Emily Harrington loves the versatility of climbing

Emily Harrington started climbing the way many kids take up sports. When she was 10 years old and living in Boulder, Colorado, she tried climbing on artificial walls, loved it, and “begged” her dad to go again. She joined the junior climbing team at a local gym and began competing. “What climbing has meant to me has changed enormously. … It went from being a sport I did as a kid to this lifestyle,” Emily, now 28, said in an interview with RCW. When she was young, she had audacious dreams of being a world champion. She is a five-time national champion and a two-time North American champion. She made it to the podium in World Cups. She has branched into each climbing discipline, including bouldering, sport, and traditional climbing, taking her into gyms and the high mountains. She mountaineers, too, including a 2012 ascent of Everest, where she met her boyfriend Adrian Ballinger, who is also a professional climber and a mountain guide. Sponsored by The North Face and...