What is up ladies and gentlemen, Mani here. In this video I’m breaking down one of the hardest problems I’ve sent in a while—this beautiful red boulder in Newton (Captain BG), somewhere around 7B+/7C (V9-ish), and for me personally: quite hard at the moment. It’s slopey, powerful, slightly overhanging, and it totally lures you into a “straightforward” start that just doesn’t work—at least not for my body and the forces you actually need to create. I go full analytic bouldering on the key sequences: why pressing the two starting holds together fails (they’re too close, you can’t generate enough force), and how turning the right hand into an undercling pinch changes everything. Then we get into the real crux for me: the snap to the target pockety sloper. The solution is a drop knee on the sidepull/side-foothold setup, plus one very subtle but massive detail—taking the left starting sloper more as an undercling instead of a sidepull so the force direction matches the next hard pull. After you stick the target sloper, the next big lesson is speed. You’re sliding out, so you have to move fast through the steps and launch into the shoulder-gaston sloper. From there it gets easier and easier toward the top: pushing gastons, turning slopey pinches into actual pinches, and yes—gray volumes are always included here.