Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" I love my climbing shoes. Virtually all of my big solos have been in the TC Pros. They are the most important thing when I'm soloing. "
Alex Honnold
Love
Big
Climbing
Related Quotes:
" Pretty much every gym I go into, I feel very comfortable. I dump my stuff, take my shoes off, do my thing. "
Alex Honnold
Off
Shoes
Feel
" I'm sponsored by the solar company Goal Zero, and they were gracious enough to install panels on my van and a nice battery system for the inside. I have lights and a fridge inside the van. And of course I had panels installed on my mom's house. "
Alex Honnold
Mom
Nice
House
" In climbing, sponsors typically support an athlete but provide very little direction, giving the climber free rein to follow his or her passion toward whatever is inspiring. It's a wonderful freedom, in many ways similar to that of an artist who simply lives his life and creates whatever moves him. "
Alex Honnold
Support
Freedom
Passion
" Music can be useful during training to help get you psyched, and I still listen to music on easy climbs or in the gym. But during cutting-edge solos or really hard climbs, I unplug. There shouldn't be a need for extra motivation on big days, be it music or anything else. It should come from within. "
Alex Honnold
Training
Help
Music
" 'Dirtbag' is just the term we use, like a 'gnarly dude' in surfing. Within the climbing culture, it means being a committed lifer: someone who has embraced a minimalist ethic in order to rock climb. It basically means you're a homeless person by choice. "
Alex Honnold
Climb
Choice
Rock
" In the years after the expedition to Chad, I started the Honnold Foundation, a small nonprofit that was my attempt to do something positive in the world. I sought out projects that both helped the environment and improved peoples' standards of living. The more I researched, the more I gravitated toward solar. "
Alex Honnold
Small
Foundation
World
" The thing with physical preparation is I have tons of friends who train at a really high level and who can give me advice. But with mental training, I don't really know anybody who has a much better mind for climbing, I guess, so I don't really know where I would go. It's not really a limiting factor for me. "
Alex Honnold
Preparation
Mind
Me
" Yosemite has the most impressive and accessible granite big walls in the world. The rock is amazing. And because of that, it's been the mecca for climbing in the U.S. - and the world to a large degree - for all of climbing history. It's the place to test yourself against the historic routes of the past. "
Alex Honnold
Past
World
History
" The diet for climbing all the time isn't really different from the diet for living. It's not like cardio sports where you're burning a bajillion calories every day. "
Alex Honnold
Day
You
Living
" My fantasy breakfast is just a really good egg scramble. Maybe I'll add a little feta, so, uh, obviously not totally dairy-free. Definitely some vegetables, maybe some really nice tortillas; something to make it like a Mexican-style breakfast. I just really love breakfast. "
Alex Honnold
Good
Nice
Love
" I've done routes where I've climbed 200 feet off the ground and just been, like, 'What am I doing?' I then just climbed back down and went home. Discretion is the better part of valor. Some days are just not your day. That's the big thing with free soloing: when to call it. "
Alex Honnold
Doing
Feet
Free
" I feel that a lot of human spirituality stems from the belief that we are unique and special in the universe, but maybe we are just what happens when there is proper temperature and proper distance from the right type of star. "
Alex Honnold
Distance
Universe
Special
" So many people condemn me for risk taking, but I find it sort of hypocritical because everybody takes risks. Even the absence of activity could be viewed as a risk. If you sit on the sofa for your entire life, you're running a higher risk of getting heart disease and cancer. "
Alex Honnold
You
Risks
Heart
" Anytime you finish a climb, there's always the next thing you can try. "
Alex Honnold
Climb
Try
Next
" I generally don't climb something if it makes me feel fear. The beauty of soloing is that there's no pressure - no one's telling me to do it. So if something seems scary, I don't have any obligation to do it. I can prepare further or just walk away entirely. "
Alex Honnold
Walk
Me
Fear
" You might get run over; you might get hit by lightning. I mean, who knows? Each day, there is a chance you might die. And there's nothing wrong with that. Every living being on Earth is facing that same existential rift. "
Alex Honnold
Run
Die
Day
" My comfort zone is like a little bubble around me, and I've pushed it in different directions and made it bigger and bigger until these objectives that seemed totally crazy eventually fall within the realm of the possible. "
Alex Honnold
Crazy
Comfort
Fall
" I've gotten over my shyness from many years of doing public events. "
Alex Honnold
Years
Doing
Events
" My sister does all this community-service type stuff in Portland that makes the world a much better place. And I make as much in a two-day commercial shoot as she does in five years, which is ridiculous. "
Alex Honnold
World
She
Place
" There's only a handful of chicks in the world who can climb big walls on my level. "
Alex Honnold
Only
Walls
World
" I am a vegetarian, and I sort of aspire to vegan-hood. So far I've noticed no difference at all in my climbing, but I feel a bit healthier overall. Though that's only because I'm eating more fruits and vegetables. I think the whole protein thing is overhyped. Most Americans eat far more than we need. "
Alex Honnold
Feel
Think
Eating
" At the crux of Half Dome, at the very top of the wall, imagine, like, a smooth wall of rock - a nearly vertical granite slap with tiny ripples for your hands and feet. And so you're really trusting the rubber on your shoes to stick to these ripples. "
Alex Honnold
Rock
Feet
Top
" Much as Africa has leapfrogged straight to mobile phones, it has the opportunity to skip the dirty, grid-tied power plants that currently operate across the developed world and go straight to clean, distributed power. "
Alex Honnold
World
Plants
Dirty
" Big climbs energize me. It's all the other aspects of being a pro-climber that wear me down. The travel and expeditions and training can become pretty tiring. But the actual big climbs - that's what I live for. "
Alex Honnold
Me
Become
Down
" I have a journal of everything I've ever climbed since 2005. For the entry about free soloing Half Dome, I put a frowny face and added some little notes about what I should have done better, and then underlined it. Turns out that is one of my biggest climbing achievements. "
Alex Honnold
Free
Face
Done
" I love the feeling of touching the rock, the feeling of my body going up the rock. "
Alex Honnold
Love
Feeling
Body
" For sure, Potrero Chico is a super nice winter vacation climbing area. It's really convenient to fly into Monterrey, one of the nicer cities in Mex, and get a taxi to Potero. Then you can just live in the camping area and walk everywhere. It's muy tranquilo, as they say there. "
Alex Honnold
Live
Fly
Nice
" I think part of what made the original 'Sufferfest' charming was the extremely low production value. It was all shaky handheld footage from Cedar. "
Alex Honnold
Value
Original
Think
" I love red bell peppers. Bell peppers in general, really. I like to eat them like apples. They're so crunchy and delicious. "
Alex Honnold
Like
Apples
Bell
" To be clear, I normally climb with a rope and partner. Free-soloing makes up only a small percentage of my total climbing. But when I do solo, I manage the risk through careful preparation. I don't solo anything unless I'm sure I can do it. "
Alex Honnold
Climb
Partner
Preparation