Final month, French climber Mejdi Schalck repeated Dreamcatcher 5.14d (9a) in Squamish, B.C. A brand new movie by 5 Ten was lately launched of his ship, which you’ll be able to watch beneath. He used Sharma’s unique soar beta to exit the slab at first, cruised the slopey rightward traverse, an influence screamed via the nails-hard closing crux.
Dreamcatcher doesn’t want a lot introduction. Now well-known worldwide, the route was freed by Chris Sharma again in 2007. Canadian Sean McColl made the second ascent, Squamish native Ben Harnden made the third, and Alex Megos the fourth on solely his third try. Since then it has seen repeats by a number of prime climbers together with Jimmy Webb, Paige Claassen, Michaela Kiersch, and Lucas Uchida, amongst others. Two visiting Japanese climbers ticked the road this summer time – Jun Shibanuma and Hiroto Shimzu. Squamish native Tristan Baills accomplished the road as effectively.
“This climb has all the time been in my thoughts,” mentioned Schalck about Dreamcatcher on Instagram. “I bear in mind years in the past watching the video of [Chris Sharma] doing the FA, the primary time being in entrance of it felt loopy. I’m glad that I used to be in a position to ship it fairly shortly. After working all of the strikes, I used to be in a position to shortly redpoint as much as the final crux, I rested a bit of bit and few classes later I despatched it! On this particular interval I wished to find a brand new place to attempt to clear my thoughts. The previous few weeks has been truthfully arduous for me, going to Squamish was among the finest determination I’ve made. I had a extremely good time climbing right here.”
After sending the Dreamcatcher, Schalck turned his focus to bouldering. He ended up racking up an unbelievable checklist, particularly contemplating he needed to take care of summer time temps. His highlights embrace redpoints of The Reckoning V14, Deadlift V14, and Black Magic V13 and flashes of Shelter V12/13 and Summoning V12. Making all this extra spectacular is the truth that Schalck’s Squamish journey was solely 16 days lengthy.
Schalck’s journey to Squamish comes after narrowly lacking out on the chance to compete within the Paris Olympics. He positioned seventh general within the Olympic Qualifier Collection, however as a result of two-athletes-per-gender-per-country rule, he didn’t qualify for the Summer time Video games as his French teammates Sam Avezou and Paul Jenft positioned above him.
In line with his 8a.nu profile, earlier than Dreamcatcher, he had two different 5.14d’s to his identify – Shortcut in 2020 and Bio Sharma Graphie L2 in 2023, each positioned in France.
Mejdi Schalck redpoints Dreamcatcher
