The North Face
1 HN recommender · recommended in 3 months, 2015–2017
6:12 · 11M views · Feb 12, 2014
A short film of Alex Honnold free soloing El Sendero Luminoso, a 2,500-foot route in El Potrero Chico, Mexico, in a little over three hours with no rope. It was made by The North Face with climbing footage and music.
It is linked whenever Honnold or free soloing comes up, as a gripping and frightening example of extreme climbing.
4 comments from Hacker News
Fantastic achievement if they pull it off. Incidentally, Alex Honnold, one of the climbers interviewed in the article, is the star of one of the most frightening videos I have ever seen - him free-soloing El Sendero Luminoso: this video Even though I know perfectly well that nobody fell to their death on that climb, and have done a fair bit of climbing myself, I can’t watch this video without having a powerful physical reaction. It’s mind-boggling what some people are capable of.
I feel compelled to post this video whenever Honnold comes up. Here he is free-soloing El Sendero Luminoso: this video He really is something else.
Here's a video that touches on Honnold's prep for his ascent of El Sendoro Luminoso. Given that it's likely the most difficult ropeless climb in history (and on limestone, which is far more prone to breaking holds than Yosemite granite), he wasn't exactly super meticulous: this video At lower grades he has been known to just go for it.
I really hope that guy practiced repressing the instinct to lunge at a bad throw when juggling. Extremely rare occurrence with such a simple pattern, but ooph! I feel like any of Alex Honnold's ropeless climbs deserves a link too, for example: this video