If you’re struggling to prevent climbing up the walls at the moment, you could do worse than divert your attention to The Enormocast. A bombastically-charged name is appropriate for a welcoming pod that aims to provide the listener of ‘a slice of the climbing life’, a state that appears equal parts easing and exhilarating.
Extremely amiable host Chris Kalous has almost three solid decades of experience in the vertigo-defying sport. If you want a taste of the structure and tone, the christening line in the opening episode, “Welcome to the Enormocast: up yours! I know more than you do,” gives a pretty good indication.
“I am here for you,” says your host, “I know how scared you were above that piece, and will hold you tightly in my podcast arms until you feel better. I understand that your beta works for you, and you’re going with it even if you’ve fallen from that same spot 32 times- my podcast will be happy to belay you on the next burn.”
Approaching its tenth year of production, The Enormocast ventures around some of the best, sometimes most notorious, climbing spots across the globe, with a variety of guests representing the spectrum of the sport. More recent episodes - now cumulatively having passed the heralded 200-ep mark - have previously featured fantastic wholly personal stories from the likes of Janelle and Mark Smiley, a dynamic wife-and-husband duo who have spent much of the last decade in a van pursuing the 50 Classic Climbs of North America, Malcolm Daly ‘steeped in climbing culture and the climbing industry’ since the late 60s who lost a leg to a severe climbing accident in 1999, prompting him to help start Paradox Sports with the idea of helping disabled folks approach climbing, and Justin Salas, a visually-impaired adventurer who achieved a blockbuster VII ascent that made him the first blind, adaptive climber to send the grade.
Whichever terrain Kalous and Co cover, rest assured prospective listener, this climbing podcast rocks.
You can catch all 208 episodes of The Enormocast on iTunes here.
