VIVIAN ASHER

LAKE TAHOE, CA

Just a few hours north of El Capitan — the iconic 3,600 foot monolith that made Alex Honnold a household name — is the stretch of the Sierra Nevada where he first learned to free solo. Alex spent every summer in Lake Tahoe as a kid, wandering down sandy gravel roads and up massive blocks of granite. While climbing has taken him all over the world, these are the rocks he always comes back to

ONE STEP AT A TIME

Pump Lust (above) is a 5.13b route on Donner Summit. Alex admits it’s not particularly better than other nearby routes, but it’s one of his favorites.

“I tried it first as a teenager and thought it was impossible. It remained one of my most attempted projects for many years. I would come into the area, try it at few times, fail, go on a climbing trip, come back, and repeat the cycle until one day I finally was able to do it. It’s nice to feel a sense of progress.”

Climbing is as much a psychological exercise as a physical one. Alex’s approach: wrap your head around the easy things first. He’s proof that small, incremental changes can add up to something big. Now he’s using that philosophy to substantially lower his carbon footprint.

“I live pretty simply, by principle, but there’s always more you can do. Over the years, I’ve made a lot of personal changes in my life — I changed my bank to something more progressive. I became a vegetarian. I installed solar in my home. I’ve wanted to drive electric for years but until now, it didn’t seem like a possibility. The places I go still require a rugged vehicle with good clearance.” 

BEHIND THE LENS

To photograph an athlete, it helps if you are one. Before Ben Moon was a photographer and director, he was a climber. His friendship with Alex began on a mountain and that personal connection to both the athlete and the sport show up in his work. When we asked him to document Alex and Sanni's weekend of adventures in the R1T, the first thing he did was put together a crew of fellow adventurers and storytellers.