Alexander Rohr, who did a personal best of 8b+ 18 months ago, has done his second 9a, Ultime Souffrance in St Loup. - What a day!!! Really not expected send..... I messed it up four times in the very last move of the hard part. Good mindset and bäääm!!! This one is much harder than Non a la bombe.... The 8a/8a+ boulder in the start shreds your forearms and bodytension. With it, the easier mid-part feels already harder. Linking the last boulderproblem felt quite impossible while the first tries. But now i was lucky although the conditions were not this good....2nd ascent... Super happy!!

Tina Johnsen Hafsaas, who started training in February after 15 months of fighting with Mononucleosis, (a virus that causes extreme fatigue), has lately made great progress in Bouldering and also done her first 8A+, Steinbucken in Dirdal. - It was incredibly cool to send this boulder. I’m still exploring what bouldering is, and I think this was my kind of boulder - steep and powerful on small holds. I haven’t bouldered much outside and I recently did my first 8A. After my send of Lynx 8A I was psyched to figure out what my maximum level really is, it felt so easy when I sent it that I couldn’t believe this was my limit. After 15 months with mononucleosis it’s hard to describe how good it feels to explore my limits and do what I love. After nine hours in the car my body was not interested in climbing, but I still managed to figure out and do all the moves the first day. When I returned the next day everything felt easier and I sent it without much trouble. I expected to fall at least once at the top due to my lack of maximum endurance, but I didn’t. Once I passed the last hard move I sent it, and it feels amazing to have a body that’s working again and that my training is paying off. Still psyched to explore my limits and in three week I’ll be in Rocklands!

Loic Zehani, who did one 9a FA about six months ago, has done his second 8c+, Bronx in Orgon. The 14-year-old needed 20 tries to do the classical chipped route, which was the first 8c+ in France.

Just log-in and start adding climbers and crags that you want to get automatic updates on. Ascents will be presented under "My Updates", at the top of the left column. For Crags you can even select a grade intervall.

My slab performance is like four grade worse compared to overhang and I know it is the feet that it is the problem. It is just natural that today with all good power oriented gyms many have problems with slab with poor feet. Technics on slab can only be trained on the scene. In general it is about putting as much weight on the foot as possible. Often it also relates to mantle technics, meaning you are hanging on one hand with fingers pointing downwards. Regarding shoes, they should be stiff and new. Indoors and on steep terrain outdoors, soft and worn-out footwear works great but the key on slabs are stiff and new shoes. Good luck :)

Tendon reports on Facebook that Seb Bouin has made a new link up in Villanoeva del Rosario making the FA of Mangarbo 9a/+. Seb has previously done several routes up to 9b and should be among the Top-10 in the world the last few years. (c) V. Romera

Official Similarweb statistics show that the 8a visitors stay 15 minutes on the site, which can be compared with 3 minutes for the main competitors. (UKC, Climbing, R&I and Planet M.) The average of page viewings for 8a is seven and for the competitors it is three. Furthermore, meanwhile 84% of the 8a visitors actively go to 8a, the competitors get only 41% of their traffic direct, the rest comes from Facebook and Google search etc. One possible explanation for this is that the other sites have been so active on Facebook etc so this is now their prime source of visitors. At the same time, one could assume that due to the Facebook-origin traffic, a large amount of the competitors' traffic is based on not so active climbers/non-climbing friends. Anyhow, the uniqueness of 8a not being active on Facebook etc and instead getting the real climbers' interest of getting updated on the climbing scene is what we are proud of. For 2016, we have made new records in sale and in fact, 95% of all banner placements are already booked :) This means that we have more resources to speed up the new design and functionality.

62 000 members have rated 3.9 million ascents, which, through the Ticklists, will help you to find the best crags and climbs in the world. Just go to the Crag Ticklist and you will get the best routes and boulders ranked. You can Search by Grades, Onsight percentage or number of Ascents. Later you can print the 8a Tick List out. Finding the best climbs with the same Search options is also available in the 8a Topo App, where you can also add the ascents to your scorecard.

Fedir Samoilov, who did his first 9a last month, has done his second, Hades in Nassereith. - I feel like I can climb harder and would like to try many projects especially in Spain. But now pause until the autumn: in the near future competitive season begins. There are plans to speak of the junior European Cups and championships, of course on the World Cup in Imst, Arco, Chamonix, Briançon and Kranj. And the ultimate goal of this year - is the Junior World Championships in China. Then again, climbing on rocks. In Spain, I expect the grade 9a+. I hope this project will be an interesting end of the year and the beginning of next year. Plans interesting and great. I hope to find sponsors to help me carry out my plan

Chuck Odette, who started climbing some 40 years ago, has done two 8b's in Hurricane; Inner Worlds and Big Man On Campus (in the picture). The great and inspiring story is that Chuck, who has put up 50+ routes 8a and harder, did his first 8b+ being 44 years old and now he is 60.