Pete Whittaker Sending Stranger than Fiction 5.14 Trad

Pete Whittaker, British trad climber and one half of the famous Wide Boyz duo, recently repeated one of the most difficult pure crack climbs in the United States: Mason Earle’s Stranger than Fiction 5.14. Located in Bartlett Wash, Utah, the 110-foot crack line works its way through a range of crack sizes and angles, requiring a mix of jamming techniques, bouldery power, and endless endurance.

Whittaker just released a full send-film of his ascent of Stranger than Fiction on the WideBoyz Youtube channel, which you can watch below. The video has been released as part of a fundraiser for cancer research, where they’re trying to hit a goal of $1,000.

Earle made the first ascent of Stranger than Fiction back in 2015 after three years of on-and-off projecting. In Early November, Lor Sabourin made the second ascent after working the route for four years. The line starts out severely overhanging, with the crack fluctuating between hands to thin hands to fingers. Whittaker found this section particularly difficult as he struggled to fit his larger-than-average, meaty hands in the crack. He decided to climb the route without tape or rubber crack gloves in order to get purchase on his jams through this section.

After a hard boulder problem, the route ends with a relentless, overhanging finger crack. The finger jams are good but the feet are desperate. In his first ascent, Earle famously climbed this section of the route without a climbing shoe on his right foot to better fit his foot in the thin crack. He popped his shoe off just before entering this final section, revealing a taped up foot. Sabourin employed this taped-foot tactic in the second ascent, but Whittaker did not.

“As it’s not had many ascents I’ll give my thoughts on the grade to add to the general consensus over time,” said Whittaker on Instagram about the difficulty of Stranger than Fiction. “For me it felt tough [5.14b], harder than Cobra, easier than Recovery. With pure cracks like this hand and finger size does always play a part though. This crack does take in a range of bad sizes so the cruxes are likely to be slightly different for everyone.

“However, what can be said is it’s such a classic for the hard global crack circuit, and you really need to know your pure jamming techniques for this one. Thanks [Mason Earle] for the vision and the fight right to the anchor.”

The past few months have been some of the best in Whittaker’s trad climbing career. In August and September he made first ascents of Eigerdosis 5.14b and Crown Royale 5.14d at the Profile Wall in Jøssingfjord, Norway. In October, he repeated Tom Randall’s Pura Pura 5.14b in Orco, Italy.

Pete Whittaker sends Stranger than Fiction 5.14