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In an attempt to make space for the newsworthy ascents that occur with ever-increasing regularity, our weekly news series tries to celebrate a few outstanding climbs (or interesting events) that for one reason or another caught our attention. We hope you enjoy it. —The editors
And the Best Climber of the Year is…
We can’t take credit for identifying/choosing this title—everyone called it out on Instagram:
Daniel Woods: “Your year of climbing will go down in history as the top performance year ever! Inspiring!!”
Jorge Diaz Rullo: “First person to climb 9c and 9A, but it’s more crazy when you do it in just A YEAR!! Don’t stop inspiring us, you are a big part of climbing history!”
Pete Whittaker: “Surely one of the best/iconic years of climbing from anyone ever. Incredible!!”
Felipe Camargo: “What a year!!”
You get the idea. To recap, Jakob Schubert’s headline year included winning not one but two World Championship titles (thus becoming one of the first athletes to secure a ticket to the 2024 Paris Games), FAing the world’s third 5.15d, and then, just last week, sending Alphane (V17). The word you may be searching for is iconic.
Schubert’s sights were set on Alphane at the start of the year, but he abandoned the project as the World Cup season kicked off. He didn’t return until a month after sending B.I.G.
“At first I also thought Alphane would really be my style, but somehow I especially struggle to do the first few moves very well,” he wrote on Instagram. “Right now I’m trying to get some more finger strength and hope it will help me to feel much stronger on it once I go for a longer trip.”
Schubert left and returned a few weeks later. There were more trip interruptions, plus some bad weather. Of course, in the end, Schubert did what he always does when the pressure is on.
“[This is] a story of personal perseverance that I’m grateful climbing can provide me with,” he wrote.
If Alphane’s V17 grade stands (there has been some doubt), Schubert just became the most accomplished climber in history, having climbed 5.15d, V17, and won the World Championships.
—Delaney Miller
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Sean Bailey does Lucid Dreaming and suggests it might be harder than V15
Just two weeks ago, in this very weekly roundup, I wrote about Sean Bailey’s stunningly successful return to outdoor climbing after several years devoted largely to competitions. After failing to qualify for the Paris 2024 Olympics, Bailey noted (in a long and painful Instagram post about the pressures and challenges of being a professional athlete) that “some things will be changing for me”; then he headed outside and absolutely smashed a number of testpieces. He flashed Slasher (V13), FA’d Doors of Perception (a V15 that saw a second ascent by Zach Galla this week), got the long-awaited second ascent of Jimmy Webb’s Transience (V14), and then, on a trip to Bishop, CA, sent what he considers his hardest boulder to date: Lucid Dreaming (V15).
“One of the purest boulders out there,” he wrote on Instagram. “Short, beautiful grips, and hard as hell. … Even day on day off was feeling like it was taxing me in a way I’m not used to.”
While some of his greatest achievements have been on ropes (he made the third ascent of Alex Megos’s 5.15c, Bibliographie), Bailey’s not new to the V15 and V16 level, with repeats of Pegasus (V15), Grand Illusion (V16), and Box Therapy (V15/16) under his belt. So when he says Lucid Dreaming was “significantly harder than any v15s I’ve tried” despite being “a good style for me,” I am personally tempted to read between the lines.
Grade aside, however, it’s great to see Bailey out there putting that comp strength to work. I suspect I’ll be writing about him quite a bit in 2024.
—Steven Potter
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Michaela Kiersch’s key to success? A pre-send beer
This past autumn Michaela Kiersch had a very productive trip to Margalef, Spain, sending Flash Over (5.14a), Zipayorik Ez (5.14b), Coma Sant Pere (5.14c), Era Vella (5.14d), and—on the very last day of the trip—Victimes del Futur (5.14d). And last week, in what is surely the most fun send-story I’ve heard in a while, Kiersch let us in on a secret: She was intensely stressed out by the projecting process on Victimes del Futur, which she didn’t try until the last week of her trip, and the key to her success was a pretty unlikely one.
Having the pressure to finish a hard climb on the last day of a trip, Kiersch wrote on Instagram, “makes me feel really UNCOMFORTABLE.” On that last day, she fell at the crux on her first and second tries, then fell even lower on her third attempt. “I was STRESSED OUT. I felt irritable, disappointed, upset, and confused [about] what to do. It was easy to blame anything but me—weather, skin, vibe. The odds of sending on my 4th try on a steep, long, powerful route like this were low. My fingers were bleeding. I was unhappy and not having fun. I decided to leave the crag. I had a big snack and a small beer. 😉 I had to remove myself from the climb in order to figure out if I wanted to try again or accept that this was a project to return for.”
But she did try again, and “against all odds, even the ones I’d stacked against myself” she sent.
Except, she added, maybe her success came precisely because she’d stacked some odds against herself.
“I do not condone drinking and climbing,” she added. But “sometimes managing my stress means giving myself excuses. It’s hard to accept pure failure. But easier when I can blame it on a beer, or the fourth try, etc. When you can accept failure, it’s easier to succeed.”
—SP
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Tomoa Narasaki Flashes Gakido (downgrading it from V16 to V14)—and adds sit start
As one of the best comp boulderers of all time, Japan’s Tomoa Narasaki doesn’t get outside all that often, but when he does, he gets things done fast. Back in 2019, he became just the sixth person to flash V14 (Decided, in Mizugaki, Japan). And last week, he flashed Gakido, which was originally climbed at V16 by Shinichiro Nomura and repeated by Ryuchi Murai (who suggested it might be easier). Then, on the same day, he added a sit start.
Narasaki says he’s not sure about the grade since he hasn’t “had the chance to try many boulders above V15.” But after flashing the stand start, he did the sit start’s moves on his second try and sent the full link in five attempts. “For now I would like to grade it as V15,” he said. “I would love for many climbers to climb it and share their opinions on the boulder.”
Fast work? Yes. Surprising? Not particularly.
Watch the uncut below.
—SP
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