Joe Rogan Experience #1626 - Alex Honnold

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast,…

   1. NANarrator0:00

      (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

   2. The Joe Rogan Experience.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:06

      Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music plays) All right. Hello, Alex.

   4. AHAlex Honnold0:16

      Hello.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:16

      Good to see you again, man.

   6. AHAlex Honnold0:17

      Yeah, good to see you.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:18

      What's happening? How you doing?

   8. AHAlex Honnold0:19

      I'm, I'm just living. I'm doing the same stuff as always.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:22

      Just living? Crawling giant shit that freaks people out?

   10. AHAlex Honnold0:24

       Yep. Yep.

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:25

       (laughs)

   12. AHAlex Honnold0:25

       That's, that's what I'm trying to do.

   13. JRJoe Rogan0:27

       What is the, the latest? What have you been up to? I know you're doing a podcast now, right?

   14. AHAlex Honnold0:30

       Yeah. No, no. I know... Do you feel a certain, uh, satisfaction about that?

   15. JRJoe Rogan0:33

       I do.

   16. AHAlex Honnold0:34

       Yeah, I don't know if you remember but you went off for like quite a long time and you were like, "You should do a podcast. You should do a podcast." And sure enough, so yeah, I did a podcast.

   17. JRJoe Rogan0:40

       (laughs) Well, I mean, you have an interesting perspective and you have a fascinating life, you know.

   18. AHAlex Honnold0:44

       Yeah. Th- they're actually, um... We don't really get into it that much. It, I, I don't actually talk about myself very much. It's, um... It was sort of leading up to the Olympics. Uh, I don't... You know climbing's in the Olympics this year?

   19. JRJoe Rogan0:55

       No, I did not.

   20. AHAlex Honnold0:56

       Yeah, so climbing's in the Olympics for the first time this summer, and so the podcast was supposed to be sort of a primer leading up to the Olympics. More as like a, like here is the state of the sport leading up to this singular moment in climbing. But, um, but then the Olympics got canceled last summer, well pushed.

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:11

       Mm-hmm.

   22. AHAlex Honnold1:11

       And so then we decided to sort of go a little deeper in backstory stuff, and so that's the first season. This basically premiered right now.

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:18

       So you... Did you record them all in advance?

   24. AHAlex Honnold1:21

       Uh, no, it's, it's ongoing. We've done, uh, we've done 10 of them and, uh, and now we're gonna do the ones leading up to the Olympics, like over the next, you know, four months or whatever.

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:29

       So you've got kind of a structure planned out though?

   26. AHAlex Honnold1:31

       Yeah. Yeah, the idea is that we wanted to... Well, I mean, you know, as you can imagine, climbing is a very broad sport, you know, starting from sort of classical alpinism in, in the Alps and, and like mountain climbing, now to Olympic climbing, where the people who win the Olympics this summer, most of them are super young and they're, they're basically like gym kids, sort of like gymnasts who just train indoors nonstop. And so the podcast is sort of an exploration of this spectrum of full adventure to full athleticism and like where climbing has moved in between. You see what I'm saying?

   27. JRJoe Rogan2:02

       Mm-hmm.

   28. AHAlex Honnold2:02

       Like it's, um... I don't know, because, you know, when I grew up as a... Like I, I was one of the first climbers in America to sort of grow up climbing in a climbing gym. And so that's part of the reason I wound up as a professional climber is I sort of had access to better training facilities than like the generation before me. And now we're looking at the next generation who's going to the Olympics and it's like even more of that athletic background and it's like, you know, it changes the sport. And so a big part of the, the podcast that we started was basically to, to see how it changes the sport and, and to try to, you know, save some of the best stories of climbing, you know what I mean? Like preserve some of that adventure.

   29. JRJoe Rogan2:34

       Oh, that's great.

   30. AHAlex Honnold2:35

       But...
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   Oh, that's so gnarly.…

   1. JRJoe Rogan15:00

      Oh, that's so gnarly. Bones poking out. I mean, that is a fucking giant fall. Oh.

   2. AHAlex Honnold15:06

      Does it say where?

   3. JRJoe Rogan15:07

      I think it's in California. No, no Utah?

   4. AHAlex Honnold15:12

      Montana.

   5. JRJoe Rogan15:13

      Montana? Okay.

   6. NANarrator15:14

      Glacier National Park.

   7. AHAlex Honnold15:14

      Geez.

   8. JRJoe Rogan15:15

      Poosh. Wow.

   9. AHAlex Honnold15:18

      Fighting on a mountain and fell to their immediate death. Geez.

   10. JRJoe Rogan15:21

       Man, that's wild.

   11. AHAlex Honnold15:24

       That is... Also, well, well done Googling that so quickly.

   12. JRJoe Rogan15:28

       Yeah. It- it's a fairly-

   13. AHAlex Honnold15:30

       (laughs)

   14. JRJoe Rogan15:30

       ... famous series of photographs 'cause it just shows you how difficult life is for those animals.

   15. AHAlex Honnold15:35

       I'm like, now do you take a moment of silence for that poor mountain lion?

   16. JRJoe Rogan15:38

       We probably-

   17. AHAlex Honnold15:38

       I'm doing it for-

   18. JRJoe Rogan15:38

       ... for both of them, yeah.

   19. AHAlex Honnold15:39

       ... for the bighorn I'm like, "Oh, that's..." It's like that's kind of dark.

   20. JRJoe Rogan15:42

       (exhales)

   21. AHAlex Honnold15:42

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan15:43

       A friend of mine had an en... My friend Josh had an encounter with a mountain lion just two days ago.

   23. AHAlex Honnold15:47

       Really?

   24. JRJoe Rogan15:47

       He was on a ranch in Northern California and he saw these deer just squirt, like take off. They just hauled ass out of there and he was 100 yards away from what he described as a 200-pound mountain lion.

   25. AHAlex Honnold16:00

       Wow.

   26. JRJoe Rogan16:00

       He said it was the biggest mountain lion he's ever seen in his life.

   27. AHAlex Honnold16:02

       Has he seen many? 'Cause I-

   28. JRJoe Rogan16:03

       Yeah.

   29. AHAlex Honnold16:03

       ... I've never seen one.

   30. JRJoe Rogan16:04

       I've seen two.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   Right. …

   1. AHAlex Honnold30:00

      but then you're just laying in a puddle of, like a little puddle of water 'cause, you know, the bottom of the hammock-

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:04

      Right.

   3. AHAlex Honnold30:04

      It all sags to the bottom, so it was all just pooling and you're sort of like, "Oh, man." It's like-

   4. JRJoe Rogan30:08

      Does the synthetic stuff act like Merino wool acts? Like, did they, they, they have that dialed in where even when you're wet you could still stay warm?

   5. AHAlex Honnold30:15

      It's still warm.

   6. JRJoe Rogan30:15

      Yeah.

   7. AHAlex Honnold30:16

      Yeah, yeah, exactly.

   8. JRJoe Rogan30:16

      Yeah.

   9. AHAlex Honnold30:17

      Yeah, it maintains all the insulation without, um, even when it's wet.

   10. JRJoe Rogan30:20

       What company do you use for that stuff?

   11. AHAlex Honnold30:21

       Uh, The North Face.

   12. JRJoe Rogan30:22

       Okay.

   13. AHAlex Honnold30:22

       I'm, I'm s- I've been sponsored by The North Face for a long time.

   14. JRJoe Rogan30:24

       Well, they're-

   15. AHAlex Honnold30:25

       But-

   16. JRJoe Rogan30:25

       ... they're really dialed in with that shit, right?

   17. AHAlex Honnold30:27

       Yeah. Yeah, but all, all synthetic clothing, like, I mean, it's all... Yeah.... it's all good.

   18. JRJoe Rogan30:31

       When it comes to, like, mountaineering, hiking-

   19. AHAlex Honnold30:33

       Yeah.

   20. JRJoe Rogan30:33

       ... hiking stuff?

   21. AHAlex Honnold30:34

       Yeah. Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan30:34

       So this trip, how long were you there for?

   23. AHAlex Honnold30:37

       We were there a month.

   24. JRJoe Rogan30:38

       Wow.

   25. AHAlex Honnold30:39

       Um, or like four weeks and-

   26. JRJoe Rogan30:40

       A month-

   27. AHAlex Honnold30:41

       ... you know, took us like-

   28. JRJoe Rogan30:41

       ... sleeping in a hammock in the rain. (laughs)

   29. AHAlex Honnold30:43

       Yeah. (laughs) Yeah. Kind of, totally, totally.

   30. JRJoe Rogan30:45

       But your guys are used to living out of a van, so you kind of rough it a little bit.
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Why do I get…

   1. NANarrator45:00

      part of... part of what that video was, was him proving to doctors that it wasn't all fake, and that's... Because that's what it says. He proved to Zurich doctors that it wasn't... his act wasn't based on fakery. That's pretty... I don't know.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:10

      Why do I get so uncomfortable just talking about this? I'm so... I'm breathing heavy. I'm like, "Oof."

   3. AHAlex Honnold45:16

      Maybe you need to practice a little bit. You could have somebody start putting needles through, like, little parts of your arm, you know? Like...

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:22

      Just, there's just something weird about people that are willingly hurting themselves and causing themselves pain.

   5. AHAlex Honnold45:28

      No, I k-... I, I kind of agree with that.

   6. JRJoe Rogan45:30

      Yeah.

   7. AHAlex Honnold45:30

      I do f-... I do find it slightly... But David, very well-adjusted man, it seems, you know.

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:34

      Very well-adjusted.

   9. AHAlex Honnold45:35

      Just very friendly, you know.

   10. JRJoe Rogan45:36

       Super friendly.

   11. AHAlex Honnold45:36

       Like, nice guy, right?

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:37

       And his card tricks are legitimately mind-blowing.

   13. AHAlex Honnold45:40

       Dude, dude, so fun fact about his card tricks. I don't know if you'd be... So he, uh, he took me to lunch once and, like, did a whole thing of card tricks, and I was totally... I, I love magic, and I think it's cool. And, you know, I was like, obviously they're all tricks, but I was like, "This is incredible." The execution's incredible. I was totally into it. I was super impressed. And then, uh, at the time, I was, I was dating this girl in New York really briefly, and, um... And a couple of days later, we all went to the climbing gym together 'cause I... like I said, I was kind of e- encouraging him to, like, do some, some climbing thing. And he... Th- then we went to lunch again, and he basically did the same set of card tricks for this girl that I was dating, but having already climbed for, like, an hour or two, and it was funny because his execution in the card tricks was noticeably worse for me. Like, you know, I could tell that he was, like, doing all his tricks worse once his arms were, like, totally wrecked from climbing for two hours. Like, basically, his fingers and his forearms-

   14. JRJoe Rogan46:28

       Right, right.

   15. AHAlex Honnold46:28

       ... were totally wrecked. And that actually made me appreciate how difficult the tricks are even more 'cause I was like, "Oh, wow." Like, if your fingertips hurt, and your muscles are wrecked, and it's hard for you to hold your arms steady, then it's, like, very hard to fan the deck, you know, evenly and to, like, pick cards properly, and it made me appreciate just how much skill is involved in what he was doing. I was like, "Oh, dude." It was... It's pretty cool. You know, basically to see somebody do something at their peak, and then when they're also totally wrecked, and then to see kind of the overlap, you're like, "Oh, this is actually quite hard." Like, what he's doing is, is, is a challenge, you know?

   16. JRJoe Rogan46:57

       You know what it's like? He's, like, he's got the fine motor skills that we have for tying our own shoes.

   17. AHAlex Honnold47:03

       Tot- totally, but for a deck of cards.

   18. JRJoe Rogan47:05

       Yeah.

   19. AHAlex Honnold47:05

       Yeah, when he can just cut to the 27th card or whatever, you know.

   20. JRJoe Rogan47:08

       Right.

   21. AHAlex Honnold47:08

       And he's like, "Let me just cut this deck," and he's like, "Oh, there's card number 24." And you're like, "What?"

   22. JRJoe Rogan47:11

       And he really can do that.

   23. AHAlex Honnold47:13

       Yeah, when- when you've seen him practice.

   24. JRJoe Rogan47:13

       Like, he's done it so many times that he has that... You know that... 'Cause there is that feeling that you have when you tie your shoe, where your hands just communicate so fluidly. You know? Like, that's, like, what people strive for in jujitsu. In jujitsu, you strive. Like, that's actually what my, uh, my coach, Eddie Bravo, he uses that as a, as an example, that when you tie your shoe, you don't think about tying your shoe. You just tie your shoe.

   25. AHAlex Honnold47:38

       Mm-hmm.

   26. JRJoe Rogan47:38

       And in a certain situation, you'll flow into a technique. Like, a technique will happen, and it'll, it'll happen, and 'cause you... Your, your repetitions, you've hit them-

   27. AHAlex Honnold47:47

       Totally.

   28. JRJoe Rogan47:47

       ... so many times that it'll just be so fluid. And so for David, it's gotta be like that, but with, like, the very tips of his fingers.

   29. AHAlex Honnold47:54

       (laughs) I know. For somebody like me with, you know, very calloused... I can't even imagine feeling anything that well.

   30. JRJoe Rogan47:59

       Right, right.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:01:01

   And then you just…

   1. AHAlex Honnold1:00:00

      you know, so be it basically.

   2. JRJoe Rogan1:00:01

      And then you just ... Requires discipline to not fall into those traps.

   3. AHAlex Honnold1:00:06

      Yeah.

   4. JRJoe Rogan1:00:06

      And also, you know, an understanding of the, the path that you choose can lead to deep disappointment if you decide to live that cubicle life. Like un- understand that this is not normal for people and-

   5. AHAlex Honnold1:00:18

      Though this is, this is somewhat close to cubicle life actually. (laughs)

   6. JRJoe Rogan1:00:23

      This thing? This is, first of all, completely voluntary. Voluntary.

   7. AHAlex Honnold1:00:26

      No, no, no, of course.

   8. JRJoe Rogan1:00:27

      Uh, we've created it.

   9. AHAlex Honnold1:00:27

      But I mean the actual, the, the feeling of like we, we are inside this tiny little thing.

   10. JRJoe Rogan1:00:31

       Yeah, we are inside a weird thing. But you've seen the new one.

   11. AHAlex Honnold1:00:34

       Uh-huh. Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan1:00:34

       You're one of the rare people that's seen the new one, which is a little bit bigger. But, um-

   13. AHAlex Honnold1:00:38

       Uh.

   14. JRJoe Rogan1:00:38

       Have you ever seen Werner Herzog's documentary, Happy People?

   15. AHAlex Honnold1:00:42

       No.

   16. JRJoe Rogan1:00:42

       It's Life in the Taiga. It's about people that live in Siberia.

   17. AHAlex Honnold1:00:46

       Well, they're not. Like it can't be happy people if they're living in Siberia. (laughs)

   18. JRJoe Rogan1:00:48

       They're very happy. You'd be shocked.

   19. AHAlex Honnold1:00:50

       Yeah. I mean, that's the point of the film I guess, huh?

   20. JRJoe Rogan1:00:52

       Yeah. The, the point is these people are trappers and hunters and gath- well, there's no gathering really. But they're, they're hunters and fisherpeople and they-

Episode duration: 3:04:56