Greg Barnes - Executive director
Greg’s been climbing since 1994, and replacing bolts since 1998. He’s run the ASCA since 2000, and has personally replaced 2000+ bolts, mostly by hand drilling! He’s personally replaced bolts on some of the most classic routes in the U.S., including The Nose, Epinephrine, Levitation 29, Astroman, and many others. He’s negotiated with land managers and secured the first bolt replacement permits in Joshua Tree, Red Rocks, and other areas. In 2016 the Access Fund awarded him the Menocal Lifetime Achievement Award for his "singular focus on fixed anchor education and replacement”. He has handled all the day-to-day activities of the ASCA almost single-handedly for many years, shipping hundreds of pounds of hardware a month to local climbing groups and bolt replacement volunteers nationwide!
Chris Mcnamara - Founder
Chris is the founder of the American Safe Climbing Association. Author of 3 guidebooks to rock climbing in Yosemite National Park and eight other climbing guidebooks, Chris is also the founder of OutdoorGearLab and SuperTopo. Outside Magazine has called Chris one of the world's finest aid climbers, and he's the winner of the 1999 Bates Award from the American Alpine Club. Climbing Magazine once computed that three percent of Chris's life on earth had been spent on the face of El Capitan, an accomplishment that left friends and family pondering Chris's sanity. He has climbed El Capitan more than 80 times and holds nine big wall speed climbing records. As a BASE jumper, he claimed a slice of the "Golden Age of Wingsuit BASE first descents" by finding and jumping 10-plus significant new exits in the United States and Baffin Island.
Nate Liles - development director
Nate manages the online presence of the ASCA and is excited to grow marketing and fundraising efforts for our critical work in the coming years. He works remotely and lives a nomadic lifestyle mostly near climbing areas in the western states. Crag stewardship is a priority for Nate and he spends a great deal of his personal time replacing old bolts, training individuals and LCO’s how to sustainably extract and replace hardware, and working with land managers to preserve the climbing resource. He has replaced old bolts on hundreds of routes, mostly at popular, high-traffic single pitch cragging areas.
Michal Matyjasik - Outreach Coordinator
Michal Matyjasik is the Outreach Coordinator for the ASCA. He completed his Ph.D. in biochemistry at the University of Colorado Boulder and now lives in Boise, Idaho. When he isn't researching the biochemical basis for the origin of life, Michal can be found climbing, updating route hardware, or making music. When he moved to Boulder in 2014, Michal began to climb obsessively, including many big wall free ascents in the mountain west. He hasn't slowed down since, and likes to spend his free time giving back to the climbing community by educating climbers about rebolting and aging hardware, installing lower-offs, and replacing unsafe bolts. You are likely to see him at a crag near you with a bag of Climb Tech hooks and a wrench.