How Many Climbers Have Been the “First” to “Flash V15”?

“Every time I finish a project, I have this habit of downplaying my performance in my head,” Jules Marchaland told me. “I tell myself, ‘Well, if I did it, then it must be soft.’”

Marchaland, a 24-year-old French ex-competition climber, told me he only really started bouldering outdoors this year. He sent his first V15 boulder (Foundation’s Edge) a few weeks ago. Now he’s flashed one. Marchaland’s effort on the Magic Wood problem Power of Now Direct marks the second flash of a V15 problem in history.

Or was it the first? Or the fourth? It’s a bit hard to say.

According to most media headlines, history’s first V15 flash occurred a few weeks ago, by German Yannick Flohé, also, ironically, on Foundation’s Edge. Flohé offered a humble, candid, and slightly contradictory appraisal. “I knew for a while that this is probably the most flashable [V15] in the world,” he wrote on Instagram, later adding, “to be fair, I don’t really think this is a proper [V15], even though no one has ever downgraded it and there’s for sure some softer ones out there.”

Still, he felt comfortable enough being the first person to step over the line and claim a V15 flash. “Grading is always tricky, especially when you flash something, so [I’m going to] take the soft [V15], like all the other greedy grade hunters on this one.”

The world’s first V15, like the first problem or route of any grade, is somewhat up for debate, but climbers have been scaling V15s for roughly 25 years. Fred Nicole’s Dreamtime is one strong contender. Nicole suggested V15 when he put the Cresciano rig up in 2000. Repeater Bernd Zangerl agreed, but third man Dave Graham suggested a downgrade to V14, and the problem was subsequently considered, at best, a slash V14/15. (A crucial hold broke in 2009, and Dreamtime now sits at firm V15.) The Rocklands problem Monkey Wedding (2002), another Nicole problem, is also a contender. This problem went through the reverse—here Nicole initially proposed V14, but subsequent ascensionists, including Paul Robinson, Adam Ondra, and Daniel Woods, all agreed V15 was more apt.

Even though it’s taken 25 years for a V15 flash to make headlines, the world’s strongest climbers have been teetering on the edge of one for more than a decade. Woods flashed another V15 Nicole problem, Entilege, in 2011, but suggested a downgrade to V14. In 2015, Ondra flashed a Woods V15, Jade, and suggested a downgrade to V14. In 2018, Jakob Schubert flashed Chris Sharma’s Catalan Witness the Fitness—which Sharma had not holistically graded but had said was an 8B+ sequence into 8A+, suggesting the problem was V15. Grading calculator Darth Grader agrees, noting this formula translates to hard V15. Schubert downgraded the problem to V14. In 2023, Tomoa Narasaki flashed Shinichiro Nomura’s Gakido, proposed at V16, and then downgraded it to V14. The list goes on.

To be clear, no one is debating that these problems are V15 anymore. But there is an established history of top-end climbers seeming to be uncomfortable staking their name to a grade on a flash, and instead shying away from the line and proposing a post-flash downgrade. Marchaland’s words seem apt, “If I did it, then it must be soft.”

The resulting conundrum is paradoxical. Is a problem soft because it was flashed? Or was it flashed because it was soft?

Foundation’s Edge, established by Dave Graham in 2013, is a popular V15. It has seen close to 20 ascents, if not more. Many recent repeaters, as Flohé mentioned, have suggested it is soft for the grade: Woods, Sam Weir, and Pietro Vidi, to name a few. Will Bosi and Simon Lorenzi both sent it in a single session, and Aidan Roberts came close to a flash, too.

But Power of Now Direct—a direct start to a reachy, Giuliano Cameroni V14 roof that was pioneered by Simon Lorenzi—has seen only a quarter of the ascents as Foundation’s Edge, and doesn’t have the same reputation as a known softie. In fact, Lorenzi called it “one of the craziest and most powerful boulders that I’ve ever done.”

Marchaland explained that although he really just wanted to “experience” the boulder, on some level he did come there specifically looking for a flash. “When I saw Giuliano’s video back then, I always knew that this line suited me well,” he said. “And when my friend Mejdi [Schalck] did the boulder, he made it clear to me that it was my style, and potentially something I could flash.”

After arriving at the problem, Marchaland could see that his friend’s appraisal was accurate. “I’d say the boulder is 100 percent my style—big holds, far apart, on a steep overhang.” He described it as “like a Kilter problem,” three apish moves on good crimps, requiring mostly finger strength.

Unlike Flohé, Marchaland didn’t play his ascent down, but he didn’t play it up either. He’s just happy with his performance. “It’s really hard to have a good idea of a grade when you flash something,” he admitted, but, “over time I’ve learned to accept that I’m capable of climbing some pretty hard stuff. So I tend to go along with the opinions of the climbers before me. Everyone’s strengths are different, and that’s why grades can be so variable.”

To Marchaland’s point, someone who is able to flash a problem is inherently a poor judge of its difficulty, both because a flash by nature entails limited research or preparation (compared to someone who sieges it over multiple seasons or years) and because anyone who can flash a problem could simply be too strong to accurately grade it. Accurate personal grading works near-limit. The difference between a 5.8 and a 5.9 is nearly imperceptible for Adam Ondra. But for someone who projects 5.9, the gap between those grades is profound.

Marchaland added that, for him, a flash represents an appealing challenge. “I’ve always been looking for that perfect flash, right at the limit of my abilities. This one was on my list, and once I got there, I waited a week for the right conditions, and it worked out!” He said that blasting up Power of Now Direct still “feels surreal, like a dream” and pulling out over the top of the problem was a moment he’d imagined in his head “too many times.”

“Everything was just like in my dreams,” he added. “The holds were the same as I imagined them. I have nothing to add, only thanks to my G’s for the support, and to Simon for the trip and the help on the proj.”

Now someone just needs to go downgrade Foundation’s Edge and Power of Now Direct. Then I can write this article again in a few years.

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