num_pages: 400
description: One afternoon in 1987 two renegade climbers in Berkeley California hatched an ambitious plan: under the cover of darkness they would rappel down from a carefully scouted highway on-ramp gluing artificial handholds onto the load-bearing concrete pillars underneath. Equipped with ingenuity strong adhesive and an urban guerilla attitude Jim Thornburg and Scott Frye created a serviceable climbing wall. But what they were part of was a greater development: the expansion and reimagining of a sport now slated for a highly anticipated Olympic debut in 2020.High Drama explores rock climbing's transformation from a pursuit of select anti-establishment vagabonds to a sport embraced by competitors of all ages social classes and backgrounds. Climbing magazine's John Burgman weaves a multi-layered story of traditionalists and opportunists grassroots organizers and business-minded developers free-spirited rebels and rigorously coached athletes. Deeply reported and compellingly told this is a celebration of climbing and the pivotal figures who made its growth possible from the rock faces of Yosemite to urban bouldering gyms and beyond.
language: English
title: High Drama: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of American Competition Climbing
publisher: Triumph Books