Babsi Zangerl flashes Freerider (5.13a/F7c+)
- Wednesday 27th November 2024
Babsi Zangerl, climbing with her partner Jacopo Larcher, has made an historic flash of El Cap over a three-day push via Freerider (5.13a).
A couple of weeks after her ascent of Magic Line ascent, click here for that report, Babsi and her partner Jacopo Larcher, squared-up to attempt a flash of Freerider on El Cap. A 1000m and 34 pitch big-wall route, Freerider was first free-climbed in 1998 by German brothers Alexander and Thomas Huber. In essence, Freerider is the so-called easier variation of Salathé Wall, both climbing the left side of the Nose on El Cap.
For context, a number of climbers have attempted to flash El Cap over the years. Back in 1997 Yuji Hirayama set the early running with a four-fall ascent of Salathé Wall. Nearly 20 years later Cedric Lachat made a no-falls ascent of Freerider albeit he broke his continuous ascent when he descended to the ground before returning some days later to continue to the top. Pete Whittaker was then next on the scene with his 2014 effort – click here for that report. Arguably, Pete’s ascent was the best effort up to that point. Climbing with fellow WideBoyz Tom Randall, Pete’s ascent was sadly somewhat tainted given he fell trying the Huber Variation – the so-called “Boulder Problem” pitch. However, having fallen on that pitch he then redpointed it before dropping back down and then flashing Teflon Corner before going on to flash all the remaining pitches to the top. Famously, three years after Pete’s ascent, Freerider gained worldwide attention when Alex Honnold made his free solo ascent of the route.
Finally, before turning to Babsi’s ascent, it’s also important to recognise the efforts that others have made in their attempt to flash/onsight El Cap; in particular James “Caff” McHaffie and Adam Ondra’s attempts on Salathé Wall. These are especially pertinent in that both Caff (in 2014) and Adam Ondra (in 2018) climbed all the Freerider pitches – including both the Boulder Problem (Huber pitch) and the Enduro Corner above – before continuing direct via the Salathé Wall. Sadly, both Caff and Adam fell whilst climbing the Salathé headwall; had they followed Freerider however they may well have been able to complete a no-fall ascents of El Cap successfully. That however, is speculation; the fact remains therefore that prior to Babsi’s ascent no-one had successfully flashed Freerider without falling.
So let’s turn then to Babsi’s recent historic ascent then. Speaking afterwards she had this to say:
"The first thing I should say is that I was really, really lucky! There were hardly any other climbers on the route with us, the weather forecast looked bad but in the end it held up, conditions were actually very good and as we climbed upwards everything just seemed to slot into place. Jacopo was really unlucky. He was so close to flashing the entire route! He attempted to lead the Boulder Problem pitch before me, but didn't see the undercling hold properly and as a result fell on the famous karate kick move. He then quickly redpointed the pitch second go and didn't make any further falls. Thanks to Jacopo, I had more information about the crux and somehow managed to stick the moves, though I still haven't quite figured out how I managed not to fall there.
We hadn't consciously saved Freerider for a flash attempt, it just turned out this way. In the past, we've climbed routes in the center and on the right wall of El Cap, but never any of the routes on the left, such as Golden Gate, Salathé, and Freerider, because we were always a little afraid of the Monster Offwidth. We've heard so many horror stories about it that we've steered clear of this part of the wall. After our free ascent of The Nose in 2019, our friend and former Black Diamond employee Kolin Powick suggested we should try to flash Freerider. To be honest, we didn't think about it too much, simply because the idea seemed too impossible. Having said that, when Lara Neumeier and I climbed El Corazon in November 2023, we chose the Muir Blast start and not the Freeblast start, to avoid climbing any pitches shared with Freerider. So, I can say that, at that point, we did already have it in our minds as a future possibility.
Still, the idea of a successful flash ascent seemed unrealistic to achieve. This season our aim was just to see how far we could get. Perhaps we wouldn't even get very far at all. That's the problem with El Capitan: even the pitches which on paper look easy, are never easy! Actually, there's nothing easy on El Cap! After climbing Magic Line on this trip, we both realized that if we wanted to stand a chance of climbing the Monster Offwidth, we'd have to train specifically for it. So, we spent 4 days doing just offwidths like Generator Crack, Twilight Zone, and others, until we started to feel a bit more comfortable with this style of climbing. It was a real battle! The Monster Offwidth pitch is 60m long and after about 40 meters I started getting cramps and ran out of breath! I thought I'd fall but then I remembered what Alex Honnold had told us: if the going got tough, I should lean out so the left leg got solidly jammed in and I could rest a little. Thank god we'd met him by chance in a cafe a few days earlier for that bit of advice!
On day 1, we swung leads and climbed the Freeblast slabs past the Heart Ledges to the pitch below the Hollow Flake, where we made our first bivy. On day 2, we pushed on past the Monster Offwidth to the El Cap Spire, climbed another two pitches, fixed ropes and returned to the spire for the second bivy. On day 3, we jumared up the two pitches we'd climbed the day before, pushed on to the Round Table, climbed and fixed one more pitch before spending our third night on the wall, then on day 4 we jumared that one pitch and climbed the last three pitches to the summit.
Our deal was that I would lead the Monster Offwidth first and Jacopo would go first on the crux Boulder pitch, which I also led right after, and we swung leads on all the rest. After the Boulder Pitch, I felt nervous. I certainly didn't feel as if it was all over, on the contrary. The first section up Freeblast had already been stressful, and now somehow we were on course to the summit. But the famous Enduro Corner still lay above us, and that proved really pumpy. And we knew from experience that even the easy pitches can be really demanding. We really had to fight all the way to the summit!
I view this, like all of the other climbs I've done with Jacopo, as a successful team ascent. Without him, nothing would have been possible and I'm infinitely grateful to him that we managed to pull it off. Although we hadn't climbed any of the 30 pitches before, and onsighted many of them, we nevertheless knew a lot about the route before setting off. We know many climbers who have repeated the route before us and so we tried to find out as much as possible from them, and of course, we'd seen some stuff on YouTube before. We also went to the cinema to watch Free Solo when that came out. So there's no way we could define our ascent as anything close to an onsight.
When we got to the summit it felt unreal. I was happy for me, and at the same time sad for Jacopo. Climbing onsight or flash is like this, you only get one chance, and on a 1000m big wall this can feel even more brutal. But Jacopo took it in his stride and his unwavering, 100% support all the way to the top was fundamental. It's a true testament of his character, and as I said before, I can't thank him enough. It was certainly the biggest mental challenge I've ever faced in my climbing career."
Footnote
In addition to the attempts listed above to on-sight/flash Salathé Wall, a number of other climbers have also come painfully close to achieving a no-falls ascent of El Cap. Leo Houlding climbed El Nino with only a handful of falls in 2005 whilst Ueli Steck did Golden Gate in 2009 with only one fall off wet rock on the 5.11c crack from the top of El Cap Spire, just before Golden Gate heads right from the Salathé Wall.