My favorite scene from the new adventure film Nobody & Goliath involves cigarettes. Having completed most of the gargantuan Goliath Traverse in California’s Sierra Nevada—a 32-mile ridgeline that passes over 60 summits—rock climbers Tanner Wanish and Michael Vaill are dizzy with exhaustion. They’ve spent the past eight days climbing in the no-fall zone.
They’ve gone long stretches of the trip without water or food. To celebrate almost being done, Wanish and Vaill spark up a couple of lung darts and puff away at 12,000 feet, giggling and backslapping like a couple of high schoolers. Both he and Vaill sometimes chew nicotine pouches for an extra burst of energy on the crag, he added, but never puff cigarettes.
Look, I’m no smoker either—tobacco products of all forms make my stomach turn. But I still love the scene. It hammers home the film’s primary thrust, which is to introduce mainstream audiences to Wanish and Vaill, alongside an intoxicating message: Climbing’s newest superstars are a different breed.
And no, it’s not just because they enjoy a cig every now and then. I called Wanish and Vaill recently to talk about the film and their newfound stardom in rock climbing. But it’s starting to change.” Don’t feel bad if you’re unfamiliar with their names.
The duo has built a following within rock climbing circles for their speedy ascents of the biggest walls in Yosemite National Park. Nobody & Goliath, which is touring theaters across the U.S. in 2026, is their first big film project. Outside has written about them once before.
In October 2024, they became Yosemite’s new power couple with a speedy finish on the so-called Yosemite Triple: El Capitan, Half Dome, and Mount Watkins. They did it faster (17 hours, 55 minutes) than any team in history, surpassing times set by some of the valley’s greatest climbing duos: Alex Honnold and Tommy Caldwell, Dean Potter and Timmy O’Neil, Brad Gobright and Jim Reynolds, among others. A week after the triple, Vaill and Wanish did the route again, and then tacked on a fourth climb, the south face of the Washington Column.
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