What's It Like to Climb a Skyscraper?

From: The New York Times
Alex Honnold, a rock climber who was the subject of the Oscar-winning documentary “Free Solo,” successfully climbed the 1,667-foot-tall skyscraper Taipei 101 on Sunday, without a rope.
Scaling a building that tall is not like climbing a mountain. Those in the club of just a dozen or so known skyscraper climbers worldwide say the activity comes with unique physical and mental demands.
It is also a largely underground sport because it is usually illegal. Alain Robert, a Frenchman who has scaled some 200 buildings since the 1990s, mostly with his bare hands, said that he has been arrested more than 170 times.
“You feel like you're literally in a movie,” Mr. Robert said, with “cops that are trying to catch the bad guy climbing the building.”
The obvious risks make it rare for someone to obtain permission to climb a tall building, as Mr. Honnold did. His climb on Sunday was broadcast live on Netflix.
“I've never been willing to get arrested,” the 40-year-old said in a podcast recorded before the climb.
Those who have climbed skyscrapers say their bodies face different demands compared with rock climbing.
According to Dan Goodwin, who in 1986 climbed the CN Tower in Toronto — then the tallest structure in the world — skyscraper climbing mainly comes down to repetitiveness versus variety.
On a rock face, each move presents a new puzzle: climbers' hands search for different holds — crimps, jugs, slopers — and they constantly adapt their bodies. But along the side of a building, climbers repeat the same few movements hundreds of times to pass over dozens of stories of windows, steel bars and concrete gaps.
“You can do a pull-up and think it's not all too bad, but try doing 20, 50, 100,” Mr. Goodwin said. “Doing the same kind of move over and over and over — it can really tax your muscles and fingers.”
Some climbers said they were concerned that Mr. Honnold's climb, carried live on Netflix, would encourage reckless, untrained attempts.
“My message to kids: Don't do it,” Mr. Goodwin said. “Unless you're a world-class climber like Alex Honnold and Alain Robert, unless you have that ability, it's a suicide mission.”
For others, the danger keeps them going.
“The only way I felt alive was when I was risking my life,” Mr. Robert said, adding that he might try climbing another building in the coming weeks.

• repetitiveness
• jug
• sloper
• tax
• reckless