American Alpine Club Podcast

American Alpine Club Podcast
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The American Alpine Club Podcast is your guide to the climbing community. We're not your typical training podcast. Instead, we're covering the advocacy issues facing climbers, diving into forgotten and niche stories from climbing history, discovering undercover crushers, analyzing trends in climbing accidents, hearing from SAR professionals, and exploring the biggest cultural ideas in climbing with some of climbing's top athletes.

  1. Local Hero Dave Hume, on Bringing 5.14 to the Red in the 90s

    DEC 19

    Local Hero Dave Hume, on Bringing 5.14 to the Red in the 90s

    In the 90s, Dave Hume was one of the Red River Gorge's original kid crushers. After climbing became a family hobby Dave Hume got obsessed—and left his own mark on the sport. In this episode, we talk about what it was like being one of the original Lode Bros, bringing 5.14 to the Red with his ascent of Thanatopsis in 1996, and the one time he beat Chris Sharma in a competition. He shares the story of how his dad and brother bolted the infamous Breakfast Burrito, one of the Red’s most classic 5.10s, and the sense of discovery of finding new crags like Drive By and Bob Marley. Plus, we cover the early evolution of the Red from trad to sport climbing, reminisce about Miguel’s before they sold pizza, and how Dave repeated Just Do It, the U.S.’s first 14c, in an insulting few tries. Dive in to hear some fun stories from this Red River Gorge local hero. *** If you believe conversations like this matter, a donation to the AAC helps us continue sharing stories, insights, and education for the entire climbing community. Donate today at americanalpineclub.org/donate

    59 min
  2. Setting the Climbing Record Straight, with Gunks Legend Russ Clune

    DEC 4

    Setting the Climbing Record Straight, with Gunks Legend Russ Clune

    Russ Clune is a climbing lifer. He came up climbing at the Gunks, traveled around the world to climb with friends and legends like Wolfgang Gullich, and would help establish the iconic Gunks 5.13 Vandals, alongside Jeff Gruenberg, Lynn Hill, and Hugh Herr. He also shares about sending Mantronix, his hardest climb ever, “back when 5.14 was hard.” These days, he’s a keeper of stories from the Gunks and across the world, and has a running record of Gunks climbing history in his head. On this episode, we meander through stories from Russ’s many climbing travels, explore Gunks toproping ethics and the often forgotten tactic of yo-yo climbing, and set the record straight on some of the most iconic cutting edge Gunks ascents from the 70s and 80s. **** If you believe conversations like this matter, a donation to the AAC helps us continue sharing stories, insights, and education for the entire climbing community. Donate today at americanalpineclub.org/donate

    57 min
  3. Stay Frosty: The Rescue Matrix, with Pete Takeda and Jason Antin

    NOV 20

    Stay Frosty: The Rescue Matrix, with Pete Takeda and Jason Antin

    You’re in the thick of it. An accident just happened while you were out climbing, and now you have to decide: do I self-rescue, or do I call for outside help? In this episode of the podcast, we dive into that moment of decision, and provide a series of questions that you can use as a matrix to help you decide what to do next. Our guests, Accidents Editor Pete Takeda, and IFMGA/AMGA Guide and Search and Rescue volunteer, Jason Antin, weigh in. Pete reflects on accident reports from ANAC where individuals have self-rescued, called SAR, or had to do a little of both. We break down a few of these case studies to explore what circumstances caused the accident victims to make the decisions they did to initiate rescue. Then, Jason shares what happens behind the scenes when you call Search and Rescue for help, and how self-rescue techniques can supplement a SAR team’s mission and help SAR get to an injured party faster. Dive in to help prepare yourself, in case you ever find yourself in that moment of decision on how to respond to an accident. *** If you believe conversations like this matter, a donation to the AAC helps us continue sharing stories, insights, and education for the entire climbing community. Donate today at americanalpineclub.org/donate

    58 min
  4. Understanding the Climbing Rage Bait Trend, with Owen Clarke

    NOV 6

    Understanding the Climbing Rage Bait Trend, with Owen Clarke

    In this episode of the podcast, we have adventure writer Owen Clarke on the pod to talk about rage bait, and how it’s showing up in climbing media and culture. Owen Clarke is a prolific writer, who regularly contributes to Summit Journal and Climbing.com, as well as many other media outlets. Recently, he covered rage bait for an article on Climbing.com, where he dove into a case study of the free soloist Lincoln Knowles. Rage bait is content that is intentionally created to elicit strong reactions from people—it’s trolling with intention, in order to drive clicks, comments, and other forms of engagement. Dive in to this episode to hear from this expert about why rage creates engagement, how shock-factor in traditional action sports media lends itself to evolving into rage bait, the unique elements of climbing rage bait, and why its specific to short-from media.

    35 min
  5. 22 Seasons at Denali Base Camp, with Lisa Roderick

    OCT 7

    22 Seasons at Denali Base Camp, with Lisa Roderick

    On this episode of the podcast, we chat with Lisa Roderick about her book: A Place Among Giants: 22 Seasons at Denali Base camp. As base camp manager at Denali (also known as Mt McKinley), Lisa was everywhere and doing everything—going out of her way to help climbers even when it wasn’t in her job description. Her job ended up panning out to include: coordinating planes dropping off and picking up climbers and tourists; reporting weather over the radio to nearby pilots maneuvering the Alaska Range; reporting weather to climbers up on Denali without service; and occasionally supporting Denali National Park Rangers in search and rescue efforts. Really only accessible by small planes, the Kahiltna Glacier is its own unique, isolated world—full of inspiration, history-making climbs, risk, worry, fascinating climbing personalities, days sunning on the glacier, and moody weather. Dive into the episode to learn more about Lisa’s decades of experience in one of the most volatile and vibrant climbing hubs on the planet.

    59 min
  6. Flashback to the Era of AAC Member Applications

    SEP 19

    Flashback to the Era of AAC Member Applications

    In this episode of the podcast, we sit down with AAC Librarian Natalie Siciliano to chat about a fascinating part of the American Alpine Club’s history: the days when you used to have to apply to be a member of the Club. The application membership system lasted for nearly 90 years–which means we have extensive records in our archives that feature the climbing resumes and recommendation letters from thousands of climbing's most fascinating characters. In this episode, we dive into the how and why of this application system, why it got dismantled, and what membership at the Club looks like now. Plus, we take a look at some highlights from the applications of legends like Lynn Hill, Yvon Chouinard, Ichiro Yoshizawa, and more.

    1 hr
  7. Softening to Grief, with Therapist Ash Langholz

    AUG 28

    Softening to Grief, with Therapist Ash Langholz

    CONTENT WARNING: This episode includes topics of death and loss in the mountains, as well as mention of some specific accidents you may or may not be familiar with. Please take care of yourself when listening. For this episode of the AAC podcast, we’re having a conversation with therapist Ashlee Langholz about grief, traumatic grief, and how the Climbing Grief Fund (CGF) can support climbers and other mountain athletes who are experiencing loss. While we’ve had a few CGF grant recipients on the podcast in recent years to reflect on their personal journeys with grief, this episode is more about demystifying grief therapy and what Ash has learned throughout the years of professionally supporting people in their grief journey. Plus, our host delves into some of her own personal experiences with the topic. Do you need mental health services as you grapple with loss and injury related to the mountains and mountain sports? Apply to the Climbing Grief Fund today at americanalpineclub.org/grieffund.

    1h 9m
  8. Periodizing Mental Training with Neal Palles

    AUG 13

    Periodizing Mental Training with Neal Palles

    The AAC’s Climbing Grief Fund has a directory of therapists who are specialists in the unique risks, challenges, joys, and euphoria of outdoor recreation, and are informed practitioners who support climbers experiencing grief and trauma. And though the directory is an invaluable resource when people need support in the face of the most intense kinds of grief and tragedy, these counselors also have expertise in other areas, including sports performance psychology. Because it's all connected–just as grief and trauma impacts our relationship to climbing, so too, does working on resilience, self-compassion, and other mental health skills help us excel at our goals in climbing. In this episode, we have CGF therapist and sports psychologist Neal Palles on to chat about how to practice and stack various mental training techniques and concepts on top of each other to build towards peak performance. We periodize our physical training, and according to Palles, we can apply that same concept to mental skills as well. Dive in!

    45 min
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4.4
out of 5
49 Ratings

About

The American Alpine Club Podcast is your guide to the climbing community. We're not your typical training podcast. Instead, we're covering the advocacy issues facing climbers, diving into forgotten and niche stories from climbing history, discovering undercover crushers, analyzing trends in climbing accidents, hearing from SAR professionals, and exploring the biggest cultural ideas in climbing with some of climbing's top athletes.

Information

  • Creator
    American Alpine Club Podcast
  • Years Active
    2022 - 2025
  • Episodes
    76
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © All rights reserved
  • Show Website
    American Alpine Club Podcast

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