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OK, so America right now is, basically, the second season of The Walking Dead. We know how to kill the enemy, but somehow we still keep getting eating by the zombies. Welcome to the apocalypse, fuckers, only this apocalypse means, no more Moon Boarding at your local gym, and no more climbing at your favorite crag.
Climbing is canceled.
This is Andrew Bisharat, and I’m here as always with my smoking hot albeit remote cohost Chris Kalous, and today we’re practicing our social distancing podcasting etiquette while speaking to Fabrizio Zangrilli, a climber, mega alpinist, and, most importantly, the founder and owner of The MonkeyHouse climbing gym in Carbondale, Colorado.
Fabrizio agreed to speak to us today to share some insight into the real struggles that climbing gyms are going through amid Covid-19. Climbing gyms, of all the outdoor businesses, are getting hammered by this virus. And so Chris and I wanted to hear from the source about what that actually means.
Times are tough, people. No one knows what the future holds. Except that Glen dies. We totally know that Glen absolutely dies.
So now, without further ado, Fabrizio Zangrilli.
2 responses to “RunOut #40: Will Climbing Gyms Survive Covid-19?”
Hey guys. I’m watching what’s happening in the US from the other side of the world. Here in Australia we have plenty of covid impacts to deal with too, but fortunately the people running the show here have been doing a pretty good job and things are still more or less under control. I just wanted to comment on Chris’s despairing rant about the lack of response to the pandemic in the US, which he said he thought included a lack of research effort. I’m a virologist, and when I’m not thinking about climbing I’m usually thinking about viruses. I’ve been paying a lot of attention to what is happening in the scientific community and I just wanted to let you know that there is a HUGE effort happening right now the US and international science community. There are hundreds of labs that have dropped everything to work on this problem from all kinds of angles. I’ve heard a few scientists comment that they feel a sense of responsibility to work as hard as possible to repay the public for the effort that they’re making to slow down the epidemic in order to buy the scientific community time to find solutions. So, my point is, hang in there guys. We’re thinking of you, and even though there’s an idiot in charge of your country there are literally thousands of very smart people working as hard as they can to find a way through this.
Thanks! I needed that.