Jernej Kruder makes rare trad ascent of The Shark (5.14b/8c) at Squamish in Canada

Jet lag, swollen knuckles, and a satisfied mind. That’s how I feel on my first day back home from Canada. Although my eyes were set on a different goal, I made the most of my three weeks there.

Cobra Crack had been on my mind since the beginning of the year. I couldn’t train too much specifically for it because of its nature: a finger crack. On top of that, I was busy in the last weeks of August, preparing everything for my festival, Kanjonfest. The event was so intense that, between the festival and my flight to Canada, I ended up in bed with a high fever. Luckily, it lasted only a day. I felt surprisingly good when I arrived in Squamish, but my body wasn’t as strong as I had hoped. Even worse, I couldn’t do most of the moves on Cobra. I split a finger, and my main finger was too big to fit inside the crack. I was disappointed, but also happy that I had an alternative project in mind - The Shark (5.14b, same grade as Cobra). This line was steeper, and I started to believe it could be a better goal for the trip. It has only seen two ascents so far: Connor Herson and Didier Berthod.

The route is hard right from the start: leaving a ledge directly into a chicken-wing dihedral. A bouldery passage into the crack drains a lot of energy and leads into a pumpy, no-rest finger crack. After three bolts, the first gear placement is a blue Totem. The stamina crack gradually opens to a purple size until you finally reach a decent rest. The wall then turns into a roof layback with some good hand jams. Another section through the roof with more laybacks and fist jams takes away even more energy. From there, an okay rest leads into the final crux: starting with a poor ring-lock that goes into flared hand jams or sloppy underclings. A tired body has to fight through on finger jams before clipping the chains.

The route was so hard that I knew I had to dedicate every day to it if I wanted to finish within the same trip. The start was so complex that I changed my beta almost daily. The upper crux wasn’t too problematic, but I knew it would be brutal to arrive there exhausted. I was slowly progressing on pre-placed gear, but my days were running out.

Five days before leaving, I finally had a promising go. I climbed the route with only two hangs on pre-placed gear. But still, I couldn’t get through the start smoothly, and when clipping the anchor, my lungs were screaming for oxygen. I had to take a rest day. I still didn’t really believe I could send it on this trip. On my rest day I decided to go biking in Whistler. That left me with only two more days, plus a potential last morning before my flight. The first day after biking was bad - my shoulders were sore, and I didn’t feel like giving a proper go. I only tried once, ripped a chunk of skin off my finger, and pinned all my hopes on the next day, as I had found a slightly better solution for the start. That gave me motivation again.

Now it was time to try the route while placing gear. Twice I almost made it to the first rest. I blamed the still weather with no breeze and made the risky decision to give it one last try on my final day. Giacomo Meliffi, a friend who was also trying the route, woke up with me again - this time just for me. He was tired, and there wasn’t time for both of us to climb. Luckily, the route is in the shade in the morning, and there was a good breeze. After an hour or so, we were back on the ledge where we had already spent eight days together. I only taped the finger that really needed it, plus the one missing a chunk of skin. I added some superglue to imitate missing skin. I felt good and reached my high point again. But that wasn’t enough. I cleaned the route, taped another finger, and rested properly.

The second try was even better - a strong fight, though I had a moment of insecurity and fell. Time was ticking, and I had only one chance left with a short rest. After about 20 minutes, I taped another bloody finger and started climbing. This time I focused on my breathing and surprised myself by not falling through all the hard opening moves. I reached the same tight hands as in my previous try - but this time I didn’t let go. I took a solid rest and then climbed smoothly to the top, placing only six cams in total. A huge victory scream followed as I clipped the chains. I cleaned the route and ran down to catch my flight.

I was almost a little disappointed that I didn’t get to try more of the tempting multipitch routes in Squamish, but I was proud to have kept my focus until the very end. In the end, I still managed to climb over 1,000 meters of easier multipitch routes up to 5.10 in free solo style, while also ticking off two classics like Zombie Roof (5.13a) and Project Grizzly (5.13b), and onsighting Freeway (5.11c, 10 pitches).

- Jernej Kruder, Slovenia