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Enormocast 318: Babsi Zangerl – 10 Years Later
Spotify
Apple PodcastsOn the latest Enormocast, Austrian rock master Babsi Zangerl returns to the show after I discovered her 10 years ago. Just kidding, but to say that her fame has rocketed since her first Enormocast over ten years ago is an understatement. Since we last talked, Babsi took her bouldering base and parlayed that into becoming one of the dominant big wall free climbers of all time. She’s racked up 8 free ascents of El Cap including the first flash, climbed most of the important alpine walls in Europe, and brought her talents to the Karakorum in Pakistan on Nameless (Trango) Tower. In between, she’s sent single pitch trad test pieces on both sides of the Atlantic and climbed 9a+ sport. All while dragging her boyfriend Jacopo Larcher around (wink). All the while, Babsi maintains her day job as a medical radiographer just to keep it real. Truly one of a kind and one of the best, its an honor to have her back on the show.
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Enormocast 317: Alik Berg – A Climber’s Climber
On Episode 317 of the Enormocast, I sit down at the Banff Mountain Film Festival with alpinist Alik Berg. Born in Edmonton and living in Canmore, Alik has spent most of his life forging himself into the climber’s climber: reliable, strong, smart, and bold. His view of the ethics and philosophy of alpinism were instilled by his dad, but also tested on the big walls of Yosemite as a teenager. As the years progressed, big wall Alik transformed himself into an expert winter alpinist in the Canadian Rockies. Though he is relatively unknown outside of the deep community of alpinists in the Bow Valley, he is revered and respected throughout that realm of compact, snow-dusted, limestone and rime-covered necky leads that is Canadian Rockies winter climbing. Never one to spray about himself, Alik agreed to sit down for the Enormocast because he wants to share the hard fought wisdom of his years in the range and beyond as those that came before shared with him.
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Enormocast 316: Chantel Astorga – What Would Voytek Do?
On Episode 316 of the Enormocast I sit down with alpinist Chantel Astorga. Though Chantel didn’t grow up in a climbing family, it was her dad who lit the fire for climbing by giving a tween Chantel a book on the Alaska Range. Then an encounter with the writings of the enigmatic Polish climber Voytek Kurtyka in a Salt Lake City library sealed her fate. Voytek’s evangelism for the “night-naked” style of fast and light alpinism became Chantel’s lodestone as she pursued her mountain skills first through skiing, then ice climbing, then forays to the Alaska Range. In 2021, it all came together when she soloed the Cassin Ridge on Denali and found her own “contact with the mystical” (Kurtyka). Since then, she’s become a sought after partner for ascents around the globe. Though Astorga recently joined the North Face Team, she spent most of her climbing career funding her own way through her work as an avalanche forecaster. Pretty damn old school.
The Art of Suffering by Voytek Kurtyka
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