Famed rock climber Alex Honnold masterfully ascended one of the world’s tallest skyscrapers in Taiwan’s capital without a rope.
“Sick,” he said, standing at the top of Taipei 101 with a panoramic view of the city after the climb, which unfolded Sunday morning local time. He added that it was very windy before taking a selfie.
Honnold said the climb up the 1,667-foot building was very physical and that he was tired.
The climb, which was shown live on Netflix, took a little over an hour and a half.
As he began his descent, Honnold put on a harness and grabbed some rope for the first time in the climb and rappelled down to a staging area where his wife was waiting. The commentators said he would be taking an elevator most of the way down.
Honnold’s free climb got underway shortly after 8 p.m. ET Saturday, a day after originally scheduled because of weather.
A little more than an hour into the climb, Honnold was nearing the final sections of the building. He paused after completing the “bamboo boxes” to speak with commentators and wave down at onlookers before starting his ascent of the tower.
Ahead of the climb the 40-year-old seemed to be ready and focused.
“I try to take some deep breaths, compose myself, take some time,” Honnold said in a Netflix statement. “There’s never any time pressure, so you can spend as long as you need just hanging in one space basically trying to compose yourself.”
The California native who attended UC Berkeley has been climbing since age 11, he’s told interviewers, including Oprah Winfrey. In 2017 he solo climbed Yosemite’s 3,000-foot El Capitan, a feat that became the denouement in “Free Solo,” which won the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2019.
His official bio notes that he’s also accomplished a “triple solo” free climb of Mt. Watkins, Half Dome and El Capitan within 24 hours. He has also explored the natural, vertical features of Antarctica, South America, Greenland and elsewhere, it says.
Honnold said before the climb that he believed Taipei 101 will present its own opposition.
“The challenge comes from the overall physicality of it,” he said in another Netflix statement. “The fatigue that [sets in] over the course of the building is slightly harder to anticipate. I don’t know how it’s gonna feel.”
He said, in part, “there’s a plan and I’m executing the plan.”
