17 August 2017

Chuck Odette's (61) 8b+ FA great story

Chuck Odette started climbing in 1978 and did his first 7a+ 1989 at 34 years old. Since two years, he is a full time retired climber who is getting a new peak at 61 years old doing the FA of Bulletproof Monk 8b+ in Logan Canyon. (c) Heidi Baxter "Technically, it's been a 2 year process. My wife (Maggie Odette 8b+ in 2016 being 46) and I have been on the road full time since June of 2015, which helps a lot. We've been living in our little Scamp Trailer for the past 2 years and 2 months! We change locations about every 2 or 3 months, following the weather usually. We're able to climb and rest on our schedule rather than climbing just on weekend and training during the week. Full time climbers have it made :) blog. I really started focusing on this route last year when I bombed out in Maple trying to do a couple of the longer 8b+ routes there. I was very close, but the best I could do was to repeat a couple 8b/8b+ routes last summer. The two routes, Ego Boost (8b/8b+) and Mexican Rodeo (8b/8b+), I had done when I was a much younger 50 years old... HA! Logan Canyon was essentially my local "home" crag for many years (1994 to 2002) so it made sense to go back to Logan and try something hard there this year. I had put up a new line called Shaolin (8b) in 2014 and linked it to a harder longer endurance finish and called it Golden Child (8b+) also done in 2014. I tried to link Shaolin into another, more direct finish at that time, which is the finish I just did, but I felt like it was too powerful for me to do at my advanced age. It's 7B or 7B+ boulder grade maybe? Hard for old geezers... or so I thought...??? :) Being away from the route for three years made me think about it more and I felt that it might be possible for me to do if I trained specifically just for that finish. Maggie and I decided to return to Logan Canyon this year so she could do a couple of FFA's or harder 8a+ and 8b grade possibly, and so I could work on linking Shaolin into this much harder finish... To prepare for this, we spent 6 weeks bouldering in the Priest Draw of Northern Arizona, which is steep pocked limestone (like China Cave) and very powerful movement. We trained hard on our portable tripod back in camp every night after bouldering, three days a week. We did weighted pull ups, gymnastic ring push ups and lots of core training stuff. Power is our weakness, so all we did was work our weakness during that time. On our rest days, we both do a lot of Ashtanga (power) yoga for recovery and opposition muscle strength training. Basically, we were doing active recovery while balancing out our pull muscles to help prevent injury. When we arrived to climb in China Cave (Logan Canyon) we were both extremely fit for it. I repeated a handful of routes to build a pyramid toward the ultimate goal of sending the new and harder finish to Shaolin. After repeating The Golden Child, during this phase, I knew I was ready to link the harder variation. It took three climbing days (over a five day period) to work out the moves to the new finish. Three more climbing days later (and another five day period) I linked the entire rig for the redpoint. I felt lucky since my physical, mental and emotional states were all at peak performance levels. Coincidentally, my peak performance level corresponded with cooler temps. We had been climbing in 30-32C temps (in the shade!) and on the send day it was only 25C. Sometimes there's a bit of "luck" involved when sending something at your limit!"
1 comment
Sort by:
Date
Reply
Most commented
Jorge Diaz-Rullo FAโ€™s Cafรฉ Colombia (?) after 240 sessions
18 March 2026

Jorge Diaz-Rullo FAโ€™s Cafรฉ Colombia (?) after 240 sessions

Jorge Diaz-Rullo reports on Instagram that he has made the first ascent of Cafe Colombia in Margalef. At 27, heโ€™s already stacked four 9b+ sends and now heโ€™s adโ€ฆ
81
Sean Bailey FAโ€™s Duality of Man (9c)
26 January 2026

Sean Bailey FAโ€™s Duality of Man (9c)

Sean Bailey reports on Instagram that he has done the first ascent of Duality of Man (9c) in Dry Canyon. โ€ After four total years and three seasons of climbing,โ€ฆ
69
Jorge Diaz-Rullo proposes 9c for Cafรฉ Colombia
23 March 2026

Jorge Diaz-Rullo proposes 9c for Cafรฉ Colombia

Jorge Diaz-Rullo elaborates on the reasons for him to suggest 9c for Cafรฉ Colombia on Instagram, which he took down last week after projecting it for 240 sessioโ€ฆ
63
Related
9 January 2023

The top climbers over 40 for 2022

Here is our subjective list of the active 8a members aged 40+ crushing hard in 2022.1. BJ Tilden (42) - USA First 9a+ as well as first two 8B+ in 2022. 2. Chuck Odette (67) - USA 8a+ and 7B+ at age 67!3. Daniel Fuertes (42) - ESP The Spaniard continues to send 9a+' year after year. Last year, he alโ€ฆ
1
2 November 2023

Chuck Odette (67) - The best is yet to come

Chuck Odette sent his hardest route, T-Rex 8b+ (c) three years ago. The 67-year-old started climbing at age 23 back in 1978. Turning 35, he decided to try to start pushing his limits, reaching his first 7c+ at 37 and first 8b+ at 44.
0
Hard core oldtimers
29 October 2008

Hard core oldtimers

Jibรฉ Tribout (47) #4 in 35+ ranking, Johan Luhr (47) #10 Peache Wรผthrich (44) #13 Franรงois Tournois-Blanche (45) #22 Thierry Caillaud (45) #26 Beppe Castelliโ€ฆ
1