#40FOR40 PROJECT
40 FIRST ASCENTS IN 40 DAY’S
A somewhat fictional rock climbing
guide, of sorts…
PREFACE
Salutations from The East Side, Oh the life of a climber with the many adventures I have shared and to the adventures lost, my heart will forever pine. The wisdom and enlightenment I have experienced along the way is something that I am humbled by every time I step into the mountains. This feeling keeps me grounded yet restless, it creeps into my psyche no matter how bad I try to block it out. It is more than an urge, more than an un-itchable itch, more than an obsession bordering on addiction and definitely a complex lifestyle.
“It is rock climbing”, how weird, how strange, how life changing it can be, many will never know. With Its unique culture and history, what an obscure pursuit with one of the richest rewards. If you have ever put your life on the end of that silly little cord and asked yourself “WTF are we doing here?”, then you know the difficulties in what I am trying to describe. It is the ever eluding rhetorical question to those of us taking this silliness a little too serious.
“Why do we climb The Mountain”? Well I’m no philosophy or psych major but I can sure as shit tell you it ain’t because “It’s There”, no offense to Sir Mallory.
It’s the beauty of it all, the views, the positioning, the solitude, the connection with nature and her not casting judgment, it’s the embodiment of the perpetual child. It’s the unknown, it’s the suffering, it’s confronting your worst fears and embracing those closest to you. It’s about being humbled by our insignificance in this blip of an existence and how alive all of this can make you feel. So alive in fact that for many, including our friend Sir Mallory, becomes something worth dying for. It definitely helps put the rest of life into perspective and I would not be the individual I am today without all that climbing continues to teach me.
If there is any amount of wisdom I can drop from what I have experienced in what seems like the blink of an eye would be that climbing is rad, nature is awesome and I love my family. Embrace all there is to share, good and bad up and down success and failure. The energy created from sharing in these adventures is really all that will be left behind in the end. Thanks to everyone of you for being an influential character in my book.
~Sensei
“May the spray be strong and the sun always to your back”
THE CHALLENGE
Climb forty first ascents in forty days… #40FOR40
What is a First Ascent you ask? Well its the first time a person or a group of people (often referred to as a team), scale a mountain, a rock face, or even a small boulder. You then get to name it, all agree on the difficulty and share in the experience of being the first and living to tell about it. Deeper than that you get to share in that experience and adventure with future generations following in the same foot steps as those set before you.
Wow 2020 what a futuristic number little me thought of and what that might look like. I don’t recall little me being foresightful enough to know I would turn 40 that year and it is some how a social milestone that you were even able to live that long! Well here I am and don’t really know what I’m suppose to say, except I think Birthday Challenges are a bit cliche. :)~.
That was until I received the invite for the legendary DIG!!! Yet another strange twist and turn in an already bizarre year.
THE RULES
RULE #1 There are no rules.
RULE #2 Never Talk about DIG Club.
RULE #3. There is no DIG Club.
The DIG Club (Do Impossible Ground Up Climbs Until Broken)
Montani Semper Liberi
The DC is an unspoken secret society with myth and legend so deeply engrained in the heritage of climbing and the mountains, that its exploits have unknowingly influenced the imagination of generations and will forever echo in the shadow of the mountain. It is said that its inception can be traced back to George Mallory and his obsession with wanting to be the first to stand on Everest. Shortly thereafter, forever shrouded in mystery, many of famous climbers and mountaineers have been said to dabble in the DIG.
The DC society identifies with the embodiment of the Sprit of the Stone. When incarnated it is believed to elevate ones psyche well above the mundane plain, in turn making you a better climber. Diving deeper into the group is their annual DIG in which members on their birthday must complete an absurd amount of climbs, usually with some other tomfoolery in a first ascent fashion. Typically with first ascents there is a lot of digging involved which is where the groups name is derived.
To further this myth and lore it is said that the one who holds the Heart of Mallory, (which is in fact Mallorys long lost journal) holds this lineage of power to be shared with whomever. Some of the most legendary have been said to posses this journal and hold the societies most prestigious seat as the Grand High Digmiester.
4 3 2 1 DIG
Almost 40 days to the date of said challenge is when I received a somewhat suspect black unmarked envelope. Little did I know the significance of this invitation signed DC. More of a challenge than an invite, daring me to participate in a tradition being thrown at me by a group I thought to be urban legend at best. Some what encrypted the invite stated they wanted me to do at least 40 first ascents within 40 days, in at least four different areas, with no less than 4 partners. I also had to do a bunch of other stuff I’m not at liberty to speak of and my partners were not allowed to know.
So on October 1st the DIG began with my long time friend Pablodiablo84. I am lucky to have a few partners willing to suffer endlessly, hiking, scrubbing and cleaning for hours to climb a 30’ 5.6! Pablo is definitely one of them and little did he realize what he had actually signed up for. Over the next 5 days Pablo and I would log over 48 combined pitches, forging 9 FAs, setting the momentum for the remainder of the DIG. The highlight with Pablo was not only starting to work on The Kaiju Towers, which was a dream come true after scoping them for so long. It was to see one of my long time friends make a magic connection with the rock. Our first scouting mission we summited a technical satellite tower with no way off without bolts. Good thing we forgot the hammer that day and the rest is history.
THE ECHO CHAMBER
Always bitter sweet to see a close friend have to head back home after such an awesome adventure. Needless to say Pablo and I were cooked after climbing the equivalent of a big wall off the couch.
After a day or two of rest however, The Kaiju were beckoning. I was lucky enough to have my closest life long adventure buddy spontaneously show up to help share his support. The adventure buddy I am referring to is my kid brother the Adventureweasel006. Whenever he’s involved in an adventure shit always gets real, so I knew it would be game on. At this point in our climbing careers we have done some life altering ascents together and this would be no different. Between the both of us we have completed over 1500 first ascents all extremely special and memorable in their own way.
With only two days to DIG we had to put down the King Line at The Kaiju, or at least give it a strong effort, with one of my strongest partners. That first day up there was priceless with my little brother and watching him go through the jubilation of emotions Pablo and I had experienced our first visit. He knew as well as I that the main objective that day would in fact become the neo classic Echo Chamber. So magic was this route with the Adventureweasel that it almost didn’t take any work. One of the most surreal dances in the vertical I have ever experienced. In the time warp of two days we completed 4 first ascents and climbed 32 combined pitches.
MONSTER ZERO
As the 40 4 40 walk about continued, my big brother reincarnated and embodiment of the kindred spirit, kaiahua rises from the mist. At this point the heaviness of it all was weighing in a bit. The spirits thus far had given us safe passage on their sacred land. So on the next approach Kaiahua and I payed our homage over looking the hidden cove of spires and pinnacles. Little did we know this would be the day of reckoning with Monster Zero. Armed with the largest rack of cammers I’ve ever gone to battle with we slayed the beast. Kaiahua Son and I, calm and collected, made a most transcendent ascent of this intimidating monster.
Pure Bushido!
After five days of new routing and digging our asses off Kaiahua and I climbed 8 first ascents and 32 combined pitches. I was now on day 18 of the DIG and 21 FAs deep by the time Kaiahua had to depart. Never goodby, always until next time but next time would not come soon enough to complete the challenge.
With a couple of well deserved rest days and feeling pretty accomplished, I was ready to set off on some shoulder season alpine. I had a couple of areas and lines I had been scoping and dreaming about. The thing with new routing is the climbs already exists you are just bringing them to life when the universe feels it is time.
HOGS BACK BLISS
You could say that micro crags in obscure hanging valleys have become somewhat of my specialty. This soaring rib of a buttress had caught my attention several years back and thought “hey that looks like that could be a fun afternoon adventure”. I had estimated it to be about a 20 minute approach and probably around 700’ long with several unknowns looming above. The Universe however had a different plan on how, when and more importantly with whom this stairway into the heavens would be done.
Enter the fourth character in this story Wolfnsnake. Although we had never shared a rope together and Wolfnsnake had never participated in a first ascent I showed him the ways of the old. Nine pitches later of pure bliss we were standing on top of yet another obscure untouched summit in the endless range of light. With well over 1000 feet of climbing below us and a four hour hike back to the car Wolfnsnake never stopped smiling. This I could see fueled the inner fire of the Wolf and together over the next couple of weeks ticked off another 9 FAs with a combined 58 pitches.
THE FINAL DIG
Like all legendary tales this journey of epic proportions also had to come to an end. On day 36 of the challenge I was able to pluck off another 5 first ascents with the support of the mt_whitney_climbing_ranch gang. Believe me when I say that by now, time, space and reality for me went into that super primitive state of existence where nothing exists and everything coexist in the same moment. It is super surreal and have only experienced this a hand full of times. By the end of that day I knew I was poised to complete the DIG!
Fast forward to the 9th of November, last day of the DIG! Weather had become a bit ominous with winter looming just as the rest of California was experiencing an Indian summer. I could barley sleep the night before knowing how special this last day would be. For the final day of the DIG my long time partner in crime and best friend would accompany me on this monumental day.
Mel_reinig had supported me on the DIG the entire time with the same unconditional love she gives everything. I knew this day had the energy to be very special and had even saved a location for this exact moment. On the car ride to the crag that morning, reminiscing about life and all bundled up like snow bunnies, I spontaneously pulled the truck off the road into a meadow we frequently visit. Before I even had the chance to see if she wanted to make that day even more memorable, I step out of the vehicle into a rabbit hole dislocating my right ankle. As I face plant into a cactus and begin to strip my clothes off in shock, I go through all the emotions you could experience thinking all was lost. As my wife gets my clothes back on me like a large toddler, I’m thinking I’m going to the ER for sure. I convince her however that I can walk it off and I must complete the DIG. “Did you hit your head!” she says.
It felt broken for sure but taped it up, barley squeezed my climbing shoe on and sent the remainder of the routes that day. It was so dreamlike I hardly felt any pain but did end up in the ER later that afternoon. X-Rays revealed there were no new breaks only a couple of older ones this time I didn’t know about.
I sincerely learned a lot from this challenge and was an extremely humbling experience to have participated in the DIG. In 40 days time with only a handful of days off, I successfully climbed 41 first ascents and 109 pitches. I Hope you all enjoyed the journey, now it’s time to get out and DIG.
GSG Guide Joshua Reinig has always been a staple in the climbing community and enjoys nothing more than giving back, educating his guests, and sharing his experience with others. Josh created a 20 page PDF detailing all the routes related to his #40FOR40 project. If you’d like a copy of the PDF he’s selling them at a very reasonable price and can be purchased by contacting him via his Instagram at @senseisplitter or at their business page @mt_whitney_climbing_ranch, enjoy!