Timy Fairfield was one of the best climbers during the 90s. Now he is back being 45 with a 8C FA. "This brilliant test-piece is steep, elegantly choreographed, gymnastically specific, savagely powerful, explosive, absolutely hard and 100% natural - the way I like it! This is one of the best lines that I have ever authored."

"THROWBACK" from Timy Fairfield on Vimeo.

Alex Hernandez has done his second 8c+, Sensepell in Catalunia, which Ramon Julian Puigblanque just made the FA of. Àlex did his first 8c+ two years ago. (c) Ktx Llucià Hernandez Nuñez

Jessica Pilz started competing in 2010 and has made the podium in the Euro Youth Cup twice. Since 2012, when she begun training with a plan, she has been the best in her age category. Her trainer is Ingo Filzwieser, the Austrian national youth coach, and normally she trains for 4 to 5 times a week for 3.5 hours. Jessy started up in 2015 with being #5 in the Euro Bouldering Championship and finished by being #3 in the Lead WC. Her worst result out in seven WCs was once being #4. In between, she was #3 in the European Championship. Add to that two 8c+'s and more and it is quite obvious that the 19-year-old is in the Top-20 on the 8a Climber of the year list. (c) Ansichtssache / Andi Aufschnaiter - In 2015 at the beginning of the season I had no pressure and no high expectations in the World Cup, because I was still climbing in youth comps and I first thought my highlight will be the World Youth Championship in Arco. But later it turned out that I also could climb onto the podium in adults comps. The explanation is easy: I trained hard for this season and had great support from the Austrian team, sponsors, trainer, friends and parents!! I think talent and luck is also important sometimes and this was might also be part of this season ;) Oh I forgot my goals on rock: haha that's easy I do't have one ! The rock trip to Oliana the last week was a great addition and reward for me. I never expected that I could climb those hard routes, because I am almost never on rock and I have little experience. But I absolutely enjoyed it with a great crew and got used to it ;) After school I want to do more rock climbing (also in Austria), because up to now I had not enough time..

Jessica Pilz, #3 in the Lead World Cup, has added two 8c+'s to her new scorecard; Mind Control and Joe Blau in Oliana. "Was sooo happy that I could send it in my 4th try, the jump in the beginning was quite far for me and the last part a mental game :P great end of the year!!" In the WC 2015, she was Top-4 in all seven events. The 19-year-old has won the Youth World Championship three times. On the 8a Climber of the year list the Austrian is #20.

Alex Beale has put together the most comprehensive 8C stats that are out there. The picture shows the great and natural progress in Bouldering. On the other hand, as there is only a couple of 8C+'s, one could suggest that the 8C scale is to wide and, some 8C's should in fact be 8C+'s.

Chris Sharma comes with great news on Facbook, (c) Ricardo Giancola "I had a great start to the new year by sending the "Catalan Witness the Fitness" at Cova de Ocell the other day... I've been trying this line on and off for quite some time so it felt good to see it through finally. It's been great process getting back into the bouldering groove! I'm not so sure about the grade but it's something like an 8B/+ into a 8A+ , so whatever that means ;) It will be really cool to see more climbers try it and get their opinion!" As it is a roof, the rest between the 8B/+ and 8A+ can not be very good so based on other link up grading and the fact it took some time, the new test piece is probably at least an 8C!?

The New Yorker presents a full length article about Ashima Shiraishi including the family background and the fact that her mother was 51 years old when gave birth to Ashima - The most talented climber in the world.

By analysing Similarweb, we can see that 8a.nu is the leading global climbing website as all competitors get most of their traffic from their country of origin. The 8a visitors are, on the contrary, evenly spread out around the globe. Furthermore, the most interesting fact is that 85% of 8a visitors come "direct" instead of just clicking on a link on Facebook or Google etc. The four main competitors to 8a get most of their visitors through links at Google and Facebook etc. 85% 8a.nu 45% UKC (32% from "Google" & 67% from UK) 33% PlanetM (42% from "Google") 24% R&I (50% come from social media) 23% Climbing (38% from "Google") In practice, in the Google and Social media era, getting 85% of the traffic direct, is extremely high and unique for a global social community like 8a.nu. This also shows a great potential to grow. To have such a high figure is also very interesting for the advertisers. If you only visit a certain domain because of a Facebook link, you are probably less interested to look around :)

Mina Markovic finishes her Catalonia trip by sending Ingravids extension total 8c+ in Santa Linya. In practice, this means that during her two weeks the Lead World Cup 2015 winner set some kind of a record by doing; one 9a, two 8c+'s and two 8c's. Imagine Mina's tick list if she just focused on rock climbing for one year. (c) Luka Fonda

Ashima Shiraishi (14) reports on Instagram that she was very close to repeat Dai Koyamada's Horizon, 8C at Mount Hiei. Japan. In fact, Dai has said it is either a hard 8C or possibly even an 8C+. (c) Yoshiko Saito - This is the project I spent a few days on but fell 3 times from the last hold that was wet. I definitely cried myself to sleep on my last night. I hope to finish projects like these in #2016!!!!