Twenty Four Karats

The Gold Coast, here at the Red River Gorge is one of my favorite cliffs I've yet had the chance to climb on. The wall is strikingly beautiful, and the movement and shapes are amazing. At the Gold Coast there is nowhere to hide - resting is rare and the climbing is in your face. This wall hosts some of my favorite climbs in the Red such as the crimpy, consistent and stunning 'Black Gold' 13c, the endurance masterpiece 'Golden Boy' 13b and the burly and beautiful 'God's Own Stone' 14a. I love climbing on this wall.

Ladzinski Photo

The long standing Gold Coast Projects 1 & 2 sit directly in the middle of this amazing cliff. Naturally, I was interested in these climbs and talked around to gather as much information as I could. It turned out that between these two projects (just a few feet apart) lay one truly exceptional rock climb. A series of varied, albeit poor grips, barely feature this section of wall. The climbable features follow the right bolted project and then gently drift left to finish up the left bolted project. I added a middle bolt to aid with the flow of the route and began working it.

Ladzinski Photo

Over the course of four days I made links, chalked up holds and refined beta. This route is hard throughout, but a very difficult boulder problem guards the bottom third- a delicate deadpoint to a complete non-hold sloping crimp, immediately followed by a second deadpoint to a pad and a half clipping hold (quite good for this particular climb). This crux involved some serious subtlety that was especially hard to execute when coming up from the ground. From the top of the boulder problem you continue through difficult terrain featuring monos, pockets and small edges. There is essentially no resting until you reach the final bolt and finish on some easy climbing to the anchors. It's savage and brilliant.

Ladzinski Photo

Today I finally put the pieces of this route together and fired the first ascent of what I'm calling 'Twenty Four Karats'. This is one of my favorite routes I've ever done and I am honored to have done it first. Finishing this climb was not easy, and even on redpoint I had to fight for it.. I'm suggesting the 5.14c grade for this climb. For me, this route, at this grade, is solid.. it will be exciting to see it repeated. I'm so stoked!!!

Ladzinski Photo

I shot a rad video exhibiting the route with my homeboy Keith Ladzinski. Keep an eye out for the link in the future! Big thanks to Bret Johnston for tons of encouragement and many belays and Keith Ladzinski for generously providing these images.