Sam Stroh: El Corazon in a Day

Over the six months leading up to Yosemite season last year, I don’t think I had climbed more than 5 pitches in a day. So, rolling into the valley in mid October with the goal of climbing El Corazon in under 24 hours felt a bit daft. Adrian Vanoni, my main climbing associate, and I had tried this objective a year before, but a snowy fall season kept us from putting forth any genuine efforts. After another year on the road, we returned for a second shot. 

As novice climbers, Adrian and I idolized the people who were crushing on El Cap, guys like Alex Honnold, Tommy Caldwell, Brad Gobright, Leo Houlding. Reading about Tommy and Alex free climbing the Triple – El Cap, Halfdome, and Mt.Watkins – in a day and Gobright doing 3 different El Cap routes in one season were huge inspirations for us. Back in 2021, I climbed the Freerider in a day for my first time successfully climbing El Cap after trying it wall style a few months before. Climbing the route in under 19 hours was a pivotal day in my climbing life and helped me identify with who I am as a climber and what I want to set my sights upon. 

Adrian and I climbed Golden Gate back in January of 2022. Since GG and Corazon share the same start and last two cruxes, we chose El Corazon as our next ‘in a day’ goal because we wouldn’t miss out on another ground up adventure. Not to mention, El Corazon is one of the sickest and most beautiful lines on El Cap. Climbing legend Alex Huber and Max Reichel did the first ascent back in 2001, just a year after I was born. The route begins on the Freeblast, along with many other routes, and goes straight up off of Mammoth Terraces for around 500 feet  before traversing 250 or so left into a largest overhanging corner system. At the top of this massive dihedral there are two crux pitches: a technical chimney stemming pitch–the Coffee Corner 13a–and a 25 meter horizontal roof traverse–the Corazon Roof 13b–before connecting with Golden Gate and finishing via two more amazing 12+/13- pitches: the Golden Desert and the A5 traverse. The route requires many different styles, from hard bouldering and sport pitches, techy corners, grovely off-widths, to beak protected faces. It was an inspiring challenge. 

Over two and half weeks, Adrian and I did a couple days simul climbing up to the Beak Flake (13b), pitch 15, in order to get the first crux pitch dialed in. This all-time pitch starts out with a sweet, dynamic boulder problem on diorite knobs before taking off onto a long splitter seam with another crux at 35 meters. These prep days allowed us to get the first 14 pitches of the route dialed and have a bunch of fun practicing the first crux which you would not want to try multiple times on your IAD attempt. We also spent 4 nights on top of the mountain rehearsing the previously mentioned upper cruxes. Our close friend and talented photographer–Victoria Kohner-Flanagan–joined us to document the shenanigans. Fixing ropes to rehearse pitches is always a surprising amount of work. In order to access the Corazon pitches from the Tower to the People, Adrian had to reverse aid the Roof pitch so we could set up a horizontal trolley line to try the moves. After a tiring 5 days of dialing in cruxes and hundreds of feet of jugging, we retreated back to the valley floor with some killer photos and ruined finger tips. 

After returning from our rap-in mission, we noticed a possible 5 day snow storm looming on the forecast, so I decided to try and squeeze in a try before the storm came. From the beginning, Adrian and I were going to jug and support one another on our attempts since we didn’t think we were strong enough to team free the route in one day, Alex and Tommy style. Since Adrian was feeling under the weather, he was happy to let me give the first attempt. So the next day I stashed food, water, and a #6 cam beneath the Beak Flake. However, after two days recovering on the valley floor, Adrian decided he also wanted to give an attempt before the storm arrived. Faced with the dilemma of how we were both going to try the route on the same day, we recruited one good friend, Australian strong man Will Vidler, and another close friend, crack climbing aficionada Brittany Goris, to be our belayers. The plan was for Will and Brittany to sleep on Mammoth Ledges, and Brittany would support Adrian, and Will would support me after Adrian and I simuled the Freeblast to save time. Simple. 

So with our food, water and belayers stashed, Adrian and I began at 2:35am.  I picked up Will at Mammoth, drank a cup of Yorkshire tea, and said goodbye to Adrian who was going to chill for an hour or so. About an hour and half later, due to some new, seemingly better (however less reliable) beta, I fell off the beginning boulder of the Beak Flake. After a couple minutes passed, I climbed the pitch despite my shaky, still a bit nervous, footwork. 2 pitches later, I was able to overgrip my way up a heady 12d pitch mostly protected by beaks and old pins. In this section, I do a big move sideways where both my hands come off the wall for a moment. I felt releived to not have fallen on this move or on the upper crux of the Beak, and had given myself at least a chance at the rest of the route. To this point, Will and I had kept morale high, but we lost some energy over the next 3 sunny traversing pitches that lead to the base of the Kierkegaard chimney. As I tried to visualize doing the route on the valley floor, this pitch worried me because I didn’t want to tire myself out by groveling up it and ‘completely cooking my turkey’.

After some heavy snacking, caffeine pills, and a Lorde song, I strapped my kneepad on and fired the chimney/offwidth in a few minutes without breaking a sweat. Two pitches later I found myself in Babsi Zangerl and Lara Neumeier’s portaledge eating a bunch of sour gummy worms. Babsi and Lara were climbing El Corazon wall style and were camped out before the Coffee Corner. Babsi is a climbing hero of mine, so getting to hang out in her portaledge below the next two crux pitches was very cool, but also super lucky because that belay is usually a hanging belay. They also gave me some Magnesium pills for some grim leg cramps that hit while chilling in the ledge. Lara was kind enough to climb up and remove their gear from the corner even though they were taking a rest day. Shortly after, I climbed the Coffee Corner at sunset. I was climbing relaxed and confidently, wasting no energy on the first of the four upper cruxes. Next was the roof. I spent weeks wondering how fatigued I would be at the base of the roof and if sending it 25 pitches up was even a reasonable thing to strive for. Yet, I executed my beta perfectly, screamed loud, and found myself drinking a cup of tea made by a hospitable, Slovakian climber Miska and her partner at the Tower to the People. There were 4 people already on the Tower as I arrived. Miska and her partner, along with my friend Tim and his partner, also trying Golden Gate. Climbing the roof with everyone cheering me on from their portaledges is definitely one of my favorite climbing moments. Everyone was so supportive and stoked, and this helped me stay motivated 18 hours in and with two more cruxes to go. I barely stuck the crux lieback on the Golden Desert, since I had to change my beta due to some cams left in the crack blocking the foot jams. Sitting at the hanging belay below the A5 Traverse (the last hard pitch), I tried to not focus on how wrecked and sick I started to feel. I remember going back and forth telling myself, ‘you got this, you definitely don’t got this' for what felt like forever as Will jugged the last pitch. After jammin’ to One Day More from Les Mis, and a quick chat with Will, I took off. Although I felt decent at the start of the pitch, I wasn’t able to see the tiny feet I use in the traverse with my headlamp and reverted to campusing my way to the poor rest before the final hard moves. I shook briefly, matched a 3 finger pocket, kicked my right foot onto a toe hook, caught a sidepull, switched the toe to a heel, crossed, and, all of a sudden, I was at the anchor. In the subsequent minutes, I’m sure I asked Will, “what just happened?” and said “no way, what?” too many times. The next 4 pitches to the top went smoother than expected. Will and I ate the remaining gummy worms and jerky at the summit before stumbling down the East Ledges. We got down at 3:30am, and Adrian, Victoria, and Brittany surprised us with a strawberry, chocolate, banana pancake dinner. I couldn't thank them enough for this perfect end to the day. Adrian sadly wasn’t able to make it happen that day, but I’m sure he will try again next season and I will hopefully be there to support!

In the end, my ascent couldn’t have happened without a ton of support. Most importantly, Will Vidler for being a world class companion and belayer. El Corazon is heinous to follow with a ton of traversing pitches, steep jugging, and many hanging belays. Will did all this while keeping morale high and carrying the pack. I owe him big time.