19-year-old German climber Alexander Megos has just onsighted a 9a sport route!
Reported on Desnivel is the news that Alex has onsighted the Spanish route of Estado Critico at Siurana.
© Peter Würth
The route was bolted by Dani Andrada and first climbed by Ramon Julian back in 2004. The cut and thrust of the story on Desnivel is that the grade has been hovering around 8c+/9a, but several top climbers have confirmed 9a for it, including Adam Ondra.
Megos, whilst not super well known in the UK, is an incredible climber and has just finished a record-setting trip to the USA. He was in the States for 121 days and managed to climb an astonishing 135 routes or boulders of 8a/8A and above.
Perhaps the highlight area of the trip was Hueco Tanks, Texas. It was at Hueco that Alex had a stand-out day where he managed to climb Power of Landjager (8A), Flower Power (8A), The Full Monty (8A+), Crown of Aragorn (8B) and Crown Royale (8B) in a single day.
Other highlights from Hueco Tanks included the famous Fred Nicole problem, Slashface (8B), and three other 8Bs Terre de Sienne, Sôl Adûnâmentum and Nagual.
Earlier in his USA road trip Megos flashed the Red River Gorge route of Pure Imagination, his first 8c+ flash (the route has been down graded from 9a), and made a four-day redpoint of Dave Graham's bouldery test-piece, The Fly 5.14d (9a) in Rumney.
His ascent of Estado Critico is potentially the world's first 9a onsight, and what is most surprising is that it wasn't by Adam Ondra!
More info to come - watch this space.
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