Based on 1 100+ unique votes from the poll "Best Climbing Ropes?" we can see that there are three winning brands and then three runner-ups. In comparison to a similar poll from 2013, we can see that Beal is getting lower positions and that Mammut, Petzl and Tendon have made a great increase. 21 % Sterling (24 % in a similar poll 2013) 19 % Beal (26) 18 % Mammut (12) 13 % Edelrid (10) 12 % Tendon (8) 11 % Petzl (4) 5 % Other: Roca mentioned most often (16)

carl dawson, a 7c+ climber at the age of 65, has published a long article with great pictures describing the recent development in Peloponnese. Unless you're "in the know", most climbers link Greece with Kalymnos, although with the recent book Best of Greece: Sport Cimbing, the secret is out... there's more to climb in Greece than that busy little island in the Aegean Sea! The Peloponnese (that big 'lump' of mainland Greece down in the south) has seen a lot of activity with climbers from Patras, who kept quietly putting up seriously hard lines for some time. However, the emphasis has now swung quite clearly to the East coast of the Peloponnese, to the winter destination of Leonidio, the fabulous tufas of Kyparissi, and to Zobolo, Monemvasia and Nafplio. So get the flights booked to Athens now!"

James Webb has done his 36th flash of an 8A+ or harder Boulder by Bleu sacré in Fontainebleau, which is actually considered to be an 8B by most of climbers. Without his personal grades, the best flash boulderer in the world would have done almost 50 8A+ to 8B+. In the 8a ranking game, James has been more or less #1 the last five years and in fact, his trend diagram has been pointing steadily upwards for the last ten years.

Fanatic Climbing reports that kevin LOPATA has done Jour de Chasse 8C (B+) which Jan Hojer has put up. Last month, Kevin did his first 8C, Misti. "This Wednesday, I succeed in my current project "Jour de chasse" 8C, very hard compared to the other testpiece of the Opium boulder "Mécanique élémentaire". The crux is to go up with the famous undercling of Narcotic to the slopers at the lip at the boulder. You need a very strong body tension for holding the final jug. Wonderful and so physical."

Planet Mountain reports that Tom Ballard has done the FA of A Line Above the Sky at Tomorrow's World in Dolomites, suggesting the first D15 in the world for it. "This is the hardest bit of climbing I have ever done. There are some very big ‘shouldery’ moves, and then you must just keep going for close to 50 metres!" Thanks to Riky Felderer/CAMP for the picture. You can follow him on Instagram, @rikyfelderer

Climb in Peace have gathered some famous climbers like Adam Ondra and cleaned Santa Linya. They have also put up info signs how to get rid of human waste using a shovel and a plastic bag. Article from 8a suggesting the same thing in 2010.

James Webb has had another low gravity day in Fontainebleu today. He did Toupie carnivore assis 8B+ and The Big Island 8C. (c) Neil Hart "Climbed the island a few years back. Got the full line on the quick today. Doesn't add much difficulty but def seems the better start. Quality! Back for some tries on the assis soon."

Alberto Rocasolano has just got the first repeat of Catalán Witness the Fitness. The FA of this boulder problem was done by Chris Sharma, who didn't give it an exact grade but commented in this way: "I'm not so sure about the grade but it's something like an 8B/+ into a 8A+ , so whatever that means ;)". After that, Nacho Sánchez was able to link the first part saying that he broke a hold at the crux so it might be 8B+ then. In the end, Beto was the first to repeat the whole line two days ago, suggesting 8C for it. At the Spanish 8a.nu site, we took advantage of his ascent to talk to this guy from Madrid, who is not new to hard grades having repeated Nacho Sánchez's 'Entropia' 8C and also having the FA of 'Soyuz low start' 8C under his belt. What is the most difficult part of this problem? How do the moves feel like? Is it very long?
"The most difficult part is a first section of 7 moves, super bouldery, where I broke a crux hold and made it even more difficult. The second stretch is more like endurance. It's got 17 movements in total." It seems like roofs is a style that fits you well...
"Well, I like everything, either roofs or not." You're running out of difficult rigs... Have you got any other super hard project?
"Now I've got two hard ones: one near home which I found this year and it's one of those that you can retire from climbing if you send it... hahaha...; and, the other will be around 8C+ or 8C/+ for sure and I'm really close to send it... But one needs to send things before bragging about them... hahaha." Would you like to try and eventually send the original 'Witness the Fitness'?
"Just travelling to there and trying it would be a dream made true for me... hahaha."

Based on some 1 600+ unique votes from the poll "Male dream climbing partner": 22 % Chris Sharma 20 % David Graham 13 % Fred Nicole 12 % Adam Ondra 08 % Alex Honnold 07 % James Webb 06 % Alex Megos 03 % Jan Hojer 10 % Other (Dani Andrada, Nalle Hukkataival and Daniel Woods mentioned most often)