[MischaHY]

I've come to realise that my perceived 'best effort' onsights are not necessarily correlated with grade (or only partially). I experienced this phenomenon again last weekend whilst climbing in Alsace for the first time. We got some routes done at the Wachtfels and there was a french climber trying a 7b called L'Antilopette which looked techy and sustained so I thought I'd have a look and subsequently put in one of the most marginal onsight efforts of my life.

The crux was techy vert pressing between pebbles and crap pockets and it felt like every move was off but somehow it kept going. At one point 3/4 contact points slipped and I ended up one-arming a pebble for a second until the friction caught on my feet. I don't think it's possible to be more off and stay on. Definitely one of my proudest onsights despite not having a big number attached.

Any other stories of very high value onsights where the grade doesn't represent the effort that went in? I'm getting psyched up for a few tricky alpine routes this year so putting more focus on techy face climbing and first go efforts. I suspect I'll have a few more of these before the season is done.

[mrjonathanr]

I flashed a route at the Diamond last summer where, way past the crux, a foothold broke. Fortunately it was 20cm above a little edge which my foot dropped onto, saving the ascent, so I kind of get where you are coming from.