting that she just climbs and does some campus only once in a while. In total, she projected the 8c for some 20+ sessions but now she says will be back on onsight mode again.

Imagine, spending about 20 days, mainly alone, and falling like 20 times from 18 meters down into the Mediterranean sea. The impact hitting the water is enormous and a bit dangerous, but even so, when Chris Sharma reached the surface he couldn't stop swimming around looking for a new crux sequence. After ten more monster whippers, he decided to rappel down finding out that it was an 8B Boulder! Could you please explain how you projected Alasha from when you found it? I found the wall about five or six years ago. Miquel Riera and I did a reconnaissance mission where we swam about 6 kilometers scoping out all the caves and walls. After seeing this line from below I inevitably had to rappel in to see the line and holds better. I then began trying the route from the bottom. However after trying for many days over several trips I realized that my effort was a bit hopeless unless I came back with a rope and really figured the moves out. So this September I came and spent about 7-8 days just working the upper section on rappel. The crux sequence is so tricky for the feet and body positions and is very powerful for the fingers. Bit by bit though I started to understand the moves better and better until I felt like I could give some good goes. It was a very special morning when I sent. With just my buddy Ricardo filming and the waves crashing. One of my top 10 moments in climbing for sure!

Once again, Adidas Rockstars pulled off an amazing show, which as always finished with a superfinal, where two finalists battled the last Boulder on time. As for the female, it actually took Janja Garnbret 4+ minutes while Tomoa Narasaki needed just 16 seconds. Tomoa has previousy won both the WC and the World Championship whereas Janja is on one of the top positions in the Lead WC and won the World Championship. The runner-ups were Jessica Pilz and Jan Hojer. In total, 72 athletes from 22 countries were invited. During the qualification and semi, normal IFSC rules applied. In the final with 3 500 spectators, a knock-out format was used and only three competitors remained after the first two Boulders. The fourth Boulder was a superfinal for the two best.

Mina Leslie-Wujastyk has done Silver Platter 8A+ in Grampians. "Very satisfying as a last day send! In between rain showers, being keen paid off!" Here is her blog report about her two month long trip, including also sending Punks in the Gym 8b+, with David Mason, who took the picture of her on So you think you can dance 8A.

Chris Sharma opened the DWS Es Pontas ten years ago. No grade suggestion was forwarded but he agreed that it might be a 9b and in fact nobody has come close to repeating it. Now Chris reports on Facebook that he has done something similar. (c) Adrian Garcia "Last week I was able to send a long term project that I'd been trying over the last 5 years on the northwest coast of Mallorca. In honor of my beautiful daughter I named the line #Alasha. So proud of this one. I really had to work hard, dig deep and pull out all the tricks in the book. As you can see it's quite a stunning piece of stone in a very epic location. It's a very different style to Es Pontas but I'd say it's somewhere in the similar difficulty range. In this picture I'm entering the crux boulder sequence (maybe around 8B) at about 18 meters high. Somewhat auspicious was the fact I sent it around the 10 year anniversary of my ascent of Es Pontas . As time passes , it's crazy to see so many things change and yet the passion is still quite the same. Life is good! A nice note to be entering the climbing season on! So much gratitude to my wife."

Łukasz Dudek had done 13 routes graded 9a before doing Obsession, a very long roof 8C Boulder. During 2016, Dudek has also done some multi-pitches up to 8b+, although he took a bad fall once. Planet Mountain has the MP story.

Chris Frick (48) started climbing in 1982. By doing Enfant de Bohème 8c at Basler Jura in 2015 and then Goldfinger 8c at Gimmelwald in August he reached a personal best. Some days ago he did his 300th route in the realm of the french eighth grade. - Progressing at 45+ is still possible. It's all about motivation and love for climbing. One can't neglect busy times with family, job, etc. But take care of yourself. Climbing means life quality. After a surgery (labrum fixation) four years ago I tried to redefine my climbing. Clear structure in days on and off helps as well as intelligent training including antagonist and stretching exercises. Most important was to get rid of so-called energy vampires in life, work and food. I found vegan nutrition works best for me. Weight control is now a piece of cake (-10 kg!). All this resulted in an energy blast that now holds on since two years. If you feel the fire inside, then go and live your dreams. Don't be stupid and say you're too old and get trapped in convenience and passiveness. To be still on is great. Enjoy life!

We have played with the rankings giving 150 points extra per year once you turn 36, 250 extra points for every year if you are younger than 19 and also 1 000 bonus points for female. 13 840 Adam Ondra 1993 - 11 900 Isabelle Faus 1993 13 832 Laura Rogora 2001 - 11 853 Alex Puccio 1989 13 193 Loic Zehani 2001 - 11 786 James Webb 1987 13 150 Ramón Puigblanque 1981 - 11 700 Ryuichi Murai 1994 13 050 Jakob Kronberger 2001 - 11 532 M Mascarenas 1997 13 045 Chuck Odette 1955 - 11 500 Toshi Takeuchi 1986 Further down in the list there are many names very high up in the ranking that have not been in the headlines yet, like: Franz Fackler (56), Ida Kups (17), Anna Enrich (54), Steve Crow (59), Amelia Marcusson (14) and Toma Strnad (41).

Ethan Pringle reports on Facebook that he has done the FA of Black Beards Tears 8c+ at the Promontory protecting the 40 meters by 15 cams and one stopper. For the history books, this is the second 8c+ trad ascent - first was Beth Rodden's Meltown. - This is definitely one of, if not the coolest and most unique FAs I've ever done in my life! I'd fantasized about how this fabled crack climb might look and feel for weeks before I saw it at the start of the month. When I first laid eyes on it, my jaw hit the floor. On September 2nd I rapped in and installed an anchor right below the very top of the wall. I knew as soon as I saw the line up close that it was going to have some bad ass climbing on it and it did not disappoint. After 10 days of the usual kind of hard work and of course a fair amount of blood, sweat, a few tears right there at the end, I nabbed the red point.