New V16 and a New 5.15 Climbed as Spring Heats Up
Another new hard route for Stefano Ghisolfi and Shinichiro Nomura puts down his first V16
As we head into the first week of spring, several top climbers are redpointing difficult projects they’ve been sessioning for the past few weeks or months.
Strong Japanese boulderer Shinichiro Nomura has made the first ascent of Gakido V16 in Chigobutai, Japan. This is his first at the grade. “Finally, I sent the old project, known as one of the biggest Japanese routes,” he reported.
His previous V15 sends were all in Japan and include Loca (FA), Nehanna, Mandragora, Rokudo, Vanitas, Mona Lisa, Byakudo, Babel, Hydrangia, Orochi, Shambala and Babylon.
And Stefano Ghisolfi, 28, who recently made the first ascent of L’Arenauta 5.15b at Grotta dell’Arenauta in Italy, has now made the first ascent of Trofeo dell’Adriatico 5.15a in Arco. The climb has a crux mid-way up and solid kneebar rest before the amazing upper tufa. It took him five days.
Ghisolfi’s hardest routes to date: Lapsus 5.15b, First Round First Minute 5.15b, One Slap 5.15b, La Capella 5.15b, Perfecto Mundo 5.15c, Stoking the Fire 5.15b, Change 5.15c, Erebor 5.15b, Bibliographie 5.15c, The Lonely Planet 5.15b and L’Arenauta 5.15b. In 2021 he famously downgraded Alex Megos’s Bibliographie 5.15d to 5.15c, which Megos agreed with.
Here in Canada, wet spring weather at most of the most popular rock climbing areas has kept climbers off the rock, but with longer days and warmer weather in the forecast it’s only a matter of time before Canadians start putting down their projects.
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