Black Diamond athlete Patxi Usobiaga has won World Cups, world championships, and onsighted 8c+. Now? Injuries from a nasty car wreck have forced him to retire from the training rigors required for competition climbing and high-end sport climbing. Patxi, forever obsessed with climbing, has redirected his motivations and aspirations into enjoying the freedom and adventure of multi-pitching on Europe’s endless limestone alpine walls. The video below was shot on the immaculate walls of Austria’s Rätikon by Bernardo Gimenez and does a wonderful job of profiling Patxi’s transition in his climbing life.

Lander, Wyoming. Beautiful climbing, wonderful people. Here is my angle on it.

Cinematography & Production: Kyle Duba

Shot in the Fall of 2011

Tom Randall and Pete Whittaker are in the US for 8 weeks in search of the most difficult off-widths they could find. "Century Crack" is the hardest off-width in the world. Stevie Haston attempted this route in the 90's with no success. No one believed the route would ever be climbed...

Alstrin Film & Hot Aches Productions have teamed up to document their two year journey.

In this video, Jorg Verhoeven is working on establishing Nordic Flower (9a)? that consists of  a 55-meter roof climb located in what is now being called the Hanshellern cave.

Meru Expedition video by Jimmy Chin with Conrad Anker and Renan Ozturk on the route named Samsara.

Sam Elias on the seldom repeated Tomfoolery in Rifle Canyon. A route at 8c put up by Tommy Caldwell in 1997 has rarely been climbed despite having been attempted by many of the best. A series of ultra-bizarre sequences gets you up this route and Sam Elias made this ascent in the summer of 2010.

These are friends from Huaraz, Peru who lead outstanding mountain bike tours in the high Andes.  They also rent quality, maintained bikes for dirt roads through rolling farmland to some of the rowdiest high altitude tours in the world.

Leaders in high-altitude mountain biking trips since 1994:
www.chakinaniperu.com
www.olazas.com

As was reported here in the Black Diamond Equipment Journal this past August, Black Diamond athletes Nico Favresse and Adam Pustelnik made the first repeat of Orbayu, a multi-pitch line on Spain's Naranjo de Bulnes, which at 8c+/9a had been hailed as the world's hardest big wall free climb.  Although the pair felt the route was not as hard as it was originally trumpeted (they graded it more in the 8b+/8c range), they had nothing but high praise for the route's quality. We had Bernardo Gimenez on the scene to capture their successful redpoint of the route and he has edited together this excellent video. At the end of the video you'll see footage of Adam as he is stabilized, rescued and hospitalized after a terrible ground-fall while attempting a new line with Nico after they had redpointed Orbayu. Adam continues to make progress in his recovery and we look forward to seeing him back cranking on the rock in 2012.