Adam Ondra gets fourth ascent of Soudain Seul (Font 9A)

• Tuesday 11th February 2025

In just five sessions, Adam Ondra has added the fourth ascent of Soudain Seul (Font 9A) at Fontainebleau to his already world-beating CV.

A couple of weeks after flashing El Elegido a Font 8B+ at La Pedriza, Adam Ondra is back in the news again with yet another impressive boulder achievement; the fourth ascent of Soudain Seul, Simon Lorenza sit-start to Dave Graham’s Big Island (Font 8C). As well as being only the fourth ascent of the Fontainebleau test-piece it’s Ondra’s first of the grade. Understandable, Adam is thrilled with the ascent of this classic and his hardest every boulder and yet, in typical fashion, he’s got his own thoughts on the grade of the bloc; more on this later however.

Reporting his ascent on-line on his Instagram page Adam confirms he’s had something of a targeted return to outside bouldering of late and that naturally that included attempting a Font 9A:

‘This winter, I really wanted to dedicate myself a bit more seriously to bouldering, and obviously, I was thinking about which 9A/V17 could fit my style the best 👊 Fontainebleau is a bouldering place where I climbed very little in the past and I almost feel ashamed about it, considering its relevance for our sport. On top of that, it is the bouldering place where I had enjoyed climbing the most. So Soudain Seul 9A was an obvious goal.’

Whilst he might not have been a regular in the forest at Fontainebleau Adam wasted no time and smashed out his ascent of Soudain Seul in just five days. Adam again:

‘On my 3rd try of the day (5 days in total) I put up some of the most memorable fights and made it to the top. 💪’

Adam goes on the comment on what it means to him and how the process went saying:

‘I feel very happy and proud about this send, it means particularly a lot to me especially after the last few seasons when I always felt very close to doing some relevant ascents, but it never really quite happened. 👊

Sending this in 5th session is the icing on the cake 👀 But I know very lucky with perfect conditions every day, with beta videos available from many different climbers and most importantly @lumartinez_93 who was sessioning with me on Big Island who insisted that I should keep trying with “squeezing with the feet” beta.☝️Watching him doing the moves with this beta (as we are the same height and arm-span) made me believe that it could be good beta for me too. Also having the sessions spread into different trips with very good training sessions in between helped me a lot too.☝️’

Not content with his success on Soudain Seul Adam carried on climbing on the next day coming away with more super impressive repeats including yet another Font 8B+ flash:

‘The next day, I flashed Ubik Assis 8B and also flashed La Ligne de Bête 8B+.✌️’

Adam is never shy about discussing grades even when it means that is “arguing” in support of a lessor grade than one below the original/commonly accepted grade. Taking to his website, Adam openly discusses the grade for Soudain Seul. We share an extract of Adam’s post below in which he explores the issues around the grade.

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‘About the grade, I don't feel like I am an expert when it comes to high-end bouldering grades. Most of the hard boulders 8C/V15 or harder I did at my homecrag and most of them are first ascents. [Soudain Seul] It feels like the hardest problem I have ever done. I honestly feel strong at the moment, the problem fits my style perfectly. And it still feels harder than my 8C+ first ascents at my homecrag (Terranova, Brutal Rider, Ledoborec). Soudain Seul is definitely power endurance boulderproblem and that is why it fits a sport climber like me. So my suggestion is that it feels harder than 8C+, but if it is 8C+/9A or soft 9A, I really don't know. It is also difficult with grade proposition as the boulder has a lot different moves where you need a lot of different skills and also size of the climber is important. And none of the skills has to be on the "9A boulder level", but it is rare to have everything. Plus, the start is definitely morphological, while the top has many different betas that unlock the problem for short climbers too.

‘To finish, I did it with no book in the kneepad (I don't need it as I am tall enough, but I find the invention of Simon absolutely genius and don't find it controversial at all). But I did it with a fan pointing straight into the crux sloper (like Simon and Camille. Nico has very dry skin and did not need it). That is very game-changing for me and much more controversial, in my opinion.’

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Notwithstanding Adam’s questions about the grade, taking the grades of the original first ascensionists – so taking the two sport climbing routes B.I.G  and Silence as F9c and the two boulders Alphane and Soudain Seul as Font 9A - Adam is now the second climber after Jakob Schubert to have climbed both F9c and Font 9A.

Added to the rest of Adam’s cutting edge achievements his CV is now even more impressive. In the last decade Adam has excelled at the very highest level in every discipline - DWS excluded - of outdoor rock climbing:

Fourth ascent of Soudain Seul – Font 9A (2025)

Second ascent of Bon Voyage – E12 one of world’s hardest trad routes (2024)

First flashed ascent of Super Crackinette – F9a+ (2018)

First ascent of Silence – world’s first F9c (2017)

Second ascent of the Dawn Wall – 5.14d/F9a world’s hardest big wall climb (2016)

After his ascent of Soudain Seul Adam gave an interview with the French website Fanatic Climbing - watch that interview on YouTube below: