Daniel Woods, 22 of Longmont, Colorado, has wasted no time repeating two iconic boulder problems established by Bernd Zangerl. While visiting Silvretta, Austria, he climbed  Memento and Anam Cara, two testpieces of the area and given V16.

Woods tells us, “Since Bernd Zangerl established both Anam Cara and Memento, I have always wanted to try these lines."  The problems were established in 2005 and 2007.

He spent two days piecing together Anam Cara for its fourth ascent and then managed an impressive one-day ascent of Momento for its seventh ascent, both September 6.  Woods registered the grades at V14 and V13 respectively.

He describes them:  "Anam Cara is a short four-move problem revolving around a desperate quarter pad undercling. It has a very thrutchy climbing style. Memento is the opposite. A few moves of incut crimps lead you to the final freak dyno. Sticking this jump was one of the coolest feelings in climbing I have had in a while. I am impressed with the area of Silvretta.”

Also on September 6, Courtney Sanders, who is Woods' new wife as of last summer, did her first V11, Niviuk, according to 8a.nu.  Sanders is 23 from Nashville, Tennessee and has been climbing for two years.  8a.nu reports, "18 months ago she did her first 7A+ so we are talking some kind of record progressing to 8A."  (Since this article was published, Sanders added two more V11s to her ticklist with sends of Zwiederwurz and The Shining both on September 9.)

The Silvretta Mountains are located in the central eastern Alps and border on Tyrol, which is Zangerl's hometown.  Zangerl has established cutting-edge boulder problems in the Silvretta region as well as the landmark V15 New Base Line in Magic Wood, Switzerland. He became best-known for claiming the second ascent of the famed Fred Nicole V15 Dreamtime, in 2001.

For more on Woods and Sanders' trip, click here.

[Daniel Woods on Anam Cara V14. Photo by Courtney Sanders]

Check out this video of Arnaud Petite climbing the famous Ceüse 8b Black Bean with cams and nuts.

Lower Pen Trywn on the coast of North Wales is famous for three defining routes, and as of this season only one of them, The Big Bang, the UK's first 9a (5.14d), sat unrepeated. Like the Sword in the Stone, it seemed to await the anointed, or Adam Ondra.

The big news out of Britain this summer was a repeat by the low-key James McHaffie, 30, of North Wales, better known as one of the UK’s leading trad climbers, whereas the routes at “LPT” are totemic in the sport genre. (See excellent film, released last week, below.)

“I was really impressed when I heard James had repeated The Big Bang,” says Ben Moon, a former top climber in the UK and internationally. “I tried it briefly many years ago, probably after I had done Liquid Amber and Sea of Tranquillity, and thought it was very hard and definitely 9a.”

[Photo of James McHaffie by Matt Pycroft/Hotaches]

While the inland mountain crags of North Wales are traditional strongholds, the coast was where sport climbing originally took hold. In 1984 Moon sparked an arc and an era with his clearly named Statement of Youth, 8a (5.13b), now often considered “the” classic 8a tick, at LPT, a sector of the Great Orme sea-cliff area. In 1990 Liquid Amber, one of the prolific Jerry Moffatt’s greatest routes, became the UK's first 8c (5.14b), and over time gained a reputation as probable 8c+ (5.14c). It was repeated only by Moon, in 1991, until summer 2009 by Pete Robins. Third in the triumvirate was The Big Bang, done by Neil Carson in 1996.

Sea of Tanquillity (8c+), established by Moon in 1993, was only repeated last year, also by Robins, for what is thought to be only two ascents in total.

James McHaffie, aka Caff, redpointed The Big Bang on July 30.

He tells us, "The climb meant a great deal for me because Neil Carson was in his heyday when I started climbing and the pictures of him on it were very inspiring for a newcomer. I really enjoyed every time I tried it, partly because the climbing suited me and partly because I thought it was good fun and knew I was getting fitter each time."

Born in the Lake District, McHaffie lives in North Wales, onsighting many E6s and E7s including the dire E7 The Bells the Bells at the sea cliffs of Gogarth, Anglesey Island. His many FAs include the E8s The Nose (E8 6c) at the Sgurr of Eigg, the Scottish Islands; The Ego has Landed (E8 6b) at Eagle Crag, Borrowdale, England; and various sport routes up to 8b (5.13d). Landmark repeats include the third ascent of The Very Big and the Very Small (8b+/ 5.14a), slate, North Wales. McHaffie has also onsighted some 8a’s (5.13b) in Spain.

He is planning a trip with friends to Yosemite in October, hoping to climb two free climbs on El Cap, possibly Golden Gate and El Corazon or El Nino: "Will have to see."

Chris Doyle, filmmaker and hard new router in the area himself, says that on The Big Bang McHaffie "took quite a while to work the top slab crux and get it sorted but seemed to get up there quite quickly.  He had done Infanticide"—an 8c (5.14b) also by Neil Carson—"which shares the same start, last year, so that helped speed things up. [The Big Bang] went relatively quickly, especially considering the conditions weren't great. He even did it again for photos!"

Moon believes that LPT offers the best limestone sport climbing in the UK, but while popular with climbers from the UK, it sees few visitors from overseas. "This is strange," says Moon, "because it generally has very good weather." The cliffband's proximity to the resort town of Llandudno, with its visible pier, lends the crags, as Moon puts it, a "holiday feel."

"I also have sentimental reasons for liking it," he says, "since it was there that I made friends with all the UK's top climbers when as a 16-year-old I hitched there on my own from London.” It was the summer of 1983 and while he arrived as an E1 (5.10) climber, his grade jumped within weeks, and the following year he produced Statement of Youth. Both his and Moffatt's climbs at LPT were career highlights.

Doyle says, "The last few years have been great for the crag as everything has been rebolted. Pete Robins repeated the old 8c+s from the 90s, Liquid Amber and Sea of Tranquillity. The other big news of the summer was Neil Dyer climbing an amazing new 8c+ [5.14c] called Megalopa. There's quite a lot of new routing going on and it's now time for the Diamond, a sport crag on the opposite headland which has amazing hard projects. It's bird-banned most of the summer so everyone's rushing there now."

A new guide to the area is to appear at the end of the year.

For current area news, click here. For general info on visiting and climbing in the area, click here.

The Big Bang 9a, 2nd Ascent, by James McHaffie, Lower Pen Trwyn, North Wales. from Wild Country on Vimeo.

The International Climbers' Festival in Lander. Ouray Ice Fest. HERA Women's Cancer Foundation Climb4Life .... As an organizer, you can post your own event at Rockandice.com. You can also, as a participant, use our calendar to plan your road trips to coincide with certain really fun events. Try Oktoberfest at the Red River Gorge, Kentucky; the Red Rock Rendezvous, Las Vegas; the New River Rendezvous, Fayetteville, West Virginia. The Skaha Climbing Festival or the one on Sandstone Ice. Comps from the Pocatello Pump to the UBC Pro Tour or a lead or bouldering World Cup event.

Telluride's MountainFilm. Or that little filmfest in beautiful Banff...

Our events calendar is free to users. Simply post your own event—hey, presto. Registration is quick and easy.

The Rock and Ice website events calendar is for community gatherings and non-commercial climbing outings (as opposed to commercial trips and courses). It encompasses fundraisers for climbing-related not-for-profits, climbing-area cleanups and trailwork days, and climbing competitions. We are also proud to support climbing culture by posting notices of film premieres and fests, photo exhibits, slide shows and book signings.

Please use and peruse our events calendar.

Pat Goodman and Jessa Goebel have established a new 5.12c headpoint at the Endless Wall, New River Gorge.

The Rifle RendezSPEW was an amazing success. An unprecedented amount of work was achieved, money raised, shwag raffled and fun had.

The Rifle RendezSPEW (formerly called the Rifle Clean Up) was part community service, part informal climbing competition, and it ended with a big barbeque, raffle and costume party where you had to dress up as a Rifle route. Over 150 climbers participated in the event on August 27.

At the registration area, there was a Five Ten shoe and Black Diamond harness demo. For a $10 registration fee, climbers got all the food and beer they could eat and drink, and they received a shwag bag with the new Rifle issue of Rock and Ice magazine, a CAMP Photon wire carabiner, a block of CAMP chalk, a Grivel 3F quickdraw sling, a Lapis boar’s hair brush, a Sterling Rope t-shirt or hat from Black Diamond or La Sportiva, a garbage bag for picking up trash and a Clif Bar. We had 100 shwag bags stuffed, and sold them all by noon.

This year, the event worked closely with the City of Rifle, and climbers were able to buy their season parking passes during the morning registration, which took place at the Feline parking lot. Communications between the City of Rifle and the Rifle Climbers Coalition (RCC) improved, and their concerns over climbers camping illegally and milling around in the road at the Project Wall were voiced and addressed.

Meanwhile, the RendezSPEW showcased what a good user group climbers are to the Park, first by helping the City clean ashes out all barbeque and campfire pits. Further, concerns over climbers standing in the road at the Project were addressed by a massive rebuilding of the retaining wall beneath the Project Wall warm-up routes, as well as clearing out a new picnic area across the river, which will eventually have a picnic table and bench for climbers to congregate (as opposed to in the middle of the road).

Other clean-up projects included removing aluminum quickdraws that have been left in place on many popular routes for years. About a hundred pounds of frighteningly bad gear was cleaned this year, and either left as is, or outfitted with steel perma-draws. Strange Ranger, Cryptic Egyptian, Huge, Bauhaus Proklamation, Simply Read, 7 P.M. Show, Zulu, Anti-Phil and others were cleaned of bad gear.

New steel anchors were placed on all the aforementioned routes, in addition to Easy Skankin’, Spurt-atron, I am Not a Philistine, Sometimes Always, Apocalypse 05, Present Tense, PMS and others.

Glue-ins were added on the seasonally seeping, but excellent routes Le Specimen and Hand Me the Canteen Boy.

Belay and trail improvements were made to the newly popular Sanctuary wall, and fallen trees were chopped and removed from the Arsenal and elsewhere. Dog droppings and garbage were cleaned up throughout the Park.

In addition to the clean up, the Game of SPEW (Send Points for Elitist Wankers) was held. Climbers were given a booklet/scorecard that explained the rules of the game, where climbers earned points for climbing routes and doing clean up projects, as well as other fun extra-credit points such as “Calling The Redpoint” (+750 SPEW points) or doing pull-ups at the anchors (50 pts/pull-up). You could also lose points for various penalties—Top Roping (-300), “Calling The Redpoint Fail” (-750).  The winner, Keller Rinaudo, racked up an extra 3,000 points for climbing Rumor Has It in his birthday suit (Lynn Hill belayed), earning him a commemorative sweatshirt that says “I’m the Best Climber in Rifle.” Edgardo Baca came in with the lowest score, which earned him the “I’m the Worst Climber in Rifle” sweatshirt.

This year, one of the main goals of the RendezSPEW was to raise funds to cover the costs of a bird study that the Rifle Climbers Coalition (RCC) commissioned earlier this summer. The bird study was to determine if and exactly where golden eagles are nesting in the front half of Box Canyon, which resides on public lands that are managed by the Department of Wildlife (DOW) and are currently closed to climbing due to protect the eagle nests. The RCC, with the guidance and help of the Access Fund, is putting together a comprehensive proposal for how climbing can co-exist with the eagles to be presented to the DOW this November. The RCC recognizes the front half of the Canyon as an amazing climbing resource with potential for numerous moderate and futuristic lines; it is our long-term goal to open climbing access here, and this bird study was one step in this process. The RendezSPEW not only succeeded in raising the $800 balance we needed to cover the bird study, but with a total of $3,000 raised, there are now extra funds that will be used for future updates to the canyon, including hardware upgrades for routes and picnic benches for climbers.

The after party will go down as one of the most memorable, as dozens of climbers showed up dressed as Rifle routes (earning everyone an extra 10,000 SPEW points). The Beast, Glue Fairy, Le Specimen, Merry Maids, Living in Fear, Brown Chicken, Quasimodo, King Fisher, I am not a Philistine, FireArms, Purple and Green, Tijuana Crack Whore(s), Gay Science, Pinch Fest and several versions of Euro-Trash all made memorable appearances.

A massive raffle and a DJ dance party finished off the event.

This event could not have happened without the incredible support of the climbing industry.

Special thanks to CAMP, ClimbTech, Liberty Mountain, and the American Safe Climbing Association for their donations of steel hardware that is being used to keep Rifle safe and user friendly.

Thanks to Avery Brewing and the Lander Brewing Co for supplying the beer.

Thanks to the Access Fund, Big Agnes, Black Diamond, Backbone Media, CAMP, ClimbTech, Cypher, Deuter, Edelweiss, Five Ten, Grivel, La Sportiva, Liberty Mountain, Prana, Patagonia, Rab, Rock and Ice magazine, Singing Rock, Sterling Rope, Summit Canyon Mountaineering and Wolverine Publishing for the amazing support!!!

—Andrew Bisharat, on behalf of the Rifle Climbers Coalition (rifleclimbers.org).

A new bouldering hotspot emerged on the world stage after the World Cup bouldering finale in Munich, when athletes headed to the first international bouldering meet in Västervik, Sweden. Among those athletes were Chris Webb-Parsons, Daniel Woods, and Alex Puccio.

Parsons says, “We were blown away by how good the rock and the problems were.”

Woods described the rock as resembling the style in Bishop, California, and as “overhanging granite with lots of potential.”

One boulder problem stood out for both Woods and Webb-Parsons. The Hourglass (V13) is one of the hardest established boulder problems in Sweden. Says Parsons, “It has to be one of the best problems I have ever done. It’s for sure in my top five problems of all time.”

Woods and Parsons agree that the developed climbing in Västervik has only skimmed the surface of what is available. Parsons says, “Västervik has some amazing potential and what is there now is world class. I’m sure with a small amount of searching there will be plenty more plums.”

(To watch more bouldering videos, Click Here.)

NORTHAMPTON, MA  – Registration is live for The North Face Open, the season finale of the 2011 Unified Bouldering Championship Pro Tour.  The competition, taking place Sept. 23-24, will be featured as the headlining sport at the Nor’easter Outdoor Sports + Music Festival in Burlington, Vermont.  All registered UBC athletes receive free weekend passes to the festival that includes performances by Rjd2, G. Love & Special Sauce and Okkervil River in a lineup of over 20 bands.  In addition to the musical performances the festival will showcase a UCI sanctioned Cyclocross Race, the Ridiculissma costumed run through Burlington, kayaking events and sport clinics and demos.

This marks the second year in a row that the UBC Pro Tour season finale is the featured sport at the Nor’easter.  As Pete Ward, managing partner of NE2C Productions explains, “Having the sport of climbing be a major draw at an outdoor sports festival like the Nor’easter says a lot about how far climbing has come and it’s also a reminder of the enormous opportunities that lie ahead.  With our hugely successful comp in NYC, recognition in the New York Times, and the preceding news that the IOC is considering climbing to be an Olympic sport, the time for climbing to put it’s best foot forward is now.  The North Face Open will do just that in front of thousands of Nor’easter attendees and I’m so psyched for climbing to be a part of the festival atmosphere.  It’s going to be an amazing weekend in one of the most gorgeous outdoor cities in the entire northeast.”

To register for The North Face Open visit www.ubcprostore.com

For more previous competition results, pics & video, please visit www.ubcprotour.com.

A group of friends discovers the nutty magic of bouldering while opening a new zone near a small town in the mountains in the Mexican state of Morelos.

(To watch more bouldering videos, Click Here.)

Hervé Barmasse of Italy and Iker and Eneko Pou, two brothers from Spain, have free climbed the Freney side of the Mont Blanc south face without bolts. On La Classica Moderna the team used only traditional protection, including pitons.

First waiting out weeks of bad weather, on the first sunny day the climbers pproached the Brouillard Pillar in knee-deep snow and proceeded to put up 11 pitches, with grades up to 5.11b. The three men spent a night at Rifugio Monzino (2590m) and then summited the following day, having climbed a total vertical gain of 3,300m and 380m vertical on rock.

The Pou brothers were raised in the Basque country of Spain, taking trips to the Pyrenees and Alps with their parents. Some major sends from Iker include Demencia Senil (5.15a) in 2009, Action Directe (5.14d) in 2000, and the Supercanaleta on Fitz Roy, Patagonia. While Iker focused on sport climbing, Eneko favored mountaineering with expeditions to Annapurna and Ama Dablam, and significant ski descents in the Pyrenees and the Spanish Sierra Nevada.

Hervé Barmasse grew up with the Matterhorn in his back yard, mountaineering and skiing in the Alps. He spent time in Pakistan in 2004 uncovering unclimbed granite big-walls. In 2006 he climbed a new route on the north face of Cerro San Lorenzo, Patagonia, and in 2007 he made the first solo ascent of the South Directissima route on the Matterhorn.

Mont Blanc (4,810m) is the highest mountain in the Alps, lying on the border of Italy and France.  Jacques Balmat and Michel Paccard were the first to climb it in 1786.

The recent ascent is part of The North Face expedition Exploring the Alps. The project focuses on establishing three new routes on three of the highest peaks in the Alps, The Matterhorn, Mont Blanc and Monte Rosa. To see a video of Barmasse climbing a new route up the Southeast face of The Matterhorn click here. To watch Iker and Eneko climb hard in the Alps click here.