UKC

Jakob Schubert has made the 2nd ascent of Adam Ondra's Planta de Shiva, 9b, at Villanueva del Rosario near Malaga in southern Spain. Last year at roughly the same time he did his first 9b, Chris Sharma's Fight or flight.

This means Jakob is only the 3rd ever, after Sharma and Ondra, to climb two...

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In reply to UKC News:

Nice! I guess the next contenders for joining the 2 x 9b club would be Sachi Amma, Magnus Midtbo and Megos of course

In reply to jsmcfarland:

Just realised Dani Andrada has also climbed two 9b's; Delincuente natural and Ali-Hulk sit start extension.

In reply to Björn Pohl - UKC:

Awesome news. 9b seems a very elite grade. Any idea how long it took him?



Isn't Ali Hulk more of a boulder-route so perhaps shouldn't count? And what's Delincuente? Though he's also done Chilam Balam now too (unless it settles at 9a+).

In reply to UKC News:

Never doubted it when I read that he was trying it. The podcast with him is great too...

In reply to stp:

A boulder problem of nearly 100 moves and off the deck the whole way??

Edit: 86 moves actually

What is a boulder-route!? if it gets a route grade it's a route, surely.

In reply to jsmcfarland:

A boulder route is something that is part boulder problem and part roped climb.

Some long boulder problems (like traverses) get given route grades and I think that makes a lot of sense in describing the difficulty. However using the same grading system doesn't make them routes. They are still boulder problems. They protected by mats, can be practiced alone usually, and are more accessible. Routes are climbed with a rope and that makes a significant difference.

The hybrids that are now being created are a fairly new phenomenon and a mixture of the two and I think it makes sense to recognize that.

In reply to stp:

Fairly new?

Haven't things like staminaband-pump up the power been around for ages? And I'm sure those Ali Hulk linkups must be a decade old now at least? And what about that thing of rouhlings (akira?), that was some time ago now (1995 so 2 decades) and is a long boulder roof into a short sport climb.

In reply to stp:

Delincuente or whatever it's called is another Ali baba cave boulder-route link IIRC.

In reply to abarro81 / stp:

Delincuente natural (9b)

In reply to AJM:

Compared to the first routes or the first boulder problems yes they're definitely fairly new. I suspect as we run out of rock and better climbers want to create harder things then linking boulder problems into routes will become more popular in the future.

In reply to stp:

Yes, if you want to count back to the first routes ever then I imagine you might decide 2 decade old things are fairly new.

In reply to stp:


Errr... They get traverse grades, which are neither route grades nor boulder grades.

In reply to Mr Lopez:

Isn't that only in Font where a traverse grade is significantly harder than route grade but easier than a normal Font grade? Surely the Dogs Dinner traverse is a route grade of 9a rather than something harder than a 9a route? And Traverse of the Gods at Longridge? Route 8b+ or Font traverse grade?

In reply to AJM:

I also think they're new in the sense that they're now being recorded and perceived as climbing end goal achievements rather than merely training exercises for climbers who have run of stuff to do at their local crag.

I think there have been various boulder problem/route link ups at Raven Tor (around Chimes/Weedkiller for instance) but as far as I know these still aren't recorded anywhere and are still just viewed as climber's personal training projects.

In reply to stp:

In terms of end goal achievements - Akira? Ali hulk? They were definitely trained-for goals for the people who have done them.

The tor linkups are recorded all over the place. Try googling

staminaband pump up the power

Or

Weedkiller chimes

The first entries I see are either blog posts and news articles celebrating achieving them or logbook entries recording them.

In reply to AJM:

Yeah fair enough. Just found them in UKC database too now. Was looking in the wrong bit before.