Climbing veterans slam eight-year-old's El Capitan climb as a 'hoax'

2022-10-31

Rock climbing veterans slam eight-year-old’s record-breaking climb of Yosemite’s 3,000-foot El Capitan as a ‘publicity hoax’ and say he never ‘put hand to rock face’

Critics have accused Joe Baker of staging a ‘publicity hoax’ around the climb, saying he mislead the public about the nature of his son Sam’s climb
Seasoned rock climbers have said that Baker and his son did not truly climb the 3,000-foot El Capitan, but scaled it by rope using mechanical aid devices
Critics said Baker drummed up a misleading narrative about how Sam, 8, would scale El Capitan in his numerous media appearances in the year before the climb
Climbers said that is not entirely accurate to call Sam the youngest person ever to climb El Capitan, despite the media fanfare that followed his ascent

Seasoned rock climbers are lambasting a father’s claims that his eight-year-old son became the youngest person to ever climb Yosemite’s 3,000-foot El Capitan face.

Critics have accused Joe Baker of staging a ‘publicity hoax’ around the climb, saying he drummed up media attention for his son Sam’s climb while misleading the public about the nature of the ‘record breaking’ achievement.

Sam, a second-grader from Colorado, and his father completed the climb of El Capitan on Saturday to a chorus of headlines calling the climb a ‘historic’ event, and hailing Sam as the youngest person to ever scale the daunting peak.

But many in the climbing community raised their eyebrows at the headlines, noting that Sam did not exactly climb the rock-face in the strictest sense, but instead ascended it by previously rigged ropes with the assistance of a scaling device called an ascender.

Though Baker posted that Sam ‘completed the youngest rope ascent of ElCap’ on Saturday, critics said that the father only made that distinction after months on the media circuit haling his son as a rock-climbing prodigy who would be scaling the rock face that gives even the most hardened of climbers pause.

Critics also said that Baker appeared to employ guides that were not sanctioned by Yosemite National Park, and that it was unclear where the money he raised in the build-up to the climb was actually going.

Baker did not respond to requests from DailyMail.com for comment.

‘This is a publicity hoax,’ said Tom Evans, a retired teacher who for 28-years has camped out at the base of El Capitan with a telephoto lens and documenting the comings and going of climbers on the cliff

For at least the past year, Baker has been pushing publicity about his plans for his son to be the youngest person to scale El Capitan.

The duo was featured in countless news segments across local and national television, and appeared on numerous interviews.

‘You don’t get on El Cap unless you are an expert in the sport,’ Baker said of his son in a promotional video on his website promoting the climb.

‘That’s what we’re developing, is a young man who is an expert in the sport. He can really do everything that the great climbers can do,’ he said.

While countless clips show that Sam – who the family says has been climbing since he could walk – is an undoubtedly talented young climber, critics said Baker’s characterization of their mission to climb El Capitan was not entirely honest.

Evans, 78, told the San Francisco Chronicle that he watched the Bakers over four days of their climb and that not once did he see them touch the rock or try to physically climb the wall.

Instead, he saw the pair ‘jug up,’ which is a process wherein the climbers use a mechanical device to shimmy up rope lines. The lines the Bakers were jugging on had been laid out for them by a climbing team that went ahead and also carried most of their supplies.

‘The guides do everything that I’ve seen,’ said Evan. ‘That’s why this is not a climb.’

Evans said he confronted Baker at a local restaurant the night before they started their climb.

‘The whole media presentation needs to stop. I know there’s no way your son suggested getting this record. This is about you,’ Evans recalled to the Chronicle. ‘He said, ‘It’s not about the record, it’s about spending time with my son.’ I said, ‘Why all the publicity then?’

Sam and his father Joe Baker on the face of El Capitan during their climb. They completed the climb on Saturday

Sam Baker can be seen climbing El Capitan with the aid of an ascender, a mechanical device which allows climbers to shimmy up rope lines

Evans said the Bakers seemed to be cashing in on El Capitan’s reputation for their own gain.

‘I’m very annoyed by this because climbing El Capitan puts you in an elite group of climbers,’ he said. ‘[The Bakers] are blatantly stealing that reputation for their own use.’

Tommy Caldwell, a well-known scaler of El Capitan, told the Chronicle he was skeptical of the Bakers because of their hunger for media attention.

‘I find it slightly cringeworthy,’ he said of their numerous television appearances.

He also thought their claims to a world record were questionable.

‘Theoretically I could have put (my son) in a haul bag when he was 1 year old and gotten him up there’ to claim a record, Caldwell said.

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