1/3/11 - News link:Cody Roth managed the first repeat of Italy's Maurizio "Manolo" Zanolla route, Malvasya, at Dvigrad in Croatia that was bolted in 1987 and freed in 1988. Originally graded 5.14a, holds have broken since the FA—including some that Roth broke off in his 10 days of attempts—and Roth now believes the line to be 5.14c.
Planetmountain.com has a report by Urban Golob and Manolo. "Fantastic, I'm really pleased, also because that route seemed to have been abandoned, forgotton about," Manolo says. "Despite its grade, it's naturally a very beautiful 'old-style' route... When I first climbed Malvasya, I graded it 8b+ [5.14a]. It seemed harder than the other climbs I'd done but giving it a bigger grade seemed excessive, for three simple reasons. The first was that the route was rather short. The second was because, cautiously and with a lot of modesty, I thought I'd never manage to climb 8c. And thirdly, the warm climate certainly doesn't help on routes like this one."
This isn't Roth's first epic 5.14: In 2007, Roth climbed Talk is Cheap (5.14b) at Misja Pec, Slovenia, and decked twice from 15 feet.
