Braver Climber Free Solos Near-Horizontal Overhang

An Australian climber accomplished an impressive feat after attempting to climb a near-horizontal overhang without ropes.

The climber, Gus Ryan, lives in British Columbia where he spends hours practicing his climbing with a harness and ropes.

However, on one particular day, Gus Ryan decided to climb Zombie Roof on Smoke Bluffs Park trail an hour outside of Vancouver, British Columbia. While that’s a typical rock for climbers to challenge themselves with, Gus took things to the next level by attempting it free solo, or without ropes.

Gus shared a video of his climb on YouTube and many people were worried for his safety.

In the comments, he explained that he only free-soloed the “Zombie Roof” once and doesn’t plan on doing it again. He said:

“A lot of time went into this to make it safe. I’ve sent the route over 15 times and many more sessions hanging around making every move feel secure. Given how short the route is, I’ve probably put close to an hour in every hard hand/foot… I had things dialed to the point of knowing what the ideal angle to put my hand into a hold, pretty close to mm precision on how to place my right hand above the lip, etc. I did this with a very comfortable margin for error.”

He added, “It had to be easy enough that I could make mistakes and still be totally fine. I didn’t get the first hard right hand finger jam quite right but it’s easy enough that I could still comfortably do the move. I also got a bit excited at the top and made a bit of a meal of the traverse haha. But yeah I had the wiggle room to make these mistakes and be totally fine.”

You can watch the incredible climb in the video below: