Chris Sharma Free Climbs a Giant Redwood Tree

Like most kids, Chris Sharma grew up climbing trees. Born and raised in Santa Cruz, California, Sharma’s earliest climbing experiences involved scaling the limbs of trees in his parents’ backyard. In 1992, a 12-year-old Sharma traded trees for both indoor and outdoor rock climbing when he discovered the sport in one of the earliest indoor climbing gyms in the U.S. He quickly went on to be recognized as one of the best rock climbers in the world, winning both national and international climbing competitions as a teen, and ultimately pushing global standards into the realm of climbs rated at 5.15. (For a primer on climbing grades and terminology, click here.) His iconic first ascents of routes named Realization (5.15a) and Jumbo Love (5.15b) were the first of those respective grades in the world and milestone achievements in the sport of rock climbing.