The boy who cried Wolfgang

I apologize for the lame title, I can't think of any cool wordplay on Wolfgang. Titles aren't my thing in general. The past few days haven't been too amazing, haven't seen any cool art or been aesthetically shocked in any way, but I did manage to go to my local climbing gym and hang upside down for a bit. It is a mark of the general suckiness of my weekend that this was the high point of my existence. Therefore, on a climber note, I give you...
Wolfgang Gullich!

The sport of climbing is kind of a niche within a niche, and while there are pockets of the world fair teeming with built men and lithe girls whose sole aim in life is to climb, it's not really a sport that many people who don't participate in can understand or appreciate. Wolfgang Gullich, who was the sport's rock star in the seventies and eighties, though, I feel transcends the small world of climbers. The fear, the courage, the bravery, and the talent are of note not just to climbers but to the world. He died, ironically, in a car crash.


spiderman!

no rope...

still no rope...

“An incredible feeling of joy melts all the tension and I suddenly have an impression that it was not a game of gambling with my life; it was not subjectively dangerous. I sit in the sun on the flat summit plateau – the ‘other reality’ is now part of the past. It is the thought of death that teaches us to value life” - Güllich, 1986, after a freesolo (ropeless) 5.12b first ascent in Yosemite.

Also, this being the eighties, he wore pink spandex a lot and still managed to look remotely heterosexual. wow.