Joe Kinder Cracks the 5.15a Barrier

photo: @outpostcinema

I might be the proudest guy on earth at the moment. My hardest climb and route to which I’ve been most devoted, Life of Villains is finished. The last 2 months and 2 days have been the most intense and emotional ride I’ve had in my climbing career. I’m now sitting here feeling calm, serene and complete. It’s weird. I think it’s going to take a while to process. It’s an FA. It’s my hardest and I believe it’s 9a+ but all of that feels like a bunch of petty labels that attempt to validate something. Yeah I’m a pro climber but more than anything I’m a passionate climber and I can’t even begin to equate this experience to a number or grade or any other term. The story of this climb is a deeper conversation and one I’ll take with me forever. Moments like this only happen once in a while and I couldn’t be f’ing happier to end the story how it has. I sincerely thank those of you who supported my effort and follow through. Life feels pretty good right now. Hehe. L.O.V. Joe Photo: @joe_segreti

A post shared by Joe Kinder (@joekinder) on Mar 6, 2018 at 4:25pm PST

Huge congrats to my bro @joekinder for sending his proj life of villains 5.15a in the Hurricane of southern Utah. So rad to see you stick with it til the end. Joe has been working toward climbing 5.15 for a long time and it’s so cool to see him realize his dream. I’m interested though how it feels now that it’s in the bag. From my own experience, the whole process becomes so much more involved, committing and bigger than just climbing a number grade harder. When you finally do it the importance of the number kind of pales in comparison the experience of the whole journey. Huge props dude so happy for you!

A post shared by Chris Sharma (@chris_sharma) on Mar 6, 2018 at 3:10am PST