Solo Climbing

Alex Honnold

When Alex Honnold, 23, one day in September 2007 free-soloed Astroman (V 5.11c) and the Rostrum (V 5.11c), he entered the history books alongside Peter Croft and John Bachar. This April 1, Honnold upped the ante, free soloing Zion’s 1,200-foot splitter-crack testpiece Moonlight Buttress (V 5.12) in 83 minutes. His chalk-shoes-and-iPod ascent was, to hear Honnold tell it, no big deal. But barring perhaps Hansjörg Auer’s 2007 free solo of Via Attraverso il Pesce (aka The Fish ; 5.12c, circa 3,000 feet), in the Dolomites, or Michael Reardon’s onsight free solo of Romantic Warrior (V 5.12b), in the Needles, California, nothing like this had ever been done.

Since 2004, Honnold says he’s free-soloed “thousands of gumby pitches,” this year attaining “a whole new level of comfort in the mountains.” Accordingly, he capped his 2008 tear with a September 6 free solo of Half Dome’s Regular Northwest Face (VI 5.12a; 23 pitches). Honnold, 2007’s Rookie of the Year, has proven himself no mere flash in the pan. In 2008, no other climber came close to matching his solo accomplishments.

Honorable Mention

• Dave Turner, for his January capsule-style, 34-day sufferfest roped solo of the 4,000-foot Cerro Escudo, in Chile’s Paine region.
• Steph Davis, for her free solos of the North Face of Castleton Tower (5.11a; 375 feet), Castleton Valley, Utah (followed by a BASE jump), and Pervertical Sanctuary (IV 5.10d), on the Diamond, Longs Peak, Colorado. (See Climbing No. 272 p.98 for a Perspective with Davis.)