Pete Picks Pockets on The Optimator

Sugarite State Park, lying on the New Mexico and Colorado border northeast of Raton, is a magical, remote, and little-known climbing area. Short basalt cliffs, speckled with pockets and split by vertical cracks, line the edges of several high mesas. Almost all of Sugarite's routes are done in a traditional style by plugging cams into pockets and cracks or wedging nuts in thin cracks. Here Pete Takeda, belayed by Steve and his shadow, leads the first ascent of "The Optimator" (5.12a), a very thin crack that Pete preprotected with RPs and small nuts in 1998.