Sitting on the wall at his first climbing competition, Alex Smith felt the intense pressure in his chest. It felt like life or death for him, jumping to the final hold. The moment he decided to leave the wall he felt like he was flying — even if it was only for a second — to the hold that would bring him to Regionals.
Smith knows discomfort.
Smith is a rock climber, competing in a sport he started on a whim five years earlier that has now become his life. Early on, he had to learn that climbing would hurt. Physical discomfort will be an ever-present issue that he continues to overcome and Smith often finds himself pushing through the pain. He has conquered constant callouses, bleeding, and a snapped tendon: ragged hands are his norm.
“You always have to push through, but it never really goes away,” Smith said. “You’re always going to be a little bit uncomfortable.”
But this hasn’t stopped Smith from loving climbing with his whole heart. He would climb anything he could as a kid, and always felt a sense of mental comfort when he was on the wall. Being able to solve the puzzles in the routes, and slowly figuring out how to get to the top is only one part of Smith’s passion for the sport. The stiffness of the chalk on his hands and the bumps of the wall under his feet is his comfort zone. Smith has found that he enjoys climbing the most and performs at his best when he’s in a good mood.
“It’s kind of blissful when you’re climbing really well,” Smith said. “You’re just soaring up these routes, having fun.”
Starting out, Smith really struggled with the texture of climbing chalk. Chalk is a tool climbers use to strengthen their grip and mitigate sweat when climbing. Smith describes it as something that helps climbers have constant friction on holds. To him, it first felt like nails on a chalkboard. The texture and stiffness made it almost impossible for him to close his hands comfortably. In the beginning of his career, Smith would climb without it in competitions, but would fall due to the sweat (and even blood) that his hands left on the holds. Over time, he learned to ignore the strange texture and now climbs with chalk during every session, often coating his perspiration-prone hands until they are fully white.
“I probably couldn’t even climb half as well without chalk,” Smith said. “It’s a huge point of climbing.”
The chalk does help aid with grip but doesn’t stop the roughness of the holds from shredding his hands and fingers. Often, holds are made of fiberglass, and Smith finds that they tend to just flake skin off. Although chalk stops most callouses from breaking, climbers often have to pull off “flappers” or broken calluses, while they’re on the wall. Calluses formed on Smith’s hands when he started climbing, and have remained there ever since.
“I don’t know what it’s like to not have calluses,” Smith said. “It just feels normal now.”
Chalk is even more important to have when outdoor climbing, something that Smith enjoys and travels for continuously. Smith prefers to climb granite the most, because of its unique texture.
“Granite has a certain grip to your skin that I really like,” Smith said. “It kind of feels like you’re gonna slip, but you never do. And you don’t trust it, but it always works.”
For Smith, being able to keep reaching for that next hold, no matter the pain, is his comfort zone.
“Being okay with being in pain and understanding that it’s not your body telling you absolutely cannot do this, is necessary” Smith said. “[Your body] is saying ‘I don’t really like doing this, can you stop?’ And it’s understanding that you can just keep going, and that’s how you get better.”
