Manu Lopez has made the first ascent of FFF (Flesh For Fantasy), ~9a, at the "Supermanjoc", the a north facing wall on the upper level at St Antonin Noble Val, FFF was one of the most important projects in the south west of France.

The route was bolted 20 years ago by Philippe Laperne and Eric Siguier and quickly became the project of Eric's and also Didier Raboutou.

At the time Eric was very low key, but he onsighted 8b and redpointed 8c/+, and this was his big project. He never suceeded however and nor did Didier....

Francois Legrand, Yuji Hirayama and others also made efforts in the 90s, but to no avail.

Then, for a decade or more, no one tried the project.

But then, last summer Manu Lopez put in ~30 sessions and got close. Shawn Raboutou, Didier's son, also came close.
And now, finally, it's done.

The route is around 30 meters long and very steep. The crux is at the beginning with something like 8A boulder on bad underclings with very bad feet. After this, it's pumpy climbing until it joins an existing 8c and climbs it's crux at the top.

As for so many other routes in the Supermanjoc sector, the style is very challenging with decent hand holds but bad feet, requiring very good body tension. The routes here have a reputation of being very hard for the grade, if not sandbagged.

Whether this goes for FFF as well remains to be seen. Hopefully Seb Bouin and/or Gerome Pouvreau decide to try it soon.

Thanks Pierre Délas at Kairn for all the information!