Nathan Phillips makes first ascent of Deep Fake (Font 8C+)
- Tuesday 31st December 2024
In early December, former British Bouldering Champion Nathan Phillips completed a long term project in Switzerland to make the first ascent of his hardest boulder to date.
In mid-November, and four days into his then-latest trip to Switzerland, Nathan reported solid progress on his long-term project at Ticino:
‘Best session on the proj yet!’ before adding more detail ‘I’m 6 years deep into this one and today I matched my biggest links from my previous trip. Reaching my high point 3 times and being much closer to sticking the move than I was previously. It honestly was so close to going down today…
Plenty of time left on the trip so as long as the weather plays ball and I stay in good shape, I’m confident I can do it.’
For the rest of that trip, no further news was offered. However, on Boxing Day Nathan announced his success (back in early December) alongside a short Mellow video of him climbing Deep Fake (Font 8C+/V16).
Writing his ascent up online Phillips said:
‘This has been a battle since I first tried this project in 2018 on my first trip to Brione. The hardest thing I’ve climbed by a long shot. It took me 8 sessions before I had managed all the moves and around 50 to finally do it (plus probably another 50 on my replica).
It was far from the perfect attempt and I had to fight for every move but that made it all the more satisfying to stand on top. It was honestly the best feeling I’ve had from climbing and I don’t think it will fade anytime soon.’
Nathan’s success on Deep Fake crowns a great year for the former two-times British Bouldering Champion. Earlier in the year Phillips had repeated both Trance (Font 8C/V15) and made the second ascent of Beautiful Mind – also Font 8C/V15. Those two boulders, alongside Juneru (Font 8C), were Phillips’ hardest blocs to date.
Watch the Mellow video showing Nathan's uncut first ascent below...