FULL PODCAST | 2 Epic Free Solos Nobody Knows About, His Closest Call & More | ft. Alex Honnold

you want to sit down and make sure you're in frame here yeah make sure it looks really good so the thing about rock climbing is that it's really [ __ ] cool little red buttons on oh let's see you want me to sit in yours to make sure that this other one is working for you or yeah let's do that looks like it's probably better that red button on that'll work oh my gosh spilling water oh no re it's okay most of it's on my notebook all right and do you have that thing's on that things on the little red button has been pressed cool on all the things we we're we're recording we can kind of just like warm up for a second and then I feel so nervous big one like like a t talk how many how many recorded interviews have you done do you think uh hundreds I don't know hundreds yeah surely yeah I mean so many cuz just uh one tour like the free solo film tour is probably probably hundreds just by itself yeah totally any that stand out to you I mean specific interviews yeah no but I mean in terms of public speaking there's definitely specific things like giving a TED talk like that where you're super nervous and super hardcore yeah but not know at all I mean there's just so much did you take I I was talking to LY about this lcy set this whole thing up thanks to LY um you like took courses in in like interviewing and speaking and stuff like that as like part of your professional development no that would be a that would be an overstatement okay uh so the Northface once provided uh Speech coach basically as a one day thing as a bit of an experiment I think they were trying to see if it was a worthwhile investment for the athlete team to have sort of some expertise available and in this particular case that happened to be right before I was supposed to give a TED talk so it was actually incredibly helpful for me personally because he sort of helped me craft my TED talk and then when you give a TED Talk uh the Ted organization also provides some speech coaching sort of help but that's more uh at the conference like basically in the couple days before the talk you know there was somebody for me to talk to to get help and then of course I read the books about how to give a TED Talk and things like that are there books on how to give a TED Talk yeah the guy that founded Ted basically wrote a book which is which is not not shocking yeah and so I don't know if it's fair to call that taking courses you know I mean basically there have been at least two or three days in my life where I've received help for at least an hour to two hours yeah so the the extent of my coaching probably sums up to three or four hours what are two or three things that stand out to you from either the book The Things I've learned from them yeah uh you mean from those types of courses and stuff yeah well I think the most useful things for me were the basics which are stand still on stage have good posture project look people in the eye speak to people your posture is much better than mine well well you know we're on video so you got to like a uh you know an erect Carriage as they say an erect Carriage no just like a you know open chest I don't know um yeah I mean the basics like don't Pace don't stutter try to say um and like too much I mean everybody knows those but actually doing it is slightly harder yeah well you've had lots of practice Yeah the main thing is I think the more you do it the more comfortable you feel and so you're less inclined to fall onto those to use those kinds of crutches right I mean I've seen that like I've followed your climbing for a long time and I've like seen I'm more well adjusted now for I've seen like the evolution it's it's actually been really fun to watch and you've done so many of these it took me I've been thinking about what to talk about with you for a long time like how do we it's hard to find new terrain exactly and I really want there to be new terrain you're you're going do some chy link up in this in this chat you're like well everything's been covered so I found this one bolt variation that connects the worst two cracks worst two roots of the crack that's exactly what's going to happen here I have uh I think I have three main topics that I'm most interested in with you and then if you have anything that you wish you know got asked more things like that stories that you'd love to tell I'd love to hear about those as well but you've teased this a couple times I think on your P podcast and then maybe in other interviews but something I've heard you say a few times is there's these epic solos that you've done that have gotten tons of media coverage and for whatever reason those are the ones that everyone knows about and the media's latched on to but I remember you saying like maybe there's a dozen that have been covered but you've done like 30 of those things tell me about the top two or three most epic solos you've done that nobody knows about about I mean two obvious uh two two different link UPS come to mind actually uh one a while back in Zion and then one uh in Red Rock but so you know freeing Moonlight butter is obviously one of the first big things I did and sort of put me on the map and whatever else uh I finally tried the route oh yeah and dude it just hit on a completely different level yeah did you find it kind of scary yeah well just so insecure like the0 five pitches oh I find five is really secure let me see your hand I've got really fat fingers you do have really fat fingers of course that means that the thinner pitches then are a bit harder but right you know it's all trade-offs but I do feel really secure on5 still so incredible so mindblowing to be up there and think about that well so yeah so I worked the first time I did Moonlight I worked it a few days then sold it it was like oh you know big excitement and then maybe four years later or five years later I came back with Tommy cwell and we did a free climbing link up where I think we did four hard roots in Zion a day and then the next week week I did a solo link up by myself obviously uh that was three of those routs so let's say I did a Moonlight and then monkey finger and then shones buts so monkey finger is like a 10 pitch 12b and shes is I don't know like a 10 pitch 11 plus and those two Roots I had soloed previously but um and those are actually both Epic Adventures as well because shunai onsite soled in a snowstorm and it was all pretty hardcore and then monkey finger uh I also sold it actually monkey finger Tommy and I climbed it and we wrapped it and then I soed it and then you know basically I'd climbed the route twice before lunch it was kind of amazing but uh but both of those when I sold them before uh it was kind of in Winter and there was tons of snow between the summit of the root and the rim of the canyon and so I had these Epic Adventures doing you know something like 2,000 ft of vertical of like Extreme canyoning Adventure climbing through the snow to get to the actual rim and then from shones when you get to the rim you pick up I think look like the Deer Mountain Trail but it's like an 8 mile walk back to the to the valley floor so when I did the solo linkup you know it's like I did these three hard routs and then tons of hiking to connect them and to get back down off the top of uh the rim and Zion I was like it's pretty big it's a big outing you know especially I 30 plus pitches of like 511 and 512 mostly yeah mostly 511 512 for sure wow and yeah I mean and none of the three Roots have ever been soloed by anybody else and it's not you know everything about it is like oh this is all kind of Mega but you know that's like an example of something that like I don't think anybody knows about it's just just a random thing how does that feel for you like was that oh it was me I was like this is so epic it was insane yeah it's like an amazing day in Zion it was it was awesome just hiking around Zion that much is so beautiful it's like it's really cool yeah that experienced Tommy night because we had just climbed Moonlight a couple times the week before to do it for our linkup and when we climbed it we seled it in like a pitch and and we uh maybe two I don't I don't remember how it breaks up so how does that work you're just placing a piece like every 80 feet or something no no you just you just bring a bigger rack and you place gear as you need it okay but um and then we use micros and stuff to protect the second so the person below is always on top rope it all it basically feels like normal climbing you just never stop okay but when Tommy and I did it Moonlight felt much easier than I remembered and I was like oh this is more like 12b like this is so chill and then I went back next week without a rope and all the Lieb backing with you when you don't have a rope on your feet are all a little higher you're pulling a little harder and I was suddenly quite a bit more pumped and I was like you know maybe 12C is appropriate I was like oh I'm a lot more pumped but anyway it was great experience that's incredible I I can understand like obviously wanting to free solo all of those routes I mean I can't but like given what you've done that makes sense what what happens that makes you go okay what if I combined all these things and did them in a day no I don't know I mean link up is just part of climbing it's just cool just more cool climbing it's that Peter Croft thing just like yeah a little bit fun in a day yeah I mean thing is when you solo a route like Moonlight or or any of those it only takes an hour so you know you have a 20 minute approach you climb for an hour what like a 25 minute jog back down and then you're sort of like cool should we have brunch like what do you do the rest of your day like obviously you go climb other things like that's amazing what so um when was that I don't know that was like 2012 or 13 or I forget it could have been 14 but it's been like 10 years basically yeah and then and then just more recently I did a similar link up in Red Rock uh where I sold Cloud Tower to the original route on the rainbow wall to levitation 29 and then I attempted to solo Dogma on Mount Wilson it would have been a nice quad thing doing all four but um but after the first sort of bottom quarter of uh Dogma I was just not into it so I down climbed and went home tell tell me about that so what what feeling did you have or what told you like what was it that you noticed that made you think like I'm just not into this I'm going to reverse this basically well the specific thing was that my fingers and toes were killing me uh because I'd climb levitation in full sun levitation 29 faces South and just bakes so it's like a th000 feet of uh climbing on dark Rock in full sun in the middle of the afternoon and it was hot and I basically burned so my skin was trash my toes were hurting and I'd already done 30 pitches up to 512 and so it's like it's you know it's a big day and uh so then when I went over to Dogma it was like getting into evening I forget I think I maybe would have had to climb into the dark I forget if I mean I'm sure I had a headlamp and I was ready for you know logging in for the night's sesh but um but I was just like this is all about to get mega you know I was like I couldn't wait my feet cuz my toes hurt too much I couldn't I didn't feel like very secure on the holds because my skin was so soft and wet after you know 30 pitches of climbing in Sun and so I was just like this is not the time to swow a big wall yeah and then Al I mean and then there's the other side of it where it's like uh just by sheer coincidence my wife's whole family was staying at the house and her Nana was there and they were having a big like cookout in the backyard and it was like a whole thing and I was kind of like do I want to miss family dinner and you know I was like either I'm about to have an epic through the night on something that's going to feel wildly insecure and be kind of messed up or I can go home and have this lovely afternoon cookout with my family and I was kind of like you know this is the time to bail yeah but then you're always like is that light duty but then is that light duty that's so funny you're the only person that could even ask that question I think was like that um I am curious about the foot pain thing that's something I've always been curious about I haven't heard you talk about that much but every time you do one of these huge things free soling LC cap for for instance 30 pitches of continuous climbing your shoes are on your feet for three plus hours I know there's Ledges and stuff but yeah I pop the shoes on and off but yeah like is is foot pain an issue on stuff like that foot pain is more an issue when you get beyond that so I'd say for free selling all cap you don't think about foot pain it's only a couple hours you know it's like perfectly broken in shoes you pop them on and off you're never in the sun where you really deal with foot pain is stuff like the ELC cap triple where you climb El Cap three times in a day CU like doing 90 pitches of crack climbing in a day and then with that like when I climbed when I did the ELC cap triple the last route we just climbed full afternoon sun like blazing heat like late June or maybe it was July even it was crazy on lurking fear which faces West and just is gets cooked in the Sun and we were just dying and so I mean anytime you're in the Sun it makes the foot stuff way worse your feet swell and yeah the feet swell and the rubber the black shoe just burns your feet and then the rock is so hot anyway but um yeah the main one of the things I always do with all these link UPS is prophylactic ibuprofen like I just take 800 milligrams ipren every 6 hours starting from the very beginning and well that does really help up to a point it's like and it helps with like the joint pain and just the various aches and pain it just allows you to feel a little tighter on everything of course uh it only goes so far you it's like I think if you really cared you'd have to switch to a harder drug than ipren yeah there's probably some like algorithm there like too much of it and then you're loopy and it's probably not safe to no I just mean if you really cared you'd have to use like bik it in or something right but uh but then you know you don't want to do that yeah you don't want to be but I think ibuprofen is actually the perfect way to take sort of the aches and pains edge off when you're just covering a ton of terrain and you get a little banged up and you hit things and your feet are swollen and your knuckles hurt and whatever you're like you know just take Ibuprofen like candy and and to be fair I only take I basically only take Ibuprofen on big days like that um I I pretty much never take it normally because normally I wouldn't want to mask any symptoms you know like if your elbows are hurting you want to know because you don't want to make them worse right and so like in general I never take pain meds but if you're trying to do one of the hardest things of your life like that's the appropriate time to take pain meds sure especially because you just know it's going to hurt all day and there's no need for it basically man but what does your body feel like after something something like that actually generally pretty good because surprisingly endurance events uh you know you'll be kind of tired maybe you want to take a nap but you won't be sore you know if I did like a three-hour Moon board session I'd almost certainly be more sore you know like intensity always sort of wrecks your body more than General endurance gotcha okay and then this is backing up a little bit but um what was the one what was the route in Zion that you soloed on-site soloed in a snowstorm monkey no sh's butress shes butress yeah it's like a really classic 11 plus crack thing talk me through onsite fre soloing cuz like rehearsing something head pointing getting it really dialed and knowing I feel comfortable doing this without a rope that I can kind of get behind that thought experiment it just makes sense but on-site Sol I mean is it okay I'm not doing a single move that I know I can't reverse and I could climb all the way back down there's a little bit of that but there's also a little bit of just it's 11 plus crack you know like when last year I fell off an 11 plus crack um I mean to some extent on-site soling is like a test you know like you're basically it's it's like your finals exam on a certain style or whatever else and in particularly for classic Roots something like shun that people climb all the time people love it's you know it's a great route so you know that it's going to have chalk on it it's going to be though that particular time I don't really know because it was kind of winter so it wasn't wasn't really wasn't really the season for it but um but at least you know that tons of other people have climbed it's not going to have loose Rock it's not you know it's like the grade is well established like there shouldn't be too many surprises you're like you're just testing yourself against a classic M but I kind I kind of like onset soling but you know from time to time I mean actually so talking about like unsung solos I mean another thing in Red Rock a friend Dave alrey who's who's a fellow sort of you know semi-professional climber sort of big wall veteran told me that I should definitely on-site solo resolution orette which is like a 25 pitch 11 plus or something up one of the mountains in Red Rock and the 11 plus pitch is like a little finger crack out of roof and he was like it's super secure it's though I don't think he told me it was out of roof I think he was just like oh it's a finger crack but it's it's all uh sort of like yellows and reds aliens like it'll fit great like you'll love it it's super easy it's Locker I was like yeah cool I'll go up and on all this thing so I got up there and and then it turns out the Crux is this cracker straight out this roof and you know you're 1,500 ft off the ground or something I was like holy [ __ ] like this is pretty scary I was like what and then and it wasn't really wasn't really that easy and I and to get up there had kind of been too easy almost uh so I wasn't really warmed up okay and so you know you're climbing like 5'8 5'9 like Alpine terrain and then I think I did one pitch of 10d which was enough to sort of be like oh I don't really want to reverse it unless I have to kind of weird technical Corner stuff and then all of a sudden you're in this weird roof and I was like man what a sandbag you know like it's it's really rare that friends tell you you should onite solo something cuz typically friends don't encourage you to solo at all and so I was kind of like it'll be great and I was like this is not great this this messed up but obviously it went went fine in the end went fine you survived what is the hardest thing you've had to reverse down climb uh I don't know I mean I'm sure I must have down climbed at least 5'11 in my life I mean I've gone up and down sport pitches and things at different cigs I don't know oh I've down climb 12b sport um but that was just because I went up it and then went right back down it same route okay uh things like that maybe there's harder I don't know but trying to think of big walls and then I've done a bunch of multi- pitches uh like in uh Petro Chico in Mexico I've had a few things where I climbed like a 15 pitch TD and then just down climbed it after wow uh things that climb towers and stuff like that where you're kind of like I don't want to carry rope and I don't want to you know I don't want to couple hours repelling by myself yeah you're just kind of like I'll just climb back down that you get double the pitches in the day nice yeah I have a couple more questions kind of staying on this theme why do some of these things get so much attention While others fly totally under the radar what is that oh I mean if you don't post anything about it and there's no video or anything then nobody knows nobody cares yeah yeah it doesn't feel important for you to to share either of those two experiences that we that we talked about well I think I I may posted something about Red Rock I mean I'll talk about it with anybody I certainly talk to my friends about it I was like it was crazy you should have been there you know but uh yeah but you just don't have to or at least I personally don't have to sell everything you know I mean like you know what I mean as a professional climber you make a living from sharing stories about climbing and you know whatever selling your climbing in some way or another but I just don't I don't need to for all of it you know it's like no one's going to care you know no matter what I do in Red Rock and how hard it is it's not freeing all cap so it's not going to like change my profile in one way or another have you noticed that shift like people these days are kind of like well he did another one well even even 10 years ago that was you know to some extent like the the big link up we were just talking about in Zion you know it's like nobody cares like I don't think anyone knows that I've onsite solid shoes like and and why would they honestly you know it's not like groundbreaking in the way that that uh Moonlight was or the halone was or whatever else yeah yeah it's just funny though because then you have something like CER luminoso a root that I sold out in Mexico that we made a fun little film about and I love that like that trailer that like really slow motion clip with that like really peaceful music and it's like panning over you I was just like beautiful footage yeah that is so insane it was so cool but so it's funny so that one only got filmed because I needed a partner for it because the root had overgrown quite a bit it like wasn't that popular and it was all covered in cactuses and stuff and like scrubbing all day like we you know basically I'd gone up with a a normal climbing partner a day and we had spent a couple hours on the way down sort of cleaning a little and like prepping the root but I knew that I needed like a week of effort to actually work on it and clean it and kind of buff it out and that's kind of too much to ask a normal climbing partner you know it's like your buddy just doesn't want to work for a week and so that was something where I knew that by making a film and doing it as like a North phas thing then suddenly you have a built-in partner you have a you know because my my partner in that case terer and renan both came filmed helped and it's all part of the process but then you know but it was perfect because that way I got my trip to Mexico covered you know we rent a little car we got tamali every night it was a great trip everybody had a good time and then and sort of as a result we made this cool little film you're like in so in that case I sort of chose to make the film because I wanted to do this thing and I needed help and I needed a crew and whatever else how often is it you pitching these things uh you mean like for the films and stuff yeah uh I don't know I mean in a way it's always me pitching the thing because if I don't want someone to film it then obviously I'll just do it by myself you know it's like you know it's always it's always my idea to some extent because it's not like anyone's ever telling me to go solo right right and makes sense but mostly though I'm rarely like pitching them like hey I want you guys to you know because if nobody wants to shoot it then I'll just go do it myself that's fine but there are certain things where it just makes sense to have help or things that where it's really easy to shoot and so you're kind of like why not have somebody there you know it's like if it's if you can just like Park and get a long shot from the car you're kind of like you know why not tell your buddy who can get some like rad shot of you doing a thing while you're doing it um so there's always a bit of a balance like that where you're kind of like oh I'm going to do this thing and it's easy for someone to shoot it like why not tell someone yeah unless you're like you know I don't want anybody there because this you know means a lot to me it's going to be really scary I'm not sure if I want to do it and I don't want the pressure and you know then then you just don't yeah that makes sense just depends I'm curious to hear your thoughts on where the where the limit of free soloing is um because you are the person that's blown everybody's minds and totally changed what we all thought the limit was um I was hanging out with Boon speed this last week up in Salt Lake and he was telling me that there's been two moments in his climbing life where he just had like a total brain melt moment and one of them was you free soling Moonlight butress he was just like like that's funny no words cap but Moonlight well cuz by the time he did cap already changed his Paradigm and um his moment the other one was uh Sharma doing super tweak oh super not necessary yeah it was super tweak I think because it was Boon spent like I can't remember he'd worked it for like years and then Chris just took a dump on it did like second day like almost did in a day yeah it was just like yeah yeah that's classic but anyway so so with that what is the most insane thing that you can imagine being possible with soloing that hasn't been done know probably no one's going to solo like the dawn wall like do you think anyone's ever going to solo like the nose or is it a bigger harder thing on LC cap or is it something totally different no I mean some stuff in the mountains obviously like Giant enchainments and things I mean like uh Sean's soing the the reverse Fitz RSE is pretty insane but that's just kind of different than free soing yeah yeah um just because of all the ice and like the what yeah you know it's a f day thing so he was like rope soing and Hauling a bag and it's just a little different than being like my shoes in my chalk bag and I'm free soing you know it's like he was basically out camping in this insane Mountain Traverse for 5 Days by himself so it's this incredible climbing achievement and it's an incredible experience but it's just a little bit it's like a different category in a way it's not like free so like he probably I'm sure he did some kind of scary moves but in general if anything was weird he would just you know Aid climb or use gear and use a rope self blade do whatever he needed yeah you know it's like he had everything with him to like keep it comfortable but including a sleeping bag you know it's like if he gets tired he just camps you know um no but I think that there's a lot of potential in in that uh area of souling you know things like like what Sean did I don't know I mean you know it's like big link UPS in Eed it's like but that's a little played out I mean I mean free soing the triple would be an obvious thing except the Half Dome doesn't go anymore CU a big piece fell off yeah um but somebody will figure something out up there and do it a different way the triple being lcap half doome and mount Watkins yeah yeah and oap is sort of 512 or 12 plus depending how you do it or sorry uh o cap is 12 plus for sure uh half doome is 512 or 12 plus and Watkins is sort of 13 minus is climbing so they're they're all pretty hard walls to do MH um in fact Watkins has never been solid and that's sort of an obvious like thing to do if somebody was motivated it's just it's just not quite as cool as as half do cap yeah I mean I don't envy whoever the the next like big soloist is because I've I've done a lot of the obvious things to do right and it's just so much less cool to do su his head no it is it it is I mean it is still really cool because when I was growing up you know I looked at what Peter Croft had done and I was like man if I could do the roster and astroman that would be the coolest thing I've ever done and to be fair it was the coolest thing I'd ever done when I did those I like this is insane and you know like I'm doing the thing as Peter I was so psyched yeah so you know I'm sure whoever repeats some of these other things that I've sold it you know hopefully we'll have the same experience we're like this is insane I'm doing this insane thing it's so cool no that that is interesting though that um it's I mean climbing is like that it's just going to be harder everything's like that it's just it gets harder and harder to have Quantum leaps where you have someone who does something that's so far beyond what's ever been done before in that whatever category is totally I mean that's kind of the the normal process for a sport as it matures you know it's like if you're an NBA player it's hard to just show up and shatter records cuz you're like there have been a lot of other really good NBA players at this point MH you know it's like I don't know whereas in the yeah back in the day it's a little easier to show up and be like I'm the man yeah you know track maybe even like a better example like world yeah world records are going to get broken but by You Know This Much at that point incremental margins right yeah no for sure yeah the whole quest for the 2our marathon it's like kind of being broken is sort of broken you're like H it's on the edge for a long time like yeah I don't know I mean climbing I mean there's still tons and tons of room in climbing but but it feels like soling is getting less popular if anything though or that there are fewer people doing that kind of stuff so I don't know we'll see maybe it'll fall out of favor for a while it'll never fall out of favor entirely though because there's always going to be some some punk kid who's like you know like all my friends are comp climbers screw them I'm going to go have an adventure you know whatever right yeah how do you feel about that for yourself personally like do you feel deep contentment with what you've accomplished as far as lcap and soloing and yosity and the the the new things you know breaking the nose record and all those sorts of things um do you feel contentment there or is that never ending oh no I feel pretty content there that's awesome I mean I mean I've basically done almost all the things I've ever want to do like that's pretty that's pretty legit yeah that's incredibly inred aspects of climbing where I'm like I'm still a terrible Boulder you know I still can barely sport climb you know it's like that is I I hear I hear you well you know what I mean compared to Elite levels like you know I mean I can barely do what some people warm up on basically and you're kind of like oh man okay I mean only a few people in the world but you know what I mean yeah yeah but the thing is I personally know a lot of those people and so then you're sort of like well he can do it how hard can it be and you're like man it turns out it's really hard yeah yeah I don't know it was like some kid you know warming up on your project and you're kind of like man that's a really good kid like found it yeah you know where I'm like I've been I've been climbing uh let's see I'm 3 so I've been climbing 27 years and basically trying my hardest for 27 years and then you see some like 13-year-old you know warm up on your project you're kind of like man how much harder do I need to try you know you're like I put a lot of effort into this and just like not that good I know I yeah I haven't been climbing quite as long I'm 33 I've been climbing for 15 years now sorry when I was 18 and um I I have kind of had this thought like I still have big goals for myself mostly in bouldering and Sport climbing and I think by the time I do them I don't I don't I don't even know if I will think they're cool anymore do you know what I mean like everything's just becoming like so watered down cuz so many people are so strong it's just like damn can't keep up with the 10-year-old kids any yeah I always thought that V12 represented really hard boulding probably because when I grew up V12 was sort of like almost The Edge you know like maybe v14 was the hardest and 12 seemed hard you're like man when 17 is kind of the edge like 12 really doesn't sound that hard jeez V12 sounds kind of dumb actually um you know a a mind blast moment for me was actually listening to an interview that you did with Tim Ferris years ago I'm huge fan of him and um you told a story about Chris Sharma you trying necessary evil and then Chris Sharma doing necessary evil can can you tell me about that can you tell the story again and I have some elaborate it on I forget what I said on Tim feris but I mean the the nuts and bolts of it are that you know chish Arma did answer evil in his like second year of climbing or something I mean it was the hardest route in the country at the time is was it his third year climbing basically Kish Arma just started climbing climb is necessary evil it's the hardest route or maybe the hardest done by an American maybe just do it had already been done I don't know the exact history but it was this incredible achievement in American climbing you're like cool Chris you know he does it in a couple tries like no biggie and then and he wanted to call it like whatever it doesn't matter but it meant nothing no no he wanted to call it like you know turd burglar or something like something totally stupid or like right right the fart Smuggler like you know it meant like nothing to him he's just like cool I climbed this route it was fun moving on yeah and you know and I've tried necessary on and off over the years and you know I've basically been climbing and training my whole life and I still can't freaking climb necessary and you're sort of like man after 20 plus years of effort I'm still not as good as Chris Sharma was as a 14-year-old who had just found this new sport yeah and you're just kind of like confounded but there's it just shows a certain level of natural Talent you know he's just really really strong right no I I found it fascinating because I think it put Talent into real perspective for me and obviously like we all have incredible opportunity to grow and develop as people as athletes all these things I don't think anyone's like destined to not be a good climber um but yeah comparing you to him I was just like whoa that's fascinating that's so crazy I think that's something that a lot of people don't appreciate or you know it's hard to see the contrasts there because I think you know if someone's a famous climber you just assume that they're a really really good climber but the thing is everyone's given a different set of you know strengths and weaknesses and you know some people have a lot of natural talents others don't some work really really hard you know like I definitely don't have any of the talent that Chris does but you know I was given a separate set of gifts which is that one probably being like a real passion for climbing like going out and doing it all the time which then sort of allows me to get the the mileage required to feel comfortable doing some of the scarier things that I've done I mean you know it's like there's just a whole it's just a whole different path but you're like man the path that he set off down like I couldn't take that path it's just it's it's totally closed off to me it's just way too hard like I can't do any of the moves like the stuff that he did as a kid I still just can't do at all yeah like oh well you know it's like just Different Different Strokes different folks totally yeah to fill in a little context for people that don't know that route necessary evil uh 14c maybe hard 14c at uh Virgin River Gorge and uh I believe it was the hardest route in the country at the time I think just do it had been done done afterward I think it I think just do it had been done but I think necessary was a little harder and came a little later interesting yeah that's that's my recollection I'll fact check it after this episode point of podcast you just throw stuff out there and nobody even cares you know totally um I was going to save this for later but that's pretty good lead in I mean you you know diminish your sport climbing relative to the best in the world which I I get what you're saying which is totally appropriate but you've done I mean you've done so many 54s up to 9A up to 14d no the 9A I've done is probably for 14 C it's the classic thing where you're like oh yeah I climbed 14d but you're like it's probably 14c and then I've climbed a couple of 14 C's but you're like yeah but like with a knee bar they're probably easier you know it's like so that's kind of the bummer of a lot of my heart sport climbing is that when you really think about it you're like you know it's probably not that hard but but it's fine but you are correct that I've done I don't know like 50 or 100 54s and so I've done you know I have a solid foundation of the grade for sure what would it take for you to climb like 15a I need stronger fingers basically I need I need more power I need to be able to pull harder I need to be able to do harder moves so some combination of more strength and more power basically better in every way do you think you would have to change cuz it seems like you train a lot and you're like very interested in it do you think you'd have to change your your habits like stop going out and having these like 30 pitch days to yeah and actually I think the biggest change would that I would need uh a little bit more consistent consistency throughout my year um like so for example going on trips yeah so like this last year this winter I went to Antarctica basically I went mountain climbing in the southern hemisphere for a month in the winter and the month before that I'd Focus mostly on cardio and like snow Adventures I was still sport climbing a little and you know training and everything but it's just hard to you know like chrish ARMA isn't climbing the highest peak in Antarctica you know what I mean it's like that's just not like Alex Megos probably can't even hike up a hill like his legs are so skinny that like he probably can but but he chooses not to because it would be a waste of his energy right and so I think that if I really want to devote myself to to high performance very hard climbing you know I'd have to rain in some of the other things that I do is that a goal I mean maybe a little um we'll see I've I mean the thing is though that that's been like a real tension in my climbing for the last 15 years let's say where it's like I've always wanted to be stronger I've always wanted to climb harder but then the reality is that I get more satisfaction from the adventures and from the big outings and from the crazy experiences and um and like going on Expeditions around the world it's like the life experience you get from doing trips in rural Africa and things like that I mean they kind of outweigh sending one more 14c or something and so that's cool you know I mean and a lot of the Expeditions that I've gone on you know that's gone a long way towards informing the work that I do through my foundation and and the other sorts of things that I do in life I'm kind of like you know I'd rather have a broad rich life I mean I do want to send hard at rots but you know at what cost yeah but I am sort of seeing now as a dad uh basically being a dad lends itself more to the to the high performance sort of hard climbing like a little more time at home a little more time training um and sort of fewer Big Adventures away from the the house for a long time yeah so I'm like oh you know good time to try to climb Hardy Roots tap into that dad's strength yeah and so far I haven't had any dad strength for I mean it makes sense it's just you have to focus your time um yeah that that it's it's crazy how many examples there are of that leading to like huge performance bumps for people that think that their climbing Hard Days Are Over You know all of a sudden they just level up in a big way because they have to focus with the limited time they have yeah I wouldn't be like if I decided to to go back to University or something and suddenly just had a schedule for like I dropped out of college and I'm not going to but but say I suddenly had a structured program for the next four years where it's like I'm going to be in one place for four years only doing this thing and only taking two weeks of vacation a year and then just stuck to a to a consistent you know hangboarding and and sort of board climbing program like yeah I don't doubt that I would my bouldering would probably jump a couple grades and and in turn my sport CL probably would too yeah uh you know but would I dial it on the inside like yeah I me the ins it's all it's all it's all tradeoffs right totally um I just had a thought it just escaped me what was I gonna say um what was I gonna say I can't remember oh do you have a wall here at your house I have a hangboard inside my wife's closet but uh but I am hoping to build a sort of Home garage setup nice but don't don't have anything yet okay gotcha I know it's kind of sad because the gyms in Vegas are really sad what is the deal with that are there like building limitations is it like a height thing or something because you would think that Vegas would have like a mega gym by now I know you would think and I and I think maybe that some some companies are working on that kind of thing okay but that's kind of always been the rumor for the last 10 years like someone's always trying to work on that and nothing's happened huh I think part of it is that they're currently three sort of adequate gyms in Vegas and so it's hard to come in to build you know it's weird it's not like a totally open market right because there already three gyms serving the Vegas area but they're all just very you know I mean I'm personal friends with everybody involved in all the different gyms so I don't want to be too disparaging but you're kind of like but they're all very none of them are modern Mega gyms yeah yeah yeah there leaves a lot of room to for improvement right I mean it's interesting though cuz like how many gyms are there in Seattle no it's insane proba or think of Salt Lake Salt Lake has like 15 gyms and 15 are like the best gyms in the country like insane gyms and you're like what does Salt Lake have that Vegas doesn't Vegas is a way better place how the population compare Vegas is 2 million people I don't know what Salt Lake is yeah but you know I mean yeah I mean even like uh the city's got to do it someone's got to be somebody will for sure I mean I'm sure it's coming yeah but we'll see no I'm from Sacramento in California that's also 2 million plus people maybe more now because I haven't gone a long time but um and it has three gyms and two of them are sort of like Mega nice commercial like really good facilities and then third is sort of scrappier the third is the one that I grew up in when I was a kid it's so it's really old but still it's like three good gyms and you're like you know why is that not the case here but whatever yeah soon hopefully soon hopefully fingers crossed either way I'm going to build a home garage cuz I'm not I'm not holding my breath for the commercial gym yeah I mean it's it's such a like a like lucky thing to be able to do for anybody but it's like so life-changing I had a home wall when I lived in Bend for a while just the convenience and being able to kind of dial things in for specific goals that you have and yeah no it's amazing it's funny because I'm always a little like oh does it feel too bougie to like build my own home setup and wall and all that because you know you can just go to the gym and climb with everybody but then I'm like God damn it I'm a professional climber like if I'm going to do anything that's sort of self-indulgent like that's the thing I should indulge in totally you know like it's not buying a Lamborghini you know it's like right building a training apparatus like that's that seems appropriate yeah that does that absolutely does yeah okay um the next topic that I wanted to talk to you about we've kind of touched on it um I think there's a story here talking about the link up you did in Zion but near misses I read your book years ago and I remember reading the chapter about you soloing a lot in Owen's River Gorge back in Bishop um from what I recall you were you were younger and it was hard to find Partners so a lot of your soloing was just born out of wanting to climb a lot and like not wanting to like meet strangers to go climb with um and I remember one specific story you would have to because it's own's River Gorge you can't like top out a lot of these routes you would go up and you have to down climb all these things and you were coming down like a 10B or something and you were like maybe 20 ft off the ground just kind of coming down nice and smooth 10 or 15 feet up and you slipped off and like fell and hit the ground yeah but probably but I probably fell from six feet off the ground or like five basically it was like smaller than a bouldering fall okay which a couple of those like you know Falls while soling are kind of more like you know you solo a route and then you're down climbing the route as you start to get to the bottom it starts to be like playful where you're like swinging around on jugs and having a good time and like the way you went on Boulders and then you basically slip off the bottom moves and then you're like whoa and you're like yeah you did fall off and it was unexpected but it's only because you were only a few feet off the ground so you knew that you can kind of loosen up okay you know so um it's like I mean I personally don't think of those as near misses as like like I've had a like a re well I've had a lot of like much more near misses but the thing is is that they never really happened so you never know how near it actually is you know it's like a hold breaks or like you know down climbing a route in Shad once in in central Africa I was down climbing some virgin chos on this tower that never been climbed and both my footh holds broke off and I was just left like hanging from this jug and you're kind of like H you know it's all these like mud plate things and you know things like that but you're like is that a near Miss I mean I felt secure on the thing it's easy climbing it's fine but you're like yeah I mean both your feet broke off it's like Mission Impossible stuff you're just hanging there being like w so I mean there have been a lot of things like that but but it's not like that keeps me up at night being like that time that thing almost happened you're like to some extent that stuff just you know just happens right that's interesting I I mean I was kind of imagining that's what I wanted to ask next like broken holds I don't know bugs flying out of I've been attacked by Ravens a bunch of times attacked by ravens Okay well like when they have Nest they they like not dive bomb you and yeah they didn't do physical harm to me but it's really scary they like big birds getting really close and you're like on small holds like oh my God it's pretty it's kind of Mega do you have what is the closest call you've ever had oh I don't know I mean the uh I that's thing is you never really know how close it is I mean I've had things where like I pulled a huge flake off Royal Arch is actually a really easy route in Eed like I was probably in my in my 10s I was probably soing appr proaches just like romping up this classic but I pulled a huge flake off and you know sort of started to go backward a little bit and then sort of shove the flake back into place and caught my balance and like the rocks stayed in place I stayed in place everything was fine but you're sort of like whoo like that's like that was scary you know you're like oh jeez but you never know how close those kinds of things are right you know it's like I don't know I mean there are a lot of lot of things like that over the years but to be fair there are a lot of things like that while hiking and stuff as well you know like approaching Cliffs and like scrambling into weird positions or like stumble at the edge of a cliff your balance or something yeah trying to find the tops of random Craigs or even just like while trail run you know you just trip over some freaking Rock and just eat it into the ground and you're like damn it you it's like I mean basically if you're adventuring Outdoors all the time things happen right you know like you get stung by a beat in in opportune time or whatever it's like it's just part of being outside all the time have you been stung while soloing actually I don't think so I feel like I'd remember knock on wood yeah yeah that suck but I've definitely uh like I was doing a sort of scary run out Trad face sort of thing in eusee and the wall was like covered in wasps or like be things basically I was like trying to time my climbing to like the swarm of stuff around me and I don't think I want up getting stung but you know it's obviously really scary yeah you know I mean plenty of stuff like that damn yeah yeah I see what you mean I mean I don't I don't solo um but I think one of maybe you should maybe I should just give it a try one of the uh nearest tank your sport climbing one of like the nearest misses I've had personally was uh I was just like bouldering up in Upper chaos in Rocky Mountain National Park and I I was like projecting this thing and spending lots of time up there over the summer a couple summers ago and I was like you know I was it was just one day of many and I was hiking up a Talis field with three crash pads on my back and I like almost lost my balance and fell off a Talis block and it like it would have been awful you know like it was a really jumbly sharp heinous Landing like 15 ft block that I was standing on or something and totally yeah something like that happens and you're just all the adrenaline and you're like don't don't lose for what I'm doing right now yeah totally yeah what does um what does the debrief look like when something like that happens do you just kind of compartmental compartmentalize it away or do you sit and like reflect on that or the interesting thing with near Miss experiences is that by the time you can process the fact that something happened it's already in the past and so there's nothing really to be afraid about now because like the thing already happened yeah so typically with soling if something go sideways like something unexpected occurs you know you sort of just have to like well that happened but it's done and I'm still just focused on what I'm doing now I think that the time when when that matters the most is if it changes your uh you know if it makes you reeval reevaluate The Rock quality let's say or reevaluate you know whether or not you're on route or you know basically if like you've just received new information that you should use in some way yeah because if you're climbing something and you're like this is classic I can just refund every jug people do this all the time and then the first jug you grab rips off the wall you're like time to reeval all of my preconceptions and treat this totally differently and so I don't know have you ever do you know regos in Spain regos yeah no it's um it's a multi-pitch conglomerate climbing area so it's like River Rocks it's like a river rocks in a matrix it's kind of like Maple Canyon in the US okay but so it's like big Cobblestone uh things sticking out of like a sort of sandstone Matrix and uh it's pretty cool but uh there's a classic root there called fiesta de BPS uh it's like a I don't know probably like 7 to 10 pitch 11d and super famous super classic like from the parking lot you can see this line of chalk going up this Tower CU like people climbing all the time so I was in Spain on a sport climbing holiday basically and uh and went to regos one day and I onite sold yesterday was BPS is like a fun you know I was like it's the best route there it's classic it's kind of in the great grade range and I was kind of like you know 11d jugs like should be freaking fine for me but I was on so it turns out that the krux like not jugs and it was all kind of scary and that is actually a route where I got attacked by birds uh higher on the route but the thing is that the jugs were so big that I was kind of afraid to pull on them because it's giant Cobblestone sticking straight out of the wall and you know the whole Cobble is covered in shock but I was kind of grabbing just the very back of the cobbles with just a couple fingers because I really didn't want the leverage of just pulling straight out on some big hold wow you know so it's pretty scary with the and then actually the other thing with Fiesta is that uh it's kind of overhanging for several pitches in a row I it's been a long time and I'd have to look at a toe but I don't want to misspeak but you know it's like say four or five pitches of like overhanging jugs that are kind of like 11b or 11c jugs for many pitches but you start to get pretty pumped if you never stop to ble and you never like sit down or anything in the middle of it and so by the end and then I wasn't really grabbing the holds that well because I was afraid to pull them out of the wall you're making it harder yeah so by the time I got to the top I was like I'm pretty damn pump I was like this is it all turned out being a little more of a thing than I expected but you're just like oh this is a lot but the point being is that when you solo you often worry about rock quality more worry you know you basically take other steps to try to stay safe right but yeah of course if you really want to stay safe you wouldn't go on set Festa but but it was amazing experience nice right um so back to Zion um I was actually I was hanging out in Waco tanks uh this winter Ethan Pringle was there for a while we were having dinner one night doing he's he's doing pretty well seen him time his uh I think his shoulder been bugging him for a while we're actually going to go to Rocklands together this summer so I'm like to spend some time with him cool you know he uh have you ever he we competed as kids he beat me at every comp I ever did as a kid [ __ ] that guy he's he's a year younger than me I think but he's always been way better than me but I always remember his parents being like Oh really good effort today you really tried your best you know like that's hilarious good job today perfect but yeah we were I don't remember how this came up but we were using uh chat GPT have you and we were I was like using it to like Outsource interviews I was like what should I ask this climber in a podcast interview just to see it was like kind of generic but like wow those are actually decent questions coming from a robot you know yeah it's not a bad way to do some pre pre-interview prep totally yeah I should think about that so I think I typed in like what what should a podcast host ask on Alex Honnold in a podcast interview about his rock climbing something like that um but I asked Ethan what he would want me to talk to you about if we ever did an interview and he mentioned uh I think it was that link up you did in Zion and I I remember I vaguely remember this I think you like maybe posted about it on Instagram or something and it was the one where you topped out through lots of snow like navigating getting off the roots was like really snowy and kind of Epic you like slipped on the snow and like a bush saved you or something yeah can you tell that story yeah yeah they're two crazy stories so the one you're talking about is from uh above Shon butas so shones you normally climb and then repel with two ropes um I soloed so I got to the top of this little Tower and when you on site soloed in the snowstorm yeah well I mean to be fair it only started snowing on the last pitch the forecast has shown snow midday and I was like oh it'll only take an hour it'll be fine and then started snowing a little on the last pitch and I was kind of like oh better climb faster and then by the time I topped out it was like snowing and I was like this is all pretty Mega anyway uh I thought I was just going to scramble up to the rim turns out that you know it's something that nobody like probably nobody has ever done because it's pretty extreme terrain and like big terrain like huge gash Canyon things and like you know 2,000t of vertical it's like this giant I me no one's ever topped it out cuz they all just repell exactly got I mean maybe maybe somebody has but it would be it would be Mega you know and I was going up there like having just onsite free solid 11 plus been like I'm freaking sending it's on it's game time and I was like this is really real so I kind of think what was it like fifth class what can you describe well it was more like a like ball bearing hail uh like unconsolidated hail on steep like sort of fourth class Labs so it was kind of like you know tricky climbing is terrain with lots of hail that it was already there and then you know the snow around me was just sort of like fun Ambiance like it's snowing it's pretty whatever but then there was also a lot of snow because it's winter so I'm like post huling up these steep technical slabs anyway long story short the the feature that I was trying to climb was like this huge wall and I was on this kind of ledge system and there was like a cliff band above me and the cliff band as as I like progressed further up the cliff band was getting smaller but then the ledge that I was on was also getting smaller and like forcing me into like a drop off to the abyss sort of thing like a 2,000 foot Chasm of Doom and so I was trying to find the sweet spot where you know if I Traverse the ledge far enough then the thing above me becomes small enough that I can sort of solo this wall to like get onto the next tier of the Mountain uh where you know if I stay at a part where the ledge is big enough then the wall above is too big you know it's just a weird trade-off anyway I found a good spot I was like okay this is my thing and I started to like solo this little face and basically broke a hole and just fell off the face and then just landed on this tree and so it just totally stuck it you know was like under 10 foot fall just like land stuck was like whoa you know because the thing that I landed on sort of like rolled off into the abyss for you know thousands of feet and so it was all very adventurous it was all very adventurous I was like Jesus yeah okay can you elaborate on that you what do you mean you like stuck the tree what can you freaking fell and I just like land I mean so there's this tiny ledge and there's like a tree on the edge of it or something that yeah yeah probably I mean I didn't like grab the tree I just happen I mean maybe if there wasn't a tree there I would have just landed either way but um but I just I just landed was like holy [ __ ] you know I was like jeez probably could have grabbed the tree though had I started to fall off I don't know man yeah there are a lot of things like that and the thing about it is that I was like that's really scary and then I just had to climb the exact same thing again but just hope that nothing broke because there's nowhere else to go you know there was no other way to do it no like this is totally virgin unclimbed yeah yeah this is like solo this is like what people imagine soloing in the mountains is like you know just like full crazy you know like the most rugged looking mountain you can imagine that's covered in snow with big chasms and you're just up there like figuring [ __ ] out damn yeah I mean that's the kind of stuff that you don't really get credit for when you're like oh I solo this route you people are like oh yeah cool you solo that route you're like but then I spent hours like fighting for my life trying to get to the top of the mountain to then hike down yeah and then even once I got to the plateau there was snow everywhere and I was kind of worried that I wouldn't even find the trail and so then you know I was like I'm just going to be wandering around up here on like the rim of Zion for hours like lost in the snow but then thankfully I found the trail and it was fun yeah you said there was two stories yeah so the other story so I had just had that experience and the next week I sold a monkey finger which is like this I don't know 10 pitch 12b and that one you know I was sort of fresh off my survival experience on on chunes and that one was just like maybe even snowier and same thing you have to do like a th000 or 2,000 F feet of Earth to get to the rim and I was kind of like Post hoing in the snow sort of confused as to where to go and it was all sort of fullon and then uh I found a freaking set of Big Horn tracks and wound up following the set of Big Horn tracks all the way to the rim and it was it was like kind of this magical experience for me because you know honestly I was like this is how Native American folks wound up with like spirit animals and things like that because itely felt like I was being guided it all felt like pretty was like this is scary I just did something scary this is all hard I don't know what to do I'm totally hosed and then you find one set of tracks in the snow and you're like well must be going to the rim cuz I was basically on a cliff side so it's like it's not going anywhere else you know it's like this big horn was clearly going back to like where there's flat ground and yeah just like guided me to the top basically I was like that's freaking cool that's incredible yeah I was like what would your spirit animal be I don't know like a sloth slowly well so let's talk about that actually because you you solo these 10 pitch routes you're like this will take an hour um that's so much faster than than anyone else is climbing these big multi-pitch Roots but that's not because I'm climbing fast it's because everybody else has to like a bunch of nuts and stuff right it's just efficiency it's just slow and steady you just never stop moving sort of thing yeah I mean I don't know if you saw the film with the no speed record but that's like that's the premier speed record in climbing you know climbing the nose in under two hours yes when you watch it like we're not actually climbing that fast you know we never stop and it's super efficient and it's the strategy is very streamlined and very well executed but the climbing you know is pretty normal like we're just climbing there are a few places where you actually move fast on the very easiest train but in general you're just climbing it's nothing crazy yeah actually you want to this is a uh a fun aside for you know for all the listeners at home so um I wrote up an article for the American albine Jal when we did the nose and I was riding it on a plane and I for my wrap up at the end I was sort of like oh I'm sort of curious so I did a little back of the envelope math on uh the world basically pacing so for 100 meter sprint uh what pace they're going versus a 2-hour Marathon like these are sort of the physiological limits for human potential like doing a 2hour or a 2hour marathon or a you know 9sec 100 meter dash like that's what Olympic performance is yeah and so that means that marathon pace is basically half of what sprinting pace is okay this is all very like back of the envelope I'm just on a plane like thinking this through yeah so then I was like for Speed climbing uh say Olympic speed climbing they're doing a 15 meter wall in 5 seconds and so then I was like if you go at half that pays because you're climbing a big wall yeah how long do you think it would take to climb l cap if you wented half the uh take a guess I have no idea uh an hour 12 minutes 12 minutes yeah and so my wrap up was kind of like obviously we're not too close to the physiological limits of of human potential you know it's like and I mean and even if you compared it to something I mean the more apt comparison would be uh the vertical K which is like a ultra running event like running a th000 meters of vertical straight uphill right cuz and the vertical K is like roughly half an hour and so clearly a human isn't capable of going up a th000 meter wall like El Cap faster than 30 minutes because like if you can't Trail around a hillside faster than that then obviously you can't rock climb and crack right but ites kind of that the physiological limits of human performance on the no speed record are probably closer to an hour and a half or like an hour 10 or you know who knows if somebody was willing to try enough times and whatever risk their lives potentially well yeah yeah it would be insane yeah but what is the record for jugging ropes up ELC cap I don't know but I would suspect like half an hour or something yeah I feel like I yeah there must be cu the cavers set up this freeh hanging line and they jug the dawn wall basically every year thing I I feel like it's like 45 minutes I could be Mis I would suspect that's that's I remember reading someone made the point that like if that can be done then like you know in theory you can climb the you can climb the nose that fast or like close to it there's more Logistics obviously and more like sideways stuff going on yeah but in some ways it's easier also so it's hard to say because there are parts of the nose where you're basically running up a ledge system and it's OB easier to like walk on a Ledge than it is to jug a free hanging line yeah cuz jugging a free hanging line is pretty freaking hard like totally they are using caving setup so it's all more streamline than what we think of as climbers okay but still yeah but so you would think that like an hour an hour and a half is like a reasonable but we're not doing it I was gonna say so if someone breaks your speed record would you go back if somebody broke my speed record and did uh I think our speed record is 1587 or something if somebody broke it and did 157 I'd be like yeah of course I'll go back we can do better 158 like that's that's fine but if somebody broke it and did 145 i''d be like no it's yours now 145 okay I think yeah like you know we may I mean maybe we could have shaved 10 minutes off it's hard to imagine because as you get closer to the Limit like that it's uh it's pretty freaking hard yeah like it gets hard to shave another minute or another couple minutes but it's crazy to me to think that like you guys climbed the nose in a shorter amount of time than like my average podcast episode like that is incredible well we really hustled you know you don't really hustle on your podcast that's true that's that's fine yeah no but that's I mean a lot of practice and everything yeah how many times did you guys climb it and prep for that well so I think Tommy and I to do the sub two I think the two of us climbed it together maybe 12 or 15 times U spread over quite a while he was doing his book tour for the push uh so he was kind of coming and going and I was working on other things and whatever um but that doesn't totally do it justice because I had previously held the record with Hans Floren and we had climbed it together I don't know you know five or 10 times over the years and then of course climb the nose just with friends and as part of other link ups and whatever else I don't know you know at least another 10 or 20 times so not that those are all practice for Speed climbing but it's like every time you climb it you learn a little bit you remember the moves whatever mhm but I've definitely climbed the nose a lot how much of it do you think you have like memorized like move by move I think if I I mean I haven't been on the nose in a couple years I'm sure if I went up it right now I would know you know half of it yeah I would I would probably remember most of the tricky parts we like oh this is the weird weird thing where you place that one Cam and you pull on it and grab that bolt you know weird weird things like that M like I definitely remember a lot of it yeah it's crazy to think I love that about climbing I love like just the the just amount of weird information that we all have sitting in our brains you know you meet someone at the campfire and you're talking about like the specific shape of a hold on a boulder halfway across the world or something and you like both can picture it you're like oh yeah your index finger like yeah you really grab that bump yeah yeah yeah no I mean and with the big stuff you there's so much to to know I mean for for Speed climbing on the nose it's almost an academic exercise as much of as much as a physical thing like memorizing the beta memorizing the strategy executing it correctly it's just like there's so much that goes into it yeah I imagine that kind of leads us in I'm not going to try to force the Segway here I have one more topic that I uh that I was really excited to talk to you about um at this point you've been climbing long enough you've inspired the Next Generation or or you've just inspired so many people to um like Jordan Canon doing big link UPS in yosity people like Emily Harrington doing cool stuff I want to hear about some of the biggest lessons you've learned from your climbing Heroes and I have three people that I've picked out but if there's any others I think it'd be really interesting uh Tommy Caldwell Jonathan seist because you guys sport climb together a lot and then Peter Croft yeah good choices though though Peter is definitely has been an inspiration my whole life and Tommy kind of has to and then jar just feels a little bit more like a contemporary you know we're like friends friends yeah like I mean he is super inspiring and he just sent like one of his hardest roots and having seen how much he put into it and I mean actually so yeah he just sent stoking the fire for people listening pretty yeah which is like a hard 15b and you're like was pretty proud but um actually so to sort of answer your question in a broad way I would say that J St and Tommy the thing that I've Maybe gotten the most from both of them are basically uh respecting their commitment to to hard work you know like the effort that they put into climbing and how much how well they've done because of the effort they've put in I mean Peter you know I mean Peter's inspiring in a whole different way and especially now I mean I'm pretty good friends with Peter uh now I mean we're both north aths we hang out we like last time I was in uh Bishop I was there for a day and I basically rallied him to go sport climb with me because uh the owns River Gorge which is favorite Craig his home Craig he goes there four or five days a week basically with even on the days that he's not climbing he goes with his dog to like hang out and just like walk around in the gorge and and actually I'd say that's one of the things that I'm really inspired about uh that that really inspires me by Peter is just his lifelong commitment to climbing you know it's like he may not be doing the craziest things he's ever done he may may not be you know like setting records but he's still just out every day he loves it he does it he's still putting up new Roots he's still like you know he's basically still sort of puttering along like doing the thing that he loves to do all the time I'm like that's so awesome and like that that'll almost certainly be me someday because I just like love going to the Craig like I love climing pitches totally but yeah so I'd say you know from Tommy and from jar that sort of commitment to Excellence the hard work the dedication you know I'm inspired by by what they put into it and then from from Peter I'm probably most inspired by just his whole life around climbing you know that climbing's been at the core of his life for his whole life you know he's just so like he talks about some new route that he did he still just lights up he looks like a little kid he's got this huge smile he's so psyched you're just like man I hope I have even a fraction of that passion in anything my whole life totally you know he's so into it yeah I interviewed him he was uh he was one of my early interviews like number 10 or 11 or something and um he like forgot we were recording he was like holding the mic and his hands were doing this and he he all fired up yeah he's all fired this is sick yeah yeah you see that GLE in his eyes it's really cool yeah it's funny cuz you know he's like he's all like wrinkly now and you're like it's cuz you smiled so much your whole life you know which is amazing yeah probably cuz he spent his whole life outside in the mountains totally yeah he's so he's got that like amazing weathered look I want that someday for sure yeah but then you need to climb more Mountains than fewer were Boulders it's true or only Boulder in in Rocky man National Park yeah P altitude is getting worked by the sun your whole life if I do end up looking like Peter it will be because time in Rocky Mountain not because I got into climbing mountains who else would make that list for you like climbers that I've been inspired by like that yeah oh I'd say that I'd say that I sort of draw inspiration from almost anybody in the right ways you know I I try not to put anybody on a pedestal where it's like this person is like an insane you know like I mean certainly when I was younger I did that a little more like you know I sort of deified Peter Croft a little bit where you're like he's the man he's the Peter coft yeah but you know as I've gotten older and a little more mature and whatever else you're just like all these people yeah and you wind up as personal friends with all these people you're just kind of like we're all human we're all just doing the best we can we're all just going climbing but that's not to say that you can't pull you know nuggets of oh nuggets you nuggets of inspiration or like fun little Pearls of Wisdom like you can't draw things from people that you meet yeah and and even if they aren't even the best climber like you know or even if every other aspect of their life is a complete [ __ ] show you know there might be that one thing that you're like man you are so good at that though you know like I mean actually a good example as soon as I said show I just immediately thought of the whole mellow crew I was like no but but I think that's actually a perfect example where like a bunch of the Mellow guys you know I mean they're all the strongest Boulders in the world they're incredible climbers they're very inspiring in a lot of ways you're like when you see the the Excellence with which they climb the the passion they have for it like those kinds of things I'm like oh that is definitely something for me to emulate in my climbing I'm like they are incredible would I want to lead their life no you know it's like I don't want that lifestyle I don't even want to climb the things that they're climbing you know like half the time I'm like that doesn't even look that cool you're like that's just that looks heinous you know look how small the holds are but you can still be inspired by how much effort they put into it and how how well they they climb you know I don't know I went soloing with Sean rabu and uh he did yeah he wanted to solo some things in y okay that's cool he was there working some you know futuristic project and um I don't know maybe like one of yeah yeah baling project yeah and maybe one of his fingers was hurting a little and I don't know he's like on a rest day and he just wanted to go solo something so I did two days with him stalling different routes and it was interesting because he doesn't really know how to crack climb so you know we were trying to be selective about things that he could climb without having to jam too much but uh but he's so good he's such a good climber he basically taking him soling like that was kind of I basically have a open policy that anybody who can has either climbed 515 or v15 I will take them so long anytime like basically there's a certain level at which like like if you can climb that hard like you're going to be fine on easy enough terrain like you can do a one arm on any of the holds that you're touching like you're going to be fine yeah you know but climan like he had no history of he had no background for that kind of thing and he just looked so smooth and composed he's just such a good climber I like God you were I was like this is next Generation that's cool like you are a great climber that's cool to hear he's so so chill I know he's so chill I can see him being like halfway up a multi-pitch solo and just being like nice this is cool you know I think he was a little nervous maybe I think he was a little like oh this is this is a lot you know cuz we climbed three different routes up to the top of u70 Falls basically which is pretty cool one of them I'd never done before um it's called VI Aqua it's like next to the waterfall it's it's pretty neat and you top out basically at the at the guard rail for like tourists looking over the waterfall so it's like this pretty cool position and he climbed well the whole time looked great having a good time but I was like I think he was a little like damn this is crazy like obviously he's cling a freaking big wall on you7 yeah it was awesome that's awesome that's crazy yeah I can actually like I can more picture him topping out and being like that was scary and like that's it yeah yeah exactly exactly you're like was it he looked really chill old yeah yeah understated that guy that's awesome it's so exciting what's happening in bouldering right now like it's crazy it's popping off v7s are going down and yeah yeah do you follow that kind of stuff yeah yeah I follow I'm I follow news on 8a.nu like all the time and then I'm not really on social that much so I don't uh I don't see like all the firsthand you know people POS and stuff but I I would say I'm pretty up on the news yeah I mean I'm like I'm freaking paid to rock clam I should have some sense of what's going on you know yeah and that that I kind of hope to hold on to for you know basically my whole life like some idea of like what the hardest grades are and stuff yeah and and like who the the talent is in climbing right now like who who who's doing the cool stuff yeah who um who have you been most impressed by that most people don't know about oh I mean depends what you mean by most people you know if you mean like Americans on the west coast then you know there's like a whole slew of Hardman British folks like you know will bosy whatever who just did uh ber of Dreams yeah and then who's the other really strong um British guy I'm blanking on his name right now Aiden Roberts yeah yeah he's been on the show yeah oh yeah cool yeah nice yeah will B is actually coming up so oh yeah cool yeah just getting the good guys that's trying you try to only interview people the meow crew is so hard to pin down yeah dude well we tried we interviewed him for climbing gold and uh it was supposed to be all four of them and only two showed up and they had like no idea yeah it was classic I was like yeah the four being is that like Sean Jimmy Daniel and Juliano yeah okay yeah got it and so we only wound up talking to to Juliano and Daniel okay but but it's funny because when Daniel is sort of the the Elder Statesman the like mature responsible one of the group you're like damn you know because Daniel has actually you know mature like Daniel is you know sort of a Elder Statesman of bouldering now for which is hard to believe hard to imagine but you're like man he has been at the highest level bouldering for like 15 years or something yeah I mean he was like winning ABS comps 15 years ago or more yeah Daniel if by some chance you're listening to this you have an open invitation to be on the podcast I've tried to reach out to he was really good too on on climing gold ni I was likeed I felt like I saw a lot of like you know personal growth or something I'm like oh Daniel you're really like it was pretty great let's talk about that so climbing gold the new Season's coming out soon tell me a little bit about the new season are there what's the topic or theme uh I don't know what the theme officially is I mean we're exploring a handful of fun different I mean I think in general in climbing gold we're trying to sort unearth some of the the great stories of climbing that may or may not have been been shared well enough so I mean like last season we did a deep dive in uh like the dope Lake Story the sort of uh the drug smuggling plane crash in such a movie script story what is a movie I mean you know it's that's Cliffhanger Cliffhanger yeah I mean it's but I mean just the fact that it's so nuts yeah yeah it's no it's I mean and that's the story that the deeper we got into it the more insane it was you're like and then what happened and who and why and you know there all weird conspiracy theories around it and a lot of them and then a lot of the people involved are all just total C CS you know they're like or or really the way to say it is that they're strong individuals that have lived their life on their own term you know you're like wow you are a you are a character you know it's like there's some interesting characters mhm so I think that the the fun of climbing gold is to unearth those kinds of stories and share them in a in a broad way yeah how do you decide what to do is that like a team effort are those your ideas or yeah it's a team effort and and I mean of course it's limited a little bit by availability it's like like can we find the person do we know their contact info it's like you know are we available on the right days and so you're always limited a little bit by who you can find and when and um because I mean we're not like investigative reporters you know we're not actually journalists but you know we're doing our best having a good time that's great I love it I love the show yeah who have been some of the people that have been the most fun or interesting for you personally to talk to on the show well in our first season we we talked to a lot of the just obvious climbing Legends and so you know I personally was was to talk to Peter Croft I was thrilled to interview ly Hill one of the ones that I really enjoy talking to uh that was sort of unexpected Delight was uh Joanna rosi who's um I think it was one of our first episodes but she and her husband did a lot of the new rooting in Las Vegas uh in Redrock and so I've climed tons of her roots and and as it turns out the roots that they've established wound up being most the most of the popular roots in Red Rock So On Any Given weekend you know there are dozens of parties climbing rootes that they put up over the last 30 years and they're still out developing and and it's just so rare especially in the 70s to have you know a lady developing 20 pitch routes and it was it's just amazing you know I was like oh you really took a different path and the fact that they were putting up sort of new school modern like nice well protected relatively comfortable routs like way back in the day like good for them you there's a reason that all the roots are super popular because they did a good job creating good roots it was anyway so it was a cool interview with them yeah that's awesome yeah do you think how long do you think you'll keep doing climbing gold does this feel you must enjoy it yeah it's fun talking to the people I will say the scheduling and the time is like I mean climbing gold is definitely the most amount of time and effort of anything I do probably okay like when you compare you know I mean because I I probably make you know a good portion of my living through corporate speaking and things like that where you like show up at some event you speak for an hour you get paid an absurd amount and then you go home I'm sort of like climbing gold is the opposite where you interview tons and tons of people it takes tons of time it's like hours spread out all the time it's like you constantly have a thing going on you basically don't get paid anything for it and whoops not paying you the the big bucks athletic greens and yeah ex yeah athletic greens yeah I mean they do um I mean obviously we have sponsors for the podcast and so the the podcast makes some money but the podcast also has you know producers and and like a team and people working on it and so like everybody's making a living and so and and you know I'm getting paid from it too but just compared to compared to like corporate yeah compared to to the money that that I personally can make through other things you know anything in the climbing world is just like when some Venture Capital firm asks you to come down and give a talk about you know achieving your potential or whatever you're like dude like like Venture Capital like they pay you know like it's not it's not freaking athletic greens right that makes perfect sense that makes perfect sense that gets insane and actually living in Vegas I I do a surprising amount of speaking on the Strip because uh Vegas is a huge uh sort of convention destination or or like sales kickoffs and like sales meetings and things like that so a lot of Industries have you know conventions where it's I don't know I've I've done stuff where it's like you wake up in the morning you drive down to the strip you speak to like 5,000 people on some insane thing you feel like Lady Gaga it's like these giant convention spaces and then you're home in time for lunch and it's like insanely well paid and you're just kind of like that was so chill you know it's like it's so easy compared to like I mean like doing the dope Lake interviews for for climbing gold uh you know bless their hearts but interviewing ston Masters online it's like just not that easy you know every every one of them is like wait so where's the button and what do you press now toally and so you know on your calendar you have it scheduled from like noon to one or noon to two you're going to do this talk but realistically it takes 25 minutes to like set things up sure and then you know a lot of the people have a lot to say so pretty soon you're sort of like okay we've now been chatting three hours realistically the climbing gold episodes we we edit quite a bit you know we're trying to tell a good story and so you can talk to somebody for two hours and you'll use like you know seven lines of the of the the material and it's important you know it's like they add an important voice to the story but you're like man it is a lot of time to get a few nuggets you know Pearls of Wisdom out of it like you can say nugget it's okay yeah yeah you just cut all my nuggets out I'll just write you send you an invoice later yeah yeah exactly like that was a lot of nuggets yeah it's gold nice yeah nice um would you guys ever put out uncut interviews I feel like that would be like a great like patreon thing or something for for climbing gold I don't know that would be a choice for the rest of the team yeah I'm sort of like I don't know would it be cheesy I'm like maybe you know the thing is that normally we're interviewing people sort of thematically though like about specific ideas that tie into some episode that we're talking about so we rarely do a comprehensive interview of a guest where it's like tell us about your childhood how did you get into climbing right and so I think that some of the things that we some of the interviews that we do if stand alone wouldn't be as interesting as you know it's not a deep dive into that person it's asking them about one specific experience yeah could still be cool but it's just a different format yeah I don't know you should talk to him about patreon okay I'll talk to lcy Okay I uh this is fun I have another I have another topic this was a bonus if we had enough time and and we're having fun here um big wall pooping stories this has been a hit on the podcast so far I've asked this of Jordan Cannon and Tommy Caldwell not to put you on not to put pressure on you but they both had great stories I I have better for sure perfect no I'm curious Tommy Tommy might have someone saying best or worst big wall pooping stories what have you got oh well I mean it depends let me hear some competition I I'll frame my uh like what was Tommy I'm trying to remember I remember he was like he was doing uh he's pooped on a wall so many times totally yeah he was doing something I can't remember exactly what he was climbing maybe it was when he did his double and he was doing ma um the Free Rider after doing magic mushroom or something but he uh he didn't know that Dean Potter was doing some like link up variation that hadn't been done yet so he like went over to the other side of this ledge and like pooped off this ledge thinking it was totally out of the way of everything and ended up being like right where Dean Potter like had to climb through on this like link up or whatever new he was doing or new variation he was doing yeah that would be the round table that's on the free router that's classic that's like next to his his poop that's classic yeah that's funny yeah no I have a bunch of uh pooping while free soing stories okay because nothing nothing loosens you up like like soling you're really sort of you know you're like oh I kind of need to poop you're like this is really scary um I'm like which I don't even know which one to start with they a bunch of like extreme I'm like and there's a recent one that's maybe almost too embarrassing not embarrassing but it's like a bit much I'm like is it for public consumption I've told all my friends it was insane you think it is I think it is okay so here's here's the story uh so this last fall I was uh working on the hert The Big Red Rock Traverse Hans ultimate Red Rock Traverse which actually um I think real rock is releasing a film of it in like next week or something or I don't know when this a is but so there should be a little like 30-minute film online of like doing this Traverse um but the but the Traverse was me doing all the Peaks and red rock I did like 14 class of grps blah blah blah whatever so like giant day but on this specific day I was uh just going up to do uh Crimson chrysis actually I was going to do the entire uh entire entire Rainbow Mountain Massie through the night so that's like Crimson chrysis over to the rainbow wall up the bird Hunter buttress across and down solar was like three classic routs up and over this mountain summoning a couple different things big hiking I thought it would take me about 5 hours of soing into the dark and I thought that when I did the whole Traverse I would get there at night time so i' had intentionally hiked in from the exit of Red Rock uh sort of near dark intending to do it all in the dark uh so it'd be more realistic for the ultimate Traverse that I was working on anyway uh some context I think I'd given myself Giardia earlier that season in Red Rock uh drinking untreated puddle water uh because it was really hot and there were a couple days where I W up doing much more than I expected and you're hiking on these Canyons there was a heavy Monsoon last summer so there was still some water in the canyon some places and some of the puddles look good anyway doesn't matter um but I had some things going on with my bowels which whatever then more condex because there was a lot of water there were it was crazy mosquito year so like at dawn and dusk there were like crazy dense mosquitoes out which which I didn't know existed in Red Rock i' never experienced it before but so all that to say so I ate dinner with my wife hiked into the Canyons at like sunsh it was hot I was like felt kind of gross cuz you're hiking uphill really quickly in extreme heat September in Vegas I was dying I got to Crimson was like oh I feel like I'm dying started salling this route which is a I don't know like an eight or 10 pitch eight plus but it's like really hard actually and it's like a blank face with no relief like there no Ledges there's no anything I was getting swarmed by mosquitoes the whole time getting eaten alive and basically two pitches from the summit I was like I'm going to [ __ ] my pants I was like oh no it's like very dire no ledge you're not standing on a ledg no no they're no like there aren't even Ledges to pop your shoes or anything it's like you're just on a blank face yeah and um and really like Smooth varnished Rock small hes you're sort of like it's like a really blank face and I was like and it was getting dark dark to the point where I need a headlamp soon and I was like basically I'm racing for the summit getting eaten alive by mosquitoes about to [ __ ] my pants and I was like I hope I make it to the top before I have to pull out my headlamp I mean it's fine I had a backpack on I could pull out my headlamp and do all that stuff but you would just be hanging there one-handed while you fish for your light and whatever I wanted to get at the top anyway maybe the last pitch I was like I'm not making it at the top I'm going to shoot my pant P right now I basically climbed the last pitch climbing a few moves basically like clamping to not [ __ ] myself and then being like if I move I sh like this is all a disaster anyway I want up making like two or three emergency moves off route to this like kind of one-handed jug pulled my pants down took a [ __ ] down like the side of the route off Route thankfully kind of fine all very watery very disastrous very Gardia total all bad news and you know eating a loud by mosquitoes it's dark I'm just hanging one-handed took this disaster poop and then couldn't really do any clean up cuz I mean I had TP in my backpack but you're kind of like so I wind up climbing the rest of the route with my pants around my ankles and just like and then made it to the top of the tower uh still with my pants off and then did my clean up and like dealt with things and you know it all wound up kind of fine but I was like oh it's nothing like the one-handed like literally just hanging on the side of a cliff one hand on a jug like taking a dump and you're like it was all it's all bit much it was very it's very embarrassing I was all sort of like this is really sad and so I almost bailed for the day cuz I was like this is not I was like cuz you go out so long hoping to have this heroic experience we like I feel like a boss and I was like I feel like a little kid that just [ __ ] his pants I was like this is really sad so I almost bailed and went home but then I was like well it's kind of even worse and so I wound up finishing the whole outing and it wound up fine but yeah it was sad thank you for sharing that yeah know just had to get off my chest you know no I've had a bunch of uh like you know hanging on poops while sing because there are a lot of places where like there's no ledge for three pitches or something and you're just kind of like well like it's time yeah um Jordan wanted me to ask you about [ __ ] P putting and where you stop to poop on your solo of LC cap well [ __ ] putting is just when you poop on a rock and then you hurl The Rock off which is pretty you know it's like a shot put but a [ __ ] put um I've done that all over the world on different Ledges tocks I mean in general that's a much better way because it leaves no impact for other climbers and it's cleaner and it's and it's fine you know especially if you're in like the middle of nowhere and um you know it's fine yeah don't don't don't do this off your local popular multi pitch yeah or don't do this like at a normal sport Cliff or you know it's it's like the the point is that it's better to hurl it into somewhere that no one will ever go if it's possible um yeah and then when I sold it I'll Capia I took an emergency dump sort of Midway also you did yeah yeah it's uh they didn't include in the movie surprisingly but but that was sort of poor form that I wind up just going down a chimney uh uh behind the Spire which is like not though I did go in a much better way because people do that occasionally when they're bivi there which is kind of poor form but it's because typically if you're roped up and you're doing that you kind of stop at a certain spot and it winds up like Landing I went like way lower and like way further in there and basically pooped into a spot where it's like gone okay um because you know because I was sing anyway so you're just kind of like get a pass while you're yeah and when that was kind of the thing I like it's way better to just go if you like if you feel like you even might need to you should definitely go because you know when you have the Crux of vcap above you you're sort of like you know this is the time yeah aside from cutting out stopping to take a poop in the middle of your solo were there any amazing scenes or moments that got cut out from that film oh I don't know I mean it was two years in my life it's like there's so much so much but anything that you wish had gotten in there no no I mean I would say that the movie Far exceeded any hopes or dreams I had for it really oh yeah it's so crazy I got to watch it on IMAX and you're like dude it's a movie about me sending the root that I'm most proud of in my life probably on IMAX you're like that's [ __ ] cool it's insane like the footage of a cap is insane like looks amazing everything about it you're like this is so cool yeah I remember my favorite part of that whole film I think you're driving into Yus and it's like you monologuing about like the warrior Spirit the Warrior Spirit that's that actually that audio came from Morocco um which there's a brief clip of uh the Morocco climbing in the film but it w up being mostly P roll and uh and then actually Jimmy has this new TV show and they so they used a lot of the Morocco footage as an episode for this new TV show like I think it's edge of the unknown but anyway um that whole Morocco thing Tommy and I did this hard link up and then I soled this wall and so I was there for 3 weeks but while I was there I was watching this show called Spartacus kind of like trashy like violent like nudity you know it's like Gladiators fighting and um it's like four seasons of it or something I think I watched like four seasons like we would just be sending all day and then I watch Sparticus and dudes cutting each other apart and then it's all kind of Hardcore but um but so I was like deeply into Warrior you know basically I was like oh this is so crazy it's like blood sport and then I was like oh solo is like modern blood sport in a way cuz like the whole entertainment Factor you know we're there're making a Hollywood movie and basically the central tension of the film is like will he die and you're like this is modern Blood Sport you know I was like this is like modern Gladiator stuff anyway so I was like all rambling about that and then all freaking made it in the movie and I was like this is a little embarrassing but like that's was fine but that's the problem is that when someone's recording you for two years you get all kinds of crazy [ __ ] and then you never know how they're going to use it yeah well I I like kind of got uh that's the thing a lot of well yeah a lot of people are really inspired by and like that's so incredible and I'm always a little like Oh I'm a little embarrassed by it I mean but I agree that if I was watching it if I wasn't the one that said I'd be like oh this is so inspiring CU like that's in the same way that you know I'm inspired watching Spartacus or whatever like you can draw inspiration from anything if it's like strikes the right cord right I mean it was it was specifically it wasn't about like the Warrior part of it necessarily it was I think you saying no one ever did anything epic while sitting like comfy on the couch you know yeah the commitment to Excellence like try hard do hard things yes yeah love yeah totally yeah yeah I'm my wife's always like but do you need to you know it's like like why not be comfortable has that changed for you having being more comfy yeah well having like s like the dream PR well yeah I mean I'm probably I'm definitely less hungry and like angst full about it I have less to prove um but I would say I'm probably I probably spend as many hours a we no that's probably not true I probably spend a fewer hours each week working on my climbing as well but part of that's just like having a kid and having a house and whatever but um no I'd say I'm just as committed to climbing as ever but I'm just a little less angst people about it and like you know yeah that's hard to say do you have a goal right now yeah well hopefully I'm going to send the Sport Pro tomorrow what you uh this new thing somebody bolted it's like a new Craig uh it's funny my friend and I were just trying it and uh we both we went back and forth on it three Burns each and we each burn be like okay you know we're going to like link from the middle to the top it's all good I don't like somebody the guy that bolted was like maybe it's 13B and then I tried and was like maybe it's 13 C and then we both got completely throttled like bunch of Burns and we're like maybe it's 13d we're like maybe it's you know basically we're just getting freaking worked and it's it's kind of a weird route where like the holds are pretty good but for whatever reason we just like can't freaking climb it and so we're like you know maybe it's pretty hard like we'll see but hopefully I can manage it tomorrow right on but that's not like a project I mean I've been trying it for a week or I've tried it a couple days now but um and then you know I tried something in the canyons there's like a new hard thing basically there's always like some stuff you know I always have a running list where it's like depending on the season depending on who's available yeah I'm doing a bunch of work travel the next couple weeks so I'm trying to intentionally not get too committed to any project because the reality is I won't be able to go work on it yeah um so I'm mostly focused on like having good sessions in the gym in the various places for the next couple weeks I that's fine what's the next trip that you're really excited about actually well I don't even have like any big trips coming up um I think we're gonna spend June in the PMW actually I think in Mama might climb on Washington Pass which I'm kind of psyched about cool Cu uh my wife's best friend's getting married so uh so we're going to be there anyway and so I might spend a couple weeks there and try to do some of the hard multi [ __ ] there nice so beautiful up there I'm pretty psyched by that because it's just like a new like a totally new area that I just haven't climbed in you try Mikey and sj's Route on Liberty Bell yeah so actually their older route um which I think did they maybe re a servant to Liberty or I'm not sure I think it was called a slave to Liberty and then they were like oh that's weird so they rebranded it but um I think that one I think is the only thing I have climbed on Liberty Bell and that was like one they put up five years ago or something and it was like 13B or something and then I think they now have a newer harder one and yeah I'd love to try it dark side of Li yeah Dark Side of Liberty yeah cuz it's on the Shady your face in the front or something um yeah no there a bunch of hard multi pitches up there I'm psych to we'll see what Partners you have but yeah but that's not like a trip you know it's just going to a wedding and trying some hard things wor there yeah and then there are couple potential things happen in the summer depending but it might be a TV thing it might be it's like we'll just we'll see how Stuff shapes up and we'll see but yeah otherwise no big uh no big no big things yeah we'll see I mean honestly I do a lot more work now and so my year is not and you have a child yeah and have a child and a wife and you know family and a bunch of other stuff yeah other other commitments and and time constraints but so I just don't have like a totally open calendar where it's like and then maybe I'll go to Road AR for six weeks and try my Pro it's like no it's way more like things have to fit on a calendar and right you know 10 15 years ago I was just living in the van by myself and you're kind of like oh it got kind of warm I'll just like go north for the next couple months like no like that those days are done but you know they might return in a few more years but yeah yeah do that with your family yeah yeah event I mean we just spent 5 weeks in France uh bouldering in font which is amazing I'm sort of like you know if I can have one or two things like that a year like that's that's that's great that's awesome yeah was that just a fun trip like did you have goals going into the trip or just trying to like enjoy a new area and doing lots of climbing no my main goal was to just not not suck which I'm like just try not to yeah try not to suck but I don't know I was like did I just hear a baby monitor I think I did it doesn't matter I was like I'm going to unplug that in case uh oh people came back there's a monitor on the floor right there okay gotcha we're almost done let's wrap up yeah okay let's do it what is something you wish people spent more time thinking about oh I don't know like like in general yeah could be anything maybe like environmental stuff you know it's like if you're going to choose one thing for everybody to think a little bit more about be like environmental impact and sort of like lifestyle choices like do you need that thing and like will that thing actually give you Joy and like is that is that the important thing in your life you know yeah like when you order food and stuff it's like would you intentionally choose to kill that creature you know it's like because there are a lot of things that are done to sort of by default and you know more intention never hurt more intention never hurt that's a nugget right there yeah that's a nugget right there that's really good well nice man um you have the hanold foundation uh where can people find you anything else do you uh what else do you have going on anything else you want people to know about Before I Let You Go I mean I'm like I think enough people have found me nobody needs to find me on anything but uh but no I mean if anybody's interested than check out the H foundation.org you know check out the news season climbing gold uh I mean shizel you know I have like a Disney Plus show coming out there's all kinds of like crazy [ __ ] like what is it doesn't freaking matter it's like oh it's all like I don't think anyone's hurting for for Alex hell content you know like I think there's enough [ __ ] out there it's it's freaking fine just go rewatch fre solo yeah I mean that's that's the best one yeah nice nice well man I really appreciate you doing this I get asked all the time if I've had you on um you have this baby bad in the monitor here let me unplug the the monitor real quick I think unplug okay it's how does it it has a life of its own you would think that if you just hold on the power button there we go nice about that obviously wife and baby are home wife and baby are home good time to wrap up but yeah I get asked all the time if I've had you on particularly by my parents friends who know nothing about climbing they're like have you had that Alex handhold guy on that like freehanded know the guy that freehanded Yellowstone and you're like oh man yeah I get that all the time like at corporate speaking and stuff people like yeah you're the guy that did the thing in Yellow Stone and you're like yeah close close enough yeah yeah freestyling yeah I do it all the time freestyling yeah really good rapper yeah he's off the cuff he's amazing but yeah I I can finally say yes so thank you um but no I I really it's really great to meet you I really appreciate you doing this I really enjoyed the conversation and I'm looking forward to the new season of climbing gold as well so did it thanks man yeah know my pleasure all right goodbye everybody bye cool

Channel: The Nugget Climbing Podcast

Views: 114,918

Keywords: Climbing, Rockclimbing, Bouldering, Outdoor Climbing, Adam Ondra, Magnus Midtbø, Emil Abrahamsson, WideBoyz, Pete Whittaker, Tom Randall, Tommy Caldwell, Aidan Roberts, Alex Megos, Hooper’s Beta, Lattice Training, Climbers Crag, Wedge Climbing, Hannah Morris Bouldering

Id: lNWDvX1MrUo

Length: 95min 28sec (5728 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 12 2024