Meet the Climbers on Team USA!
The United States is sending a full slate of eight climbers to Paris—more than any other country. While two of these competitors, Colin Duffy and Brooke Raboutou, might be familiar to those of you who watched the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, the other six climbers on Team USA are first-time Olympians. All eight of them are accomplished international competitors.
Note: Sport Climbing has two medal disciplines: “Speed” and “Boulder & Lead Combined.” No climber has qualified for both disciplines.
Team USA’s Boulder & Lead Climbers
Colin Duffy
Twenty-year-old Colorado native Colin Duffy is competing in his second Olympics, after taking seventh in Tokyo when he was 17. Duffy grew up climbing with the legendary Team ABC out of Boulder, Colorado, training alongside fellow USA teammates Brooke Raboutou and (later) Natalia Grossman under the tutelage of Robyn Erbesfield-Raboutou. Though historically a lead specialist, Duffy’s bouldering game is now equally strong. At the World Cup in Innsbruck in 2022, he became the first male world cup competitor to take gold in both Boulder and Lead in the same World Cup event. Read this interview about his takeaways from Tokyo.
Natalia Grossman
One of the most accomplished competition climbers in American history, Natalia Grossman, 23, started climbing in California at age 6, but her family moved to Boulder, Colorado, in 2015 specifically so that she could train under Robyn Erbesfield-Raboutou on Team ABC. Grossman has won an astounding 10 IFSC Bouldering World Cups and one Bouldering World Championship. In 2021, 2022, and 2023, she came in first overall in the IFSC World Cup Bouldering discipline—and in Lead she placed second and third in 2021 and 2022 respectively. It’s a stacked field, but Grossman is certainly a medal favorite in Paris. Check out this interview from 2022.
Jesse Grupper
Jesse Grupper, 27, secured his Paris ticket by winning the 2023 Pan American Championships. In addition to his impressive competition performance—he took third overall in the IFSC World Cup Lead discipline in 2022—Grupper is one of the most accomplished outdoor climbers in American history, particularly when it comes to flashing (doing routes first try but with information about the moves). In 2021, he flashed Livin’ Astro (5.14c) in Rumney, New Hampshire. And in 2023, he flashed Pure Imagination (5.14c) in Kentucky’s Red River Gorge. He has also climbed 5.15a outside. Fun facts: Grupper graduated from Tufts University with a degree in mechanical engineering, works part time in a biodesign lab, and manages to climb at a world class level while also living with ulcerative colitis. Check out our longform interview with Grupper.
Brooke Raboutou
Competing in her second Olympics (she placed fifth in Tokyo), Brooke Raboutou, 23, is a seasoned competitor who has racked up more than a dozen World Cup medals since 2021. But Raboutou doesn’t just excel in competitions; in 2023 she became the second woman in the world to boulder V16, climbing Box Therapy in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, though she proposed a downgrade to V15. Raboutou is also a member of one of the most famous climbing families in the world. Her mother, Robyn Erbesfield-Raboutou, was a four-time World Champion in the 1990s and was the third woman to climb a route graded 5.14. Her father, Didier Raboutou, was also a leading climber and competitor in the 1980s and ’90s. And her brother, Shawn, is currently one of the world’s strongest outdoor boulderers.
Team USA’s Speed Climbers
Zach Hammer
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An 18-year-old native of Ann Arbor, Michigan, Hammer started climbing at the local gym, Planet Rock, when he was just 3. He secured his seat during the Olympic Qualification Series, placing seventh in both the Shanghai and Budapest events. His best World Cup finish was in Salt Lake City this past May, where he placed fifth.
Emma Hunt
A 21-year-old native of Woodstock, Georgia, Hunt began competing on the adult international circuit in 2019. Since then, she’s won numerous medals. In 2021, she won the Pan American Championships. The next year, she took second in the overall IFSC Speed World Cup in 2022 and won the World Games. At the IFSC World Cup in Salt Lake City in April this year, she set the American women’s Speed record: 6.301 seconds.
Piper Kelly
Hailing from Indianapolis, Piper Kelly, 24, secured her Paris ticket at the Pan American Games, where she set a personal best time of 7.52 seconds. She graduated from Xavier University in 2023 with a degree in exercise science. She’s currently ranked ninth overall in the 2024 IFSC Speed World Cup.
Samuel Watson
A 17-year-old from Southlake, Texas, Watson started speed climbing at age 13 and loves “the process of training and competing for speed,” he told Climbing after qualifying last October, “the process of having this tangible thing that’s the same every time and slowly getting better and better at it.” He’s been competing in World Cups since 2021 and has won two of them—Edinburgh in 2022 and Salt Lake City in 2024. He is the current Speed world record holder, having set a time of 4.798 seconds during the qualification round at the 2024 IFSC World Cup in Wujiang, where he took silver. When he qualified for Paris by winning the Speed category at the Pan American Games in 2023, he “hugged my mom so hard with my hand that I pinched a nerve in my left forearm. I was crying, it was a big emotional moment.” It’s been nearly a year since then; presumably the nerve is better. For more information about his world record, click here.
Track and Field!
Hobbs Kessler
That’s right. Hobbs Kessler, the only male American runner to qualify for the Olympics in both the 1500m and 800m distance since the 1970s, is also a rock climber—and a good one. He has climbed 5.14c outside (Southern Smoke, in the Red River Gorge), climbed the Northwest Face of Half Dome in Yosemite, and competed in the 2019 IFSC Youth World Championship in Arco, where he took 34th. While he doesn’t climb as much as he used to, he reputedly still manages double digit board climbs (V10+) whenever he makes a rare appearance at the gym… pretty decent athlete I guess. Check out our profile of Kessler from 2021.
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