Essay On Adam Ondra’s Multi-pitch Achievements

Posted April 23, 2010 at 7:33 am · Comments { 5 } ·

Black Diamond has an interesting essay on their journal site that details Adam Ondra’s impressive sends in 2008 of WoGü (5.14b, 7 pitches, FFA) and Hotel Supramonte (5.14a, 10 pitches, First Onsight)

Posted In: Asides, News, Traditional Climbing
Climbers:

Subscribe

Subscribe to the RSS feed to receive updates, and follow us on Twitter & Facebook

5 Responses to Essay On Adam Ondra’s Multi-pitch Achievements

  1. Julian April 23, 2010 at 8:42 am #

    That was interesting, but it makes me worried (again) that it is impossible to write well about climbing. That entire piece was fairly well-written but it basically amounts to navel-gazing hero worship. And I honestly can’t remember reading a “serious” piece about climbing that didn’t suffer from too much navel-gazing, too much faux-literary pretension, too much attempted mythologizing, or some combination of the three.

    Or maybe I’m reading the wrong stuff. I don’t know.

    GD Star Rating
    loading...
    Reply
    • Narc April 23, 2010 at 8:45 am #

      You may have a point but keep in mind this was a piece written for a sponsor by someone directly involved in both ascents. I just thought it was interesting to get more of a first hand account of these climbs.

      GD Star Rating
      loading...
      Reply
      • Julian April 23, 2010 at 8:52 am #

        I actually enjoyed the entire thing, and your point about it being for a sponsor is well-taken. My critique is probably less about this particular piece of writing than it is about my concern that the entire genre of writing about climbing is doomed to be totally banal and boring. It might also be that I’m just bored and that’s bringing out my natural snobby tendency.

        GD Star Rating
        loading...
        Reply
  2. A April 26, 2010 at 4:15 pm #

    I think you have a point on this particular essay. Yet I might be misjudging but the fact that it is not a first hand account of it makes a huge difference (to me at least).
    I remember finding myself with sweaty hands after reading the short Tommy Caldwell essay on Mescalito that was posted on the BD website, if i recall correctly.
    It seems that the mountaineering genre lends itself to the exercise a bit better. Same as for videos: as much as you would make a full feature movie about one particular mountain ascent, doing the same about one particular sports climb might turn out extremely dull.

    Maybe sports climbing is forever condemned to be climbing porn in this media world.. My two cents.

    GD Star Rating
    loading...
    Reply

Trackbacks/Pingbacks

  1. Kletternews & Klettervideos! | kletterblog.info - April 23, 2010

    […] Pietro Dal Pra erinnert sich wie er Adam Ondra bei der Erstbegehung der Mehrseillängenroute “WoGü (8c)” und dem Onsight der Mehrseillängenroute “Hotel Supramonte (8b+)” sicherte – sehr stimmungsvoll! (via ClimbingNarc) […]

Leave a Reply