The Power Company Climbing Podcast

Alex Megos may well be the strongest climber in the world. But is he the best?  In this episode I sit down with Megos and his good friend Ken Etzel, the director of the new film that we are discussing, Rotpunkt.  Rotpunkt gives us a rare glimpse into the up and down struggles of someone trying to become the best in the world. Maybe not suprisingly, these are struggles that every single one of us can relate to. Possibly even more fascinating is the bond that was forged between filmmaker and athlete, and the pressures that this bond had to endure while making the film.  You can find the film at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbWvFjUIt5k You can find Alex Megos on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/alexandermegos You can find Ken Etzel on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/ken_etzel We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

ONE MILLION DOWNLOADS. Thank you for the continued and growing support! It means the world.  In this episode, Nate and I sit down to talk about where it all started and why we keep doing it.  We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

Bill Ramsey is a legend. He had achieved near mythical status in the Red River Gorge by the time I started paying attention to sport climbing. Pioneering many of the best hard sport climbs that now draw flocks of people to Kentucky’s steep sandstone crags, Bill wasn’t the typical 24 year old developer with a part time job and nowhere specific to be. He was a Professor of Philosophy at The University of Notre Dame - an over 14 hour round trip to and from The Red - a drive that Bill made weekly. His routes Omaha Beach, Transworld Depravity, Golden Boy, and The Return of Darth Moll, among many other classics, came from this period. He’s done 26 5.14’s - 25 of those after turning 40. Bill recently checked one of his life list, Randy Leavitt’s stunning Jumbo Pumping Hate (14a) at Clark Mountain. He had just turned 59 and was a few days from hip surgery. To say that Bill is dedicated is a massive understatement, and we haven’t even mentioned his training sessions. Without going too far into detail, Bill has found that marathon sessions work well for him, and he’s stuck to that with great results. Perhaps most intriguing, and most universally applicable, is his idea of The Pain Box, which we discuss in the episode.  As I get older it gets a little tougher to find the same inspiration in the 20 year old crushers that I once did, and there just aren’t that many 40+ year old climbers still chasing progression. Bill has always been someone I’ve looked up to as not only a great example of perseverance and dedication in his climbing, but in his life choices as well. Bill moved from a tenured position at Notre Dame to UNLV so that he could be closer to the year round climbing in Las Vegas. Not content with a schedule that he could fill with climbing and training, Bill gives back to the community as Vice President of the Southern Nevada Climber’s Coalition. Every step of the way, a legend. You can find Bill's full Pain Box essay at https://www.powercompanyclimbing.com/blog/2019/11/11/ep-150-a-philosophy-of-sending-with-bill-ramsey We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

For Dr. Jared Vagy's third appearance on the podcast, we decided to tackle a few hotly debated topics - things like stretching, prehab, training "dangerous" grip positions, and more.  If you haven't listened to Episodes 88 and 107, featuring Jared's Rock Rehab Pyramid, they are worth the time.  You can find Dr. Vagy online at www.theclimbingdoctor.com You can get his book, Climb Injury Free, at https://theclimbingdoctor.com/product/climb-injury-free-5/ Great video from Quinn Henoch on static stretching that we reference in the episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgL8GkzpNsw We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

Episode 12 with Will Anglin and Rowland Chen quickly became a cult classic. Today we bring them back for P.O.E. Part 2, a follow up to examine how the P.O.E. path they had both embarked on had worked out. If you haven't yet, it will be to your benefit to go back and listen to that episode. Go ahead. We'll wait.  Both, despite their lives getting busier, have made big progress - not an easy thing to do when you're already climbing at a high level. There have been mistakes, reassessment, taking things too far, desk jobs, and less free time, but they've found their way to progress. Be prepared to laugh, but you might also want to take notes.  You can find Rowland on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/rowwlaaand/ You can find Will on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/wlanglin/ We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

Science and Data are increasingly popular in training for climbing, and for good reason. Leading that charge is Dr. Tyler Nelson of Camp 4 Human Performance. He's built a strong following on Instagram, and is giving solid information to coaches and climbers all over the world, but as with any post on social media, much of the context is lost. Context that I feel is massively important.  In this episode Tyler and I sit down at The Donut Distillery in Nashville, on our way to teach together at the Performance Climbing Coach Seminar, to discuss how to look at the research, whether science is the end all be all, and what exactly is the context for all of this information.  We also reveal the winner of the Instagram Donut Contest! You can find Tyler at https://www.camp4humanperformance.com/ and on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/c4hp You can register for the next Performance Climbing Coach Seminar at https://performanceclimbingcoach.com/ We don't tweet. We scream like Eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

A home wall can be an extremely valuable tool to have at your disposal. Deciding to have one is easy, but that one decision will open up a world of damned near impossible to make decisions. Set board or spray wall? If a board, which one? If a spray wall, what angles, what density, WHICH GRIPS?? So. Many. Decisions. In this episode Nate and I sit down at Tension Climbing to talk with Will Anglin and Michael Rosato about the first of those impossible decisions - board or spray wall. They have both at their disposal at the Tension Climbing Center, so they intimately understand the benefits and challenges of each. One of those challenges is that it can be tough to fit a set board into many homewall user spaces. Tension has come up with a solution - their SHORT (H:10ft x W:8ft) and SHORT AND NARROW (H:10ft x W:5ft) “crops” of the Tension Board. It’s essentially the same set, just cropped to a smaller dimension with it’s own set of problems in the Tension App. These guys just keep innovating. Learn more about the new Cropped Tension boards at: https://www.tensionclimbing.com/product/tension-board-sets/ We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

"A room full of superheroes," is how this conversation was described by an Australian climber at Mt. Arapiles. He's not wrong. In this episode I sit down in Blackheath at the home of Tom O'Halloran and Amanda Watts with a who's who of Aussie climbing to discuss the idea of Intentional Community. Besides Tom and Amanda, we talk with Lee Cossey and Andrea Hah, Lee and Sam Cujes, Julian Saunders, David Brailey, and Vince Day. While we're missing a few key Blackheathens, we got a pretty good representation.  Stick around to the very end!  You can find the Baffle Days podcast HERE and HERE Connect with Amanda Watts nutrition services HERE Check out Day Gallery HERE Connect with Dr. J - Julian Saunders HERE Everyone on Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/tom_ohalloran https://www.instagram.com/a.mandawatts https://www.instagram.com/leecossey https://www.instagram.com/andreahah https://www.instagram.com/flashandsass https://www.instagram.com/david_brailey https://www.instagram.com/leecujes https://www.instagram.com/day_gallery_blackheath   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

Hangboarding is overrated, but it's also important. Please, for the sake of all that is good in humanity, listen to Episode 143 before you listen to this one. Every time someone listens to this episode out of order, the climbing gods will remove the obvious start to another undiscovered classic boulder. Don't let this happen!  In this episode Nate and I sit down to discuss the antithesis to the previous episode. Hangboarding is important. We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.

Yes, you read that correctly. OVERRATED. In this episode Nate and I sit down to discuss the top 5 reasons why one of the most popular forms of training for climbing is simply being blown out of proportion. Sue me. We don't tweet. We scream like eagles.   The Power Company Podcast is brought to you by Power Company Climbing and is a proud member of the Plug Tone Audio Collective. You can help us keep episodes sponsor-free by becoming a Patron for as little as $3 a month. Find full episode transcripts and more at our website.