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Adam Ondra Attempted to Onsight Salathe Wall on El Cap

Adam Ondra attempted to be the first climber to ever onsight the Salathe Wall 5.13 on El Capitan. Yuji Hirayama fell twice during an onsight attempt in 1997.

Ondra travelled to Yosemite with the hopes of making the onsight, for the past few months he’s been competing at the world cup and climbing new 5.15 sport routes.

Since arriving in Yosemite, he’s sent Book of Hate 5.13d and Dominated V13 and onsighted Cosmic Debris 5.13b trad. On his first visit to Yosemite in 2016, Ondra made the second free ascent of Dawn Wall 5.14d.

The first ascent of Salathe Wall was by Royal Robbins, Chris Pratt and Tom Frost in 1961 in just under 10 days. The first free ascent was in 1988 by Todd Skinner and Paul Piana. Alex Huber was the first to lead and free every pitch in 1995.

Ondra teamed up with big wall specialist Nicolas Favresse and started up the route one-minute after midnight. Ondra crushed most of the route but fell at the crux of the headwall.

Ondra wrote on Instagram, “Salathe was a dream of mine for a long time. A dream of just being up there, feeling the air and exposure of the “headwall” (upper part of Salathe which is the crux), putting my hands into perfect cracks.

“And to onsight it. Some dreams came true yesterday, but the ultimate – the onsight is not fulfilled. And the nature of onsight is that it will never be fulfilled any more. It is only one try, lots of pressure in case of such a legendary route like Salathe in Yosemite on El Capitan.”

Salathe was a dream of mine for a long time. A dream of just being up there, feeling the air and exposure of the "headwall" (upper part of Salathe which is the crux), putting my hands into perfect cracks… And to onsight it. Some dreams came true yesterday, but the ultimate – the onsight is not fulfilled. And the nature of onsight is that it will never be fulfilled any more. It is only one try,  lots of pressure in case of such a legendary route like Salathe in Yosemite on El Capitan. Yesterday we started with amazing partner @nicofavresse at 00:01 AM, 7 AM we were up at the "Boulderproblem", 8:30 AM at the Block, still onsighting all. At 1:30 PM we continued through Enduro and the roof and I failed to onsight Headwall pitch 1 in the upper part, on my second go I fell right at the anchor. No more energy to give another try. Pic by @bernardo_gimenez @montura_official @blackdiamond @lasportivagram @mytendon

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