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" I was 19 when my father died from a heart attack. He was a 55-year-old college professor and had led what was by all appearances a risk-free life. But he was overweight, and heart disease runs in our family. "

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" If you're climbing big routes that'll take you 16 hours, or, like, El Capitan, you have to take something like a big, robust sandwich. Climbing isn't like running or triathlons, where you have to constantly be eating blocks, gels, and pure sugar. Climbing is relatively slow, so you can pretty much eat anything and digest it as you climb. "

Alex Honnold

Climb

You

Eat

" I live out of my van, which gives me a first-hand appreciation for power and lighting. A few years ago, I rebuilt the interior of my van to include solar panels and a battery that powers LEDs for lighting and allows me to charge my phone and laptop. "

Alex Honnold

Live

Appreciation

" Free soloing is almost as old as climbing itself, with roots in the 19th century. Climbers are continuing to push the boundaries. There are certainly better technical climbers than me. But if I have a particular gift, it's a mental one - the ability to keep it together where others might freak out. "

Alex Honnold

Free

Roots

" 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

Apples

Bell

" I've walked away from more climbs than I can count, just because I sensed that things were not quite right. "

Alex Honnold

Away

Just Because

" 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. "

" A hangboard is a little piece of wood with edges, holes, and slopes. There's different strategies for different things - hanging, varying grips, adding weight. If I do a hard finger workout, I'm definitely sore. "

" We are apes - we should be climbing. "

Alex Honnold

Should

Climbing

" 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

Become

Down

" The simple facts of Chadian life - what it takes to survive in that kind of climate with nothing but a hut and some animals - stunned me. And this made me realize, perhaps for the first time, how easy my life was compared to those of people in less privileged societies. "

Alex Honnold

Time

My Life

" 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

" I often joke that I've just become a professional schmoozer. Like, nobody cares how well I can rock climb anymore. It just has to do with how well I can schmooze. "

" I've tried to approach environmentalism the same way I do my climbing: by setting small, concrete goals that build on each other. "

" I make a fair amount of my food choices for environmental-type reasons than nutrition or taste. I'm trying to minimize impact, which is something most people don't necessarily think about when they're shopping. "

" People think I just walk up to a sheer cliff and climb it with no knowledge of anything, when in reality, there's tons and tons of information out there, and I'm already well tapped into it. "

" 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

Fear

" In a general sense, I think it's bad to bring too much money into climbing, since it takes away a little from the beauty of the mountains. But at the same time, I can't blame the Nepali government - or the Indian, Pakistani or Chinese, depending on where you're climbing - from wanting to capitalize on foreign climbers. "

" 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. "

" I'm not thinking about anything when I'm climbing, which is part of the appeal. I'm focused on executing what's in front of me. "

Alex Honnold

Front

Thinking

" There's a constant tension in climbing, and really all exploration, between pushing yourself into the unknown but trying not to push too far. The best any of us can do is to tread that line carefully. "

" 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. "

" 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. "

" My friends like to remind me that I have relatively weak fingers. Aerobic strength and general endurance have come easy, but finger strength has always been my biggest weakness. "

Alex Honnold

Friends

Endurance

" 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. "

" When I was a teenager, I did a lot of pull-ups and push-ups. Every night before bed, I'd do 150 - in sets of 30 or so. Looking back on it now, I'm not totally sure that's the best way to improve as a climber. But it did make me a lot better at doing pull-ups and push-ups. "

Alex Honnold

Looking Back

Night

" 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. "

" Seven years ago, when I started free soloing long, hard routes in Yosemite - climbing without a rope, gear or a partner - I did it because it seemed like the purest, most elegant way to scale big walls. Climbing, especially soloing, felt like a grand adventure, but I never dreamed it could be a profession. "

" Climbing is definitely very much strength-to-weight ratio. At the same time, I've never dieted or restricted calories. You're just sort of mindful about not getting plump. "

" Pretty much every gym I go into, I feel very comfortable. I dump my stuff, take my shoes off, do my thing. "

" 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. "