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"In this light you look like Poseidon"

Look Pirmin Bertle living his vertical dream and putting up Bolivia’s first 9a on 3900m in El Eden near Potosì

“In this light you look like Poseidon” is Bolivias’s first 9a, the second one on the Altiplano on almost 4000m, the fourth one in Latin America. I could send it after some ten tries in a once-in-a-lifetime perfect rush one month before the end of our five months trip to South America and as an opening to the most unbelievable finish of the journey I ever could have imagined. (But more to this in the next weeks.)

The route consists of about 25 hard moves with only one moderate rest point before the red point crux. The first boulder is definitely harder than everything I repeated on this trip (problems up to 8A in Capilla del Monte or Golden) and way more my style. On the right foot you need a harder shoe like the Scarpa Instinct VS to push from very open foot holds for the jump move but in the following main crux part of nearly 15 moves, there was no way to hook the crucial hook with anything else than the heel shape and the new rubber of the Instinct VS-R (and even with this one only one of three hook tries were successful).

This part is pretty much the most technique I have seen in a 9th grade route up to now but rapidly slides into a wonderful face climb with big moves and pure resistance fighting to the rest. No need to try to explain how the hight of 3900m feels in something like this, as no one, who hasn’t felt this by his own lungs, can possibly imagine. (After three months of acclimation I spend 10 minutes of heavy breathing in the rest point.)

Up to there you have linked 7C+ to 8A+ without a rest, thus something like 8c+, but the last 7B+ boulder still will throw you off, if you are not in a good route climbing shape (or if you think about spending only something like one month on 4000m).
Despite almost five kilograms less than in good shape at home, just after sending, I still was insecure about the grade to give. Only when I returned to my main project in Socaire one week later, doubt evaporated like a single drop of water in the Altiplano sun.

Pirmin Bertle 

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