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)

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."

It seems quite likely that Climbing will actually make it to the Olympics 2020. This is of course very good news and IFSC should get full credit for making it happen. The IFSC plan is to let 30 + 30 athletes compete in Lead, Speed and Bouldering during four days. Three medals would be awarded to the best male and female competitors with the best combined score. Detailed info starts on page 40 of this document. The suggested qualifying quota is; Top-3 in the World Championship Top-3 in the Youth World Championship Top-9 in the World Ranking Top-3 in five Continental Championships; Africa, Europe, Asia, America and Oceania. In practice all these qualifying events, including the World Cups, must be run with the same four days combined format. Surely, it will be a hype and most of the best will go all in. However, it just might be that several who are not willing to sacrifice full season for a ticket to Tokyo see a great opportunity. Instead they could focus just on one discipline and win the World Championship or World Cup, when the best must have a wider focus. Imagine that maybe none of the guys in the Olympic 2020 will get a discipline medal in the World Championship or even in the overall World Cup 2019? A previous 8a poll shows that most climbers agree with Chris Sharma that this suggested new format is a big shame!

The Ledge Podcast has made an interview with Chris Sharma, where our legend talks about his vision for his gym to become an international climbing meeting point for everyone coming to Barcelona before they go rock climbing in Catalonia, He seems to think he has too many bolted projects and at least one of them is harder than La Dura Dura 9b+, which he already has spent some time on. He thinks that he can do harder routes but he does not know if he wants it as it takes so much commitment. Patxi Usobiaga is moving to Barcelona and they have been discussing if also Chris should try training hard for a period. Regarding Olympics, Chris is really straightforward. Although he is positive for climbing to make it into the Olympics, he disapproves of the format. "The format that I have heard about I am not so happy about. Combining the three format is a big shame!"

Here is a quick Climbers of 2015 List. Please comment and give suggestions. As in previous years, the list is based on both rock and competitions, giving extra credit for those doing all disciplines. 1. Adam Ondra 2. Mina Markovic 3. Ashima Shiraishi 4. Alex Megos 5. Jan Hojer 6. Janja Garnbret 7. James Webb 8. Domen Skofic 9. Jakob Schubert 10. Ramon Puigblanque 11. Jessica Pilz 12. Alex Puccio 13. Stefano Ghisolfi 14. Sachi Amma 15. Daniel Woods 16. Megan Mascarenas 17. David Graham 18. Jernej Kruder 19. Angela Eiter 20. Chris Sharma 21. Niccolò Ceria 22. Edu Marin 23. Jonathan Siegrist 24. Seb Bouin 25. Dani Andrada 26. David Firnenburg 27. Nalle Hukkataival 28. Gabri Moroni 29. Paul Robinson 30. Akiyo Noguchi, Tommy Caldwell, Kevin Jorgeson, Alban Levier, Christof Rauch, Gauthier Supper, Allizee Dufraisse, Sean McColl , Jain Kim, Shauna Coxsey, Pirmin Bertle, Katharina Saurwein, Isabelle Faus, Florence Pinet, Karoline Sinnhuber, Jongwon Chon, Nina Williams, Hannah Midtbö, Dai Koyamada, Maria Davies Sandbu, Klemen Becan, Sasha Digulian, Manu Lopez, Nina Caprez, Margo Hayes, Romain Desgranges, Melissa Le Neve, Nicki van Bergen, Katie Lambert, Sebastian Halenke, Ethan Pringle, Anak Verhoeven, Martin Stranik, Nathaniel Coleman, Jorg Verhoeven, Miho Nonaka, Mathieu Bouyoud, Reffo Silvio, Laura Rogara, Nicolas Perlorson, Piotr Schab, Magnus Midtbø, Carlo Traversi, Barbara Zangerl, Jacopo Larcher, Janina Gmiter, Ellis Butler-Barker, Marco Zanone, Giorgia Tesio, Ben Moon,

With the amazing barefoot ascents by Charles "Mowgli" Albert in Fontainebleau, there exists a possibility that there will be a market for sticking rubber toe plasters. As Mowgli has showed that on some few extreme boulder cases, bare feet are equally good as any shoes, what about something in between, rubber just on the big toes? This will increase the friction and make it possible to climb longer sessions without shoes and benefit from closer contact with the rock. Clearly, neither barefoot or rubber toe plasters will ever be popular with normal climbers but if you want to do some extreme climbs to get a higher grade, why not try it. Imagine the benefit from getting your whole big toe into a thin two finger pocket, compared to trying to get one millimeter of the shoe in the opening of that deep two finger pocket. One alternative could of be to make a semi-separate pointy big toe on shoes? This would also make it possible to get in your big toe deeper in the two finger pocket. If this could help you through the crux, you could try it out by creating an indentation in your shoe next to your big toe.

Charles Albert, who did the FA of the L'Alchimiste left exit last week, considered to be harder than the 8C right exit, did it today twice. (c) Neil Hart did get it on video both times. "He is so strong he made it look like a 6A. I picked him up at one o'clock and we did a very quick 7B that took two tries and we drove to the L'alchimiste. He just pulled on and fell three times on the crux then sent it, then climbed it again so we could get another angle. It is easier for him bare foot because he can hook his toes into the side pulls better. Definitely a new level!"

James Webb, #2 in US Bouldering Nationals last weekend, arrived to Fontainebleau, when it was snowing. It cleared up and one hour later he did the fourth repeat of L'Alchimiste. Gradewise, it has been given 8C and 8B+ and on Bleauinfo there was 8C/+ mentioned as well. James did it in just three tries and gave it a personal 8B grade in his scorecard. (C) David Mason "3 tries total. Im a bit confused by this right & left exit stuff. Its just one wall.. with just one line.. and two different options for beta. Thats it. Pick the beta that suits your style and go for it. Nonetheless, a quality problem! Very psyched to be here. It is a nice line for sure. Great rock and interesting features. Today was the first day. Traveled here over the night and landed this morning. Took the train to Font and my bud Dave Mason picked me up and we went climbing... No world cups for me. Would rather spend my time here on the rock. Probably gonna be here till mid march. Hopefully the weather holds up for us!"

Rock & Ice reports that Marianne van der Steen has set a new standard for dry-tooling by making the first ever male or female flash of a D13+, Kamasutra at Bus del Quai in Italy. It was opened last year by the three times Ice World Champion, Angelika Rainer and here is FA video. "Van der Steen told Rock and Ice that she’s a slow climber and thinks that might be a reason why she “never [does] too well” in World Cups where time is an important factor." The most amazing thing with Marianne's world record was that, "When she got to the ground, she wasn’t pumped at all, she says, “therefore it didn't feel like I'd done something super difficult. It was only later that evening when I realized and heard probably no one had ever done a D13+ flash. Picture by Marco Servalli.

Bouldering was more or less invented in Fontainebleau and it is still the most often visited and biggest arena in the world. The first topo was produced in 1945 but already in the 19th century, the Bleauserads were challenged by the blocs. The Bouldering difficulty gradings can also be said to have been invented in the Forest and in fact, the american V scale is above 7A a copy when in comes to grade steps. Grades in Font have been said to be sandbagged but in reality this is just another way of saying that another grade scale has been invented outside Bleau. The best way to describe this is to compare the maximum grades. In 2005, the highest grade in Font was 8B, which can be compared to the fact that in 1996 and 2000, the world's first 8B+ and 8C had been established and since then repeated many times. Meanwhile, some 100 guys had done an 8B+ outside Font until 2005 and gained fame in magazines and on websites as well as sponsor contracts, but nobody claimed to have done 8B+ in the Forest. In reality, there is probably at least a handful Bleauseards that have done 8A to 8B Boulders in Font, equally difficult as some 8B+ to 8C+ that were reported at the time around the globe in areas like Ticino, Rocklands, Hueco Tanks, etc. Here are some Bleauseards who probably climbed 8A - 8B's in Font prior to 2005 - these problems would have been reported as 8B+ outside Font - Julien Nadiras, Antoine Vandeputte, Olivier Lebreton, Sebastien Frigault, Christophe Laumone, Jacky Godoffe, Manu Marquès and Christian Roumegoux. The bleau.info scorecards of Marques Vimeo and especially Roumegoux (52), in the picture by Pierre Delas, are very impressive and yet they are unknown outside Font. Some 15 years ago Christian did an 8c+ and onsighted two 8b's on rock and did several 8B's in Font. If Font used the same grades as Ticino etc, he could be a world famous boulderer having done probably some 8B+'s.