Althouse: "Being up on the wall for over a week and the hard climbing Tommy and Kevin have done up until now adds an element of difficulty on top of the hard climbing they have to do."

January 6, 2015

"Being up on the wall for over a week and the hard climbing Tommy and Kevin have done up until now adds an element of difficulty on top of the hard climbing they have to do."

"Imagine performing your very best after not walking for one week. I know Tommy has made an effort to try and do stretching, pushups, (and) yoga in the (hanging tent) hoping this might combat the unusual circumstances of living like veal between their climbing."

60 comments:

madAsHell said...: It begs the question....Why??; 1/6/15, 11:16 AM
Anonymous said...: Having been there many times, just thinking about those climbers is terrifying. dumber than jumping out of perfectly good airplanes, that's for sure.

winter? frigid rock with ice on the surface?

My idea there it this time of year would be to sit on the balcony of the Ahwahnee till I decided to warm my a$$ in front of a roaring fire; 1/6/15, 11:23 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: It begs the question....Why??

Because it's there.; 1/6/15, 11:26 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: I'm surprised they're doing it in winter, but they're experienced, and have been planning it for years, so they must know something ( actually, quite a few things ) that I don't.; 1/6/15, 11:29 AM
sparrow said...: Vanity; 1/6/15, 11:37 AM
tim maguire said...: Tremendous views and I'm sure when they're done they'll have a lot of cache in climbing circles for having done it.

Don't see why it's news, though.; 1/6/15, 11:37 AM
Original Mike said...: "Vanity"

That's not it.; 1/6/15, 11:38 AM
sparrow said...: Then what's your take Mike?; 1/6/15, 11:43 AM
Curious George said...: "sparrow said...
Then what's your take Mike?"

Pussy.; 1/6/15, 11:45 AM
Mark Caplan said...: Evidently this doofus duo never heard of CGI.; 1/6/15, 11:54 AM
Henry said...: I'd like to see the colorful graph of what Tommy and Kevin do all day.

Work? Or Leisure?; 1/6/15, 11:55 AM
Magson said...: Reminds me of a story set on Kim Stanley Robison's "Green Mars" of a group of climbers going up the escarpment around the base of Olympus Mons. Something like a 10,000 meter cliff. Or maybe it was 15K. Either way, they were literally climbing into space, so they had to pack spacesuits as part of the gear they were hauling with them. And it was a months-long climb too.

My reaction to that as a short story was pretty much "I can't imagine anyone wanting to do something like that." Guess these guys proved me wrong.....; 1/6/15, 11:58 AM
Henry said...: It begs the question....Why??

It looks brutally difficult to me, but it is what they do for a living.

Why does Tom Brady throw footballs?; 1/6/15, 12:00 PM
Lyle said...: Don't look at the pictures!; 1/6/15, 12:00 PM
Original Mike said...: "Then what's your take Mike?"

I can't speak for other people, of course, but I've done some challenging outdoor things and I get an incredible sense of accomplishment. If it's dangerous, you also get an "I'm alive!" thrill when you're done. The first time I did an off-trail trip in the Canadian Rockies (we crossed over a mountain ridge from one river valley to another) we got in over our head and had to cross a steep rock face (backtracking was not a good option, because we would have had to cross the glacier that we had crossed the day before, and we didn't want to have anything more to do with that!). It was a scary crossing, but we got it done and I don't think I've ever felt so high as I did when we were climbing off that face. We also learned a valuable lesson; we were much better equipped on our next trip.

I wish I had the balls to do what they're doing (not to mention the youth).; 1/6/15, 12:04 PM
Rob said...: How exactly does one live like veal? Be fed milk and die young?; 1/6/15, 12:04 PM
traditionalguy said...: Daredevils are not that interesting. Even Houdini escapes are only interesting in a "how stupid are they? way.

If they did it to animals it would be called cruelty. Doing it to themselves is entertainment for masochists.; 1/6/15, 12:06 PM
lemondog said...: I like that ordinary looking people set out to accomplish extraordinary feats.

Wiki on Caldwell:

Caldwell, Beth Rodden, and fellow climbers John Dickey and Jason Smith were held hostage by rebels in Kyrgyzstan in 2000. Caldwell ended up pushing a lone captor off a cliff, which led to their escape to government soldiers.[2]; 1/6/15, 12:11 PM
sparrow said...: So it's adrenaline rush/thrill? I'm buying it, sounds plausible.; 1/6/15, 12:13 PM
furious_a said...: It begs the question....Why??

For the same reason(s) kids climb trees and water towers. Except taller and scarier. What's wrong with a little adventure?

Elite climbers are physical freaks like elite cyclists. I knew an expedition leader from Colorado who could do one-arm, two-finger pullups. Either arm.; 1/6/15, 12:18 PM
Original Mike said...: "So it's adrenaline rush/thrill? I'm buying it, sounds plausible."

The danger part is. More important (for me, at least) is the sense of accomplishment. What I enjoyed on my wilderness trips was the planning, the hardware, and the acquisition of a more and more refined set of skills. It's fun getting good at something, and in this case that skill allows you to see some very beautiful landscape.; 1/6/15, 12:28 PM
furious_a said...: so they must know something ( actually, quite a few things ) that I don't.

According to local guides the Jan-Feb weather in the valley is more predictable, albeit colder, than in the summer. Something about the cooler San Joaquin Valley weather minimizing local mtn weather effects, or something.

Also greater lightning risk in the warmer months. Those domes are natural lightning rods.; 1/6/15, 12:30 PM
Ann Althouse said...: I get scared just looking at the photos.

The one with them relaxing in the tent is so weird.; 1/6/15, 12:34 PM
kjbe said...: I read that their hands will sweat too much in the summer for decent hand holds.; 1/6/15, 12:36 PM
furious_a said...: The one with them relaxing in the tent is so weird.

Not recommended for sleepwalkers.; 1/6/15, 12:46 PM
tim maguire said...: If you want to be scared by a photograph of a crazy height:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/s-repairman-light-bulb-1-500-foot-tv-antenna-article-1.2066017; 1/6/15, 12:59 PM
kjbe said...: fascinating.; 1/6/15, 1:40 PM
John Scott said...: Traditionalguy wrote,
"Daredevils are not that interesting..."

What kind of blanket BS statement is that? I'm a hang glider pilot and I fly with a lot of interesting guys. One person I know is a test pilot for Virgin Galactic (he wasn't flying the day of the tragic accident), another is a professional juggler, finishing second one year on Americas Got Talent. One of our fellow pilots owns the company that came up with the idea for the first down line you see on the field at football games. Later he and another pilot would prove that you can design a vehicle to go straight downwind faster than the wind itself.

Here's how I spent New Years what about you?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQzAtdDpcsM; 1/6/15, 1:55 PM
Blue@9 said...: Lol.

Unsurprising reactions:

Wow, I can't imagine doing this or imagine why anyone would want to do this, because I don't want to do it. They must be morons or just vain.; 1/6/15, 2:14 PM
Larry J said...: madAsHell said...
It begs the question....Why??

Perhaps they want to be the best at what they do. Is that a bad thing? Perhaps it's the sense of achievement from overcoming an extreme challenge. Is that a bad thing? Perhaps they want to live their lives to the fullest. Is that a bad thing?

Have we become so adverse to danger as a society that we aren't willing to let others do dangerous things that we wouldn't dare try ourselves? Are we becoming (or already are) a nation of pussies?; 1/6/15, 2:56 PM
David said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 1/6/15, 3:32 PM
khesanh0802 said...: I always think this type of climber has a bit of a death wish. They are going to keep testing themselves until, unfortunately, they find the limit of their ability.

These two seem uncommonly rational about the whole thing. It certainly is a tremendous physical and mental challenge and I wish them success.; 1/6/15, 3:34 PM
David said...: Living like veal?

Veal doesn't live. Calves live. And die. These guys may be in more trouble than they think.; 1/6/15, 3:35 PM
jr565 said...: This whole stunt reminds me of the old joke about cliff diving as a sport "There are only 2 categories in cliff diving: ' Grand Champion' & 'Stuff on a Rock.

Let's hope they don't end up as "stuff on a rock"; 1/6/15, 3:45 PM
Mary Beth said...: Both update their Facebook pages regularly and tweet from the Dawn Wall, which has been called 'as smooth as alabaster, as steep as the bedroom wall.'

Are bedroom walls steeper than any others? It's been called this by whom? I tried to Google it but the only results were all news stories about it. I thought "bedroom" might have been a PC substitution for "harem" but I couldn't find it using that word either.; 1/6/15, 3:53 PM
William said...: I don't think this will catch on as a sport. Nonetheless, within five years the stunt will be repeated and their time will be beaten. But eventually the sport will die out--and I'm not necessarily speaking metaphorically.......Does anyone remember who holds the flagpole sitting record?; 1/6/15, 4:42 PM
jiri said...: I'm not gonna lie, William, I don't think you understand what they're doing. There's a short film on YouTube from a few years ago that explains it better than the Times.

Khesahn, the Dawn Wall isn't hugely dangerous. They'll push themselves until they find something they can't do, but failure isn't that dangerous. This is (hopefully) the culmination of ten years of work. Alpine climbing is what's dangerous.; 1/6/15, 4:55 PM
madAsHell said...: To paraphrase Bear Bryant: "There are only two possible outcomes, and one of them is very bad"; 1/6/15, 5:32 PM
Anonymous said...: jiri said...
They'll push themselves until they find something they can't do, but failure isn't that dangerous. This is (hopefully) the culmination of ten years of work. Alpine climbing is what's dangerous.

Unless of course when they ultimately miss a hold and fall till the safety line catches, the swing bounces somebody's (helmetless) head into 100 MT of rock, or an 8 ounce rock flakes off the cliff two hundred feet higher and slices a skull in half. Not that dangerous, though Alpine has a lot more variables.; 1/6/15, 7:28 PM
wildswan said...: These days they (the kids) like to do things like running, camping and mountain climbing with less equipment. I have a niece who ran up a Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire barefoot. She got to the top first too, passing, as she said, overloaded expeditions with heavy clunky shoes.; 1/6/15, 8:12 PM
L Day said...: Jiri is right. Alpine climbing is what's really dangerous, not that big walls aren't dangerous. There have been many, many deaths on El Capitan, but these guys are professionals in every sense of the word. They try their best to control every variable. They train like mad men. I know Tommy Caldwell and he certainly is one of the fittest climbers in the world. One arm pullups? All day long. One finger pullups? No problem, any finger, except with his left hand, I believe. He'll only be able to do pullups with the remaining fingers on that hand. He cut off a couple some years back with a power saw. Why attempt this route in the winter? For greater friction, both with hands and feet. "The Valley" gets hot as hell in the summer, hands sweat, and no amount of chalk can give the kind of friction that chalked hands in cold weather provide. Even the sticky rubber on their shoes works much better when it's cool. Why do they do it? Because it's fun! Really! No Shit! They are also hyper-competitive individuals, on par with any pro athlete in any sport. Death wish? Not a chance. By now Tommy has had thousands of opportunities to die. These guys love life and live it to it's fullest. If you haven't been on a wall before, you really can't imagine what it's like. Something that's not apparent from these photos is just how impossibly small the holds are on this route. The Dawn Wall has never been climbed "free". It's only been done as an aid route to this point. Some Idea of the difficult? Take one of many "cruxes", re-create it on a gym wall. You probably don't know anyone, no matter how fit, how strong, who could get both feet off the ground.; 1/6/15, 8:44 PM
L Day said...: I shouldn't trust my memory. It was his left index finger, just above the second knuckle. Doctors were able to reattach it, but it got in his way after that, so he had it removed.; 1/6/15, 8:53 PM
B said...: This sounds like the guys that climb Everest without oxygen. You're doing something hundreds of others have done, just making it slightly harder. You're still going to be completely forgettable.; 1/6/15, 10:07 PM
L Day said...: It might sound like semantics to non-climbers, but I'll try to explain what's going on here. Most everyone that climbs a big wall on El Capitan, (way more than 99% of climbers) employ quite a bit of "aid" on the route. Aid climbing is when the climber makes upward progress by pulling up on gear that they place (usually in cracks). That is they drive in a piton, or place some other piece of gear in a crack, clip a set of "aiders" (sling steps) to the piece they've placed and climb the steps, place another piece, clip in the "aiders" and climb higher. Tedious as hell, it's a LOT harder than it sounds. They'll climb some fraction of the entire route "free". That is, the gear they place, and the ropes they use are there to catch the climber when he falls, not aid upward progress. No pulling up on gear, no standing in slings. Just climbing like more or less like a monkey would climb a tree, using natural holds only, not grabbing gear. What Tommy has been doing for years now is methodically "freeing" aid routes on El Cap. Most climbers that employ aid, that would be almost every last one of them, take three to five days to climb El Capitan, with some routes demanding ten days or more of effort to climb about 3,000 feet or vertical granite. Tommy once climbed two routes on El Cap, just under 6,000 feet in total in under 24 hours. All free. There's not anywhere close to one in a thousand climbers, that could do something like that.; 1/6/15, 10:32 PM
L Day said...: Sorry about the horrible punctuation, etc., in the piece above.; 1/6/15, 10:35 PM
Jane the Actuary said...: So what I can't figure out is this: is it really just the two of them, pulling up the equipment along with them? Or is there an unseen support crew, providing all the necessities but just not doing the freehand climbing? (Like how Bear Gryllis has the camera crew with him as he "survives" by himself.); 1/6/15, 10:42 PM
Original Mike said...: Thanks for the explanation, Larry.; 1/6/15, 10:50 PM
jiri said...: Jane, the answer is yes. Tommy and Kevin are doing all the work, but they do have a camera crew with them.

So they aren't alone, obviously, but they don't have people behind the scenes greasing the skids. They need the film to pay for the next project.

Kevin did a series of short films last year (when they would have completed the wall, probably, without the government shutdown and a rib injury Tommy suffered while falling gear). They're quite good, look them up.

B, it's more like climbing Everest without oxygen the first time. I don't know everyone who's done it but I damn sure know Reinhold Messner.; 1/6/15, 10:53 PM
jiri said...: I wish I could edit that post. Tommy hurt his ribs while hauling gear. The perils of mobile.; 1/6/15, 10:57 PM
L Day said...: Jane, This undertaking is a rather large production, with photographers and videographers hanging from ropes parallel to the climbers. It is my understanding that friends "drop in" for visits, perhaps bringing some edible delicacy or such with them. I do not know just how much, if any, help they have had from others with the total work load. On a typical ascent of a big wall the work load is murderous, and the climbers do everything for themselves. One will most likely leave the ground hauling a hundred lbs. or so of gear and be limited to two quarts of drinking water per person per day, simply because water is so damned heavy. The dawn wall climbers won't be doing it like that. They must have plenty to drink, plenty to eat, and nice warm sleeping bags, wall tents, etc. in order to maintain their strength. Most likely hundreds of lbs of gear, food and water in total. I would be surprised if they don't have friends volunteering as "sherpas". The level of technical difficulty is so extreme that I think they've only imposed two rules. 1) The final ascent of the route must be in a single push from the ground, no going down to rest and recoup. 2) All pitches must be climbed free, even though they will likely fall many times on some of the pitches before they finally "free" the pitch.; 1/6/15, 11:13 PM
L Day said...: One can place all climbing on a continuum between adventure at one end and sport at the other end. Not to say there isn't a lot of adventure involved, but this is way, way over on the "sport" end of things.; 1/6/15, 11:15 PM
L Day said...: Jiri, Really? They're hauling all the water they'll drink? That's a hell of a lot of work to do on top of how hard the climbing is. I was just guessing that they might have some help with the hauling. I really can't stand to read the articles in the press because the writers are generally so clueless as to what's actually going on that you can't take what they write seriously.; 1/6/15, 11:23 PM
Alex said...: madAsHell said...
It begs the question....Why??

Because it's there.

Spock asked Kirk the same question in Star Trek V when he climbed El Capitan. "Because it's there".; 1/7/15, 12:06 AM
Anonymous said...: As a former boy climber of anything I could get a foothold on, I am envious. Sleeping on the side of a rock wall sounds like fun. I wonder what sounds you hear at night.; 1/7/15, 4:14 AM
jiri said...: Larry, I guess I wouldn't be surprised if their supplies are in a common pool with those of the camera crew. They're all friends. It's not a sherpa situation, where the climbers climb and the support crew dots all the dirty work. As I said, Tommy hurt himself last year when a haul hook failed, causing one of the bags to drop a few hundred feet, wrenching on his harness hard enough to separate arib from his sternum. They're definitely doing lots and lots of work. On a project like this climbers will take days before starting to haul supplies into place.; 1/7/15, 4:31 AM
L Day said...: Not to diminish the effort in any way, but here's something I came across. "The duo are not alone on their journey. There's a team tagging along, bringing batteries, food and more."

"It's a bit like an expedition, like an expedition going up Everest in that way. We have a base camp; we have porters," Caldwell says.

So, yeah, they're getting lots of help and they've been working on the route for years, preparing themselves, and the route for their ascent. That's the way it goes when you're pushing limits, style suffers, but a new standard of difficulty is established.

Once upon a time, I climbed El Capitan via a route known as the Nose. It was considered the greatest, and hardest rock climb in the world at the time of it's first ascent and took months of work to establish. My partner and I simply lugged our gear to the base of the first pitch, a somewhat death defying exercise in itself, then started up. After five days of climbing, mixed free and aid, and hauling, exhausted and dehydrated, we stood on top. Tommy did this route (after a bit of practice) and the Salathe Wall in less than 24 hours, nearly 6,000' of the world's hardest rock climbing, all free. The man is simply amazing.; 1/7/15, 7:10 AM
Rusty said...: Ignorance is Bliss said...
I'm surprised they're doing it in winter, but they're experienced, and have been planning it for years, so they must know something ( actually, quite a few things ) that I don't.

Until there's a fuckup and somebody fall off the mountain and the taxpayers are stuck for the bill.
It's all fun and games until the state police send a helicopter to lift out the body.; 1/7/15, 8:58 AM
Larry J said...: Until there's a fuckup and somebody fall off the mountain and the taxpayers are stuck for the bill.
It's all fun and games until the state police send a helicopter to lift out the body.

I don't know about this particular place but in many locations, climbers pay a fee that goes into a search and rescue pool. The taxpayers don't get stuck with the bill.; 1/7/15, 9:22 AM
Rusty said...: Larry. I'm willing to bet that it doesn't come any where near covering the rescue/recovery of a bunch of yahoos wandering around the mountain wilderness.
Not only that, but when the body/bodies can't be recovered there is a surprise to anyone wandering around when the snow melts.; 1/7/15, 1:41 PM
Larry J said...: Rusty said...
Larry. I'm willing to bet that it doesn't come any where near covering the rescue/recovery of a bunch of yahoos wandering around the mountain wilderness.

Your insurance premiums by themselves won't pay the cost of most claims. That's why insurance companies poll premiums from many customers and go with probability to set premiums. Sure, the fees each individual climber pays won't pay for a serious search & rescue effort but if you have hundreds of climbers paying the fees and only a few needing to be rescued, it can be enough to cover the expenses. If it isn't, raise the fees.; 1/8/15, 1:05 PM