![]() Then climbers started climbing things harder than 5.10d, and we turned the dial to 11. However, as climbers got better, it became obvious that the scale had to keep getting harder, so we ended up with 5.10a, 5.10b, 5.10c, 5.10d. Initially, the easiest climbs were rated 5.0 and the hardest climbs were supposed to be 5.10. In the US, climbers measure the pure gymnastic difficulty of a route using the Yosemite Decimal System (YDS). When projecting a route, climbers take dozens of falls as they work out the sequence of moves that will work for them. With a safety rope, climbers can try harder things when they are free climbing instead of free soloing. Notice the belayer behind her managing the ropes she uses for protection and the gear near her left hand. Emily Harrington free climbing Golden Gate (5.13 VI, 41 pitches) on El Capitan. Depending on the features of the rock available for the climber to grab, this can be relatively easy, or nearly impossible. The ropes catch the climber if they fall, but all the climbing is done by pulling or pushing on the rock itself. Free climbingįree climbing is climbing with ropes but without using those ropes for upward progress. However, people are often confused because climbers also talk about free climbing and soloing. These are very different styles that both involve ropes, and are much more common in general and particularly on big walls like El Capitan. Free soloingįree soloing – the style that Honnold recently made famous, means an ascent that is done alone without any ropes for protection/safety. There are different styles of climbing and the climber lingo to describe them often confuses people. Image Erik Sloan/ Aid, Free, Solo and Free Solo – what’s the difference? Climbing routes on the right side of El Capitan’s southwest face. These range from relatively straight-forward beginner big walls like The Salathe Wall to desperate expert-only scare-fests like The Tempest, and from famous climbs like The Nose that often have multiple climbing parties on it at once to routes that haven’t even seen a second ascent. Roughly a third of Yosemite Bigwalls: The Complete Guide is devoted to the climbing equivalent of trail maps for El Capitan, each route with its own name. ![]() Climbing Routesįirst of all, there are different routes on El Capitan. However, “hard” can take on a lot of different forms and there is a lot of nuance in the way that different people approach the goal of getting to the top. So many ways to Climb El CapitanĬlimbing El Cap is hard (really hard) no matter how you do it. In some ways what Alex did is the most mind-blowingly difficult thing to do, but there are other styles of climbing El Cap that are much harder in other ways.Īnd although this compelling story rightfully captured the minds and hearts of people all over the country it sits in context of one inspiring story after another that plays out on the steep walls of El Capitan. ![]() He climbed El Capitan without safety ropes, putting himself intentionally into a “you slip, you die” situation that goes on for one tenuous pitch after another for 3000 feet (900 m).īut that isn’t the only way to climb El Capitan. It is the portrait of a straight-speaking, dedicated rock climber with incredible mental control who managed to do what was previously thought impossible. The process of preparing and executing that dream was made into the Oscar-winning National Geographic documentary, Free Solo, by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi. Seriously, even if you’re not a climber, go and watch this film right now.Climbing El Capitan stole the national spotlight with Alex Honnold’s death-defying free-solo climb on “El Cap”. This exhilarating accomplishment was captured by filmmaker Jimmy Chin and documented in the must-watch movie Free Solo, which is at the top of our list of best climbing films. On June 3, 2017, Yosemite climber Alex Honnold climbed El Cap via the Freerider line without the use of ropes or any other protective equipment in three hours and 56 minutes. While quite a few hardy climbers have now free climbed El Capitan, only one person has free soloed El Cap at the time of writing this article. El Cap is so massive it can be difficult to see climbers on it with the naked eye (Image credit: Cavan Images)
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