Sasha DiGiulian leads the first all-female team to climb the imposing Rayu Route

In 2010, Sasha DiGiulian won her first national sport climbing championships against women of all ages at the age of just 17. A year later, she claimed the world title and now boasts more than 30 first ascents by women.

Rayu was set up by Iker Pou, Eneko Pou and Kico Cerdá in five weeks in 2020 and climbs the south face of Peña Santa de Castilla via a continuously steeper, dizzying trad line with distributed pitons.

DiGiulian asked Söderlund to be her teammate because they've been friends for a long time and the Swede can climb 5.14 routes with ease, having also climbed 9a (5.14d) and bouldered 8b (V13). This is Harrington and DiGiulian's second international trip; last winter they traveled to Makatea in French Polynesia to film an episode of DiGiulian's new vlog series for Red Bull TV. Thirty-year-old American Harrington's career achievements include soloing the 5.11a Chiaro di Luna on Aguja Saint-Exupery in Patagonia and a 5.13+ route at her California base at Lake Tahoe.

The first half of the spectacular route is in the 5.12 (6c) range and leads to a spacious but sharp and sloping ledge where DiGiulian and her team spent the night. DiGiulian explained, "Big Wall Free Climbing is a reminder of what humans are capable of. It's what we do, and it's why we came here. It's that feeling of digging deep and creating something you didn't think was possible."

Three pitches above the ledge is the key pitch of difficulty 8c, followed by two more technical pitches, and from there 60 pitches of technical climbing lead to the summit, from which the Atlantic Ocean can be seen. Shortly after DiGiulian and Söderlund re-staked the route on Sept. 12, all three climbers re-entered the route to assist Harrington in successfully completing the crux pitch. They supported Harrington from September 16 until the end of the trip on September 22, but by then she still hadn't managed to rehang the 8c-which would have been her first 5.14.

DiGiulian revealed, "I wanted nothing more than for Brette to make 8c. We made the climb, but Brette just couldn't make the 8c. She tried more than a dozen times and fell in the same spot every time." Still, Harrington led many of the 13 pitches, fiddling with small ropes, adjusting totem clips, struggling through fall-free terrain and showing key gear positions so they could switch ropes on the next round. To make matters worse, the rock was so sharp that they cut their fingertips bloody, so they wrapped them with tape to prevent further cuts. The weather also presented a challenge, as Harrington explained, "The storms were very violent. A huge hurricane was raging off the coast of Portugal. Some days there was fog, other days there was rain and thunderstorms. Here we have big thunderstorms called 'chubasco'."

Söderlund, 30, added: "It was impressive to learn how to do the adventurous via ferrata as a team. I accidentally loosened a block that came down and almost hit Sasha. Other parts of the route are loose, too. There are not fall zones on every pitch, and the cracks have knobs and barnacles, making gear placement difficult. Fortunately, we haven't had any scary falls. We are already talking about another project together. We complement each other very well in terms of climbing style."