Soviet Speed
This year's Olympic climbers weren’t the original USA climbing team. That honor actually goes to a rag-tag group of adventurous dirtbags including Beth Wald, Russ Clune and Todd Skinner, who managed to travel to the USSR at the tail end of the Cold War to compete in a one of a kind climbing competition.
Image: Beth Wald Collection
Validate My Beta
Were the Olympics more a bust than a boom? If you had $20 million to grow the sport of climbing how would you spend it? Are we at the end of the era where we climb alongside the pros? The Climbing Gold Team takes a look back at the learnings from season 2 and looks into the future of our sport.
Image: Ben Neilson
The Knife’s Edge
These are the things in the shadows that no one wants to talk about. The open secrets elite athletes carry. The behaviors coaches would prefer not to see. The hard realities fans tend to ignore about the sport playing out in front of them. Today, Kai Lightner and Beth Rodden help us shine a light on disordered eating in climbing.
Image: Julyanna Carvalho
Show Me The Money
As climbing grows and enters into mainstream consciousness, we’d be naive to think that money won’t play a role. What does it take to “go pro” in climbing? How does the business of climbing evolve so that it doesn't fall into the same pitfalls that plague other sports? We dive into these questions with Rick Burton, a professor at Syracuse University Professor and Jonathan Retseck, founder of RXR Sports.
The Competitor’s Mind
What goes through a climber’s brain when the lights shine and the cameras go live at a world cup stop? Ashima Shiraishi takes us on a journey into the heart and mind of a true competitor.
Image: Jimmy Chin
Risk, Intensity, Complexity
To move a sport forward, you have to take it apart and put it back together again. Today, we talk with two thought leaders in climbing’s next chapter -- routesetters Tondé Katiyo and Adam Pustelnik -- about the craft of creating movement and we introduce a concept every climber should know about.
Image: Alvi Pakarinen
Forerunner
Right now, the spotlight shines brightly on the newest generation of competition climbers, but the path they’re following was blazed by those before them. Today, we talk with Alex Johnson, or AJ, who has ridden the highs and lows of professional climbing over the last 20 years. She won her first bouldering national competition at age 12 before going on to win two golds at Bouldering World Cups. Her career charts a fascinating shift in climbing culture, the comp circuit and the hurdles to being a professional climber.
Image: Susanica Tam
Inadmissible
Armando Menocal worked to save climbing in America and helped kickstart it in Cuba. While developing the international climbing destination of Viñales, Armando met the love of his life. They planned to get married, but the Cuban government had other ideas.
Olympics Recap
After four days of alpine starts to watch climbing at the Olympics, Alex and Fitz catch up with producers John Burgman and Leici Hendrix for a laugh-filled breakdown of the good, the bad and the ugly. Ultimate fandom. Cable subscriptions. Math on the fly.
Image: Bree Robles
Space Race
In 2019, The US Olympic Committee gave USA Climbing a one in 10,000 chance of winning a medal. Two years later, USA Climbing sent four climbers to Tokyo. Americans are winning World Cup competitions like never before. What happened? The sleeping giant woke up.
Image: Bree Robles
Try Harder
When it comes to the Olympics, we will probably never see a climbing competitor like Kyra Condie again. While other competitors in Tokyo have had the benefit of robust, government-funded national programs or boutique climbing teams, 23-year-old Kyra has spent the better part of a decade as her own coach and trainer while navigating the highest levels of international competition.
Image: Bree Robles
Olympics Viewing Guide
Alex and producer John Burgman walk us through the upcoming competition, make their picks for the gold and explain why the world’s best climber is probably the underdog.
Image: Bree Robles
You’re Too X-Treme For Me
The decades long courtship between the Olympics and climbing reads like some bizarro script for a rom com. It seemed like a sure fire thing until curling got in the way. Alex and Fitz interview John Burgman, author of High Drama and an expert on competition climbing. We breakdown climbing’s journey to make its Olympic debut.
Chapter 10: Room For Growth
Is climbing defined by adventure or athleticism? How does a sport grow and evolve? Alex and Fitz discuss these questions and other nuggets as they reflect on the first part of the series. And we reveal one of Alex’s pet peeves.
Image: Austin Siadak
Chapter 09: Untelling The Story
Ship Rock. The Totem Pole. Spider Rock. Just because it’s there doesn’t mean we should climb it. We dive into the troubled relationship between climbers and tribes and take apart an inaccurate story the climbing community has been telling itself for decades. Climbers Aaron Mike, Len Necefer and Tara Kerzhner help brush away the chalk to reveal a deeper story.
Image: Isaiah Branch-Boyle.
Bit Of Gold Bonus: Fricking Stanley
Sean “Stanley” Leary never got a lot of media attention, but he was a driving force in the progression of the sport and beloved by the climbing community. He held numerous speed records in Yosemite, pioneered new routes on Baffin Island and was on the leading edge of wingsuit flying. Alex shares some of his memories of climbing with Stanley.
Image: Cedar Wright
Chapter 08: Give And Take
After a protracted battle over bolts and sport climbing, American climbers nearly lost the ability to climb on public lands in the early 1990s. It would have completely altered the course of our sport. Fortunately, lawyer and climber Armando Menocal rose to the challenge of protecting climbing for generations to come, despite the fact that many climbers hoped he would fail. We take a peek into the early days of the Access Fund and Leici Hendrix adds perspective on the importance of local climbing organizations.
Image: Armando Menocal Collection
Chapter 07: This Place Will Change Climbing
As climbing gyms become a global crag of sorts, how do we welcome people in? Do climbing gyms become a country club or the mechanism for broadening our community and unleashing a wave of new talent into climbing? Memphis Rox has redrawn the model for what a climbing gym can be. Designed to be more than just a state of the art climbing gym, it is a not-for-profit community center located in the heart of Memphis, TN. Photographer Malik Martin and industry veteran Jon Hawk bring us ideas on the future of our sport with a little help from Conrad Anker.
Image: Malik Martin
Bit Of Gold Bonus: Pizza Party
Beth Rodden inspired a generation of climbers with her incredible free ascents of El Cap and hard trad climbs. Her leap into that realm began at an impromptu pizza party hosted by Lynn Hill. When a living legend asks you to ditch university and come to Madagascar, the only answer is “Yes.”
Image: Jeremiah Watt
Chapter 06: When Climbing Takes Flight
By the mid 2000’s climbing was growing, but the ephemeral first ascents were harder to find. Enter BASE jumping. The leaders of our sport stepped to the edge and jumped into the golden age of human flight. With it, a whole new element of risk arrived in climbing. We talk with Randy Leavitt, Chris McNamara and Steph Davis, who helped pioneer the movement.
Image: Ian Mitchard