Two Americans have completed what was long considered the world’s most difficult rock climb, using only their hands and feet to scale a 3,000ft vertical wall on El Capitan.
The forbidding granite pedestal in California’s Yosemite National Park has beckoned adventurers for more than half a century and Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson became the first to free-climb the rock formation’s Dawn Wall, a feat many had considered impossible.
They used ropes and safety harnesses to catch themselves in case of a fall, but relied entirely on their own strength and dexterity to ascend by grasping cracks as thin as razor blades and as small as dimes.
The effort took 19 days as the two dealt with constant falls and injuries. But their success completes a years-long dream that bordered on obsession.
Caldwell, 36, was the first to finish, then waited on a ledge for Jorgeson, 30, who caught up minutes later.
Free-climbers climb inch by inch, wedging their fingers and feet into tiny crevices or gripping sharp projections of rock
The two embraced before Jorgeson pumped his arms in the air and clapped his hands above his head.
Then they sat down for a few moments, gathered their gear, changed clothes and hiked to the nearby summit.
About 200 people were waiting for them, including Mr Caldwell’s wife and Jorgeson’s girlfriend, who welcomed them to the top with hugs and kisses. It took the pair two to three hours to hike back down the mountain.
In the meadow far below, another crowd broke into cheers. Relatives of the men watched on telescopic monitors. Caldwell’s mother Terry said he could have reached the top several days earlier, but waited for his friend to get there together.
“That’s a deep, abiding, lifelong friendship, built over suffering on the wall together over six years,” she said.
US President Barack Obama sent his congratulations on Twitter, saying the men “remind us that anything is possible”.
The trek up the world’s largest granite monolith began on December 27.
Caldwell and Jorgeson lived on the wall itself, eating and sleeping in tents fastened to the rock thousands of feet above the ground and battling painful cuts to their fingertips much of the way.
Free-climbers do not pull themselves up with cables or use chisels to carve out handholds. Instead, they climb inch by inch, wedging their fingers and feet into tiny crevices or gripping sharp, thin projections of rock. In photographs, the two appeared at times like Spider-Man, with arms and legs splayed across the pale stone that has been described as smooth as a bedroom wall.
Both men needed to take rest days to heal. They used tape and even super glue to help protect their raw skin.
At one point, Caldwell set an alarm to wake him every few hours to apply a special lotion to his throbbing hands.
They also endured punishment whenever their grip slipped, pitching them into long, swinging falls that left them bouncing off the rock face from their safety ropes.
The pair were helped by a team of supporters who brought food and supplies and shot video of the adventure.
There are about 100 routes up the rock known among climbers as El Cap and many have made it to the top, the first in 1958.
No one, however, had ever made it to the Dawn Wall summit in one continuous free-climb until now.