The RunOut Podcast

Tag: big wall

  • RunOut #117: How Two Big Wall Noobs Free Climbed the Nose

    RunOut #117: How Two Big Wall Noobs Free Climbed the Nose

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    Alex Waterhouse and Billy Ridal are both 26 years old, from Sheffield, England, and have been competing on plastic since they were 12. But once slapping plastic lost its allure, these two climbers found themselves dreaming of adventure. And adventure they found, as they spent a month fumbling their way into the world of big-wall climbing during a month long trip to Yosemite National Park earlier this year. And the unlikely duo emerged from their trip with one of the greatest prizes in climbing: a free ascent of the Nose. We caught up with the lads and talked about how they pulled it off.

    But first, your increasingly trivia-oriented show hosts look back on 2023 and try to recall what the hell happened.

    Last, damn good Buddy Spray from RunOut RopeGun Cooper Houston.

    Show Notes

    Two Retired Comp Climbers Pull Off a Rare Free Ascent of the Nose on Climbing.com

    Follow Alex Waterhouse on Instagram

    Follow Billy Ridal on Instagram

    Become a RunOut Rope Gun! Support our podcast and increase your RunOut runtime. Bonus episodes, AMA, and more will be available to our Rope Guns. Thank you for your support! http://patreon.com/runoutpodcast

    Contact us Send ideas, voicemail, feedback and more. andrew@runoutpodcast.com // chris@runoutpodcast.com

  • RunOut #109: John Middendorf on How Climbing Gear Precedes Progress

    RunOut #109: John Middendorf on How Climbing Gear Precedes Progress

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    Our guest today is a genuine legend and one of the pioneers of big-wall climbing. John Middendorf is a mechanical engineer, gear designer, researcher, writer, and teacher based in Tasmania. His climbing accomplishments pushed the limits of big-walls, adventure, and exploration throughout the 1980s and ‘90s. Most notably, he’s responsible for the first ascent of the East Face of Great Trango Tower, widely considered the largest and steepest continuous wall in the world at 4,400 feet, which he achieved with Xaver Bongard in 1992. The team used portaledges designed by Middendorf himself from his company A5 Adventures. Over the years, Middendorf has continued to refine his portaledge designs, with the D4 Designs which you can find on his website bigwalls.net, one of the first climbing websites in the world. Today, Middendorf has been engaged in an academic review of esoteric climbing journals of old to learn how the developments and advancements of gear have preceded leaps in progress thanks to the “influencers” of the day.

    But first, yer friendly podcasting hosts are back on their usual bullshit after a few weeks of summer vacation.

    Our final bit is some buddy spray from RunOut listener Andres Santiago. For spraying about his buddy, Andres is receiving a Yeti Yonder water bottle. If you’d like to submit spray, join us on Patreon.com/runoutpodcast to do so.

    Show Notes

    Check out bigwalls.net

    Links to Mechanical Advantages, Vol 1 & 2: Note, these are 500mb PDFs. Download as files

    Mechanical Advantage, Vol 1.

    Mechanical Advantage, Vol 2.

    Yosemite Climbing in the ’80s by CVL

    Become a RunOut Rope Gun! Support our podcast and increase your RunOut runtime. Bonus episodes, AMA, and more will be available to our Rope Guns. Thank you for your support! http://patreon.com/runoutpodcast

    Contact us Send ideas, voicemail, feedback and more. andrew@runoutpodcast.com // chris@runoutpodcast.com

  • RunOut #47 – The Best Story in Climbing

    RunOut #47 – The Best Story in Climbing

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    After a long summer re-building the camper of his dreams, Chris Kalous departs on a strange and savage journey into the heart of Trump country, while Andrew Bisharat trembles under the banner of Q-Anon hashtag sightings close to home. Meanwhile, for most climbers in South Dakota, it’s business as usual—though are their crags getting the credit they deserve?

    Next, over a pot of boiled beef parts, the hosts sit down with Jordan Cannon and Mark Hudon and discuss their unlikely partnership and the story of their new film, “Free as Can Be,” documenting Hudon’s bid to free climb the Free Rider decades after he and Max Jones first came up with this wild, audacious goal.

    And for the Final Bit: J-Star returns and describes spinning of orbit, and colliding with gravity.

    Become a 5.14 RopeGun! Support our podcast and increase your RunOut runtime. Bonus episodes, AMA, and more will be available to our Rope Guns. Thank you for your support! http://patreon.com/runoutpodcast.

    Contact us Send ideas, voicemail, feedback and more. andrew@runoutpodcast.com // chris@runoutpodcast.com

    Social Media

    RunOut Facebook: http://facebook.com/runoutpodcast

    Andrew Bisharat: Twitter @eveningsends Instagram @andrewbisharat Evening Sends

    Chris Kalous: Twitter: @enormocast Instagram @enormocast Enormocast

    Show Notes / Links

    Mark Hudon sent “Shiboomi” (5.13a) in Rifle in the last week of September!

    “Free as Can Be” – Official Trailer: https://vimeo.com/438735532

    Jordan Cannon Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/cannonjtc/

    EnormoCamper: https://www.instagram.com/p/CEUDPcBAw5U/

    ”Sport Climbing: From Top Rope to Redpoint Techniques for Climbing Success”

  • RunOut #34: Yosemite Is Still the Center of the Universe

    RunOut #34: Yosemite Is Still the Center of the Universe

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    The very first time I drove into Yosemite, I almost couldn’t wait to lay eyes on El Cap and Half Dome after so much time spent dreaming about one day climbing these formations. I paid my entrance fee and hit the gas on my Nissan Sentra, sputtering ahead until I found myself soon stuck behind a slow-moving rental RV, which was one of those RVs with a cheesy depiction of Yosemite’s famous tunnel view plastered across the back of the rig.

    The irony of the moment was not lost on me, nor did it ultimately detract from the moment when El Cap finally came into view. It literally took my breath away.

    Yosemite is the center of the climbing universe. It’s the place where style, ethics, rules, techniques, gear, myths, stories, and legends were born. And even after all these years, Yosemite is still very much where it’s at. What happens here is almost automatically interesting.

    Which is why Chris and I are talking about what went down in Yosemite this past season. Big sends, grand failures, and run-of-the-mill world-class climbing on the best granite in America.

    This is Andrew Bisharat, and I’m here with Chris Kalous and you’re listening to The RunOut. And today we’re geeking out on Yosemite and all the rad people doing rad things there. And before we begin the episode, I must include a serious shout out to one of the stories we missed, that of big-wall climbing pioneer Mark Hudon returning, at age 63, to Freerider, and damn near sending. He free-climbed all but 15 feet of the Freerider, which is definitely one of the best efforts of the year.

    Hudon, of course, was one of the first people even to consider El Cap as a free-climbing project, exactly 40 years ago when he and his partner Max Jones made an audacious bid at free climbing the Salathe wall. The fact that he returned 40 years later and almost sent the Freerider Variation, is just awesome.

    What an incredible story. What an incredible sport we have here. Gives me the all the feels.

    OK, hope you enjoy this episode. On with the show.

    PHOTO: Tara Kerzhner

  • RunOut #11: Connor Herson Frees the Nose.

    RunOut #11: Connor Herson Frees the Nose.

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    On November 19th, Connor Herson, a 15-year-old high school freshman from Emerald Hills, California became the 6th human to free-climb the Nose, only missing the 5th ascent to Keita Kurakami’s extraordinary free rope solo by a few days.

    Supported by his father Jim, a longtime valley climber, Connor freed the famous climb in a three-day push, only falling on, then redpointing, the Changing Corners pitch rated 5.14a.

    Connor has been surrounded his whole life by a climbing family including his dad, his mother Anne, and his badass older sister Kara, who, incidentally, climbed Half Dome in winter and the Nose in a Day sans jumars as a mere tween.

    On today’s RunOut, Andrew Bisharat and I – two climbers well past their prime – grill Connor Herson – a climber only on the cusp of his vast potential – about what makes him tick.