Weekend Whipper: Ripping Big Holds On His 70th Birthday
Readers, please send your Weekend Whipper videos, information, and any lessons learned to Anthony Walsh, awalsh@outsideinc.com.
Who doesn’t like a birthday surprise? This one comes to us courtesy of H., a route developer in Central Oregon who celebrated his 70th birthday last Sunday at a beautiful basalt crag he’d been helping to establish since 2020. H. was hoping to snag a birthday FA of a newly bolted and cleaned 5.10+ called Captain Crux. But alas, said his friend Liz Thelander (who was filming), “mother nature had other plans.”
After climbing smoothly up the first twenty feet of the climb, H. leaned right to place a quickdraw in the third bolt hanger. When he transitioned from pulling down on the hold to applying force in a gaston position, his clipping jug exploded off the wall, sending H. arcing toward the ground alongside a few dozen pounds of jagged basalt. Luckily for him, the hold broke in the direction H. had been weighting it, which meant that the large shards of rock, easily heavy enough to do serious damage to a belayer, fell to the left of the climbing line, allowing the belayer to give a masterful catch and keep H. from a groundfall.
H. didn’t emerge entirely unscathed; the shards of rock cut and bruised his left forearm during their adjacent descents. But after some light bandaging and a snack, H. got back on the climb—this time on TR—to claim a clean ascent on his birthday.
All in all, H.’s experience is a good reminder that even well-cleaned climbs tend to shed rock early in their lives, particularly when that rock is basalt or limestone—so it’s best to wear a helmet.
Stay safe out there!
Readers, please send your Weekend Whipper videos, information, and any lessons learned to Anthony Walsh, awalsh@outsideinc.com.
Watch more Weekend Whippers:
- The Perils of Stick-Clipping
- Here’s What Happens When You Catch Your Foot Behind the Rope
- Punching It to the Chains (Or Trying To) Over Tiny Trad Gear
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