Tom O'Halloran has made the first ascent of his long-term project, 'Hump of Trouble', at The Underworld, Blue Mountains, Australia.

O'Halloran, who has previously climbed multiple routes at 9a - as well as the V15/9a The Wheel of Life (V15) - has opted to not give the route a grade, saying:

'It's the hardest piece of climbing I feel like I've ever done, I have no idea of the grade. Anyone that has dived deep, deep, deep, on a first ascent redpoint will understand where I'm coming from here. There's a certain point where the difficulty just doesn't make sense anymore'.

'I'm gonna need Jakob, or Alex, or Adam or someone to come over and actually just tell me what it actually is, because I have no reference point, other than the fact that it pushed me harder than anything else I've ever been on in my entire life'.

'It's been something I've tried for almost half my climbing life. Feels weird that it's over. Thank you everyone for being there along the way'.

O'Halloran had invested sixty days into the route at the start of the season, having previously 'never come close to a third of that amount of time on one project'. It took him a further nine days this year to make the first ascent. 

Despite not offering a grade, O'Halloran has suggested that the ten metre route is 'Australia's hardest', which would make it 9a+ or harder.

In a video of O'Halloran projecting the route earlier in the year (shared below), he stated that his initial thoughts on the route were that it felt like a V13/8B boulder directly into another V13/8B boulder, with no rest whatsoever. This would likely make the route closer to 9b/9b+.