Climbing Magazine

The first time I tried to climb a new route on Half Dome, I couldn’t even get to the base. Snow melted on my haul bag and dripped down onto the back of my rain pants as I hiked. I’d drawn the hood on my rain jacket and counted water droplets as they poured off the blue brim that framed my view. Eight miles into a 16-mile day, I’d reached the subdome, where the granite monolith breaks out of the trees into the sky. A day hiker would continue up to the cables and the summit. But instead of followi

Let me guess: You’ve been doing pull-ups religiously for the last year. Two sessions a week, sets of five to 10, right? Maybe you’ve even added a few extra reps since you started and surpassed a few friends in the exercise. On paper, you’re getting stronger. But when you get on the wall or on rock,especially the steep stuff, nothing feels different. The same moves that felt hard for your upper body three months ago still feel hard now. You feel stuck. This is an extremely common frustration in c

“Padhega toh kuch banega,” Dorje Morup would often say. “Study, and you’ll make something of yourself” is the translation from Hindi. Three decades later, they’re still the first words his eldest son hears when he thinks of his father. In 1996, Morup left for Mount Everest and never returned. For years, an unidentified male body on Everest’s Northeast Ridge was known simply as “Green Boots,” after the neon green Koflach boots he wore. Tucked beneath a limestone over

Jake Whisenant, 30, August 2 Speed climber, first ascensionist, FKT’er, route developer, ski mountaineer, peak bagger, cyclist, surfer, fruit forager, chef, DJ, son, friend, brother, fiancé. Somehow Jake managed to be all of the above. When the sudden and indifferent tidal wave of cataclysmic loss sweeps over your life, it is all too easy to believe the world has cruelly and unfairly betrayed you as punishment for a crime you did not commit. But Jake never took the easy route. The hard route—the

Nawang Thindu Sherpa’s lifeless body lay trapped at around 19,000 feet on the lower flanks of Broad Peak, where an avalanche had deposited him days earlier. A few hundred meters below, his friends Pem Dorje Sherpa and “Speed” Dawa Sherpa kicked steps into the steep snow of the broad couloir, fixing a rope behind them that they hoped would eventually help them lower his body back to Base Camp, and from there, on home to his family. This was their second attempt to reach him on Pakistan’s 26,414-f

Aside from the holographic line blazing up the route in front of him, it was a rather normal day at the crag for Ben Pearman. Catching a brief weather window in the chilly Rockies spring, he and two friends headed for Kahl Wall (5.10-), a classic trad climb up the steep limestone of Mount Yamnuska in Alberta. As they approached, Pearman thought back to his first time climbing the mountain—which is notorious for difficult route-finding—via a different route known as the King’s Chimney (5.7 PG13).

A certain recent documentary has exposed the general public to Dean Potter’s wild hair and wilder eyes, revealing what we freaky climbers have known for decades: Dirtbags are hot. They’re totally shredded, intimidatingly obsessive, and even their body odor is doing it for you. Maybe that’s because it reminds you of a drunken night in the Valley that left you short a quarter ounce of weed, but rich in memories that are even more X-rated than your average J Tree folly. Luckily, even the most Luddi

I felt an overwhelming urge to go big when I hiked into the Bugaboos’ towering granite spires earlier this summer. Perhaps more than I ever have in my entire life. My motivations were impure, colored with the sharp pencil of angst. The following week marked the beginning of a prolonged and painful new chapter for me: I was confronting a longstanding shoulder pain with surgery. It would be a year before I could climb in my beloved home range again. My climbing partner Adam and I had stacked our o

Last week, young European speed climbers descended on St. Pölten, Austria, for the second World Climbing Europe Youth Series competition this year. But the competition soon gained attention from far beyond speed enthusiasts, with many accusing the male commentator of stereotyping female athletes as lazy and unmotivated. Since then, many climbers have criticized the sexist commentary, with some women even posting training videos on Instagram with the remarks as audio, highlighting their obvious f

The list of noteworthy female free solos in history is remarkably short. That’s not entirely surprising since study after study demonstrates that men take more risks than women. While the list of men who have free soloed routes of 5.11 and up is quite long, we could find only three women who have climbed that grade or higher without a rope. Now, a fourth woman has joined the list. On May 3, Aleksandra “Ola” Taistra made a ropeless ascent of Alfredo Alfredo (7a/5.11d), a limestone line up Monte O

I was up in the Flatirons, Colorado, recently with my buddy Andy, belaying him on the legendary sport route Slave to the Rhythm (a nod to the Grace Jones album). We chatted between burns about the route’s history, including how the first ascensionist, Dan Michael, gave all the extruded cobbles funny names—e.g., “the Skinhead”—and nailed a piece of wood to a tree to warm up on. Back in 1987, this was visionary stuff: Previously, we had this bizarre idea that you should just show up to your projec

From weird fixed horns that climbers commonly mis-rig, to general SERENE violations, to highly questionable toprope setups, we love taking a look at your anchors. Our goal is to provide informed insights about the anchor submissions we receive from which our readers can learn from. We also aim to foster productive conversations around anchors among the climbing community, whether you leave a comment on our story and pose a question on an Instagram post. Whether it’s an unusual fixed anchor

This article was originally published on April 17, 2025. Since then, Parker has created about 100 pairs of Pronks and shipped them to climbers across North America. He currently has a 70-person waitlist and plans to bring it cobbling and sewing help soon to expand his capacity. In late March 2025, in Salt Lake City, in the same garage where he spent two years training for the hardest offwidth in the world, 34-year-old Danny Parker turns away from his work bench and holds up a hot pink shoe. I’ve

A few weeks ago, I went to England for Climb Festival, a deep water soloing competition and party hosted by The North Face that has previously occurred in San Francisco, Shanghai, and New York. This year, the fest took place at London’s Canary Wharf. In addition to yours truly, a couple other representatives from climbing media showed up. But most of the journalists were from mainstream or fashion publications, like New York Magazine, Bustle, and V-Man. So on the morning before the festival, whe

I grew up in a gym. I learned my first curse words on a chalky, sweat-stained gym mat. I got my first tattoo with the friends I did four-by-fours with. First boyfriend, even.  If there’s one thing that has held true over my years of cramming my feet into tiny, downturned rock shoes for the sake of performance, it’s that breaking in shoes sucks. Every time, no getting around it, a horrible experience. During one gym session, a friend said she’d pay to have someone break in her shoes for her. We w

Three new maps created by the Outdoor Alliance with insights from Access Fund shed light on how the recent reduction of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments could impact climbers. On July 13, the Trump administration released a proclamation that reduced Bears Ears National Monument by 91% and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by over 90%. These sudden cuts exceeded Trump’s 2017 cuts, which slashed Bears Ears by 85% and Staircase-Escalante by 47% before Biden ulti

  Illustration by Mike Clelland One way to move faster on long routes Short-fixing is an experts-only technique that essentially separates a climbing team into two roped soloists via a knot at an anchor, allowing the climbers to move simultaneously. It’s most commonly used on one-day ascents of big walls, or to speed up the process during multi-day ascents. Don’t confuse short-fixing with simul-climbing, when both climbers move together, without the rope fixed to an anchor in between. When

Roofer When I was 18 and out of high school I landed what I figured was the perfect job for a climber: roofing. Besides working outside where you get a free “hardening” by the elements—rain, wind, temperatures exceeding 100 and down to zero—being a roofer acclimates you to heights and danger. Carrying 80-pound bundles of shingles up a tall ladder from dawn to dusk is a training bonus. When I was a roofer, the boss even had a fun contest for us “maggots” to see who could carry the most shingles a

Progressing from weekend cragging to long alpine routes can be intimidating for anyone, even strong and competent traditional climbers. While the most valuable knowledge is gleaned from experience, there’s plenty of real-world advice to learn beforehand. Alpinist Scott Bennett has many years of experience in the mountains and on rock, from the first ascent of the 2,000-meter North Pillar Sit Start (5.11) on Patagonia’s Fitz Roy to a five-tower link-up (in a day) in Castle Valley, Utah. Here, he

This morning, the World Climbing Association voted to block a motion on suspending Israel’s national climbing federation, the Association for Sport Climbing and Mountaineering in Israel (ILCA), from international competition. More than 70 national climbing federations attended the virtual General Assembly on July 23 dedicated to geopolitical issues, where members were additionally scheduled to vote on suspending the Belarusian and Russian federations. On July 8th, the final day to introduce amen