There’s a deep story behind every great climbing achievement. Climbing movies are more than your usual adventure-sport porn. They are narratives about lifelong achivements, mania and sometimes failure, with a bunch of mind-blowing athletic prowess and edge-of-your-seat thrills mixed in. That’s just what you’ll find in The Reel Rock Tour, which lanches its sixth iteration this fall in venues across the globe. Here is a list of 2011’s offerings:
Slack Life
Dirtbag slacker Andy Lewis solos the world’s longest high-lines.
Wide Fetish
Meet some of the oddest climbing specialists around—off-widthers.
Speed Climbing
Dean Potter and Sean Leary vie to break The Nose speed record.
Origins: Ashima
A 9-year-old girl from New York City storms the bouldering world.
Project Dawn Wall
Follow Coloradan Tommy Caldwell on his quest to climb the Dawn Wall.
Ice Revolution
Will Gadd takes on heinously difficult overhanging ice.
Going Big: Yosemite Big Walls
Elevation Outdoors contributor Chris Van Leuven and SuperTopo founder Chris McNamara have combined their first-hand knowledge of the planet’s most famous climbing playground on to write the third edition of Yosemite Big Walls. The book is required reading for any climber planning to take on classic and lesser-known big-wall routes in the valley, and it provides an updated, special focus on clean lines. It should come as no surprise that the detailed topos are the big highlight, but the pair also took the time to give credit to the history of these routes, documenting first ascents and interviewing those who made them—compelling reading even if you’re not a big-wall climber.
$30 print book, $27 eBook, $38 both; Supertopo.com