so when/how did you get into climbing?

the thought approched me at school today about how it was nice to get into climbing at such a young age (16) and made me wonder when some of the other best climbers in the world got into climbing. i love seeing families at the gunks bringing they're kids up classics and wish i had that connection with my paremts. but anyhow post a little about when you got into climbing and how.

jaysen wrote:the thought approched me at school today about how it was nice to get into climbing at such a young age (16) and made me wonder when some of the other best climbers in the world got into climbing. i love seeing families at the gunks bringing they're kids up classics and wish i had that connection with my paremts. but anyhow post a little about when you got into climbing and how.

You must think you're speaking to an esteemed bunch.

Friend dragged me up the first flatiron. After that I was hooked.

+1 to not being an esteemed bunch, with a few notable exceptions.

I got started when our ROTC group took part of the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare climbing class at Leavitt Training Area, in Bridgeport CA. I think I was 15 at the time.

They taught us how to tie a swiss seat harness, rap with a single locker, and then spent the rest of the day top roping and rapelling. After having to tie off mid rap to do PT on the wall (vertical sit ups, jumping jacks etc.) I decided this was a lot of fun.

I didn't get into the sport seriously until about 7 years ago, when I moved to Vegas and fell in love with the rock and opportunities here and nearby.

Someone randomly myspace message me and invited me to go climbing at the gym. Got hooked and talked all my friends into climbing. Now it seems like all I have are climbing friends.

Was hiking/climbing peaks and suddenly got interested in going vertical one year back in the mid 70's. Road trips out of Illinois ever since.

I was in the 8th grade and my friend and I saw a flyer for lessons in an outdoor shop window. The first day was boulering and TRing at Mt. Rubidoux, the second climbing two pitch routes at Big Rock. The next course was a seven pitch climb up Tahquitz.

That whole first year I climbed exclusively in Adidas basketball shoes, leading trad up to 5.7 at Tahquitz and Josh. I didn't even care my feet skated everywhere. I was hooked.

Got into it when I was 10 because my older brother (then 15) got into it. That was in Dallas, so we only climbed in the gym. I did my first outdoor climbs in Oklahoma when I was maybe 13, and then it really took off when I came to Utah when I was 18 (I'm now 25).

My little brother Pat taught me how to climb.

When we were kids, our dad would climb once or twice a year--easy alpine ridges, stuff like that. We thought it (and he) was the coolest thing in the world and begged him to take us out. But mom laid down the law--no climbing until we turned 18.

I, being the dutiful older brother, obeyed this rule. Pat, being the rebellious younger one, had other ideas. One day we went for a walk and he took me to a roadcut. He showed me that he could climb it with no hands (solo). Naturally, I had to try--with my hands--but I got up 10 feet before the rocks broke apart in my hands and I fell/slid back down to the roadside.

Later, he took me to some dirt cliffs that he would climb using a rock dagger to chop hand and footholds. Again, I got up 1/4 way and got way scared--"this is crazy!"

Pat got his hands on a rope and a friend that was less of a scaredy-cat that me. They would toprope scrappy little cliffs by body belaying each other from the top.

My folks soon enough got wind of Pat's escapades and wisely decided that resistance was futile. This, of course, was very unfair to me, so my dad and his partner took me for my first roped climb--Arrowhead Arete in RMNP. Meantime, my folks (also wisely) made Pat take a safety course with a local guide service. By this time he had acquired a limited assortment of stoppers, hexes, biners, tied slings, and one rigid friend and had started leading.

Being a young teenage punk, Pat had difficulty finding partners so he started dragging me out again. I was way scared (after all, a young teenage punk is setting up my belay anchors), and in about a half a dozen TR sessions I was only able to make it up 10 feet before insisting on coming down.

Eventually, Pat took me up the Rock One Route, a 3 pitch 5.4 on Lumpy Ridge. For some reason, this freaked me out less. So later that summer, we climbed the Kieners Route on Long's Peak with our dad. When I saw the Diamond from Chasm View...that's when I got hooked for life.

jaysen wrote:the thought approched me at school today about how it was nice to get into climbing at such a young age (16) and made me wonder when some of the other best climbers in the world got into climbing.

Careful with your syntax, Jaysen; this statement makes it seem like you believe you're one of the great climbers of the world!! But to answer your question--I was in high school when I started climbing. We would boulder on some scrappy blocs down on the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia, and we'd lead bolted sport routes on the Henry Avenue Bridge, also in Philly.

The age: 13
The place: Boy Scout camp (Skymont)

Spent 1 day doing merit badge boy scouty stuff, and was bored with knot tying races. This platinum-haired behemoth of a guy named Bruno walked into the dining hall that evening and said something like: "Hey, any of you wanna go cliff jumping, caving, rock climbing, and rappelling off 200' cliffs? Meet me tomorrow morning, 6 AM sharp."

Only about a dozen kids showed up, and only half of them could do the 6 pullups required for admission into the High Adventure program. Go figure.

The next 5 days were amazing. Ever since, I've been stuffing myself into holes in the ground, clinging to cliffs by my fingertips, and most every other adventure I can find . . . and my folks seemed to be into most of it too. I guess it kept 'em young.
Bruno, folks, thank you.

I started out at my local YMCA when I was about 14. They actually had a pretty descent wall for what it was. I would climb there on and off throughout high school. It wasn't until May 2009, when I took a trip to Yosemite, that I finally climbed outside. I did a couple of routes in the Church bowl with a YMS Guide, and totally caught the bug. I got home, shortly after found an awesome mentor, who in turn introduced me to a bunch of other partners, and I have been climbing throughout the North East since.

Yeah i got into climbing from a few girls that i goto school with, so in the beginning it was primarily gym climbing which got me really in shape and i quit school sports (running and skiing) to pursue climbing. and because of that i turned all my training towards it because it was finally something i really enjoyed, not something that had to be about rank and prestige. my parents liked it at first but once i started going outside sport climbing my mother became very worried and it multiplied when i began trad climbing. then when she saw photos of me on high exposure at the gunks the roof blew off the house and she tryd to shut me down but obviously it dident work. but climbing dident jsut give me a hobby it really changed my life in that it renewed my vision in life and gave me some of the best friend i will ever have. i just think its cool to share stories about how it all started.

Chris Duca wrote: Careful with your syntax, Jaysen; this statement makes it seem like you believe you're one of the great climbers of the world!! But to answer your question--I was in high school when I started climbing. We would boulder on some scrappy blocs down on the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia, and we'd lead bolted sport routes on the Henry Avenue Bridge, also in Philly.

well i dident mean it like that, it just made me wonder about how really strong climbers got into the game, and how long it took them to get to where they're at

i went to undergrad at SUNY New Paltz

I went the Nor'Easter fesitival for the camping in NH this past September... saw pro climbing for the first time and thought "Why haven't I tried this yet?!?"... drug my body to the gym the week after!

I'm totally not a 'good' climber--but I'm really lucky to be the Dad in one of those families that you refer to.

We vacation in Estes Park every summer--we are trying to work out moving there for summers, in fact, but darn that whole financial thing--and a few years ago, my wife thought it would be fun to go rock climbing. So we arranged a trip through a local shop for ourselves & our kids. We did the same the following summer, and during that trip we decided that we could learn enough so that by the following year, we could go on our own. In January '10, we joined a local gym.

The problem with the kids climbing, though, is now my wife & I are leading 5.9s-5.10s, but our sons (9 & 11) are leading 5.10c-5.11a, and going up a letter about every month. Methinks I'm going to need to learn to aid climb/ascend before this summer--I'm not yet comfortable with the thought of my 11yo cleaning.

Anyway, when I talk to those really good climbers I meet out & about, it seems that ages 8-14 are really the sweet spot to start climbing. Unfortunately, I missed that interval by about 25 years.

Saw Chris Sharma in the X-Games. Instantaneous hookage.

I started bouldering with a buddy of mine in the fall of 2007 when I was at school at Virginia Tech. He got me going to this little boulder gym in the back of a church in the next town over. It was pretty cool, had a good variety of features for what it was and no grades. There was a core group of guys that set routes but it got shut down just recently.

The spring semester of 08 my buddy told me about the climbing club at school and we went to a meeting and joined. At that point, the club was fairly inactive, but they were planning a trip to the Red River Gorge for spring break.

We bouldered all spring semester trying to get strong for the trip and eventually the time came to get to Kentucky.

We showed up at Roadside and met up with three people from the club. The Vice President, his soon to be girlfriend, and another guy. We didn't have harnesses and had thought they were bringing them for us because it was a club trip. Nope. Back to Miguels for a harness.

Neither me nor my friend knew how to tie in so they taught us that real quick and we started by climbing some easy routes on the music wall. Then we moved down and they put up Up Yonder (11b) and we flailed on that.

The whole time we were there I begged them to teach me everything they could so they taught me how to TR belay, lead climb, and lead belay all in the span of three days. I took my first practice fall on day 2, and a huge ride off the anchors of Creep Show (10d) when I slipped clipping the chains.

While I was there I was also told that trad is for pussies and old fat men. I believed that for a year and then realized how dumb the guys that taught me were. The skills they taught me were good and safe, just some of their ideology was way off. Two of them haven't roped up in 2 years or so and just boulder.

After that I started getting out to the New a lot with some friends and learning more and more.

The Vice President of the club came up to me while we were bouldering on campus one day and asked me if I'd want to run the club the next year because they had no one else even remotely interested. I didn't really know much at this point but I decided to take it on and along with my buddy who got me started climbing we took over as President and Treasurer. The VP stayed on as VP and I soon learned he just used the club to his benefit for gear and trips.

Every year I learned more, taught more, and led more, it was kind of a trial by fire but I've come a long long way since the summer of 08. Read my trip report to the Wind River Range and you'll see what I mean.

I'm 24 now, I guess I started at 20 (birthday in Nov). 3.5 years as of right now. I've learned a lot in that short time, partially because I wanted to and partially because I had to, and I've got a lot more that a I want to learn and do. I want to aid, climb big walls, ice climb, and climb some big mountains alpine style.

Well, I am just getting started in climbing. For me, it starts with seeing a movie: Footloose. There is this amazing mountain in the background that just called to me. Two days later, I filled a duffle bag with my most important stuff, and eventually found my way to Utah. I can sneak into a local recreation center with a wall, and i am learning to climb each night.
My wonderful boss just gave me his old equipment, so now I can begin to get outside and climb for real. I am excited to get outside, and climb the mountains I have seen only from movies. This is a story in progress, as I can only climb a 5 dot 6 route at this time. I plan to get better, and the people who work at the gym say anything is possible.
One day soon, I hope to bolt my own climbs too. It will only be a matter of time
J.F. Sebastian

about 9 years ago i walked into starved rock outfitters, aka GearExpress.com, and poked around, picked up john longs how to rock climb, and the MSR Pocketrocket(i was really into backpacking at the time). took the book home, read it from cover to cover and went back to the store to talk to the owners. since i live around a plethora of chossy sandstone(starved rock state park), they insisted i take the tr101 aty the gym, before they would sell me shoes, etc. so i did, came back monday got my shoes and some other stuff. when i built thier new building, i did alot of side work for gear, and beeen climbing outside ever since!

J.F. Sebastian wrote:Well, I am just getting started in climbing. For me, it starts with seeing a movie: Footloose. There is this amazing mountain in the background that just called to me. Two days later, I filled a duffle bag with my most important stuff, and eventually found my way to Utah. I can sneak into a local recreation center with a wall, and i am learning to climb each night. My wonderful boss just gave me his old equipment, so now I can begin to get outside and climb for real. I am excited to get outside, and climb the mountains I have seen only from movies. This is a story in progress, as I can only climb a 5 dot 6 route at this time. I plan to get better, and the people who work at the gym say anything is possible. One day soon, I hope to bolt my own climbs too. It will only be a matter of time J.F. Sebastian

I'm not sure whether this a joke or not after looking at the pictures in this guys profile...