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Virgin Ascents

So you want to climb a mountain, but you've never done it before. No sweat—there's a first time for everything. Even the world's greatest climbers were once beginners like you, gearing up with ropes, carabiners and crampons and heading for the hills for their first technical ascents.

To help fuel your peak-bagging fantasies, we asked a few seasoned mountaineers to tell us about the early climbing experiences that inspired their life-long passion for the sport.

Listen as Viesturs and Anker talk about climbing in the good ol' days, Potter recalls the childhood trauma of his first ground fall, and Jenkins waxes philosophical about the value of mountaintop epiphanies.

Ed Viesturs

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(Mountain Hardwear)

Dean Potter

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(Jimmy Chin)

Conrad Anker

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(Kristoffer Erickson)

Mark Jenkins

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(Courtesy of Mark Jenkins)

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