8-year-old boy becomes youngest person
to climb California’s El Capitan

I have a large photo print, about 36" tall of a photo that I took of El Capitan back in the 70s, and it has adorned my great room wall for at least 35 years. It is a most impressive vertical wall of rock. I've stood at the bottom, and watched climbers work up the face through a telescope. And long ago, in the 70s also, my wife and I climbed a number of fairly serious mountains in the Wind River Range in Wyoming. And we used to climb on the weekend for fun at the vertical faces of Seneca Rocks in West Virginia, too. And years later we did the easy back side of Half Dome, and while we were on top, some climbers came up the vertical face of that iconic mountain. But we were never up to the challenge of El Cap. I'm impressed with this young man. That is no minor accomplishment.

Nope! The whole family is crazy!

This is misinformation, non-news lie. FJB was the first. Just ask him. s/o

I can see it now 16 years in the future at some meat market bar when he sidles up to some hot chick, "Hi there, I'm Sam Baker, and Adventure is my middle name!" Chick laughs so hard she blows chunks and Mai Tais all over his rock climbing outfit.

Any relation to the balloon boy from years back? Something not right about this story even if it is 100% true. No 8 year old kid decides this on his own. He was poked and prodded and it starting on the day he was born judging by his name. We had a couple in our neighborhood who were avid runners. Every day they would load their baby into their 'racing stroller' and shoot him up and down the streets. I always thought they were programming the kid to be a runner. His name? Chase.

The lad Sam Adventure Baker is living up to his name. Is father Joe related to Joe Don? (Joe Don Baker or Joe Don Looney? you ask.) Four years ago Alex Honnold and Tommy Caldwell, climbed the Nose at El Capitan, 2,950 feet straight up, in one hour, fifty-eight minutes, and seven seconds. That's the record. Here is the climb in fast forward motion taken from a long distance away, the climbers looking like ants on the rock surface. Watcj 'em go, and be amazed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdOzbM_7GMI (Honnold and Caldwell speed climb the Nose in 1:58:07) An acrophobic, I couldn't even look down from the top of El Cap, but am in awe of great climbers like Alex and Tommy. I wish the young Baker fellow many years of braving the heights, and am in admiration of him as well.

I forget. Is it possible to parachute from the top of El Capitan? Is that next for little Adventure? Chihuahua looks on with envy.

From the video I saw, it would be more accurate to say the 8-year-old PRUSSIKED up El Cap rather than CLIMBED. Ask your mountaineering friends to explain the difference between the two.

This won't end well.

Okay. What’s next? Disneyland ain’t gonna be nuthin’ to this kid.

And when he plunges to his death at 10, daddy will say "he died doing what he loved." Haven't we heard that before?

It is clear that this was very important to Dad and that the boy would do anything to gain his approval and adulation. I don’t know what “prussiked” means but it seems to me that Dad hauled the boy up El Capitan with the assistance of two others. I seriously doubt that the boy was doing individual climbing and setting of the spikes or whatever that alllowed the climbing party that followed to climb foward. Sam was along for the ride.n Just my opinion.

I do not admire this father for pushing the child into this. Let the lad do it when he is old enough to make an informed decision.

This reminds me of the youngest-to-fly-around-the-world exploits some years back. When a young girl died due to high wind conditions on take off and her inability to handle them, despite an instructor on board, they declared an end to that record category.

Re #12, a prussic sling is a special knot which wraps around a climbing rope and has a loop. It will slide when unloaded, but under a load on the loop, locks to the rope. A pair of these can be attached to slings for your feet. So, you can ascend a vertical rope placed by someone else by standing on one sling, which will lock to the rope and raising the other leg by bending the knee, and slide the other prussic sling up, because it is unloaded, then standing on the bent leg. Then slide up the other prussic sling, and stand on it. You can "walk" up the rope by alternating the two slings. There are mechanical devices which will slide in one direction on a rope and grip in the opposite direction called Jumar ascenders. A pair of them can be used just like a pair of prussic slings. When crossing a glacier, I always carried a pair of prussic slings in my pockets in case of a fall....such as in a crevasse, where your partner that you are roped to has (in theory) used their ice axe to stop themselves from following you into the crevasse, but they may be unable to do anything other than act as an anchor. You would be hanging in space on your climbing rope, and could attach the prussics and self rescue. Even following a better climber counts, although leading at least a few pitches would be proper form, and normally the follower will climb, just be top roped. And as far as exposure....hell, once you are past 50 ft it doesn't make a damn bit of difference how far it is. About the biggest wall my wife and I ever did is about 700 ft, which about 20% of El Cap. Fond memories of times long ago for me. Not longer strong enough or brave enough to do a lot of this.

I'm glad this kid's father is not my father, ego blasting at its purest