Wayne Willoughby (the author), Brandon Adams, and Kristoffer Wickstrom on a 17 hour 15 minute, one day ascent of The Shortest Straw, El Capitan, Yosemite, California. 2017. Photo Credit: Tom Evans

In 1953 I contracted paralytic Polio and have battled through a dozen surgeries, multiple bike and motorcycle accidents, assaults, and Post Polio Syndrome. Pretty epic, but I am a lucky bastard, all that suffering makes wall climbing seem like fun.

I have done:

• ​25 el cap ascents (the first in 1990),  4 In a push, 12 in a day. I've climbed El Cap in every month but Feb.
• 4 ascents of the Diamond, (bivied on one). 
• 10 ascents of the Chief, (all one day ascents but one, an unplanned bivy due to a partners finger injury ).
• 1998, Hans Florine, Brian McCray and I set the record for Bad Seed (El Capitan, Yosemite) in 1998. It was only the fifth ascent of the route.     
• Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Astrodog 2016, IAD
• Calaveras Dome, one day ascent.
• Glacier Point to the Apron Yosemite.
• Primrose Dihedrals on the Moses Tower, Canyonlands UT.
• Spaceshot, Desert Shield and Dark Side of the Moon in Zion, all IAD.

 
All of my ascents but two were the first Adaptive ascents of each route, or first IAD.  
 
 
If all goes as planned, I will be doing four or 5 walls this year (2020).  

• TyT in the Black, two Chief ascents, and two el cap pushes, one with my friends Conrad Anker and Hans Florine for a film project I am working on.

COMMON CLIMBER ARTICLES

• The Unreasonable Man -  A moving story of sheer will, persistence, ambition, and, most of all, a love of climbing. The author, who was struck by Polio at a young age, battles surgeries, injuries, and a deteriorating body from Post Polio syndrome, yet still climbs big walls, doing first adaptive ascents and record-setting speed ascents.