Jacopo Larcher frees his mega trad climb at Cadarese
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Paolo Sartori
A few hours ago South Tyrolean climber Jacopo Larcher freed his mega trad project at Cadarese in Northern Italy. Currently no name or grade has been put forward, but chances are it is one of the hardest trad climbs out there, not only in Italy.
Larcher eyed the line during his first visit to Caderese 6 years ago, when Riky Federer showed him this beautiful overhanging arête. "I immediately cleaned the rock and that same evening I rappelled down the line to try the moves. That’s when my odyssey began" Larcher just told planetmountain.com.
The climb is about 25m high and after a first section in the region of 7a+ "with some touch and go climbing, not protected particularly well, where you best avoid falling", there are two crux sections: the first breaches the roof, the second leads past a rounded crimp over the bulge. A delicate rockover then leads to the finishing crack.
Whenever he travelled to Cadarese Larcher tried the route but he only started working the line intensely three years ago, after sending La Rambla at Siurana in Spain and Gondo Crack at Cippo in Switzerland. It became so much of an obsession that Larcher often travelled to Cadda on his own to try the moves.
"At first I didn't understand anything, it just seemed impossible, then as time went by I managed to unravel the moves. Now I know them so well that I’m hard pressed to give the route a grade. The only thing I know is that it’s the most difficult thing I’ve ever climbed. Both in sport climbing and in trad climbing. I’ve never tried anything as hard as this before." An interesting detail: prior to his free ascent, the 29-year-old had never managed to link all the moves without falling on toprope.
Larcher dedicates the climb to Peter Mair, a mountain guide from Sexten who perished in the mountains in 2016. "He means a lot to me, he taught me so much and played an important role in my growth, as a person and as a climber. A bit like this route really."
Links: jacopo-larcher.com, FB Jacopo Larcher, La Sportiva, The North Face
