Shawn Sturges

After graduating from high school in the summer of 2004, Shawn Sturges was experiencing a puzzling sudden decline in vision. Before summer’s end his world turned black – literally black – caused by Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy. Shawn was now classified as “VI” or a visually impaired individual. It took time to adjust to his new life, and he eventually returned to martial arts and school – earning multiple Bachelor’s degrees in Business Administration. Through Martial Arts and University, he learned the discipline, perseverance, determination, and belief in one’s own abilities that are needed to find success which he later took to rock climbing.

In the fall of 2015 Shawn was introduced to rock climbing by a friend, and he was hooked. Shawn joined the local Adaptive Climbing Group (ACG) to learn climbing techniques at Brooklyn Boulders in Chicago. A year later he joined an adaptive climbing competition team to compete at the USA Climbing Adaptive Nationals in Georgia in the summer of 2016, taking home second place in the visually impaired category, and earning him a spot on team USA to compete in the 2016 IFSC World Para Climbing Championships which were held in Paris, France 2016.

In the Spring of 2017, he joined the Paradox Sports Adaptive Climbing Skills Clinic in Joshua Tree National Park where he learned crack climbing techniques, aid and trad climbing techniques, repelling, anchor building, and many other climbing techniques to be both a safe and more responsible outside climber. Shawn also joined the 2017 Paradox Rocky Mountain National Park trip to climb Long’s Peak, one of the 14,000ft. peaks. Inclement weather altered trip plans, however this resulted in Shawn’s first successful multi-pitch and rappel of “The Bomb” on The Wind Tower in Eldorado Canyon. Shawn has climbed multi-pitch routes on Devils Tower and in Vedauwoo, bouldered in the world-renowned Fountaine Bleu in France, ice climbed in the upper peninsula of Michigan, and again joined Paradox in 2018 at The Red River Gorge. He continues to hone his skills to reach his future goals to climb big walls, multi-pitch climbs, and ice both in the U.S. and around the world.

“The visual limitation that I face is not a hindrance that most believe it to be while climbing. As an adaptive climber and individual in our world I am in a constant state of problem solving. What I have learned as a blind individual is that my world is very tactual, so rock climbing lends itself quite well to my world. I use visualization and flat hand scanning a tremendous amount while I climb which helps me to determine my path of upward ascent. My daily navigation skills that I use to travel around Chicago has also helped me to find success in climbing since I am always aware of my body position and surroundings which is also very important when on the wall. What I have determined is that climbing to me is not that different from my everyday life and that realization will be what helps me to achieve all my climbing goals.” – Shawn Sturges