Lost in America
by SCMA Member Brandon Thau

In late July Grant Gardner and I completed a Randy Leavitt and Greg Child testpiece on the east face of El Capitan called Lost in America. The first ascent took ten days and included 12 pitches of new climbing. At the time it was first done, in 1985, it was rated VI 5.9 A5 and one of the three most difficult routes on El Capitan. Lost in America is not a trade route but it gets done two or three times a year. The new rating on Lost in America is now VI 5.9 A3+, which is based on the new wave aid scale. Under this scale A3 pitches can have long strings of body weight placements, but you probably won't get hurt if you fall. A4 is just A3 over ledges that you'll break bones on and possibly die. A5 means your going to die if you fall. Some new wave ratings would be: West face of Leaning Tower A1+, Nose A1, South Face of Washington Column A1, Tangerine Trip A2+. Contrasting Lost in America to our previous ascents we were attempting a route a whole number grade higher than our hardest ascent.

Our first item of business was to buy copperheads. We purchased heads from Eric Kohl and Tucker Tech. I wasn't worried about the ascent until we talked to Tucker. We told him what route we were going to do and he said to give him all of our money because we were going to die. Grant and I humped loads up to the base later that day and fixed the first pitch. I lead the first pitch in 4 short hours. The 120ft pitch consisted of A3 nailing off the ground, some widely spaced rivets, and an overhanging blind hook placement to finish. I knew it was going to be a long climb if every pitch took this long, but my excuse was that I hadn't aided in a year and I just needed practice. The next day Grant lead the Big Country pitch which allowed us to fix over 250ft of rope to the ground. The highlight of the day was the testing of my belay seat which consisted of foam rubber taped to a board with a sling through it. The same day we witnessed Nate (our friend) lead the Coral Sea pitch on Native Son. We were expecting him to die, but somehow he completed the pitch. We headed down the talus to our cars where we spent one more night on the ground.

Upon waking up we hiked to our fixed ropes and jugged them. The rope did not touch the rock the whole way, its only contact was the belay anchor 250ft up. Once again Grant and I were climbing the side of El Capitan where you will get done like a two-dollar ho if you have to retreat, because retreat is almost impossible on the overhanging face. After emptying a pantload out my right leg loop I was ready to lead the third pitch. I clipped a rivet and 30ft of nasty fixed heads, then some cams, the old A4+ pitch didn't seem that bad, then I came to an old fixed #1 head. I tested it and it ripped. Grant and I had never placed a head on lead before and we figured an El Capitan climb would be the best place to learn. I wiped the sweat from my hands and reached for a #2 head, I placed it, Xed it and tested it. It was a good placement and I was proud of it so I continued to place two more on the way to the belay. Grant lead the next two pitches and gained experience with expanding nailing. Some of the features were so expanding that Grant clipped the piton while he was placing it just in case the piton he was standing on fell out while he expanded the flake more. Grant was disappointed that he placed only one head, he was hoping for 50 placements in a row. At the end of the day the portaledge was constructed and we ate greasy cheese and cold ravioli.

The next morning I lead the runout 5.10 pitch on black diorite. The first 25ft had no pro so I could have done an assplant onto the belay, but the difficulty eased and the pro got better as the pitch continued. The seventh pitch had a nasty 5.9 offwidth/chimney that required 2 #4 camalots and a #5, there was an A2- section and I was done for the day. Grant led the next two pitches without much event except for the occasional "watch me" when he weighted a Z-piton that was placed halfway in. Many hook placements were used on the eighth and ninth pitches, copperheads were mashed in diagonal flakes in order to protect the hooking traverses. Much iron was slung into the rock on the ninth pitch. I had the privilege of bashing my knuckles into the right facing corner when I cleaned the pitches. Grant had the portaledge ready when I arrived so we ate and slept while hanging off a single threaded quarter inch shortie.

I started the next day with a hook traverse to an A1 cam crack. An hour after I started I arrived at a blank spot where I really had to think. I placed a hook, a less-than-body-weight piton, a #0 TCU(behind an expando flake), a HB offset, hook, bathook, and a #2 copperhead that blew. I fell 25ft and pulled everything back to the #0 TCU. The TCU's cams inverted due to the expanding rock contracting around it. I was very thankful that the cam held or I would have gone another 15ft at least. I went back to where I placed the copperhead and noticed that the bathook placement was blown, my bathook shattered the lip on the hole. Since the groove was filled with deadheads, and I didn't want to try and place another head so I placed a birdbeak behind one of the deadheads. After I was past the birdbeak I hammered in as many pitons as I could, about 45min later I finished my scariest lead on the climb. When Grant cleaned the pitch he had to expand the flake with a piton to free the cam, which was already trashed. Next on the day's agenda was the crux pitch, the Fly or Die. I told Grant it wouldn't be much of a challenge for me so I gave him the pitch. Grant hooked off the belay for 15ft then placed a really nasty knifeblade. If he fell he could have knocked my head down my throat, but lucky he was able to complete the traverse, clip some rivets, fixed copperheads, bathooks, and the belay. Grant was nice enough to backclean the traverse so all I had to do was lower out and clean the rivets, but little did I know I was going to lower out 30ft off a #1 fixed copperhead. Suddenly I had visions of the head popping, me swinging wildly until the lip of the sloping ledge cut the rope and sent me falling head first so I could kiss the site of where somebody's shitbag had landed an hour earlier. But that didn't happen. Grant led the Place of Dead Roads which took almost the entire pin rack. The beautifully clean right facing corner lasted almost the whole pitch. We watched a speed ascent team on Lunar Eclipse during our small party celebrating our last night on the wall. The rest of the climb is not worth mentioning except for the straight-in nailing on the 15th pitch. At the 13th pitch Lost in America joins Zenyatta Mondatta which we are convinced is a A2+ traderoute.

Upon reaching the top we rested and started our descent late with only one headlamp. We took our haulbags with us instead of throwing them off which was a mistake. We stumbled through darkness to the car exhausted.

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