Any climbing enthusiast has either been there or will one day be there: the near-death experience—the fear that can either stifle performance or catalyze it. Colorado Academy Upper School climbing coach Matt Lloyd had this very experience during an ice climb in Vail when a “tremendous crack shattered the stillness.” In Climbing Magazine, he writes that during the climb “…the entire pillar had broken horizontally just above my knees … both frozen masses perched like two school buses balancing nose to nose.”

The experience led Lloyd, who recently published the climbing guidebook, Rock Climbing Clear Creek Canyon, to probe the psychology of fear. What he found might take your climbing to the next level, or as he writes “save your life.” Click here to read the full article, The Mind Game, published in the October issue of Climbing Magazine.