Climbing History

Chris Sharma started climbing in the 1990s aged 12 before winning the US national championships 2 years later. He went on to reinvigorate hard sport climbing in the US, quickly repeating many of the hardest lines before establishing his own hard routes such as Necessary Evil in 1997, the first 8c+/14c in the USA.

Through the rest of his career he took sport climbing in to the modern era by cementing the 9a+ and 9b grades with a string of cutting edge ascents throughout Europe (Golpe de Estado, Neanderthal, Stoking the Fire and many more), as well as adding some of the hardest routes in America with climbs such as Jumbo Love and Dreamcatcher.

Somewhat uniquely amongst his contemporaries, Chris' climbing has been well documented from a young age due to a close relationship with videographers Josh Lowell and Brett Lowell.

Alongside his sport climbing Chris is a prolific deep water soloist, climbing many of the existing hard lines and then adding many of his own: Es Pontas, Alasha, Black Pearl, Big Fish and Vision Quest being some of the hardest DWS lines in the world.

In 2023 he added Sleeping Lion (9b) in Siurana. Initially suggested at 9b+ it has settled at 9b after several repeats, but remains an impressive new addition at one of Spain's most famous crags.

References

[1] Interview with Jack Geldard for UKClimbing.com, 29th August 2012 https://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/features/chris_sharma_talks_9b+-4894

[2] Rampage by Josh Lowell and Brett Lowell, 1999 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqe_w2JTlKM

[3] Best of the West, 2005 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6VZzVPnlVA

[4] Interview with Alex Honnold on Climbing Gold, 2nd April 2021 https://www.climbinggold.com/episodes/chapter-03

[5] Interview with gripped.com (2026) https://gripped.com/uncategorized/chris-sharma-on-5-16-and-how-do-you-know-when-youve-climbed-a-new-grade/