Eighteen-year-old Italian Gianluca Vighetti has climbed the first pitch of Adam Ondra’s Change in Flatanger, Norway. The pitch goes at 9a+ / 5.15a. He clipped it on 1 October after about four days on the wall and says he wants the full route next — currently around 9b+/9c with kneepads, which would be his first of that grade.

About ten days earlier he made the first ascents of Never Give Up (9a/9a+) and Incompleto (9a). Ondra freed Change P1 in 2012 without kneepads; most repeats now use one or two. Grades on the pitch still bounce — some call it soft 9a+, others hard.

Vighetti has already made waves on Ondra lines: last winter he repeated Niobe quickly and suggested a softer grade. Flatanger stays busy after Jules Marchaland’s King Kang 9b+ at Hanshelleren.

Route on climbing.place: Change (Hanshelleren, Flatanger). Nearby: King Kang.

Photo: Nicolò Vece (night climbing in Gravere, not Flatanger).

Sources: Gripped, Instagram @gianlucavighetti (Oct 2026).