Duy Hoang

Age: 20

Climbing Experience: ~3 Years

Favorite Move: Bicycles/Toe Hooks and Dynos!

Duy brings a new meaning to the term steward of the climbing community. During his time at ASCEND as a member, Duy has brought more first time guests to visit ASCEND than any other member in history! He is currently a Junior at CMU studying Physics for his undergraduate degree. At CMU he works as an RA in one of their on campus residence halls. He enjoys taking other RA’s and student peers to ASCEND and he attributes his personality to the large number of new guests that he has brought into the facility. “ASCEND is a special place to me and I can’t help but want to share it with others!”

Duy grew up in the Portland, OR area but didn’t discover climbing until just before he came to Pittsburgh for college. Duy has enjoyed climbing in ASCEND and some of the local Portland based gyms while he travels home, but hasn’t ventured outdoors to climb very much. Duy hopes to make it outdoors during the 2021 guiding season with ASCEND. When asked how he felt about ASCEND’s setting, he said that he loved it but noted that it was distinctly harder than some of the gyms he has climbed at in Portland.

Everyone at ASCEND is proud to call Duy our Member of the Year and we all sincerely thank you for your care and effort in growing our climbing community. To offer some words of encouragement to new climbers out there, Duy mentioned that “climbing has taught me that consistency is key, and in order to succeed you need to keep working at it.

Note: Duy is being featuered as Member of the Year, which was intended to be presented in March 2020 at our 3rd Anniverary Party. Sorry, this all got lost in the COVID shuffle. He's being recognized for bringing in the most new guests to ASCEND - 18 total brand new climbers! Thank you for spreading the joy of climbing to others, Duy.