00:00:01.20
Alyssa
Hey everyone, welcome to the Uphill Athlete podcast. I’ll be your host today. My name is Alyssa Clark, if you’ve forgotten at any point. ah But I am stoked to bring you someone that I think really came on everyone’s radar ah last year, but has been in the climbing world actually for only four and a half years, which is incredibly shocking considering all that you’ve done.

00:00:26.73
Alyssa
But I have Tanner Wanish. I should have asked you about that before. Wanish?

00:00:32.61
Alyssa
Wanish! Wow! The third choice!

00:00:34.21
Tanner
I get that all the time. It’s okay.

00:00:37.19
Alyssa
Tanner Wanish on with me. He has, as I said, been climbing for four and a half years. He’s a former Navy SEAL. He also runs or is on the board for Crux Wilderness Therapy, which I’d also love to ask you more about.

00:00:55.17
Alyssa
But probably what he’s most known for is breaking some guy named Alex Honnold, handheld, someone like that, ah his record on the Yosemite Triple Crown. And you came in at 17 hours and 55 minutes. You’ve also done NIAD in nine hours and then decided that that wasn’t enough, that you were going to do the quadruple adding in the Washington column and completing that in 20 hours and 50 minutes. So the triple is well I guess I’ll just let you get into it but Tanner thanks for being on I don’t know why I just thought of asking you to be on the last few days but I was like oh my gosh wow slam dunk like easy easy day so thanks for being here.

00:01:47.19
Tanner
Yeah, thanks for having me on. I’m happy to connect here. I’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, so it’s cool to come on and get a chance to just yap for a bit.

00:01:57.08
Alyssa
Love a good yap. That was one of the best, I feel like, ah discoveries. My friend told me about gapping. I was like, gapping is the best.

00:02:05.03
Tanner
It’s great. Yeah, I could yap all day. I do it all the time. I’m pretty good at it, too.

00:02:09.84
Alyssa
That’s awesome. So I’d love to, I’m sure you’ve gone over this a little bit, but just a little bit about your background of, you know, how you got into sports, where you grew up, and then also what led you into wanting to be a SEAL would be awesome.

00:02:26.74
Tanner
I grew up in South Carolina, not outdoors, inclined in any way whatsoever. I went to the Citadel, it’s a military college in South Carolina.

00:02:38.72
Tanner
I was like one hair under a court order from going to the Citadel.

00:02:38.95
Alyssa
That makes sense.

00:02:44.19
Tanner
I was like the definition of troubled youth coming out of high school is a bit out of control. And it was kind of a forced decision.

00:02:55.88
Tanner
to go there and it ended up being like the best thing that ever happened to me. It gave me a good sense of discipline and I needed some rigidity and some structure and like a set of rules and a good, I needed some good strong male figures to tell me what to do at the time, which I definitely got.

00:03:14.55
Tanner
so ah yeah but at the end of At the end of college, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. I worked at State Farm the s mer after my junior year for like the whole summer, because that’s what my grandpa did, and he was very successful. And I just know It’s just like what you do. It’s like, well, this is what the guy in my family did. He’s doing well. I’m going to go do that.

00:03:38.62
Tanner
And one summer ah doing that told me immediately, this is not what I want to do. I don’t I don’t think I’m cut out for a desk job for a variety of reasons. It’s not going to be a mutually beneficial situation for me or the people in the office. So I went when I went back for my senior year, two of my best buddies at the Citadel, Danny and Jay got special forces contracts to go into the army. It was like a big dream of theirs to go into the special forces and be Green Berets.

00:04:10.30
Tanner
and they are kind of flippantly. throughout like, hey, you should ah you should look at this seal route. I didn’t know anything about the seal teams. I didn’t ever meet a seal. I didn’t even know what they did. I grew up swimming my whole life. I was pretty good. as I think I was probably the best at going into college with swimming, like sports-wise. I wrestled as well, but I was definitely better at swimming. So I had a pretty good water background. And it just seemed like this kind of like brutish

00:04:41.48
Tanner
uh fit where it was like you’re good in water why don’t you go do this water you know water thing and uh I did like very brief research on it. You know, I saw guys j ping out of planes and shooting guns and stuff. And like, yeah, that looks better than State Farm. Sure. And just completely like on a whim went into their cruder’s office and ended up dropping a packet. And I auto qualified for a bud slot, which if you get high enough scores across the board, like a c ulative highest score, you just auto qualify. You get a contract within 48 hours and you’re immediately, you just get the next shift date that you want.

00:05:17.15
Tanner
So like, in retrospect, it’s it’s almost embarrassing to say I didn’t have like these grand lifelong dreams of like, I need to, you know, embody honor and commitment and go like serve like honestly I just didn’t want else to do it seemed like a really cool opportunity to test myself and, you know, prove that I was worth i it seemed like an opportunity to prove that I was worth

00:05:41.49
Tanner
being counted on by others it’s an opportunity to prove that you are somebody that people can look to in a time of like adversity or crisis or something it just seemed like a really cool opportunity to kind of you know test your mettle and see like are you one of these guys or are you are you the rest and statistically you’re going to be the rest that you know the 95% that don’t make it but

00:05:51.83
Alyssa
Okay. Okay.

00:06:01.83
Tanner
I don’t know, everything, it worked out reasonably well, all things considered. Obviously there’s like a million ways that could have gone horrifically bad. Yeah, it worked out well and I shipped out right after college and did about nine years in the Navy.

00:06:19.73
Tanner

00:06:20.14
Alyssa
Oh wow, okay, that’s quite a bit of time.

00:06:22.87
Tanner
six and a half in the SEAL teams or so, just because how long the training pipeline is. It just takes a while to get there. So yeah, that was the general route to the Navy. And then I separated in December of 2022. So I just passed two years ago.

00:06:40.58
Alyssa
Wow. Do you feel that, you know, I’ve actually never really heard, and I should say this, I think it was before my husband’s in the Navy, ah spent a lot of time training people and working. I’ve actually trained some special forces people. And I’ve never heard it described as being that person that people can count on as wanting to be a part of the team. How do you see that translate to being a ah rope partner or being on the wall? like Do you feel a similar kind of that sense of partnership and such? Because it seems to me like, oh yeah, that makes a lot of sense because that’s such an intimate relationship.

00:07:23.61
Tanner
Yeah, no, for sure. There’s, I want to, like every, every day I go out to climb with somebody, I want to be the best partner I can. I want to you know, understand ideally we’ve got shared objectives in mind on the kind of day we’re trying to have, whether that’s, Hey, we’re going to go project. We’re going to climb really hard today and we’re not going to stop until we’re totally trashed or we want to do a big volume day and we’re going to climb until we’re Totally trash, but it’s going to be a vol e. We’re going to do 40 pitches instead of working the same route all day. and you know I want to have that good attitude. I want to make the team a stronger team. you want to. I just want to add to the partnership in every way I can and not take away. I don’t want to be complaining. I’m not, you will never in a million years see me show up late to go climb. That is like my biggest pet for you in the world. And it’s super common. It drives me nuts, but like, I’m not going to be late. I’m not going to hike slowly. I’m not going to forget gear. Like i but i I want to treat this like we’re, you know, out there working to be, to be a little better. And obviously there’s days where we’re like, Hey, we’re just going to go crag and we’re going to have fun. and It’s not a serious day. This is like a totally type one day, and that’s a different scenario. But if I’m going to go out for any sort of actual objective that day with a partner, I want to be the best partner I can. I want to be somebody that people, you know, when they think of a big objective, they’re going to be like, oh, I’m going to call Tanner to see if he wants to do that because I know that he’s going to show up prepared with a good attitude and lots of stoke, and he’s going to maximize our chances for succeeding at whatever we’re going to go do that day.

00:08:55.09
Tanner
So I just think that’s like, it’s the least I can do as a partner. And I’m honestly, that’s what I’m looking for in partners as well as people that kind of embody those same values and stuff that, you know, our time is valuable. I don’t get to climb as much as I want. I would like to climb every day and anything less than that is going to be less than I want. So like,

00:09:12.81
Tanner
If you show up 30 minutes late, like, I’m probably going to be a little antsy when you get there and be like, okay, well, we just, you know, we just missed like already a pitch or two. And, you know, if you halfway through the day, you’re like, oh, I just remembered I got to let my dog out. Like, okay, well, we just lost five or six more pitches. And so, yeah.

00:09:27.97
Tanner
I just think about it, I just think stuff like that. I can also be like, I totally acknowledge this. I can be a little bit intense in the mountains. ah There’s like two, there’s two tanners for sure. And it’s gonna depend on what day we’re looking to have. But Like I said, whether it’s like, hey, we’re gonna go crazy with a group of 10 people and we’re just gonna have fun. Or, hey, we’re gonna go do, you know, we’re gonna go do Whitney, we’re gonna go to Whitney lab and we’re gonna try to do it in under six hours car to car or something. Those are night and day different tanners. And like on the second one,

00:09:57.90
Tanner
It’s kind of a business and I want to push hard and train.

00:10:00.90
Alyssa
you know

00:10:04.03
Tanner
And if you don’t want to do that, that’s fine. I’ll go by myself. But a lot of times that that like miscommunication or maybe misunderstanding on like we thought we had the same ah you know idea in mind but we don’t has definitely resulted in a few like ah few burn partnerships and stuff, not in a personal bad way, but just like, hey, maybe we’re not the best in the mountains together.

00:10:21.80
Alyssa
Right. yeah Absolutely, I mean to be honest it I do the exact same thing with my running and actually had I worked with mental performance coach and and he put it really well of like There’s runs that are meant to be shared with friends and family and are just for fun and then there’s runs It’s like that’s mine.

00:10:24.30
Tanner
So yeah, and I just think it’s important to communicate that beforehand on what kind of day you’re looking to have. so

00:10:51.12
Alyssa
That’s my training and like I am NOT willing to budge on what needs to happen that day and that differentiation, I feel like it really helped me too.

00:11:02.04
Alyssa
I also, I mean, you can ask my husband Codi, I am like, so antsy if I’m not getting my workout done the way that I want to the way it was written, and on time. So I feel ya on that.

00:11:14.69
Tanner
Yeah, I get pretty stubborn on that. I would like to routinely, I mean I would say at least 50% of the time, I’ll just say before we step off, like, hey, when we get to the top, I’m going to run down, you know I’m going to run 14 miles to the car.

00:11:31.79
Tanner
And you can come with me, or I’ll meet you at the car. But like I’m not, I’m not like I’m not budging on that. I’m just letting you know that’s what I’m going to do. Or if we’re on the way up, and it’s like this you’re immediately not keeping up for whatever reason. You’re not having a good day, or you’re not fit enough, or whatever. I’m just like there are days where I’m just like, hey, I’ll see you back at the car. I’m going to go. Because like you said, like these these these training days are really important for me. and Yeah, I just feel like I’m, I hate feeling like I left stuff on the table that day. I like to use up my, you know, I like to use up my days well and, you know, I can’t, yeah like it, it costs something to go into the mountains every day and go do these like big mileage or big volume or intensity days.

00:12:15.22
Tanner
and any of those that are wasted, I just don’t see the reason why I would waste them. Why wouldn’t I just say like, okay, I’ll see you in two hours because you’re not moving fast enough. I don’t know. I know that’s totally controversial. I totally get that. I just literally value my time. Ah You know, that’s Tanner time and Like we said, there are definitely other times where it’s like, Hey, this is a social day. We’re going to hike as a group and we’re going to chat. Maybe it’s more of a mental health day. We’re going to, we’re just going to talk and shoot the shit and kind of get into the weeds for a couple hours. And those are just as important. I totally acknowledge, like those are very important, but, uh, that needs to be kind of. Maybe designated beforehand. I don’t want to go out on a day that I want to push hard and then end up being like, man, I’m like, I have a ton left in the tank at the end of the day. Cause I feel like I just wasted, you know, an opportunity to get a little bit better. So.

00:13:04.08
Alyssa
Absolutely. I mean, I, yeah, you’re if not controversial to me because I always say like, if, if someone is pacing me or. You know, we’re going out on a run and believe me, I love people.

00:13:16.66
Alyssa
I love the community, all of that. But I’ll say, Hey, I love you, but I’m not going to stay with you. Like if you’re not keeping up, I am dropping you. Sorry.

00:13:27.53
Tanner
Yeah.

00:13:27.49
Alyssa
Like, like today, today’s not the day. This race, not the race. Like I love you so much.

00:13:33.11
Tanner
Most of my partners have experienced that problem.

00:13:35.11
Alyssa
What’s up?

00:13:37.71
Tanner
I don’t know if any, I don’t know if anybody I’ve ever had big days with has not experienced that at least once where I’m like, Hey, love you, man. I’ll see you back in the car. I got to go. like so And it’s not personal at all.

00:13:48.47
Alyssa
Yeah, it’s not.

00:13:51.13
Tanner
Days where I’ve been on the other side, I’ve had days where I’m like, I had a day, I went out with Vitaly actually, we were just talking about him, where we went out we went out and did like a spur of the moment circular towers traverse. And two thirds of the way through, I was like, dude, I feel fucking terrible.

00:14:05.52
Tanner
like I am dying right now. I don’t know if what i if it was a nutrition issue or some just, what for whatever reason, I wasn’t performing. And he was obviously doing well. And I was like, hey, you go ahead.

00:14:16.70
Tanner
I’m going to cut out this shoot. I’ll meet you back at the car. Because I don’t want to hold him up. I know that he’s feeling strong and he wants to have that day.

00:14:20.72
Alyssa
yeah

00:14:23.30
Tanner
I don’t want to be the guy that’s making you wait on me. I know what that’s like. It drives me insane. So for God’s sake, you go ahead and have the day that you want to have. And I’ll just not hurt my feelings. It’s going to hurt my feelings way more if I’m like the anchor that’s ruining your you know your day that you’re trying to have.

00:14:38.05
Tanner
so I totally get it. There’s no problem with being on either side. I just think it needs to, I wish it was a bit less personal of it. It shouldn’t be like a personal thing.

00:14:45.41
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:14:46.37
Tanner
It should just be like, hey, you know, for whatever reason, we’re not connecting today. So we’re going to connect in an hour by car. So.

00:14:53.72
Alyssa
Yeah, you know, I would say that ah in the running world, that is much more acceptable. I would guess in the rock climbing world, that there’s much more of that like, hey, we’re just out here like having fun, that you probably get more pushback.

00:15:10.31
Tanner
Yeah, a little bit.

00:15:11.85
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:15:12.87
Tanner
Yeah. And also like it depends on if we’re, you know, are we in technical terrain and stuff? Like maybe we’re both like Vitaly and I soloed most of that, but like we’re soloing it with the ass ption that if we got into a situation, we have each other there in like a small rope that we can belay each other through.

00:15:27.53
Tanner
So I don’t have the opportunity to just cut out randomly, because I would have cratered the entire day. So I waited until we were done with the technical climbing to then cut out, because you know it’s if you’re doing technical stuff or you’re at risk, like I don’t want to leave him 20 miles deep in the mountains with no radio and no way to get in contact with anybody.

00:15:39.45
Alyssa
Totally.

00:15:45.48
Tanner
And now he’s by himself when he thought he was with a partner. So there’s just considerations like that, too. And yeah, it’s a little more nuanced, I think, but just the idea of making sure you’re kind of on the same page with the day you’re trying to have.

00:15:58.40
Alyssa
Absolutely. And that, there’s kind of two pieces that I want to touch on today. One of which is thinking about, well, I guess you brought up this term we were chatting a little bit before, but big alpine slash climbing endurance events. So you know you’re talking like 15 plus hours out moving through the dark, through the light, you know on the wall, running, etc.

00:16:30.76
Alyssa
How are you thinking about your training for these events? How are you differentiating the technical aspects of climbing and also making sure you know you do have the endurance to go for that long?

00:16:49.93
Tanner
Yeah, yeah I’ve been I don’t know.

00:16:53.16
Alyssa
A huge question, just a small question.

00:16:53.79
Tanner
We’ve been trying to figure out a good term for this weirdly, hyper-niche style of climbing that we’re doing. We’ve just been calling it technical enduro, like the quad where you’re doing this is gigantic, you know you’re in technical terrain for 20 hours or something like that.

00:17:13.11
Tanner
And ah a lot of these big traverses are kind of, they’re like, I mean, I don’t know, not, honestly, they’re not that similar. They’re like, it’s, you’re in technical terrain where you’re definitely in no fall zones for quite, for, you know, a large portion of the day, but it’s obviously different than being 30 pitches up a cap or something.

00:17:28.58
Alyssa
Totally.

00:17:29.74
Tanner
But there is a lot of this stuff. So, I mean, I think that first and foremost, you need to be able to climb. You need to climb.

00:17:39.95
Tanner
Everything that you’re looking at climbing like 100 percent confidently would be like the absolute primary check mark. If you can’t climb everything confidently, you don’t have any business in adding 17 hours of that.

00:17:57.04
Tanner
It just needs to be almost second nature, the stuff that you’re doing.

00:17:58.05
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:18:01.25
Tanner
So when you’re going out and doing the Grand Traverse in a day or Evolution Traverse in a day or Circular Towers or whatever, yeah that climbing needs to feel like scrambling. If you’re up there and you’re like,

00:18:13.95
Tanner
Obviously, this is all my opinion. I’m sure that there are other ways to do this, but in my opinion, it needs to be it needs to be you need to be so comfortable doing that. that that’s not. It’s not a consideration because when you’re on your 18 on technical terrain, if you’re not comfortable, you know that’s like ah that’s a serious safety hazard.

00:18:32.78
Tanner
You’re going to end up grinding, complete halt.

00:18:33.03
Alyssa
Oh, yeah.

00:18:36.14
Tanner
The wheels are going to fall off dramatically. If you’re not, if you’re not super, super comfortable when you start 20 hours in, you’re going to be, you know, you I mean, just not going to make it that far. There’s no way. I think that that’s the primary thing, making sure that you’re super comfortable on either the grade that you’re climbing or like the specific terrain, whether that’s super exposed ridge climbing. or if it’s speed climbing on LCAP or something like that. It’s understanding that you know this is well below your pay grade in terms of technical difficulty. So I think that’s the first thing. I don’t know what I would put second, either the mental head game or the physical fitness. I think they’re both equally important.

00:19:17.54
Tanner
because if your head’s not right, obviously to do this stuff, you’re not, you just, you just won’t make it past the, you know, you won’t make it past the first peak. Cause there’s, there’s definitely days that we’ve gone out to climb, to go speed climb. And I think speed climbing is like objectively probably the riskiest thing I’ve done like in my adult life, probably it’s like, it’s, it’s just, it is just.

00:19:39.66
Tanner
inundated with so much potential hazard. And it’s all like one tiny mistake away. And your subconscious is very aware of that. like If you make one small mistake, it could be fatal or it could be life changing. And we’ve seen that happen with you know professional climbers in the past. It’s a very, very real reality that’s like it’s tangible at all times. it’s you will You will not forget that. So I’ve had days where we’ve gone out to speed climb. And I’m like, dude, I just don’t have the g ption to go do these hundred foot run outs today, like for whatever reason, I didn’t sleep well last night or, you know, maybe I had an experience recently that rattled me and I need to get my head back but I, you know, there’s days where I’ve just been like, I just don’t, I’m not feeling as bold as I need to be today to do what we’re, what we’re looking to do. And then you know, congruently, same with the big,

00:20:28.71
Tanner
with the big soloing days in the mountains, because if you are going to do a lot of these bigger days, Grand Traverse again, like stuff like that, you’re going to have to solo almost the entire majority, if not the entire thing, to do that in a day in any sort of like remarkable time.

00:20:43.64
Tanner
It’s just the reality of covering that much ground. It’s just not possible to do it while you’re roping up and pitching out.

00:20:46.08
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:20:49.85
Tanner
So I’ve had days, I’ve had plenty of days where I’ve gone out to, you know, by myself into the mountains and I’ve gone up to, i had a I had a day, two years ago or something where I hiked up and I was going to do, I was just going to solo the east buttress of Whitney, which I’ve done several times. And like for no reason in particular, I just was like, I just don’t really want to do this today. Like I know that there’s this.

00:21:11.70
Tanner
a little bit of an exposed section up at the top above the Pee Wee where you’re like, you’re like a thousand feet of air under you and it’s super, it’s like five, six climbing. It feels pretty secure, but like, I just, I was thinking about that and I was just, I had trail runners on and that was my plan to go do this. And I just was like, I just don’t want to, I don’t want to experience that situation today where I have to confront this fear, put it back in the box and then kind of deal with it.

00:21:39.25
Tanner
So I just went up the Mountaineers route and it was a great day and it was totally fine. And maybe I was just in my head, maybe everything would have been fine and it would have been a totally fine scenario. But I want to be really attuned to that that little voice in my head that says, hey, maybe today is not the best day to do that. And I listen to that 10 out of 10 times. like I don’t have days where I’m like, oh, I have to solo this or I’m going to lose everything. So I want to keep that back door very readily cordoned off and accessible at all times to be like, oh, I don’t want to do that, I don’t want to take this risk today.

00:22:09.69
Tanner
Because it is a lot of risk. That’s the reality is like, you can downplay it and say that this is just well below your grade, but you are one mistake away from likely a life changing scenario.

00:22:12.63
Alyssa
Totally.

00:22:19.35
Tanner
And that’s that shouldn’t be shied away from you should acknowledge that and kind of confront that scenario. And then you can choose to go anyway, but you shouldn’t ignore that. I don’t think that’s a good way to approach that. So I think that, you know, obviously that’s like the second thing is like making sure your, your head is right for these big technical Enduro days where you’re going to be taking more risk than you normally would. And then obviously the fitness, like, can you physically do it? Can you physically climb for 22 hours? Can you physically climb four walls in a day? Like, have you ever climbed 80 pitches in a day? Like,

00:22:51.06
Tanner
it’s gonna it’s gonna hurt like you’re gonna start cramping up in really weird places it’s gonna be very odd so you know that’s ah but like all three of those things are like immediate deal breakers if your head’s not right you you can’t even start if you physically can’t do it you can’t even start like they’re all they’re all like top tier important things because I feel like a lot of stuff goes into these they’re just like these high demand like kind of involved dates where they just require like ah this really c ulative toolbox of fitness and headspace and ah technical skills and that’s like that’s what I love so much about it is like it.

00:23:28.89
Tanner
you know, I could have gone and climbed El Cap a year into climbing. If I can climb 5’9″, you can pull on gear, you can climb the nose. yeah Like realistically, if you can pull on cams and you can climb 5 ‘9 “, you can go do the nose tomorrow.

00:23:41.56
Tanner
But you’re probably not going to do it in five hours and then do three more walls. That’s going to be something that happened

00:23:45.99
Alyssa
yeah

00:23:46.74
Tanner
years down the road after you’ve built that really good fitness space and vol e and intensity and I can do these 511 moves when I’m 68 pitches in because if I can’t do that move now I have to aid this pitch and now this pitch is going to take me an hour instead of five minutes.

00:24:01.93
Tanner
So like it’s just this really cool comprehensive cumulative like I’ve put in all of this work across the board and all these categories and this is this is the prize right here is like these really big technical days.

00:24:14.72
Tanner
So sorry that’s a lot of yapping right there.

00:24:16.24
Alyssa
No, that was amazing. I mean, I guess I really just want to highlight the fact that you said that there are some days where it’s just not the right time to do it. And I listened to that because I feel like the reputation that elite climbers athletes get is that we don’t have that we just go all the time we like never kind of back off and that is not the case and i think and i love that you pointed that out and said like yeah i really listened that voice 10 out of 10 times so listen because that’s what keeps us alive first off and it’s also just it’s very humanizing where it’s like no we’re not just hardos

00:24:58.93
Alyssa
all the time pushing to the absolute limits, there are days for that. And there are days where it’s like, yeah, I’m just not in the space for that right now. And that’s equally important.

00:25:11.51
Tanner
Yeah, yeah.

00:25:11.60
Alyssa
so thanks for saying that.

00:25:12.77
Tanner
We just talked about…

00:25:13.82
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:25:14.69
Tanner
Yeah, of course. like it’s you know We kind of just touched on the burnout stuff before ah before we started recording. But there just to go back to your point on like backing off on that, i’m gonna I don’t want to butcher this.

00:25:26.47
Tanner
I think this is Leo Holding. I don’t know for sure. I could be totally wrong about this, so I hope somebody corrects me if I am. I think he said, ah in terms of base j ping, he’s like you know really big into the base j ping scene.

00:25:39.17
Tanner
And somebody it might be Leo said I want to be known as the guy who walked away from the most base j ps ever Because he’s like it’s about walking up and like if there’s an ounce of me that says today’s not the day to take this risk No questions asked pack your shit up hike down the backside and you have nothing to lose from that like you got a great day and outside and like you’re 100% not going to die that day of base j ping.

00:26:05.08
Tanner
Whereas like if maybe you had, but like I want to have a similar ah similar mentality with specifically these like high risk days where if I’m not feeling like I’m capable of like shouldering the load of risk that day, I’m not going to do it because

00:26:05.27
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:26:22.52
Tanner
that’s when mistakes get made because now i’m not like i’m not thinking clearly and maybe i’m forcing stuff and if i’m forcing stuff i’m not listening to that little voice in my head and like i’m not i’m not flowing i’m not organic and like you know the more you like it’s counterintuitive but like i don’t want to be thinking out there while i’m doing stuff i need stuff to be happening kind of automatically and Yeah, i just there there are days to like push through that, obviously, and that’s very valuable to have days where like, man, I don’t want to do this, but I’m going to do it anyway. I don’t think that high risk objectives are the time to do that, though. I think that’s the time where you need to be your most willing to back off. and say for whatever reason, this doesn’t feel right. And maybe I can’t articulate exactly why, but you know, this is always going to be here. I’ll do this next week. I’ll do this next month. Like I don’t need to, I don’t need to take this risk today specifically. Maybe I’ll just go run or I’ll go.

00:27:13.90
Tanner
you know, do a bunch of top rope solo laps or something like that. But I think that’s an important part of being, you know, not, not having ego involved, not being stressed about like, what are people going to think? Or who did I tell I was going to do this? Like, it’s, it doesn’t matter. It’s your, this is your longevity in the sport. And I think that’s, you know, probably the most important part of longevity is being willing to like, listen to those things that are said like, maybe not today.

00:27:38.13
Alyssa
Yeah and I think that when you really start knowing yourself, knowing your body and your mind, there’s a difference between oh this is hard and I don’t know maybe I’m tired or I’m working really hard versus I don’t feel okay about this situation like something is wrong like I think sometimes people think like oh well you just don’t want to train hard or you’re tired or whatever it’s like no it’s not really that like there’s some force that’s

00:28:10.02
Alyssa
Speaking like today is just not the day for this to happen and that’s I think a very different voice than like hey you know I’ve been grinding and this is really hard but like I you know I need to push through I can do that.

00:28:14.87
Tanner
Yeah, totally different scenarios. And like I said, there’s great value in hitting that wall and pushing through it on those days that you can afford to. But yeah, I just think that it’s important to be able to recognize that. I had a lot of trouble for a couple of years with overtraining, like really, really badly overtraining myself into these chronic injuries like that I’m still dealing with today. like

00:28:49.94
Tanner
I still have terrible back problems and like shoulder problems and knee problems. I’ve had knee surgeries and like torn labr s and stuff and it’s because I would refuse to acknowledge that reality for quite a while. You know, maybe today’s not the day to just completely bury myself. And I would respond by being like, oh, you’re being a little bitch. We’re gonna we’re gonna double down now. You know, yeah I’d hear that inner monologue of like, hey, today’s not the day to really just you know crush yourself. And I would respond by being like, oh, I need to and need to bury that voice so deep. So I’m gonna do even more than I was going to.

00:29:30.87
Tanner
And I was destroying myself. It was so counterproductive, like really hard, like self harmful stuff like that. And now I’ve gotten a lot better at recognizing you know the difference between between the reality of like, hey, you don’t have, you just physically don’t have that much to give today. Or you physically can’t shoulder this mental burden of like the risk that you’re looking to take versus Maybe you are just being a weenie today and like you do need, you do need to just push hard. Like maybe you are just tired, like the train anyway. So I’m trying to, I’m trying to get better. I’m still working on that, but we’re trying to differentiate a little more accurately now.

00:30:06.94
Alyssa
Yeah, I mean, to be honest, in all fairness to you, I mean your background is literally counterintuitive to that thought.

00:30:18.50
Alyssa
Your background with seals, etc. It’s just like, yeah, you go. It doesn’t matter. like Feelings are not a part of this equation.

00:30:24.25
Tanner
and no matter what Yeah, not yeah and you can’t be like, I’m not.

00:30:30.02
Alyssa
I’m not really, I’ll give you credit for that. like That’s kind of been ingrained in you for a while, so I’d get on you that you’re kind of trying to try to break away from that. But I’m curious how your training breaks down when you’re doing something like the triple of how much of it is kind of that endurance piece of running, hiking, and how much of it is you know getting on the wall and climbing. Like how do you think about that in your training?

00:31:05.67
Tanner
Yeah, so it’s obviously going to vary pretty dramatically from objective to objective. So for like the triple and and the quad specifically this year, Mike and I met up ah like two months prior to the triple.

00:31:11.58
Alyssa
right

00:31:20.25
Tanner
And we just, we started, our Yosemite season was kind of broken up into two two parts. We had Tuol ne and then the valley. Tuolmne was until the valley got cool enough.

00:31:30.88
Tanner
And then the thought was as soon as the valley is cool enough to climb on the South facing walls will immediately go to Yosemite will drop everything. So while we’re in to all I mean the One of our kind of back back of the mind Objectives was the backer urine. So we were kind of trying to figure out it’s like a big mental test piece and to all I mean It’s this really really incredible route but it’s like very very run out. It’s ah it’s like a pretty serious ordeal and you know, something that if, you know, if, if you were capable of doing it one time, you probably just do it one time and probably never again. So we were, we were kind of like, our goal was to have these, we were doing two on one off and ideally we would do the first day would be an intense day where we’re chasing grades. We’re trying to climb at least five 12 every day, work on like actually sending pitches.

00:32:23.87
Tanner
kind of like you know more more power and intensity and that like specific contact power of being able to like do hard moves and then the second day we would do these like really kind of hilarious vol e days where we would just try to climb like three or four multi-pitch routes in a day just until until it was dark we just climb until we’re completely trashed and the idea is you you always want to go into a rest day just like completely demolished and then the rest day is just spent doing R and R and like skin skin care basically we just lay in bed and eat and do skincare and like stretch all day which was awesome and i’m so we we kind of had those two goals in mind where we were kind of orienting toward the back of urine and then also working toward

00:33:04.74
Tanner
toward the triple in the background. I think this is kind of like, again, counterintuitive. I don’t do much running at all. I do a lot of uphill work. I loved, I just told you, I got up at four 30 today and did two hours on the treadmill uphill before this. And like.

00:33:23.29
Tanner
I’ve been doing a bunch of ski touring in the mornings, like going and doing uphill laps at the resorts here and stuff before the sun comes up. And I really enjoy that. I don’t do a ton of pure running for no reason.

00:33:34.74
Tanner
I don’t really know why I don’t. I keep saying I want to. I was really big into running. Honestly, that’s not true. I know why I don’t do it because I totally shredded my ankle last year, or two years ago.

00:33:46.10
Alyssa
Oh, okay.

00:33:47.31
Tanner
I had a complete blowout. I was super excited. I was kind of going down this more of an ultra running path in 2023 where I was pretty excited. I actually got a sponsored slot from the Navy seal foundation to do the Leadville 100.

00:33:59.74
Tanner
And I got accepted and I was stoked.

00:34:00.90
Alyssa
Oh, cool.

00:34:02.14
Tanner
I was like, this is going to be this big, big life dream. I thought that was like the most badass race in the world. And then that summer I just catastrophically blew out my ankle. I had a full grade three ATO fell rupture and a bunch of grade twos, like other ligaments.

00:34:17.03
Tanner
I was in a boot for a couple months and then I did it again a couple months later. , and but basically like, haven’t done a ton of running since then because I’m like. I’m Still scared that my ankles are gonna fold. It’s like it feels like I’m like missing hardware in my ankle right now I can feel like there’s a lot of looseness and lack of tension and so yeah, i I ended up just switching over to doing like a lot of steep uphill stuff and Hiking uphill with weight and stuff like that because I feel like I’m maybe a little less scared. I’m gonna fold my ankle I’m supposed to get that that

00:34:49.02
Tanner
That ah ankle surgery that the chronic ankle what it’s a lateral ligament reconstruction or they cut all your Yeah, they like to cut all your ligaments off and then they like to ratchet them down and reattach them Because I and my ankles are just useless.

00:34:55.77
Alyssa
oh cool okay

00:35:04.63
Tanner
It’s like I didn’t see my wife on the couch a couple months ago. We were late watching TV or something and she grabbed my foot and pulled it and she subluxed my ankle. Like with her, like just, just like accidentally pulled it out and she was like, ah, what was that?

00:35:19.87
Tanner
And I was like, why did you just do that? and ah You know, it popped it back in and I was like, there was like no tension in my ankle at all. It’s really frustrating.

00:35:26.42
Alyssa
oh

00:35:27.87
Tanner
I was supposed to get that surgery last year and I kind of kicked the can down the road. And now I’m like, I’m kind of just waiting for my ankle to fold again. And ah the the compromise with the orthopedist was like, I was like, can I just wait for this to happen again and get surgery?

00:35:42.85
Tanner
Then he’s like, sure. He’s like, it’s not if it’s when it’s going to happen. But if you want to wait for it to go again, we’ll just do surgery then.

00:35:47.50
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:35:50.08
Tanner
I was like, okay. So sorry. I don’t remember your question now, but that’s why I, oh yes.

00:35:53.36
Alyssa
No, no!

00:35:55.24
Tanner
So, I don’t do a lot of things.

00:35:56.13
Alyssa
Like, breaking up. Yeah.

00:35:58.09
Tanner
Yeah, yeah, so I don’t do a ton of running, yeah.

00:35:58.29
Alyssa
Gotcha.

00:36:01.65
Alyssa
How is it for, yeah, I mean, uh, man, when you’re in the midst of everything, it’s like, I do not want to actively choose a time when I’m going to have to stop all of this and do that.

00:36:12.37
Tanner
Exactly, yeah, yeah.

00:36:13.69
Alyssa
I wouldn’t, I, I’m supposed to, I shouldn’t have my wisdom teeth out, much smaller things. And I keep being like, maybe later.

00:36:20.65
Tanner
I mean, no, it’s a bummer though.

00:36:22.25
Tanner
Because I really enjoy running, I enjoy running. Like I really like it. I’ve just been, I’m like really in my head about it now because I’ve, I’ve, this ankle has folded.

00:36:28.60
Alyssa
yeah.

00:36:30.56
Tanner
I think six times now in the past, like three years. And each time it goes, I’m in a boot for like two months. Like I can’t climb the mountain for three months. It’s like. It’s catastrophic when it happens. It’s like everything stops. I can’t walk. I can’t hike. I can’t climb. Like the world stops. And last time it happened was like right after we got out of the Navy and the VA healthcare wasn’t set up yet. I was like in between insurances. So I didn’t have a way to get that surgery right away, which is what I should have done. And then ah by the time everything got set up, I was like walking again and I was like, well,

00:37:02.99
Tanner
What if I just wait for it to happen again? I don’t want to take myself out now.

00:37:08.22
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:37:09.09
Tanner
So yeah, it’s totally not the right way to do it. I should just get this done. I’m just like, well, I’m doing the stuff I’m doing right now. And it seems to be functioning OK. But no, I mean, I would like to run.

00:37:20.51
Tanner
Vitaly and I did rim to rim last week.

00:37:23.90
Alyssa
Oh, nice. Okay.

00:37:25.60
Tanner
this time or not this time, like in March of last year and that was like, that was literally the only day I ran, I think in all of 2024. It was the only day I ran and it was awesome. I loved it. It was like such a great time. And I was able to do that because of the amount of time that we put in, you know, hiking and and just moving outside and stuff, but it probably would have been a lot more enjoyable to do with a good running base. So.

00:37:48.12
Alyssa
Yeah, no, that’s, I mean, impressive that you did that, uh, without much of the running background. And that total sense that running is, yeah, you don’t, you’re like, but I don’t really know.

00:37:59.85
Alyssa
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. so So when you’re coming down, yeah, when you’re coming down off of, you know, El Cap

00:38:01.59
Tanner
Yeah, I kind of freak forgot

00:38:09.65
Alyssa
Or, you know, kind of in betweens, are you just really fast hiking?

00:38:14.30
Tanner
Good job, Nate.

00:38:14.78
Alyssa
Are you jogging? Like how also, okay.

00:38:17.84
Tanner
Yeah, we’re like we’re we’re like we’re jogging all the downs and flats, and then we like we kind of you know power march the up yeah ups and stuff.

00:38:18.86
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:38:25.09
Tanner
But it’s I mean, those days are like, you’re that’s just a long, slow burn. It’s like, what I would imagine, I haven’t done a 100-mile race, obviously, but it’s like, what I would imagine something like that would maybe trend a little similar to that, where you’re not in you’re not in zone three, zone four.

00:38:40.41
Tanner
You’re in you know zone one or two for 20 hours, and it’s like,

00:38:41.40
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:38:45.02
Tanner
There are definitely, like, when you’re leading pitches, there are times where you’re jacking that heart rate up, like, quite a lot. But, you know, then you’re recovering while you’re jogging. And, like, jogging down east ledges or jogging, you know, jogging off lock-ins is, like, we’re jogging, you know, a nine or ten minute pace. Like, it’s not, we’re not, like, we’re not sprinting. it’s it’s not It’s not much more exertion than just, like,

00:39:09.05
Tanner
than just hiking, I think. So, you know, my partner Mike has, he ran cross country for like forever in college and stuff. He’s got a super good background of like a big strong base like this as well. So yeah, I think it’s important to not, not you know, not jack that heart rate up too much. And then obviously you bust for the entire day. So that’s all part of the strategy is like burning the long slow wick.

00:39:36.32
Alyssa
Yeah. Do you think that one of the pieces of lowering that time could be like, you know, Hey, let’s just kind of work on the running aspect, increase that, or do you feel is the percentage of that time that you’re spending moving in between routes almost negligent compared to how much faster you can get the climbing piece?

00:39:59.79
Tanner
Yeah, yeah I think it’s kind of negligent. We made it down from the S mit of El Cap in like 37 minutes.

00:40:02.71
Alyssa
Gotcha.

00:40:06.54
Alyssa
Oh, wow. Okay, that’s so much shorter. Yeah, okay.

00:40:09.08
Tanner
Yeah, we’re like you know I could maybe get that down to like 28 or something, but like i but then I would show up and be red lining and like not able to eat.

00:40:14.87
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:40:18.00
Tanner
or so like I need to show up, and meet as I walk up, I need to take in 2,000 or 3,000 calories and then immediately set off for the death slabs up half dome. I think for something like that, I think the time is going to drop from logistics over everything is like how confidently you can move on that terrain. And you know every single aid move you can cut out is gonna is going to save you time. Every second that you cannot waste doing a gear turnover or reracking or like whatever is going to save you time. And it’s going to be kind of net as long as you’re like not completely like

00:40:53.58
Tanner
just moseying around off of these summits and like, you know, approaches and stuff. I think it’s going to be negligent kind of in the grand scheme for this specific, like, you know, for like the triple quad specifically.

00:41:05.66
Alyssa
Yeah, that makes sense.

00:41:06.41
Tanner
Yeah.

00:41:07.52
Alyssa
This is, I don’t know why I thought this, but this is like the, my immediate thought was when you’re driving in between them, how much is the urge to be like, I got a speed, like let’s go.

00:41:20.24
Alyssa
Or are you like, well,

00:41:21.73
Tanner
Wait. I wasn’t actually driving. So we got a, I got hand hand, my wife picked this up. Uh, and then Clint did the second time, but we start out by doing Watkins and then we run, we kind of jog from there. It’s three miles to the road. So I think we got there in like 40 minutes or something like that, like not, you know, just kind of like.

00:41:47.34
Tanner
just kind of not, I mean, we need to show up like ready to, again, ready to eat and then like ramp down.

00:41:52.58
Alyssa
Totally.

00:41:53.09
Tanner
So we got there and I mean, I think we, I think we said something like drive, drive intentionally, but like you don’t need to. You don’t need to be like throwing the cabinets open in the back of the van, you know like shit flying out, like bridges falling out. like that’s you know Whether we get there 10 minutes earlier or 10 minutes later, like that’s not going to make or break the day. But if we if like if we can eat as many calories as possible and then like try to get that systemic reset for like ramping down and kind of like closing our eyes and just getting that you know that whole like

00:42:28.77
Tanner
that whole systemically, like I’m back to complete zone zero right now to like restart. I think that’s way more important. So, you know, if you’re in the back, that road’s pretty windy.

00:42:39.16
Tanner
If you’re in the back of the bed, throw in like, you know, rolling around like this is going to be terrible.

00:42:39.82
Alyssa
It is.

00:42:43.85
Tanner
So yeah.

00:42:46.15
Alyssa
I have been back when we used to have a truck camper. I have been in the bed in the truck camper driving on those roads and was like, I’m gonna die. I’m gonna throw up everywhere and I’m gonna die.

00:42:56.28
Alyssa
This is the worst thing ever. Yeah.

00:42:57.92
Tanner
yeah Yeah, I know.

00:42:58.48
Alyssa
know

00:42:59.25
Tanner
We have hand rides in the back sometimes and we get on the roads. so I see her crawling out of the bed in the dark and coming out front because she’s getting sick, getting thrown around back there.

00:43:09.29
Alyssa
It’s rough. Oh, gosh, I had one more question. Oh, yeah. And then we’ll switch to the last topic. And again, you’re really primed for this kind of thing with the sleep deprivation that I’m sure you had to that I know you guys have to go through but how are you dealing because again like sorry to keep using the trail running that’s just kind of my reference point but like I’m when I’m you know 20 30 hours deep on a run I’m just thinking about like hey don’t fall on that cliff like you guys are actually on the cliff so how are you dealing with that

00:43:53.88
Alyssa
Fatigue? Like, do you get sleepy on these? How do you keep your focus levels up? Because obviously, there’s just a lot more consequences. Like, that’s the part that’s always intimidated me about doing really technical long things is like, okay, I know I can stay awake, but like, can I keep my focus?

00:44:10.64
Alyssa
And yeah,

00:44:11.57
Tanner
Yeah, so we did. Yeah, so that’s definitely like a huge factor. So my man, I got so lucky someone in this partnership with Mike Michael Vale. He’s just psychotically mentally resilient. He just loves suffering in this really positive way. Just like limp. I’ve never I’ve never heard him complain. I mean, it’s just like a bottomless source of like you know motivation and Stoke on these big days.

00:44:39.95
Tanner
Primarily, I think that’s really important to have a partner who’s like, yeah obviously, you know, there is nothing worse in the world when you’re starting to feel a little bit of the pain cave and then the person that you’re with starts complaining and you’re just like, shut up.

00:44:52.74
Alyssa
Oh yeah.

00:44:54.79
Tanner
don’t say another word, I’m gonna leave you behind. It just immediately kills it. like It doesn’t matter what you’re feeling, don’t say it out loud. because like you know like On a race day specifically, if you’re like, this is our time to just, this is not the time to complain, this is the time to, this is when you do put it back in the box, we’ll talk about how bad this was afterwards, don’t say that again.

00:45:10.73
Alyssa
Totally.

00:45:16.25
Tanner
and like Mike’s really, really good about that. Honestly, I think I’m a little a little like maybe less good, I don’t know. i’m like pretty quick to, not pretty quick, but I definitely on the quad had like I mean, we both had times where we were like, it, it wasn’t complaining. It was like, it was saying, Hey, I’m just letting you know, as my partner, I’m not doing too good right now. And it’s not, both of us know we’re not complaining. That’s like, Hey, I need, I need a little bit of oversight right now because like we are on consequential terrain and like for whatever reason I’m bonking.

00:45:50.18
Tanner
you know I’ll immediately start taking calories and caffeine and like whatever I need to do but for the immediate moment and I’ll update you when I’m out of this hole but like I need you to keep an eye on me for a second here and we both had he he had one of those on uh on Washington col n and uh I remember one mine I mean my on on the first one mine was on El Cap I was definitely a lot better on the quad but yeah just being able to communicate that I think is really important but we so So on Washington col n, for for example,

00:46:24.61
Tanner
I don’t know why, this just seems like an easy one. We repelled the Washington Col n instead of doing the hike off. That was the third big wall that we did.

00:46:29.82
Alyssa
Okay.

00:46:31.44
Tanner
We started it at 5 a.m. and we topped out at 7 a.m. or something like that, and then we were repelling.

00:46:36.50
Alyssa
Oh yeah.

00:46:36.86
Tanner
And repelling is statistically like where all the accidents are going to happen. That’s like, you know, nine out of 10 accidents or fatalities will happen on the repel. So we topped out the Washington Col n, and then we were doing double rope wraps with a tagline the whole way down.

00:46:50.44
Tanner
just because the walk off is like, I hate that walk off more than anything. I don’t know why I absolutely despise that walk off. And I was like, I’m just, I was like, I cannot do that walk off after three big walls and before a fourth.

00:47:03.54
Tanner
So it’s like, let’s repel this safety was a big factor. We actually said like, should we repeal this? Because if we do the walk off, it’ll be miserable.

00:47:10.35
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:47:12.76
Tanner
But we’re not, we’re probably not going to die where they’re repelling like there’s that you’re just opening up all these opportunities for mistakes. So when we got up there, we were, you know, at that point, we were, I don’t know, 20, 27 hours or 28 hours without sleep. And we were 18 hours into the day or something like that, 17 hours into the day. I don’t know.

00:47:34.07
Tanner
and three big walls in so we’re like very fatigued at that point and the wheels are like starting to come off and you know the calories are just not really replacing it and we’re we’re really foggy and you know like when that sun rises on the second day and you kind of feel a little drunk and you’re like ah

00:47:48.11
Alyssa
oh yeah oh yeah

00:47:48.96
Tanner
not like just not really as cognizant as I need to be right now and not as coherent as I should be. So when we got up to the top of that, we like we stopped and like had a talk and we were like, we actually implemented all of these like additional safety protocols that we normally don’t do where we’re like, we’ve just been climbing together a lot you know for several years now and thousands of pitches were like,

00:48:11.95
Alyssa
Oh yeah, oh yeah.

00:48:13.31
Tanner
We’re pretty comfortable just on autopilot doing that. And we specifically said like, Hey, we’re both going off of autopilot for these entire repels for every single repel. We are going to look at each other’s attachment points. You’re not waiting for anything until you’re waiting for it, or you’re not waiting until you’re waiting and like everything’s locked.

00:48:32.02
Tanner
You know, we tied knots, we saddle bagged ropes, like we were removed and we were slower on the way down for sure because of that. But it was better than, you know, on a good day, we probably could have burned those repels in like 20 minutes or so, something crazy where we just like to have it so ironed out. And on this day, maybe we took like 35 or 40. But that was an intentional decision that we did because now we’re in this really consequential terrain where we know mistakes are are prone to happen and we’re super sleep deprived and we’re tired so we try to like inject a couple extra safety nets or like you know guardrails into these scenarios but obviously when you’re on when you’re leading and stuff you know when you’re going up like we we simul climb the first 11 pitches of half dome in like one block and and you know there there are

00:49:22.29
Tanner
you’re generally in no-fall terrain the entire time. If you fall at any point on that, you know Mike’s placing like one or two cams maybe per pitch. Some pitches aren’t like anything. So like we’re climbing a lot slower, but how we mitigate that is like we did a bunch of laps beforehand, so we’re still comfortable in that terrain that I’m not second-guessing stuff. I get to a crux, and I know that it’s like, oh, finger lock here, and this foot goes out here, and I can there’s a good jam right ahead that I can rest on. and like plugging a cam to pull on. So you obviously can’t remove that risk totally. We try to be really cognizant of things like, hey, we’re already doing high risk activities and now we’re adding sleep deprivation and, you know, supreme exhaustion to it and stuff. So we just try to be aware of that. Like I said earlier, like I don’t want to shy away from that and I think it’s not happening. That’s not a good way to approach that by being like, no, we’re fine. Nothing’s going to happen. I know stuff can happen and we’re trying to safeguard against that. But the reality is,

00:50:17.40
Tanner
If you want to do these, you know, these are big technical problems and you will have to take that risk at some point until we find a way to mitigate that further.

00:50:20.16
Alyssa
Yeah, yeah.

00:50:26.57
Tanner
I just haven’t really found a way to do that. If I could remove all the risk from, ah from the quad and do the whole thing and like some. And you know with some fucking drone that flies behind me and as soon as I fall it catches my shirt and like I’m at no risk I would be happy to do that I don’t need the risk to feel like I’m you know doing more it definitely Exacerbates the kind of experience and in a very like real way But not necessarily in a good way it just it’s you know people get hurt people die doing that like I acknowledge that which is why I’ve said I’ve kind of been pretty vocal about, I don’t want to make a career like speed climbing moving forward. I honestly don’t know if I will speed climb at all moving forward. I’m sure we’ll do a couple of naiads and stuff like that’s great. But I don’t, it just seems like it’s disproportionately dangerous compared to the other stuff that I’ve been doing.

00:51:11.21
Tanner
And it’s, you know, we did the quad. Like, I’m good. I don’t need to keep, I don’t need to keep seeking that risk over and over and over for what?

00:51:16.89
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:51:20.12
Tanner
Like, let me go do something else that’s like, that I’m attracted to and is really inspiring. So yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know if that answers your question, but that’s generally how we approach it.

00:51:30.56
Alyssa
No, I think that’s, yeah, ah totally. I mean, I think that’s so… It’s such a good point of, hey, we don’t ignore that this risk did exist. We take more measures as you know the fatigue levels rise. Yeah, I always think that’s the trickiest part often with climbing is that as you increase Like as you move upwards in the sport, I think that the tendency is like it becomes more risky.

00:52:00.11
Alyssa
Like that’s almost how you have to keep upping it. And that, that always to me is kind of an unfortunate part. It’s the same in like skiing and ski touring, et cetera. It’s like, okay, how about the bigger lines, the bigger routes, like, you know, they, they are naturally more risky.

00:52:15.57
Alyssa
And so, yeah, it’s not like you just go faster or something.

00:52:16.92
Tanner
yeah

00:52:20.80
Alyssa
It’s like, well, yeah, there’s, yeah.

00:52:21.29
Tanner
Yeah. Well, there’s like, there’s both aspects of like, what can you physically do? Which is like, that’s one leading edge of the sport, right? Like five 15 D is like what you can physically do right now as a h an, but then there’s what will you do?

00:52:33.38
Tanner
And it’s like, that’s where a lot of that that’s, you know, that’s the other leading edge of the sport is like, what risks will you take?

00:52:39.77
Alyssa
i like that

00:52:41.06
Tanner
That’s unfortunately, like those are the two, that’s where it bifurcates is like, what can you do and what will you do? And those are both like, those are both the tip of the spear of like the leading edge of the sport and unfortunately one of those is a lot more dangerous than the other and it’s this like it’s almost this this like cheat code of being like well I actually can’t do that much but I will do I’ll just choose to like hit override on my you know manual safety meter in my head and I will do this thing that’s like maybe obscenely dangerous or risky but it’ll catapult me into the spotlight because now I’ve chosen to take these risks and maybe I got away from it or I got away with it and now it’s going to inspire somebody else to push that a little bit further. So it’s kind of a double-edged sword. I think there is a lot of value and I think boldness and alpinism and climbing and mountaineering and stuff. I think there is there’s a culture of like boldness, will,

00:53:37.45
Tanner
Be this bedrock of the of the you know sport for forever just because that’s it’s kind of built on this like idea of of You know the hard man courage in the face of certain death in the mountains But it’s I do think it’s a double-edged sword because it’s like we’re gonna hit a point of diminishing returns obviously at some point which does happen somebody will take that one step too far and I and then everybody will take a step back and And then the next generation, some you know young stud will come out and say, OK, I’ll do it.

00:53:59.12
Alyssa
Too far.

00:54:08.57
Tanner
And he’ll get away with it. And then somebody else will leapfrog him, and then he’ll die. And everybody will take a step back. So it’s just kind of the unfortunate reality of these like really ah objectively risky yeah kind of objectives that people are looking at.

00:54:23.19
Tanner
So, I totally get it.

00:54:23.64
Alyssa
but yeah

00:54:24.23
Tanner
I’ve contributed to that. I totally understand. Like doing the quad, we have to take safety shortcuts to do that amount of climbing in a day. There’s no world where you can’t.

00:54:34.52
Tanner
So I know that I’ve, I’ve, I’ve contributed to this and some young crusher is looking at that and he’s saying, I can do five in a day because I’ll do, I’ll take time off here and I’ll take time off that.

00:54:44.99
Tanner
And I won’t clip this anchor and we’ll simul climb all of this and I won’t place any gear on this pitch. So now I can do this wall an hour faster. So I have time for a fifth wall. And like I know that’s going to happen and I don’t want to propagate this like it’s dangerous, you know, it’s not like a sexy thing.

00:55:00.77
Tanner
It’s like it’s stressful and it’s kind of scary.

00:55:02.84
Alyssa
Yeah.

00:55:03.30
Tanner
It does have a place, but I think it needs to be approached super intentionally and cautiously and just people aware of what they’re getting into.

00:55:11.82
Alyssa
No, I’m glad you said that. I think it is such a piece of the sport that I don’t think it is obvious and apparent in other sports.

00:55:22.31
Alyssa
I mean, you could look at cycling as like doping.

00:55:27.51
Tanner
Yeah, that’s always that’s always the backstop like Forever, that’s always the pack stop is you will die if you if you’re if you’re incorrect here. Which is like, you know like that that that’s sort of

00:55:27.64
Alyssa
Running, I think that’s also doping is a part of it, pushing that limit. But yeah, it certainly seems less in your face as climbing and alpinism and all of that of like, yeah, too far is death, unfortunately.

00:55:46.45
Alyssa
Yeah. Yeah.

00:55:57.06
Tanner
ah that sort of consequential result from and and from an intentional decision does create this like this sense of, I don’t wanna say value, but like it does make this like a really meaningful sport to know that like I’m gonna go test myself in the mountains, and I know that if I’m wrong, I will die. like I know that. So maybe I’m only gonna do you know the Whitney Trail, and like the chances of me dying are very low.

00:56:25.12
Tanner
But not zero. It happens every single year, every single winter somebody dies on the Whitney Trail. So like it’s there’s something to be said about going into a ah scenario where you know that you’re at risk, but you’re going to test yourself to make the right decisions and come home safe. But I just think that it gets a little.

00:56:42.48
Tanner
glamorized I think from a lot of social media stuff. And again, I know I’ve contributed to this too. I understand that. I just think it needs to be approached cautiously in a really intentional way. Not, not quite as flippantly as like, yeah, we’re going to go, you know, do these death defying things. Cause we’re crazy. It’s like, no, do it because you prepared and you know that you’re confident and like, you know, you, you have, I just think, I just think the motives need to be like a little, uh, they just seem to be examined in like a way that, that should matter.

00:57:13.20
Alyssa
Absolutely, yeah, could not agree more. And I want to tie that into, and gosh, we’re running out of time quickly, but hopefully we can just touch base on this briefly.

00:57:19.82
Tanner
So, yeah.

00:57:24.73
Alyssa
And what kind of caught my attention, just because this is something I think about very often in the outdoor industry, is ah making it in the sport, you know landing that contract that allows you to climb professionally, to do what you love all the time.

00:57:46.16
Alyssa
And you were able to just do that with La Sportiva. You have a few other sponsors. So congrats on that. It’s not easy and we’ll talk a little bit about that.

00:57:52.99
Tanner
Yeah.

00:57:55.18
Alyssa
But how do you grapple as you are headed into your first quote-unquote season where you’re really, you know, like on a team being paid to do these things? How are you thinking about your objectives and what you want to accomplish now?

00:58:16.99
Alyssa
Having that component that’s like, at the end of the day, like I’ve said this so many times recently, you want to be a good person, you want to be a strong part of the community as a sponsored athlete, but your results are the reason why you are a sponsored athlete. At the end of the day, you have to perform. That’s literally part of your job.

00:58:39.97
Alyssa
like I have said this a lot and talk to team managers, but like, how are you in this kind of space of climbing, et cetera, thinking and looking towards a season of being in that position?

00:58:58.20
Tanner
Yeah.

00:59:01.91
Alyssa
It’s a tough question.

00:59:02.57
Tanner
Yeah, just have to be just bluntly, it does. It’s not even a slight consideration for me. ah

00:59:11.34
Alyssa
Heck yeah, I mean, that’s amazing. So you don’t feel like.

00:59:13.31
Tanner
I think that I have, I just have this natural inclination to want to push myself and kind of improve, you know, as a, just kind of as a standard when I wake up every day. And I am really, if I did, you know, if we did the triple, we did it. We had time left. Let’s do the quad. That’s an obvious progression for my partner and I.

00:59:37.33
Tanner
And I kind of have that in most climbing like if I okay I’m climbing 512 like very comfortably now. Let’s work on 513 now like I don’t think I’m I Mean at the moment. I’m not struggling at all to Stay motivated to do these big objectives. I have an enormous whiteboard in my shed with probably 50 different things on it that I want to get done.

01:00:04.06
Tanner
I don’t, I don’t know. I don’t want this to sound like I’m not, I’m not, this isn’t supposed to be self aggrandizing in any way. I’m not trying to like, but so I just think that I feel very compelled to like to do these things that inspire me.

01:00:12.17
Alyssa
Yeah.

01:00:19.77
Tanner
And they just happen, like at the moment they happen to be on, you know, on or near the cutting edge of the sport. So I think that as long as I’m, prioritizing the stuff that is really inspiring for me and that I want to get done I guess the most right now.

01:00:39.05
Tanner
It just happens to also be the biggest things that are being done at the moment in these like very specific niches inside you know climbing and stuff like that. So like we talked about earlier this year is like this will be like the year of the traverses and like the stuff that I’m looking at doing is our most of the biggest traverses in the entire world and like or at least in the United States.

01:01:01.59
Tanner
and that I’m doing that whether I have all the sponsors in the world or whether nobody gives a shit and my Instagram page is deleted tomorrow.

01:01:06.03
Alyssa
Yeah.

01:01:11.37
Tanner
I’m doing the exact same thing regardless. like I’m gonna keep taking the same pictures. If Instagram shut down tomorrow as an app, I’d be texting them to friends like, look at this, how beautiful, this is amazing. you know and like The social media stuff has been an incredible asset for me.

01:01:25.57
Tanner
to be, I’m not delusional. I know I’m not a professional climber in the sense that I don’t climb 5.15 or 5.14 or 5.13. I totally acknowledge that. I’ve like, I’m just trying to pursue what I’m really passionate about and what’s kind of inspiring and social media has been a big a big way to provide value, I guess, where maybe I’m not on the cutting edge of these like specific kinds of the sport, where I don’t climb that hard in the grand scheme of things, which is completely true. But I really like telling stories and sharing these experiences and stuff.

01:01:57.64
Tanner
I don’t know whether i whether I have the support from these companies or not. With all the free time that I have, whether that’s all day because they’re paying me to do this, or it’s on the weekends because I need to go get it with a regular job, I’m going to keep doing the stuff that inspires me the most. I’m going to keep sharing it because I think it’s really, I don’t know, it’s really gratifying. Like I get messages all the time from people being like, Hey, we went out and we we bought a van, you know, this week, or like we went out, we tried rock climbing, or we went hiking, or I’ve got i’ve gotten hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of those messages now at this point from that page.

01:02:33.64
Tanner
of people that have been like inspired to go do this stuff just because I had a good day and I felt compelled to like share that experience as an opportunity that like hey you can also have this good day I’m not saying look at me I’m saying look at this you can do this too this is awesome so whether the whether the you know the the brands want to support that or not It’s it’s awesome that they did. I’m extremely grateful that Sportiva signed me. and and We just talked about this before. I got signed to a two-year contract like on salary, which is just like this craziest thing on planet Earth. so like Now we can really lean all into this and not stress about

01:03:10.81
Tanner
You know, how are we gonna pay the mortgage and stuff because we we also talked about this too There’s this funny like notion that if you’re you’re like rolling in The dough or you making a ton of money if you’re like if you have Instagram followers up up to this point I’ve been I mean just full disclosure Coros has paid me $400 a month. That is all the money I’ve made. I don’t make any money. I don’t know where people like, people leave comments all the time being like, he’s super rich. Like he’s got followers, he’s getting paid. I’m like, who do you think is paying me? Like I’m not, we’m making no money here. We have like, my wife works full time and she’s been incredibly supportive. We get some money from

01:03:50.25
Tanner
From the VA like coming in, that’s like you know stuff from the military, which is great. We donate a large portion of that to Crux every month because I feel like that’s the least I can do when I’m getting a paycheck. And then none of it’s like a livable wage. If my wife wasn’t like working and supporting this and like allowing me to like have this opportunity to push and try, this would have gotten i wouldn’t I couldn’t even have gotten off the ground. We never would have started. like you know it’s like it’s almost embarrassing to say but like she’s enabled this whole thing it’s been an incredible opportunity so now that these brands have like kind of back backed us and like Maxim and Coros and Sportiva and Black Diamond has been like a huge gear support and stuff that’s the only reason I’m here is that they’ve like taken a chance

01:04:31.10
Tanner
And it means a lot that they’ve looked at me and said like, maybe you’re not doing, you know, you’re not climbing 516 today, but we think that you’re going to be a good enough investment that we’re going to, we’re going to partner with you. Like we’re looking at the trajectory and hopefully you’re going to continue this, this like growth in years to come. And that’s kind of like been my pitch the whole time is like, Hey,

01:04:51.38
Tanner
like you know I’m not making headlines quite yet before the quad but like look at this trajectory and I think if you guys get in now and support me you know I’d love to work together in five years when we are at the point where we’re like hey this is you know this is like the the biggest thing that happened this year is like you know Tanner is partner doing this new big thing and it’s like an exciting thought but like it doesn’t happen in a vacu you like need that support

01:05:18.72
Alyssa
I mean, gosh, like couldn’t have, not that like there’s a right answer, but like you would be doing it anyway. Like you would be doing all of this anyway, whether or not Sportiva decides to totally do that, but that’s not the case for everyone.

01:05:31.24
Tanner
That’s the only reason. Yeah, that’s the only way you’re gonna.

01:05:36.75
Alyssa
So ah like that’s yeah.

01:05:37.31
Tanner
Yeah, I mean, dude. I’m not waking up at 4.30 and going to walk around with d b ass treadmill hours.

01:05:41.92
Alyssa
excuse

01:05:42.96
Tanner
If I like but to appease my $400 a month sponsors, like I’m not, I’m not going to go do these like horrific, you know, 20 hour mountain days or it’s like negative 10 out.

01:05:53.46
Tanner
Like that’s fucking hard. It’s hard work. You have to love that. You’re not going to do anything, I’m sorry, just bluntly, you’re not going to do anything remarkable unless you love this sport. Because the amount of time and effort and energy that is required for you to like to put in and sacrifice to do anything worth talking about is enormous. And there’s not ah there’s not a paycheck that will motivate you to do this if you don’t really love it. It’s just not possible. There’s no way.

01:06:20.35
Alyssa
it’s on.

01:06:20.51
Tanner
So yeah, whether they’re, the support is incredible. It allows me to focus more fully on this stuff that I love, but like, it’s not going to change anything. It doesn’t, I’m not, you know, I’m posting the same pictures I did today that I did when I started climbing five years ago or whatever, whether I got two likes on it or a thousand likes on it.

01:06:38.95
Tanner
I don’t care. I just want to share stuff that inspires me and that I want to share with people and be like, look at this. This is beautiful. This is awesome. You can do this too. So yeah, it’s cool.

01:06:48.78
Alyssa
Oh, it’s super cool, yeah. No, it’s just it’s funny, I always joke. like As I’ve kind of moved through the sport, you know race bonuses get bigger and stuff, but I’m like, man, my hourly rate is still shit.

01:07:04.05
Alyssa
If you look at all the hours, like my hourly rate is really bad.

01:07:04.33
Tanner
yeah ah

01:07:10.71
Tanner
Yeah, I totally hear you. It’s definitely not, I mean, it’s worth it, you know, if it enables me to keep going out and like, it’s such a ah like a privilege and a blessing to be able to wake up every day and just be like, what am I going to do today to be able to perform better at my next objective, whatever that is.

01:07:18.35
Alyssa
Totally.

01:07:28.13
Tanner
like And like, if that’s going and doing four hours of like uphill touring with weight, or like, if I need to go for, you know, if I need to go to the gym and do like a hundred pitches or something like that, I love that. That’s awesome. And then I come home and I’m like, totally wrecked. And I’m like, what an awesome day. Like I did something that’s going to further me doing better at something that I really care about. Cause like, I really care about these big, big days and objectives. And like, they mean a lot to me.

01:07:55.15
Tanner
And it’s just like such a privilege to be able to put in that time. It’s been, I mean, granted, it’s been a fucking ton of work. And like, you know that it is a lot of work.

01:08:05.14
Tanner
Like, I mean, probably hundreds of emails at this point, like outreach, most of which just get completely ignored. And like, a million those from a million people and like definitely like a lot of a lot of like you know tough like you know you you get your hopes up for like certain brands or supporters sponsorships and then like they don’t come through and like there’s like some parts where like what the fuck are we doing man like this is not working this is not like i had that recently after uh

01:08:29.49
Alyssa
Yeah, oh yeah.

01:08:34.51
Tanner
We, I was, I got invited to come on the Black Diamond Ambassador Team, which I was super excited about. And then ah when just, I don’t know, I have nothing bad to say about Black Diamond at all. But when the contract came out, it wasn’t it wasn’t a good fit. It wasn’t a good ah it wasn’t a good fit for us to like to sign that officially. And man, it like that felt like,

01:08:59.95
Tanner
that felt like this pinnacle of like, oh, if I’m a Black Diamond supported athlete, like there’s nowhere higher to go. I just rise within Black Diamond, but like there’s nowhere to go laterally. like This is it. This is the top of the climbing world.

01:09:14.08
Tanner
And And it was like, when I got the offer, like officially my wife had, we had this big celebration dinner and it just felt like everything had worked and we’re like, holy crap, we did this. But it was always like, let’s wait and see the contract. And then the contract came out and it was like,

01:09:31.27
Tanner
fuck man. Like immediately we read it and we’re like, this isn’t going to work. And, uh, so we ended up, we ended up backing out and like, now I’m going to keep, I’m still working with them. I’m going to keep working with them and like a less formal sense. They’re still, we’re still incredibly supportive. They’ve done probably more than any brand at this point.

01:09:47.29
Tanner
in terms of gear support and everything. But yeah, that was like such a low point when that fell through and I was like, what now? like Where do you go? like what do you What do I even do now?

01:09:58.27
Tanner
like this is I’m not making money doing this. I have to go get a regular job. And like I’m not complaining. That’s just the reality. like If we’re gonna have kids, I need to support my family.

01:10:06.60
Alyssa
yeah yeah

01:10:08.12
Tanner
And the thought all along is like, as soon as we have kids, as soon as my wife gets pregnant, if I’m not making a sustainable income with this, everything stops immediately. I go get a job, which is the way it should be. I want to support my family.

01:10:18.98
Tanner
I don’t want my wife to work while she’s pregnant, while we have a newborn. like you know So I was like, I’ve had this big digital bomb timer in the back of my head, like counting down to like when are we when we’re having kids.

01:10:29.84
Tanner
And like I have this much time to make this work.

01:10:30.11
Alyssa
Yeah, yeah.

01:10:32.19
Tanner
And if I don’t make it work by then, That’s it. I’m done. It didn’t, and I tried, but it didn’t work. I failed, gave it my best to go back to State Farm, whatever. Like, I don’t know. So it’s weird.

01:10:43.27
Alyssa
we but a state farm but yeah

01:10:44.81
Tanner
Yeah, I know. But it was like really, really special that Swartiva kind of came in at the golden hour and, and like right after the the last one kind of fell through and they came in and yeah, it just feels really cool that they like see something in me that’s worth investing in.

01:10:45.97
Alyssa
it’s

01:10:58.20
Tanner
And, , yeah, I just, I hope I can earn my spot on the team this year. I’m stoked.

01:11:04.05
Alyssa
I’m sure you can, but oh man, like, yeah. I have had that heartbreak so many times and you’re like, this is the, this is it. This is making it.

01:11:15.84
Alyssa
And then you realize that like making it is not what you thought it was.

01:11:16.00
Tanner
yeah

01:11:20.78
Alyssa
You’ll probably have your personality as I’m guessing we’re pretty similar. Well, I actually never really feel like you make it, even though on paper, like my husband will be like, you’re making it. I’m like, no, I’m not.

01:11:30.92
Alyssa
I could get X, Y, and Z. I could rise in this way. I could do this. And like you’re never really going to feel that. But also, like gosh, yeah I’ve had my heart broken so many times.

01:11:40.38
Tanner
Yeah.

01:11:41.94
Alyssa
And it it honestly is probably the most

01:11:43.70
Tanner
Wow.

01:11:46.56
Alyssa
It feels so personal where youre like you try to be like, it’s just a business. It’s okay. But like you are literally saying it is personal because it’s you.

01:11:52.03
Tanner
it is personal

01:11:55.53
Alyssa
You’re like, I’m, it’s not like, Hey, X, Y it’s like, no, it’s literally you that feels like he’s being rejected.

01:11:55.76
Tanner
Yeah, Yeah, I I say that I’m like, it’s like a brand looking at me and going no, not you

01:12:07.94
Alyssa
Yeah.

01:12:08.27
Tanner
if she

01:12:08.72
Alyssa
Too skinny, too small. Yeah. You’re like, what? Yeah.

01:12:12.35
Tanner
I totally, yeah it feels personal, yeah. It’s like, oh man, that’s kind of brutal to hear. And after like, you know, dozens and dozens and dozens of those, you’re like, is it me?

01:12:22.28
Alyssa
I suck! Yeah!

01:12:23.58
Tanner
I really struggle with this, I have this like really, really constantly just like a brutally negative inner monologue. That’s like, I’m trying to work on, and I think part of it’s been really beneficial for like, it’s a great motivator, honestly.

01:12:39.16
Alyssa
Oh yeah!

01:12:40.20
Tanner
You know the incessant shit talking to yourself is like actually a great way to talk but it’s actually pretty brutal, too. So like right after we signed with sportiva. I like said something to my wife, or I was like yeah I i mean they only signed me because I have like Instagram followers Oh, and she was like shut the fuck up like you always do this you always do this and like well You know I’m like not even that good of a climber and they only They just want like, they just want they care about that and like not athletes.

01:13:04.95
Tanner
And she’s like, you are out of your mind. Like this is insane. And like, but I do that every single time where I like, immediately try to like, demean or or like, you know, take value out of these accomplishments or status or value or whatever.

01:13:08.66
Alyssa
yeah

01:13:17.76
Tanner
And I’m trying to work on that a little more. But yeah, I don’t know. i It’s, ah yeah, it’s something I’m trying to figure out. Still, it’s, it’s kind of, it’s kind of been a tough, tough lesson to learn.

01:13:28.24
Alyssa
Yeah. Yeah, well, I can… a test to someone who has been, gosh, doing it for probably eight years ah like seven or eight years where I’ve been like, okay, maybe I can start reaching out, et cetera.

01:13:44.90
Alyssa
Yeah, you’ll probably still keep feeling that way. Also when you’re like, oh, I’m not really like, you know, cut like at the top of climbing, et cetera. Well, I’m going to call bullshit. You’re a different kind of climber, but you are the top of that type of climbing.

01:13:57.80
Alyssa
I think it’s like, like it’s like in the ultra world saying like, well, I’m not the best 50 K or in the world, but I’m really good at a hundred miles or whatever.

01:13:58.14
Tanner
yeah

01:14:04.32
Tanner
No, that’s true.

01:14:05.08
Alyssa
Like there are a lot of, yeah. So you are very like at the top cutting edge of,

01:14:07.99
Tanner
Yeah.

01:14:12.35
Alyssa
your area of climbing Like I couldn’t touch a fast 50k or that was really going after it.

01:14:15.16
Tanner
Yeah.

01:14:19.42
Alyssa
Like that’s just not my strength But 100 miler like yeah, let’s go so just yeah different different fields of the same sport which I think it’s so cool that we’re at the point in sponsorship where that differentiation Has value like it’s not just one it’s like there’s a range and

01:14:37.76
Tanner
Yeah.

01:14:41.85
Tanner
That’s actually a good point. I haven’t really, for some reason, right. As soon as you compared that to running and the, did the different disciplines between short distance and long distance and ultra distance and stuff that like immediately was a palatable way for me to see that like, Oh, you’re right.

01:14:54.67
Tanner
Actually that’s like, you know, I don’t need to run the hundred yard dash the fastest and also be the fastest a hundred miler. That’s not possible. Like, so yeah, that’s, that’s true.

01:15:03.30
Alyssa
It’s not possible. Yeah. Cause you have, you have an endurance piece that someone who’s at the, you know, shooting for that five 15 D five 16, that’s just not on their radar.

01:15:06.37
Tanner
Yeah.

01:15:18.78
Alyssa
Like that’s not going to help them be. Whereas you’re trying to do something that just requires a much different load and capacity.

01:15:31.20
Tanner
Yeah, no, that’s a good point. Yeah, I know. I think I have a good propensity to suffer positively. And I think that that ‘s kind of why I’ve liked, I mean, obviously you do it too, like it’s that’s, that’s like why we’re, you know, kind of in these masochistic, ultra enduro things, right? Because you get to, you get to really like, get to know yourself pretty well. And it’s cool. It’s a cool experience.

01:15:55.14
Alyssa
It is. ah Awesome. Yeah, gosh, we got to have another podcast because I feel like we can keep chatting about all of these pieces. Also, you have one of the best Instagram handles.

01:16:08.44
Alyssa
I like big buttresses. I laugh every time I see it. It’s great.

01:16:13.01
Tanner
yeah Han hated that.

01:16:14.99
Tanner
Han hated that so much. We actually, I don’t know know, we started out as like, as like just this adventure page of like, ah you know, we bought our first van and we started climbing and just like everybody else were like, we’re just going to share what we have going on and stuff.

01:16:29.77
Tanner
And like, I just kind of, I had this big breakthrough year that took off and a lot of the stuff I was doing was getting some notoriety and, and the pages slowly kind of morphed into mine.

01:16:41.54
Tanner
But i and that wasn’t our original page name. And if I remember we were driving in the car and I was like, I’ve got the best idea. And I pitched that and she was like, that is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. She thought it was so d b, like so against it. And I was like, I got a good feeling about this. And I just, I turned it over and we never looked back.

01:17:02.94
Alyssa
I love it.

01:17:03.54
Alyssa
I was wondering if she was pro or against it because I could see both.

01:17:08.60
Tanner
You did not like it. And it’s really funny now we’re at a point where we get like, we get recognized like ah quite a lot at, you know, especially climbing places or gyms or anywhere like that. And that’s like how everybody they’re like, Hey, you’re a big buttress. I’m like, yeah, yeah, I know. It’s kind of funny, but yeah, I love it.

01:17:26.65
Alyssa
Oh, that’s awesome. One last fun question. ah What’s your go-to like as you’re cramming food in between climbs, what’s your go-to for that fuel?

01:17:40.62
Tanner
Oh, beef. Yeah, I’m not very creative.

01:17:42.60
Alyssa
Beef?

01:17:42.99
Tanner
I’m like, yeah, I’ve been on, I know I’m like, we, I’ve been on a primarily carnivore diet.

01:17:43.10
Alyssa
Okay.

01:17:51.20
Tanner
We could do a whole podcast about this. Somewhere, somewhere a nutritionist is listening to this, like, like ripping their eyeballs out of their head. I eat, I eat one meal a day, almost every single day.

01:18:03.37
Tanner
I don’t eat until at least 5pm every day. like no matter what and then at 5 p.m i’ll eat like two pounds of beef in a sitting and then i’ll have another dinner generally at like 7 p.m or something like that but i have like a two hour window that i just cram like thousands and thousands of calories in so on our on our triple actually we got we got a bunch of tri-tip uh and our our

01:18:27.08
Alyssa
oh my gosh

01:18:28.63
Tanner
Our old school climbing buddy, John Bernhardt, was out. He was grilling a tri-tip at three o’clock in the morning. at the picnic up area So when we, I’ll send you a picture when we get off this, but when we got off the El Cap, we went running down the East ledges and he’s got this like, he’s got this barbecue cookout set up at 345 at El Cap picnic area.

01:18:48.80
Tanner
like it’s a summer day but it’s like 20 degrees in the middle of the night and he’s out there flipping try tips like hey breakfast is ready and we just started riffing like riffing steaks down it was so good we just i don’t know i feel like that helps me like recover the best I’m also a sucker for like some you know some milk duds if we’re in if we’re getting the sweets down milk duds is like my go-to so yeah exactly yeah

01:18:51.43
Alyssa
Oh my gosh.

01:19:11.72
Alyssa
nice uh just gotta get some cow component you know the milk the the tri-tip that’s awesome oh fun sweet well tanner people can find you it i like big buttress is there any any other pieces you want to plug or or places yes please

01:19:30.43
Tanner
Yeah, I just want to plug Crux Wilderness Therapy, the nonprofit. Yeah, I just think it’s like the coolest program in the world. And just like a 30 second like brief you know synopsis. We provide outdoor climbing clinics every single weekend around Southern California, guided by AFGA guides. They’re completely free for all veterans.

01:19:53.33
Tanner
service members and their families. So if you want to learn how to climb or like to go climb El Cap one day or whatever you want, come out to our clinics. Our guides are all veterans and we’re there to facilitate literally whatever you want. We’re just providing free AMGA guides to break down all the barriers to entry. So if you have been climbing and you want to learn how to climb trad or multi-pitch or big wall or whatever, we can do whatever you want. It’s just this really cool resource. it’s We’re a wilderness therapy resource and if you just want to like get outside and you know, enjoy out, you know, the, the blue skies and sun and like not think about all your problems for a day, come out and climb and like get away from reality. It doesn’t matter. But our Instagram page is crux wilderness, uh, and then crux wilderness.org. It’s like the coolest program in the world. It’s awesome. So, uh, yeah, get on it.

01:20:40.60
Alyssa
Oh, that’s super cool. Yeah, I love that. Awesome. Well, Tanner, thanks for coming on. We’ll have to bring you back on for sure. Maybe to talk about some meats.

01:20:52.41
Alyssa
And yeah, good luck.

01:20:52.50
Tanner
Do that.

01:20:54.05
Alyssa
I hope that, ah yeah, we cross paths soon, sooner rather than later.

01:20:58.70
Tanner
Yeah, awesome.

01:21:00.81
Alyssa
Awesome.

01:21:01.33
Tanner
Thanks for having me on.

01:21:02.99
Alyssa
Thanks for coming on. And thank you for listening to the Uphill Athlete podcast. If you can rate, review. Subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. Helps us get in front of more people. Thank you for listening. It’s not just one, but a community. We are uphill athletes.