Ethan Pringle Sends Friendsgiving

Last Tuesday, Ethan Pringle sent a sport route at First Ascent Avondale with a proposed rating of 5.14a. Let that sink in. 

Pringle, a 30 year old Californian with a big smile and lithe build, is a pro climber who has been at it for two decades. He was an ultra-successful competitor on the indoor climbing circuit, both nationally and internationally. His resume of outdoor ascents puts him in good company with the best climbers in the world. Pringle’s hardest boulder project sent is The Wheel of Life (V15) and his hardest sport route sent is Jumbo Love (5.15b). 

The 5.14a he set for himself on FA Avondale’s Beast Wall was no “gimme”, and his first send of the route came in front of a sizable crowd of on-lookers who were either taking a climbing break or a break from the food-filled plates at FA’s Friendsgiving feast – conveniently scheduled on the same evening. 

Pringle was in town for non-climbing reasons, but FA’s resident pro Michaela Kiersch extended him an invite to climb at FA. After passing his belay test (yes, pros have to get belay tested, too!) and connecting with Cheech Lin, FA’s head routesetter, he generously gave his time: he guest-set the 5.14a route, was the star of the (successful) climbing demo, took pics with members/guests, joined everyone for Friendsgiving, and spent a few minutes with me to talk about climbing. Check out what he had to say below.

“It’s great to see how a community… can thrive so much…”

Me: How have you liked your time in Chicago? 

Ethan: It’s been fun. Hmm, how much do I divulge for the blog? [laughs] We went to the art museum, the Field Museum and I’ve done a few yoga classes and climbed here. And been eating tons of fancy food; pigging out, which is probably why it took me ten tries to do my route. 

Me: What do you think of a climbing community that lives in such a flat place?

Ethan: It’s amazing that there is such a community. It seems like there’s a lot of people who are really close and well connected. It’s great to see how a community in a place like Chicago can thrive so much and that people can maintain the psych. 

Me: Who are your sponsors? 

Ethan: Mountain Hardware, Touchstone Climbing, Tenaya and Trango. 

Me: Where are they sending you next to climb? 

Ethan: My sponsors don’t really send me places that often. I’ll go places for them if there’s an event involved, but if it’s just a rock climbing trip it’s pretty rare that it’s something that they’re organizing for me. I have done a couple expeditions where they were heavily involved and they were supporting the whole thing, but mostly I get to choose where I go. I’ll probably go to Yosemite or Bishop when I get home. 

Me: Do you have any projects in Bishop? 

Ethan: I do, yeah. Actually, I have a bolted thing in Pine Creek that I came almost as close as I could possibly come to sending last winter, and then never went back. So I gotta go do that. 

Me: What’s that one? 

Ethan: 14c sport route.

Me: Wow!

Ethan: It’s really short, but amazing rock and really good moves. And then there’s also harder stuff to do at the Buttermilks, but I’ve done a lot of the stuff that I can do in a few days; everything else is like V15; I need to train hard and diet hard to do that stuff, which I am psyched to do. 

“I didn’t think it was going to be that hard…”

Me: What can you say about the route that you set for yourself here? 

Ethan: I didn’t have that many specific ideas, but had a few ideas of moves I wanted to set for. I was thinking about the 360 move, but didn’t have a concrete plan.

It was more about what holds I chose for my hold bag and how they’d work on the angle of the wall, and how can I force someone to climb as many moves in as short of section of wall as possible, hence the convoluted, round-about sequences. I like setting that stuff. It’s fun to force people to do sustained bouldery moves with a variety of holds and movements where you can’t skip sequences very easily. It definitely turned out a bit harder than I thought it was going to be; I didn’t think it was going to be that hard after I set it. When I set it, came down and went up, I was like ‘these holds are way worse than I thought they’d be, and these moves are harder than I thought they’d be.’ Greg* did it second try, and he said, ‘oh, I think it may be a 13c or d,’ and I thought that sounded about right.

Me: So you said you didn’t think you’d send it today? 

Ethan: I didn’t think so, no. I felt like after that first try today, I felt a little better than I did on it yesterday, but not very much. I think eventually you just get better on the moves; eventually if you do the moves enough they end up getting easier. I also made some smarter choices about not clipping too high, you know, clipping by my waist, so that helped. I was able to cop a rest on that big ball right before those big pinches, so that helped. I felt really good on that ball, like I could take some deep breaths and know that I’d be able to do the next sequence if I’m not too pumped. 

Me: Is there a difference in the way you approach a project that you set for yourself or someone sets for you indoors, as opposed to something outdoors? 

Ethan: Not really. It’s pretty much the same. A route that I set for myself, I hopefully know all the beta and it takes less figuring out. Although in here you have so many choices about where to clip; you can choose one line or the other; and that takes the most figuring out. This route, choosing to use that rest right before those big pinches was key. It was smarter to match and shake out, and I’m glad that worked. 

“Eventually you perfect what you can do…”

Me: Do you have a mental process or game when you’re approaching rock outdoors that you’re projecting? 

Ethan: Yeah, it’s all about the beta. First its figuring out the easiest way to do the difficult sections, and the easy sections. Because people limit themselves with, ‘oh, I’m not strong enough to do this route or this boulder problem.’ But probably they are [that strong] if they’re getting on it in the first place, they just need to take time to figure out nuances and which holds to grab and how to grab them. After 20 years of doing this, I’ve learned that it’s all about the beta. Then once you have the beta, you commit the moves to muscle memory and just do them over and over. Eventually you perfect what you can do and go a little bit beyond it and keep doing that until you send the route. 

Me: Thanks for your time. Is there anything you’d like to shout out to the community?

Ethan: Everyone’s been super nice and it’s been great to hang out here. I feel welcomed. Thank you. 

By: Gabriel Skvor

*Greg Wingate is one of FA’s route setters