Jorge Díaz-Rullo Completes His Hardest Boulder Ever
Known more for his sport climbing, the Spanish climber just topped Muerte por Asfixia V16
Jorge Díaz-Rullo recently repeated Muerte por Asfixia V16 (8C+) in La Pedriza, Spain. The line was established by Pablo Zamora in early January this year. Díaz-Rullo’s sent the problem on only his third session, and his ascent is likely the second. A power endurance test, the line traverses leftward across a very steep, low-to-the-ground boulder before a cruxy section reaching the lip. Part of the problem’s difficultly comes from trying to not dab a block that sits directly beneath the line.
“I still can’t believe I did my hardest boulder ever!” said Díaz-Rullo on Instagram. “In my third session and taking advantage of a window of good weather in midsummer. Very complete boulder problem, demanding, with that spicy endurance at the end and also, with its special particularity of climbing very close to the ground in some of the moves. Really a boulder that I considered my style and one that I liked a lot. La Pedriza never ceases to amaze me!
“About the grade, I am aware that part of its difficulty is about not doing dab on the stone. This gives me a bitter taste because I know that the difficulty doesn’t come all from the moves themselves, but it still seems to me something original and special about this boulder. On the other hand, I have no references on these grades, but it’s definitely seems harder to me than the [V15s] I did before. Now, I am very motivated to look for more references on these levels in boulder and of course, try harder things in the future.”
Muerte por Asfixia is Díaz-Rullo’s first V16. According to his 8a.nu account, he’s sent seven V15s and 15 V14s, all in Spain. Known more his sport climbing, Díaz-Rullo has completed some of the hardest routes in the world including a first ascent of Mejorando la Samfaina 5.15c and a repeat of Alex Megos’ Bibliographie 5.15c. In February this year, he made the third ascent of Chris Sharma’s Sleeping Lion 5.15b.
With his ascent of Muerte por Asfixia, Díaz-Rullo joins a small number of climbers who have climbed both 5.15c and V16. These include Adam Ondra, Sean Bailey, and Jakob Schubert. Technically, Schubert has not climbed V16, but he has climbed V17 with his ascent of Shawn Raboutou’s Alphane. Many in the 5.15c club have climbed V15 but not V16. These include Chris Sharma, Seb Bouin, and Alex Megos. Stefano Ghisolfi, with many 5.15c’s under his belt, has bouldered V14. Will Bosi has climbed 5.15b/c and bouldered V16 and V17.
Pablo Zamora’s first ascent of Muerte por Asfixia V16
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