Alex Honnold Quotes

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Alex Honnold

Profession : Athlete

Birth : August 17, 1985

I was 19 when my father died from a heart attack. He was a 55-year-old college professor and had led what was by all appearances a risk-free life. But he was overweight, and heart disease runs in our family.

Alex Honnold

Yosemite has the most impressive and accessible granite big walls in the world. The rock is amazing. And because of that, it's been the mecca for climbing in the U.S. - and the world to a large degree - for all of climbing history. It's the place to test yourself against the historic routes of the past.

Alex Honnold

My comfort zone is like a little bubble around me, and I've pushed it in different directions and made it bigger and bigger until these objectives that seemed totally crazy eventually fall within the realm of the possible.

Alex Honnold

No matter the risks we take, we always consider the end to be too soon, even though in life, more than anything else, quality should be more important than quantity.

Alex Honnold

You might get run over; you might get hit by lightning. I mean, who knows? Each day, there is a chance you might die. And there's nothing wrong with that. Every living being on Earth is facing that same existential rift.

Alex Honnold

I'm not thinking about anything when I'm climbing, which is part of the appeal. I'm focused on executing what's in front of me.

Alex Honnold

I took a test once; they said I was a genius.

Alex Honnold

I live out of my van, which gives me a first-hand appreciation for power and lighting. A few years ago, I rebuilt the interior of my van to include solar panels and a battery that powers LEDs for lighting and allows me to charge my phone and laptop.

Alex Honnold

At the crux of Half Dome, at the very top of the wall, imagine, like, a smooth wall of rock - a nearly vertical granite slap with tiny ripples for your hands and feet. And so you're really trusting the rubber on your shoes to stick to these ripples.

Alex Honnold

I've walked away from more climbs than I can count, just because I sensed that things were not quite right.

Alex Honnold

There's a constant tension in climbing, and really all exploration, between pushing yourself into the unknown but trying not to push too far. The best any of us can do is to tread that line carefully.

Alex Honnold

I love red bell peppers. Bell peppers in general, really. I like to eat them like apples. They're so crunchy and delicious.

Alex Honnold

I generally don't climb something if it makes me feel fear. The beauty of soloing is that there's no pressure - no one's telling me to do it. So if something seems scary, I don't have any obligation to do it. I can prepare further or just walk away entirely.

Alex Honnold

Big climbs energize me. It's all the other aspects of being a pro-climber that wear me down. The travel and expeditions and training can become pretty tiring. But the actual big climbs - that's what I live for.

Alex Honnold

My friends like to remind me that I have relatively weak fingers. Aerobic strength and general endurance have come easy, but finger strength has always been my biggest weakness.

Alex Honnold

I've never really understood the criticism that climbing is inherently selfish, since it could equally be argued about virtually any other hobby or sport. Is gardening selfish?

Alex Honnold

So many people condemn me for risk taking, but I find it sort of hypocritical because everybody takes risks. Even the absence of activity could be viewed as a risk. If you sit on the sofa for your entire life, you're running a higher risk of getting heart disease and cancer.

Alex Honnold

Anytime you finish a climb, there's always the next thing you can try.

Alex Honnold

I like the simplicity of soloing. You've got no gear, no partner. You never climb better than when you free-solo.

Alex Honnold

I have a journal of everything I've ever climbed since 2005. For the entry about free soloing Half Dome, I put a frowny face and added some little notes about what I should have done better, and then underlined it. Turns out that is one of my biggest climbing achievements.

Alex Honnold