Dai Koyamada has climbed a new V15 at the age of 41 at Ryutosen in Nagasaki on the island of Kyushu, Japan.

Sending a new problem that grade any day is big news, but on the first day of the year seems like a good sign of things to come.

A post shared by Dai Koyamada (@dai_koyamada) on Jan 1, 2018 at 7:33am PST

“It’s really unbelievable,” Koyamada said. “Sometimes I can demonstrate extreme power unexpectedly. It might be today is the day or it’s because of succeeding weight control or just taking enough rest after shoulder injury or all of them.

“Not sure but I’m very happy to make it anyway. It’s a great start of new year. It’s Gekirin (逆鱗) and I think V15… I can say it’s the hardest in Kyushu.”


Koyamada was born in Kagoshima and has been climbing since 1993. In 1996, Koyamada won the Japanese National Championship.

He made a name for himself on the rock early on by completing the first ascent of Logical Progression 5.14d in 2001 in Joyama, Japan. At the time this was considered one of the most difficult sport climbs in the world.

Koyamada was made world famous in 2004, when he journeyed to Australia and repeated every problem at the Hollow Mountain Cavein the Grampians, problems put up by Fred Nicole and Klem Loskot and some of Australia’s top boulderers.

He then made the first ascent of The Wheel of Life V16 in 2004. In 2004, he traveled to Switzerland and repeated Dreamtime V15, considered the hardest in the world.

In 2005, he repeated Action Directe 5.14d in the Frankenjura, Germany and proclaimed it harder than any other route that he had climbed.

Koyamada continues to push the limits of hard rock climbing. On April 4, 2017 at the age of 40 he climbed a new personal limit with the first ascent of Nayuta V16 in Gero, Japan.

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