Through a shared devotion to outdoor climbing instruction, Blane McClellan and Walker Bedell co-founded the first Little Rock-based certified guided climbing and climber education program: Frontier Climbing Company, launching the business in early Feb.

McClellan said FCC offers guided climbing in Central Arkansas for adventurous tourists, groups, and fellow climbers.

For their first class, FCC partnered with UCA Campus Outdoors on Feb 26 and took eight students to the Rattlesnake Ridge Natural Area to learn how to tie in using a figure 8 knot, proper belay technique, climbing safety and lead climbing technique.

McClellan said his journey to co-found the business started with inspiration he drew from Memphis Rox and his involvement with the American Scholastic Climbing League of Arkansas.

Memphis Rox is a non-profit climbing gym that specializes in providing climbing opportunities for less privileged youth.

McClellan said, “What they did at Memphis Rox had inspired me and one of my climbing partners to try and figure out, like, how we could remove barriers to climbing, get more people climbing, more kids, specifically, how we can engage communities that typically would never have the opportunity to experience climbing.” 

McClellan went on to help start the Arkansas chapter of the American Scholastic Climbing League.

“The whole point is, like, if you’re in a middle school or high school in Arkansas, and you can get, you know, three people in your school and a sponsor there, you can sort your own climbing team, and you can rock climb for your school and represent your school in the league.”

McClellan said that one thing they emphasized in the Arkansas chapter was supporting kids who couldn’t afford the cost of climbing gear by raising money for climbing scholarships for students.

McClellan said that students who qualified for the free lunch program at school were qualified to get a scholarship.

“So what we did was we paid for five months of climbing gym memberships for any of those kids. We bought them harnesses. We bought them climbing shoes, all their gear.”

McClellan said his work with the American Scholastic Climbing League of Arkansas made him want to get his single pitch instructor certification through the American Mountain Guides Association so that he could take kids outside to work on climbing. 

Bedell, who had worked in indoor climbing gyms since 2016, had always had a passion for taking people outside to climb and was just waiting for an opportunity to do so.

“You got to treat the [climbing] gym like it’s a treadmill. But people don’t just run on treadmills, right? Let’s say you’re planning for a race. You don’t run that race on the treadmill. You train for it on it, and then you go outside and run the race. You utilize the gym as a tool, as a place to train, but you got to make it outside.”

Driven by his passion to take climbers outside, Bedell would take the class along with McClellan and they would go to get their certification together.

While taking the class together, the pair saw how their work goals aligned and started devising FCC.

Bedell said, “And so after talking with him, yeah, I guess it was clear that this is my opportunity here to team up with someone and take that leap of faith and quit my job and start this thing. It’s been an awesome journey…and it’s just crazy… I’ve wanted this for so long, and it’s actually coming true. I feel like I wish I could have done it sooner, but it’s like, no, the timing has been perfect.”

McClellan said that after they passed their certifications the next step was the “back-end business stuff” which he had an advantage with due to 20 years of business experience. “It’s a lot cooler when it’s your own thing and it’s something that you really enjoy, and that you’re passionate about,” he said.

Bedell said that they wanted to tap into a climbing industry that was underdeveloped in Central Arkansas.

“When I started climbing 10 years ago,” McClellan said “there was really no avenue to formal education for climbing, so if you wanted to learn new stuff, to go outside and learn skills like you either had to have a mentor or somebody you met in the climbing gym or YouTube videos that was about it.” 

McClellan said, “We wanted to start this business to eventually grow to be able to support careers for other climbers here in Central Arkansas… Part of the reason we named it Frontier Climbing Company as well was… to build this business up where we can support providing jobs for other people, we have to do some other things outside of just guiding and just climbing so our hope is that we can add some other revenue streams to find other opportunities to bring into the company.”

Bedell said that they also want to help educate climbers so they can outdoor climb safely and avoid injury.

Bedell said, “I feel like there’s a laundry list of benefits that go with climbing… [The] first thing that pops in my head is the community aspect…. the community aspect of it is just so beneficial to have.”

Bedell said that the climbing community is encouraging, open-minded, loving and supportive and that he was glad to have found the community in college so that he could make fond memories with fellow climbers. 

McClellan said, “It doesn’t matter what the reason you have, or necessarily, why you’re spending time outdoors in nature, whatever it is, the more you do it. I mean, you can’t escape or deny just the transformational power of just spending time in nature and what that does to people.”

He said, “Kids … they’d be asked, ‘Hey, what did you get out of climbing? What’s the number one thing you found?’ And they all say the same thing; they say ‘Peace.’”

McClellan said, “Hemingway said there are really only three true sports, and it was [motor] racing, bullfighting and mountaineering and I think that’s really kind of the essence of climbing, right? It’s the true nature of any kind of competition. The competition is between what you’ve done and what you’re capable of doing and battling through fears [and] just doing stuff that scares you. That’s all so healthy on so many different levels.”

For more information on Frontier Climbing Company, visit its website frontierclimbingcompany.com or its Instagram @frontier_climbing_company.