Build My Own FeedBD athlete Alex Honnold reports on his record-setting Half Dome/El Cap speed solo linkup
Earlier this spring Black Diamond athlete Alex Honnold made a speed solo linkup of the Regular Northwest Face (V 5.12a, 23 pitches) on Half Dome and the Nose (VI 5.9 C1, 31 pitches) on El Capitan, employing a mix of rope soloing, daisy soloing and free soloing. Honnold manage to set solo speed records for both routes, as well as for the linkup, which involved an estimated 5000 feet of climbing in less than 12 hours. Below is his insightful report about the linkup (along some excellent photos taken by Tom Evans of ElCapReport.com) that details the gear he used, the style he climbed and his thoughts during the day.
I was a young gym rat when I first saw Masters of Stone V and the part that struck me the most, besides the amazing tribute to Dan Osman, was Dean Potter soloing the Nose and the Regular Northwest Face in Yosemite. The idea of climbing two big walls in one day all by yourself filled me with awe. Or maybe dread. It seemed so alien to be all alone on a sea of granite like that. As I've climbed more over the years that original impression has stayed with me. Even having freesoloed the Regular Northwest Face, the idea of soloing the Nose was daunting at best. It's just so big. But this year I spent a good portion of May and June speed climbing laps up the Nose with Ueli Steck. We intended to try for the record at some point but ultimately we weren't really excited about the project. I was a little disappointed to spend my season speed climbing rather than free climbing, and by the time we were done it was getting super hot and all the climbers were heading north.
My last real goal for the season was to try to climb El Cap three times in a day with my friend Sean Leary. But he was gone for a while, dealing with family stuff up north. I wasn't sure exactly when he would be back and wanted to do something beforehand. I realized that I was uniquely fit to do the solo link up. I'd always wanted to climb El Cap and Half Dome in a day. Last year I got rained out on Half Dome and failed in the link up. It seemed like it'd be even better style to do it by myself. I had the Nose completely dialed from our speed laps and I knew that the Reg NW Face would feel pretty mellow if I was using daisies to protect myself at the hard parts. Mellower than freesoloing it, anyway.
Once I got my head around the idea of soloing the link up I immediately latched onto it. Even once I found out Sean would be back in two days to do our Triple I didn't want to pass up the solo. Instead, I hiked up to Half Dome so I could start the next morning. I figured if I did it fast enough I wouldn't be too tired and I would be able to climb with Sean anyway. (As it turns out, after doing the link up I didn't really want to rock climb anymore, so we put the Triple off for a few days. Sorry, Sean...)
I hiked up to Half Dome with a minimal rack, personal climbing gear, my bivy gear, and a 30-foot line that I use to tow my van that I figured could work for the Robbins Traverse—the only time I expected to use a rope. There was still a huge snow cone at the base, courtesy of an unusually heavy winter. I stashed my food midway up the first pitch and made myself cozy in my sleeping bag. I chit chatted a little bit with two folks who'd done the route that day and were resting before heading down the next morning. And then after dark two more folks came down after doing the route in a day. Turns out one of them was an Israeli friend of mine, so we chatted for a long time. I was glad that there was no one there in line. I would have the route to myself.
I woke up at 4:45 am, thinking I would be ready to go right at light. But I'd done a poor job of guessing sunrise and wound up sitting around waiting for the lights to come on. Then I scrambled up the snow cone and half the first pitch before changing into climbing shoes and switching to rock climbing mode. I threw down my jacket and headlamp and started up the wall. I had a small pack with my shoes, food and water, figuring it was important for me to stay well fed/hydrated since I was going to have a long day.
The climbing itself was pretty uneventful. The climbing is mostly moderate, especially when I used the bolt ladders to avoid the hard free climbing. I climbed the chimneys with my pack hanging down below me on a daisy. The only time I really had to pay attention was on the Zig Zags, where I climbed with two pieces clipped to my daisies at all the hard parts.
I spent easily 10 minutes sitting on Thank God Ledge trying to booty a brand new fixed #4 Camalot. I'd just learned a trick the day before about hitting individual lobes a certain way and walking cams around and I wanted to make it work. But after a while I gave up on it and continued to the top. The final slab, which had been quite stressful for me freesoloing 2 years ago, felt totally casual clipping into the bolts.
I topped out amongst a handful of hikers. It was about 7am and the top was still quite peaceful, a pleasant change from the usual summit gong show. I savored my climb for a few minutes while eating a Clif bar and started my descent. My friend at the base wasn't out of bed yet when I got back down and started packing up my stuff. He pulled himself out of his bag to wish me luck on the Nose and told me he'd watch from the meadow. I hustled back down to Mirror Lake, where I'd stashed a bike, and rode back to my van.
In El Cap Meadow I spent some time re-racking and trying to eat and drink. I didn't really know what I would need, so I went a little heavy on gear: pretty much a doubles rack from super small to #1 Camalots, then singles up to #4. I had a skinny rope that I'd borrowed from a friend, something like an 8.5. I figured it would be enough for my purposes. I wasn't planning on whipping huge on it.
All told my gear weighed more than I would have liked. I hadn't really thought about it before, but the problem with soloing is that you cary everything, all the time. Normally you burn off the rack as you go, so by the end of the pitch you only have a little left. And conversely, the rope weighs nothing at the beginning of a pitch. But when you're daisy soloing you have the whole weight of everything on you all the time.
I got to the base of the Nose around 10 or 11 am. There were a bunch of parties converging on it from different directions. Some Frenchmen who were hauling bags, some Russians who were only hoping to climb to Sickle to check it out, some Americans who were at the very bottom and said they were bringing up a lot of beer. I was a little weirded out by the whole show and took off climbing as soon as I could. I felt super self conscious to start freesoloing up a crack that people were lined up to aid climb. It was surreal to look up the Nose and think that I would be scrambling the whole thing by myself. I honestly had no idea what to expect. I had a good supply of food and water as well as a headlamp. I was prepared for anything, though I was planning on climbing the same style as the Reg NW Face. Freesoloing everything I could and daisy soloing anything hard. I had the rope for a few pendulums, the King Swing, and the Great Roof.
I looked up the route and saw a party in the corners above Camp 6. I set my sights and started climbing. Everything went smoothly on the first three pitches; easier than expected. On the fourth pitch I pleasantly found that someone had fixed an extremely bomber line up across the two tricky pendulums to Sickle. I could see that the rope was fixed to the bolt on Sickle and refixed to a half dozen pieces along its way down, so I happily hand over handed up it and saved myself a lot of ropework. I figured that something useful like that makes up for all the times that you go up on a pitch and discover that someone cleaned all the fixed gear or ripped the crucial head.
Dolt Tower was my first real stop. It was time to eat and drink again and I checked my timer. It was something like 1:15, which is a pretty damn good pace. I realized that I wouldn't be needing a headlamp after all. I waved down to the Meadow, knowing that Tom Evans was probably watching on his telescope and wondering if any of my friends were around. Then I took a leak, and wondered if they watched that, too. I figure if they can see anything from there then I have nothing to be ashamed of...
I rope soloed the short aid section up to the Boot Flake, but then I took myself off again before I climbed the actual Boot itself. It's simpler for me to not deal with a rope, especially on something secure like a hand crack. Still, it's exciting to take yourself off belay on El Cap.
Everything was uneventful up to the Great Roof, which is where I planned to do my only pitch of traditional rope soloing. I'd even brought a single jumar for the occasion. This was one of my first real pitches of rope soloing ever but it went smoothly. I started to notice how tired I felt as I jugged and I told myself I wouldn't do any more rope soloing. From here to the top I was going to daisy solo, even if it took longer. I couldn't bear to go up and down to clean pitches.
Putting my rope away at the base of the Pancake Flake was one of the more memorable moments of the day. As I unclipped my daisies from the anchor and started freesoloing the easy lieback above me I felt absolutely heroic. The sheer exposure of 23 pitches dropping off beneath me filled me with glee. I'd spent a lot of the season posing for photos on various routes for a couple of different projects. Now I found myself doing the most exposed climbing of my life all alone. It was invigorating.
The last six pitches are mostly hand cracks so I largely freesoloed them, except that I was getting more and more tired. I started french freeing a little more, climbing a tight hand crack with one hand jamming and one hand pulling on a #1. As I climbed into the Changing Corners I passed into the shade which brought me new life. Climbing in the full sun all afternoon had left me a little wilted and my feet hurt from hot, tight climbing shoes. And then on the last two pitches I finally caught up to the parties I'd seen from the base. I stopped at an anchor to eat some food and chit chat with a cute belayer. But as much as I just felt like hanging out and chilling in the shade I still had to get to the top. So I climbed through the leader, with permission of course, and didn't stop again until the summit.
I was massively psyched to reach the top. My timer said 5:50 but I rounded up to 6 hours since I hadn't started it until the top of the first pitch; I'd been distracted by the mob at the base and hadn't remembered. I couldn't believe that I'd actually done the link up, and in roughly half a day. Having thought about it with awe for so long it was a little surreal to actually do it.
Honestly, I don't remember anything else about the hike down or what I did on the ground. I guess none of that stuff was as important to me as the actual climbing. Weird that I can remember individual placements I used on the Glowering Spot but I can't remember where I went for dinner, or with who.
But I do know that my appetite for big walls was sated for a few days, so I bailed out of the Valley to rest a little and repsyche before doing the Triple with Sean.
— Alex Honnold
United States / English 
