Eva Lopez is one of the top Spanish climbers in history. While she is largely known as one of the world’s foremost researchers on training for climbing, she’s also a crusher. She was the 5th woman to to climb 8c and in 2013, at 42 years old, climbed her first 8c+, a route she bolted called Potemkin.

In this episode, Eva and Kris discuss the state of Spanish climbing in the 1990’s and what it was like watching Josune Bereziartu come into her own during those years. They also dig into the woman vs. woman rivalries that are often played up by the media and why it’s less common to see that happen today, and what Josune and her incredible accomplishments mean to climbing history.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

Basque superstar Josune Bereziartu first tied in as the 80’s were changing into the 90’s, after seeing a documentary showing two women climbing in the Verdon. Within those first few months of Josune learning to climb, Lynn Hill did the first 14a ever climbed by a woman.

By the middle of the 90’s Josune became the 5th woman to equal the feat, which had yet to be surpassed. Her friends suggested she could be the first to climb harder, so she started training to make it a reality. Before the decade would change again, with the performance gap in climbing widening, Josune would push through the pressure and become the first woman to climb 8c, or 5.14b.

And she wouldn’t stop there.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

Chris Schulte is a boulderer who is obsessed with the lines and shapes of climbing. He fell in love with Fontainebleau many years ago based on a photo of Fred Nicole climbing Karma and has cultivated a relationship with the forest and climbed many life-list boulders there.

In this episode, Kris asks Chris to describe the forest in his poetic way, and to tell stories of his best memories of Bleau and the special connection he has to some of the boulders, specifically Karma and Duel. They try to unpack why Catherine Miquel isn’t as well known in the US despite her incredible accomplishments, and discuss traverse grades, eliminates, and how to be a good steward of climbing and the places we climb.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

Throughout the 90s, Catherine Miquel was the undisputed queen of bouldering. Surprised you haven’t heard her name? I was too, but we aren’t alone. Not many of the people I’ve talked to know of her or her incredible resume.

Climbing in Fontainebleau, she entered the decade as the only woman to climb V8, and then it was off to the races. Again and again, she pushed the limits, culminating in an ascent of one of the most famous slabs in the world. Duel.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

Josie McKee is a climbing guide, former YOSAR member, all-around big wall super badass and a climbing coach through her company Mind Athlete. She’s climbed El Cap over 20 times, set several speed records, has free climbed damn near every Valley classic, and her Yosemite resume rivals just about anyone’s.

In this episode, Josie walks Kris through each pitch of Freerider and what it takes to climb the route - most importantly the changing mindsets required throughout, shifting from dread to curiosity, and finding joy where most think only of fear.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

If you were following Chris Kalous and The Enormocast in the early days, then you are well aware that he’s climbed Freerider. And if you follow his new show, The Runout, you know how interested he is in the history of one specific pitch of The Free Salathe - Pitch 19 - the pitch that Alex Huber subverted by climbing the Monster Offwidth, thus laying the foundation for Freerider.

In this episode, Kris and Chris go deep into the history of pitch 19, the ethical rules of big wall aid and freeclimbing, and discuss how one pitch of Freerider changed the course of big wall freeclimbing history.

Check out more here.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

In 1998, Alex and Thomas Huber climbed the first ascent of Freerider on El Capitan in just over 15 hours. Their climb ushered in a new era of big wall free climbing, and there’s no question it was a hugely important moment in climbing history.

But the way we credit it, most often simply to Alex Huber, ignores the rich history of the route.

The Huber’s pioneered about 1/30th of the climbing. The vast majority of the route was established over many years by a who’s who of Yosemite and free climbing history. Robbins, Frost, Pratt, Long, Bachar, Hudon, Jones, Glowacz, Skinner, Piana, Schneider, and MORE.

Put simply, Freerider is a linkup. A brilliant linkup, but a linkup nonetheless. And we just can’t talk about it without going back. Way back. Back into time.

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Thank you to our partner, Tension Climbing. Tension creates tools to help you elevate your climbing experience. Check out the goods here and use code STONE for 10% off anything but the full Tension Board set-ups, hardware, and gift cards. When you support Tension, you're supporting the team at Plug Tone creating this show.

Written in Stone is co-created with Power Company Climbing. Use code STONE at checkout for 20% off. Details at www.powercompanyclimbing.com/stone

Today, we're featuring a great conversation between our friend Ryan Devlin, host and creator of the Struggle Climbing Show and member of the Plug Tone Collective, and Jordan Cannon.

In this bonus episode, Jordan takes us on the unbelievable adventure of tackling one of the toughest high-altitude big wall ascents in the world, the Cowboy Direct route of Trango (Nameless) Tower.

Check out all of the episodes of the Struggle Climbing Show here.

Check out more info on this episode here!

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