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| 11:17pm Sunday on top of El Cap. 17 hrs 29 mins |
I climbed, by myself, The Triple Direct
(TD) route on El Capitan on Sunday, July 13th, 2014. Non-Climbers: The TD is a route up the
middle of a 2,950-foot-cliff, El Capitan, in Yosemite Valley. A normal party would
plan to take four days on the route. The route has been climbed by very high
level of experience teams in under six hours. I do not know of any recorded
solo speed record to date. I think this might be the first one-day ascent of
the route by a soloist! We’d call that TDIAD (I climbed the route in 17 hours
and 29 minutes. Car-to-car in 20 hours and 21 minutes.)
I am told it was 106 degrees in Yosemite Valley on Sunday; not
ideal for climbing El Capitan. I choose The TD because I could climb for the
first part of the day in the shade. Then the route goes slightly right around
the corner into upper dihedrals so you get late in the day shade too. If I
timed it right, I’d only be in the sun for a few hours. Predominately this
worked out for me. It’s tough for me to get time to do something big and also
climb the days before to get “tuned in,” so I really wanted to use this day,
hot or not. Thursday and Friday I climbed with my friend Derrick Lindsey on
Tuolumne granite, so that was a great time to get re-familiarized with the
rock.
Climbers: (non-climbers this may be Greek, not interesting, or
hard to follow.) I started off the ground at 5:48 am. I used a 70m X 9.1mm BlueWater rope. I planned to stretch the rope to full length nearly every lead
unless there was some logistical advantage otherwise to do so. I planned to jug,
(ascend the rope), with a 4,000-cubic-inch backpack, a bit big for these things
but nice to have the room for the approach and descent. My rack was: ten quick
draws, ten free biners, four long runners, doubles of everything up to #2
Camalots, one #3 and, in case Alex Honnold is reading or hearing about this, I
didn’t take a #4. I took triples of the ½ cams, BD Gray. I also took four
offset cams. I took about 20 nuts, mostly tiny ones. To my past partners, yes,
I placed a few. I came upon five biners on the route and ended up leaving three
and dropping a quick draw, so I was even on that score. However I inadvertently
left a #1 camalot on the pitch off the Glowering spot. – Go get it treasure
hunters! I self belayed with a Grigri, and brought one aider and one Yates
speedy stirrup. I had one gallon and one liter of water, NUUN tablets, HoneyStinger Energy Chews and Protein Bars, and Field Trip Jerky. Although I had a
light long sleeve shirt and wind breaker in reserve I climbed the entire route
in my Outdoor Research Ferosi NIAD pants* and short sleeve Astro man shirt.
(*they are lighter then Schoeller pants and have compartments at the knees
which held light padding for my knees)
I
climbed the first 2.5 pitches in one pitch. (I, un-roped, soloed up the first
30 ft of pitch “1”) I climbed from 2.5 to 4.5 in a pitch, which left me at the
two bolts at the base of the bolted 5.11d section. From there I made it to the
ledge, “Triangle Ledge,” after the last face crux. Then from that ledge I made
a single long pitch to the top of the half dollar. It’s actually 74 meters from
the anchor on that ledge to the anchor on top of the half dollar. I put in a
natural pro anchor 4 meters down from the top anchor. From there I un-roped
soloed, dragging the rope behind me on the easy terrain for two pitches up to
Mammoth Terrace, to avoid jugging that section. I then un-roped soloed the
first pitch off Mammoth to the base of the aid pitch that slopes up and right.
I did this first aid pitch normally, then the next two I linked. I found five two-liter bottles of water left by someone on the Gray Ledges and drank about a
half liter as I still had plenty in my pack to drink. I led up the next
pitches, but had a rope snag so had to cut it short to an 80-foot pitch to
lower down, retrieve my pack and un-snag the rope. I led the long hard arching
left aid pitch just before it turns right to The Muir and combined that with
the traverse over to the lower off point. I lowered my self here leaving some
biners and swung the pendulum over to the big ledges under Camp 4, then pulled
the rope, thus not having to backtrack that portion.
I tried to hide in a little rock corner from the sun on this
ledge and stall, changing my shoes and eating. It was hot and this portion of
the route was the three or so hours in total that I was in the sun. It was this
section where I really was having to dig deep for motivation to continue on. –
Note to self, never under estimate the sun and high temperatures power to suck
the energy out of you. My consumption of NUUN in my water earlier on the route
surely got me through this bit. From this ledge I led diagonally up to the base
of the Great Roof. I took a fall on my GriGri within the first ten feet of leading
the Great Roof when a cam popped out on me. I took another four-foot fall
directly onto my daisy after that, ouch. I led the Great Roof and combined it
with the Pancake Flake. From there I made it to Camp 5 with rope to spare.
New discovery for me! I led from Camp 5 all the way to Camp 6, about 68
meters! From Camp 6 I found out it’s 71 meters to the block belay! I improvised
a natural anchor and “tethered” it to the bolts. Although the moon was nearly
full, it was on this lead that I put on my headlamp. From the Block, (that is
not there anymore), I led all the way up the final bolt ladder onto the slab
section just before it traverses to the right. From there it was just a short
70-foot lead up to the finishing anchors. At these anchors I “Shouldered”
everything, then soloed up to the tree to stop the clock at 11:17pm. I figured
basically I made 17 long pitches out of the route. There was ample moon light
on top and two gallons of water sitting at the tree! I drank about two liters
of it and poured a liter in my bottle to have for the descent. After 25 minutes
of laying there panting, resting, eating, drinking, and packing my pack, I
staggered up to an upright position and began the hike down.
The rappelling crowd was up on top with their 1,000-meter rope
dangling off El Cap. A woman on top said she made the rappel in less than six
minutes! That was sounding really good rather than the two-hour hike down the
east ledges. Alas there were cavers coming up the lines in the middle of the
night because it was too hot in the day to do so.
I made it back to my family van at 2:09 am. And back to my bed
at 3am. I woke up at 4:15 am to start on Sunday so I did my “BTB” (Bed-to-Bed) time
in under 23 hours! I hope your Sunday was equally adventuresome, or maybe you
took a rest day since your Saturday was full of fun.
I will be sharing stories next Tuesday, July 22nd, 2014 in Concord at Brenden Theaters. http://bit.ly/1nEsaxh
I will be sharing stories next Tuesday, July 22nd, 2014 in Concord at Brenden Theaters. http://bit.ly/1nEsaxh
#outdoorresearch #diablorockgym #touchstoneclimbing
#nuunhydration #honeystinger #kinesys #fieldtripjerky #petzl #bluewaterropes
#lasportiva #armaid #smithoptics
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3 comments:
Further notes after some questions from others...
I wore La Sportiva TC Pros and LS Vertical Ks for the descent and to jug some of the pitches.
I don't know the temp on the wall, but it was not 105. Probably under 80 while I was not in the sun for the first 6 hours. It was very windy in the middle of the day while I was in the sun, so probably not above 90 degrees for me during the 3 or so hours I was in the sun.
I think I was the only climber on El Cap that day. Of course I shared it with some spelunkers who were doing an evening ascent of their 1000 meter fixed line.
Only you Hans could solo TDIAD and then look half your age like in the last photo!
thanks Steve Fettke, It's all in that late evening Alpine Glow, smart phone, and head lamp lighting tricks.
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