It was an epic weekend of sends in the Canadian Rockies with top climbers putting down hard routes.
Adam Ondra made the first ascent of Disbelief 5.15b at Acephale, Canada’s second 5.15.
Sasha DiGiulian and Mike Doyle made the second ascent of the 15-pitch War Hammer 5.14 on Castle Mountain.
Miles Adamson made the third ascent of Honour and Glory 5.14d in Echo Canyon.
And Jacopo Larcher made quick work of The Path 5.14R at Back of the Lake.
The summer is only half over and there’s a lot of strong climbers in Canada working on hard projects.
"Disbelief" 5.15b (9b), probably upper end of the grade. Acephale, Canmore, Canada. It was a crazy day. I almost wanted to give up. After two tries, when I got to the crux move (which is actually a foot move) totally fresh, I would slip off for like 15th time. No light in the end of the tunnel, despite the fact I stuck the move 10 days ago once, only to fall off 2 moves higher. On my 3rd try of the day, I somehow did not slip and did bot fall. I cannot think many other routes where I climbed so close to my limit. @blackdiamond @mytendon ,@lasportivagram @montura_official @gardatrentino @bernartwood
A post shared by Adam Ondra (@adam.ondra) on
This summer I took off for Banff, ?? with this goal in mind; to commit my summer to 3 5.14 big walls put up by Sonnie Trotter, aptly named the Canadian Trilogy. I had no idea what to expect as to how I would do on the routes (I still don’t); all I felt in control of was preparing myself physically as best as I could. Yesterday, after a week here, @mikedoyleca and I did the 2nd Free Ascent (First Female Ascent) of @sonnietrotter ‘s “Warhammer,” a complete line up Castle Mountain that includes Castles in the Sky, with technical grades up to 5.14. I have known @mikedoyleca for many years. He has always been an inspiring fellow climber, mentor, and friend. I am so thankful to have succeeded on this climb together. Having @sonnietrotter , the first ascentionist, and one of my all time inspirations there to film it was icing on the cake. Thank you so much, both of you. ?? Also, huge congrats to @s_a_m_t_u_c_k_e_r on Castles in the Sky; you’ve got it on Warhammer! And to @alex_fricker – who I tried the ground up push with a couple days before; go take it down!!!
A post shared by S A S H A • D I G I U L I A N (@sashadigiulian) on
It finally came together. Today I made the 3rd rare ascent of Honour and Glory, 14d. It took about 20 days of work. Sharma took 4 years on Biographie, and Huber hundreds of attempts to do La Rambla. So while 20 days felt like way too long, and I was getting frustrated, I’m sure with a multiple season project I could climb harder than this. Hiking up with Ondra, I got to talk to him a ton about projecting and training. A lot of things were surprising, mainly how many days he climbs in a row and how often he climbs twice in a day (morning/evening). I took all of his advice very seriously and trained in the evening several times last week after a morning session. I also cut out alcohol and made sure to eat properly for recovery. It was 5 days of climbing in a row, mostly doing 4×4’s at EP. I then took 2 days off, had a light day yesterday and felt incredible today. It was also one of the only days where the entire route was dry, and it was windy enough for sticky rock but warm enough to stay warm. I wish I could have done it when Reel Rock was filming but that doesn’t really matter, I learned a ton from Ondra and am so stoked to be a part of the 9a club.
A post shared by Miles Adamson (@miles_adamson) on
