James Pearson, (bio at Wild Country website) who has repeated Neil Bentley's masterpiece at Burbage South, Equilibrium, the UK's first E10, has added his own testpiece at Burbage North. He climbed the short arete right of Superstition (E8) on the Living In Oxford block to give Promise, offering a grade of E10 7a (or Font 8a climbing), headpointed, spotted and protected by a small slider of dubious worth (photo-topo here).
Meanwhile at Burbage South, Australian brothers, Ben and Lee Cossey after a shift behind the counter at the busy Hathersage emporium of Outside, decided on a spot of night climbing. Ben climbed Parthian Shot, John Dunne's famous E9 6c, by head torch, but by the E7 6c direct start of Child's Play. All gear was placed on lead except the gear in the flake. His brother Lee was thwarted on his attempt by head torch reflections from the shiny carabiners. (photo-topo here).
Meanwhile at Cratcliffe Ben Bransby soloed the Cratcliffe Prow after top rope practice. Short but with a bad landing he did it twice, thinks it maybe Font 7c, and was originally going to have his Mum and dog spotting but luckily roped in a couple of 'boulderers' to do the job. You can read a first person account of his ascent at the ukbouldering.com forum, he posts under the name of 'El Mocho".
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