This video hooked me when my friend Tommy Caldwell said, “Middle-aged dads sitting around talking about rock climbing.”
But then I heard: “And we decided to race to see who could climb 9a first.”
Guess I can excuse myself out of that race!
Empath (9a / 5.14d) is the hardest sport climb in the Tahoe region, and now that Tommy is a local, he has turned his attention to climbing it.
This is a really fun video tracking his progression, starting with three years ago when I hiked up to this cliff with Tommy so he could check it out!
I remember thinking it’d be a hard climb to shoot, but the Caldor Fire (unfortunately) took out a bunch of trees in this area, making it easier to capture video.
Great job to Hendrik Pot on directing and shooting this film!
