It’s amazing to me that he’s still alive, and lives in Las Vegas with a wife and kids. Like somehow he has a “normal” life on top of his climbing insanity.
Fun fact, Alex said in an interview that this is a picture of him having a panic attack. Just shaking and desperately trying to keep calm as adrenaline pours through his system.
Didn't know that he was able to have panic attacks at all. Something to do with his amygdala or something. Good to know that he's only human, I was deeply moved after watching him in Free Solo.
Is it this picture or this ledge? I believe his half dome assent was scary because he wasn’t fully prepared. However this specific picture was taken afterwards.
I'm very far from doing something like this, but I do have quite a bit of experience hiking/climbing in exposed terrain, so I can do my best: People usually start off enjoying relatively light hikes in the mountains, because it feels good to be hiking in cool terrain with awesome views. As you get more experience, what seemed scary a couple years ago doesn't look scary anymore. You like hiking, so you go for the hike, without thinking much about the fact that you thought it looked scary and dangerous a couple years ago.
Keep repeating this cycle, and you might suddenly find yourself tied into a rope, with crampons, an ice pick, and skis on your back, on the top of some frozen mountain that looked insurmountable some years ago. It doesn't even feel scary, just really awesome.
Add some brain damage (slight joke, but Alex Honnold does have a smaller "fear center" than most people), and you end up in situations like the one in the photo.
My point is that it isn't really about adrenaline seeing like a lot of people think. It's about going for awesome hikes, and your limits for what you feel safe doing shifting over time as you gain experience.
I can imagine myself on that ledge and being the one person where after thousands of years of being perfectly fine, the ledge finally decided to give way and separate from the cliff.
"Thank God Ledge" is an iconic feature on the Regular Northwest Face of Half Dome in Yosemite National Park. This narrow granite ledge, approximately 35 feet long, varies in width from about 5 to 12 inches and is situated roughly 1,800 feet above the valley floor.
Reminds me of the Via Ferrata in Switzerland. It really gets the blood pumping and gives you a massive adrenaline rush, as your feet are walking on tiny metal bolts driven into a sheer cliff. You can see all the way down to the valley floor from between your toes :3