Known for their leadership, as well as their character, our guides bring a wealth of knowledge and experience from years of guiding and climbing throughout the United States.
They continuously give back to their communities by donating hours to youth climbing programs at local schools, maintenance at our climbing areas, as well as search and rescue efforts.
Our guides live to climb and to make climbing accessible for others. The only thing our guides are more passionate about than climbing is providing you with a great experience. Whether you’re brand new to the sport or have been climbing for years, your guide will provide you the highest level of instruction and encouragement.
Dan Markle
Owner/ Senior Guide
I am very fortunate to have grown up in Colorado, where I had endless snowy mountains and steep canyon walls to explore. Attempting to master the craft of traveling in them safely, and showing people this amazing world is my life’s work. Living in the mountains, and being in them almost every day of my life, has shaped me in more ways than I probably know. I’ve now built my life around and within them. Almost twenty years of experience climbing and skiing has taken me from the European alps, to new Zealand, to the cascades and Rockies of north America. I have been guiding professionally on snow and rock for the better part of a decade, and guiding has never really felt like work to me. I enjoy the physicality and the demand for focus that it requires. I value sharing passion for adventure in the outdoors, doing something that looked impossible, appreciating the beauty of nature, forming great relationships with your climbing partners, and unplugging for a while. I believe these things make a better world, and guiding makes me better, but most importantly it’s just plain fun. Learning to provide safe, fun, and engaging experience in the mountains is what I spend all year working to perfect.
“Time spent in the mountains is best spent with others”
• Wilderness first responder
• AMGA apprentice alpine guide
• AMGA apprentice ski guide
• AAI Avalanche profesional level 1
Patrick Betts
Technical Director/ Senior Guide
Patrick Betts is the Technical Director at Front Range Climbing Company and is based in Moab, Utah. He has been guiding and working in the Outdoor Industry since 2009 and guides year-round in Colorado, Utah and beyond. When he is not guiding, you will find him traveling to climbing destinations around the world. Patrick is an experienced adventure photographer who enjoys taking photos of people pushing their own limits and capturing the landscapes of the areas that rock climbing takes you. Follow along @adventurethrulens
Justin Bowers
General Manager/ Senior Guide
Growing up in the southeast, Justin cut his teeth backpacking and rock climbing in the Appalachian mountains. He started climbing seriously in 2007 with a trip to Mt. Rainier in Washington. After summiting Rainier, he was hooked on climbing in the high alpine. This led him on a new life course, taking him to many of the world’s great mountain ranges. Justin has climbed walls and peaks in the Rockies, Cascades, Alaska Range, Tetons, Patagonian Andes, Indian Himalaya, and the Alps. Cumulating in multiple summits of Mt. Rainier, Grand Teton, Denali, Mt. Blanc Du Tacul, 40 days on the Northern Patagonia Ice cap and canyons in Moab.
“Mountains, I have come to learn, are bridges. Taking your body, mind and being to places you would never go and to people you would never meet.”
- WFA
- AAI Avalanche Level 1
- Patagonia Mountaineering School
Bill Olszewski
Guide/ Legend
Bill has many years of outdoor rock climbing experience and a willingness to share the experience with others.
Bill’s enthusiasm while climbing is expressed in his fluent climbing abilities through difficult climbs and routes. His expertise and knowledge while instructing gives climbers a solid foundation of safety and climbing principles that will allow them to confidently make their own decisions while climbing at the local indoor gym, crags, and multi-pitch routes.
“For me, climbing is a communion with nature. When I’m on the rock, focusing on the movement of the line, all the distractions of daily life melt away. Climbing is an amazing source of inner peace.”
Cole Schnacker
Senior Guide
Cole is a Colorado Springs native. He started rock climbing in a local bouldering gym in 2013. Cole learned how to climb using ropes after taking a guided rock-climbing trip at the Garden of the Gods. Since then, Cole has climbed in 8 different states in many well-known locations like Yosemite National Park and Red Rock Canyon, Nevada. Cole was hired as an apprentice guide at Front Range Climbing Company in early 2019. Cole has a passion for teaching and sharing the love of rock climbing.
Nathan Schadle
Guide/ Photographer
Nathan is our Sunshine guide, hailing from California. The ‘Big guy with a big beard’ has been rock climbing and living in Colorado since 2012. His favorite places to climb are Moab, Utah and Garden of the Gods, Colorado. He wants to continue learning about Aid climbing and crack climbing. When not rock climbing, you can find him eating an avocado cheese burger.Favorite climbing quote: “If I can’t climb it, it just means I haven’t figured it out yet.” (Lin Hill)
Jim Zitting
Guide
Jim Zitting is a good ‘ol Missouri boy who got his climbing start teaching in the Boy Scouts. In the summer he’s planted like a tree in Garden of the Gods. In the winter he’s headed south to find more summer.
Matt Bolan
Guide
Hey! My name is Matt Bolan and I’m one of the climbing guides at front range. I’m originally from Ohio and moved to Colorado in October of 2020 I moved out here because I love adventures and what better place to do that than in the mountains. Rock climbing is my passion and I love sharing that passion with others.
Joshua Parsons
Guide
My name is Joshua, I’m a 24 year old native of Colorado Springs. My climbing career began the day City Rock (our local climbing gym) opened its doors 13 years ago. Fighting the ever-present force of gravity has been perhaps the only constant in my life since. I began exploring the outdoor vertical realm in early high school, and later was guided by Front Range Climbing Company (Bill, who I now work alongside) on my first few trad leads at age 16. Since then, I have focused on diversifying my skill set to become a well rounded climber. I’m equally stoked whether it’s sport, trad, snow, ice, single or multi-pitch… But of course bouldering sucks, everyone knows that.
Antonia Furlo
Guide
Also known as “too-cool Toni,” is a young guide who got her start climbing in 2018 with one of Front Range’s very own guides, Cole Schnacker. Her first climbs were in our well loved Red Rocks Canyon Open Space, and she was hooked from day one. She’s had many outdoor adventures since in locations across the country, and her experience managing a climbing gym has instilled her with a passionate knowledge of technique and safety. Toni has accrued a wealth of experience working with children and families, and finds joy in coaching new and experienced climbers alike through whatever challenges they face on the wall. Her love of puzzle solving and creative out-of-the-box thinking pushes her to find solutions for anyone to be able to ascend to new heights. She believes climbing is deeper than just any sport, most anyone can (and should) climb, and is excited to help wherever someone needs support.
Arax Corn
Guide
Originally from Missouri, I began rock climbing in 2010 when I moved to Colorado. This will be my sixth season guiding with Front Range. One thing I love about guiding is being able to share my passion, and seeing people push past their perceived limits! A favorite place to climb is Moab, Utah- here I am pictured climbing a desert tower in Castle Valley.
Another aspect of being a climbing guide that I prize: those moments on the rock that translate to the rest of life… perseverance through a hard bit, or that sweet sense of accomplishment when you reach your goal i.e., the summit!
Sara Gordon
Guide
Sara originally hails from New Hampshire; but left to serve in the United States Air Force for 20 years, before joining the Front Range Climbing Company team in 2016. Sara is passionate about teaching various climbing techniques/practices, inspiring others, and finding new ways to relate climbing to life.
Luke Antonia
Guide
Verticality! That’s the name of the game. I love it all! Rock, Ice, snow, glaciers, mountains, ropes. Everything climbing. You name it. Trees? Yeah, I’ll climb those too!
As a guide, I pride myself on having a keen sense for risk management and utilizing the safest techniques given the circumstances.
- AMGA Rock Guide Apprentice
- Wilderness EMT (Emergency Medical Technician)
- Rope Rescue Technician
- Leave No Trace Master Educator
Guide Alumni
Brian Shelton
Founder
Brian has been climbing since he was 15 years old. His experience has been gained in the vertical world of Devils Tower, Yosemite’s big walls, and the remote, sandstone towers of Utah’s desert. His knowledge of regional climbing areas is unrivaled.
Brian loves guiding because it gives him a chance to share something with others that has been meaningful to him. Because of his judgment and technical knowledge, clients keep coming back because of the philosophy “safety first, summit second”.
“There is a world of climbing out there that most people aren’t aware of. I love the chance to open people up to it, to teach them skills and offer them adventures of their own.”
Stewart Green
Guide
A freelance writer and photographer based in Colorado Springs, Stewart Green has been a climber for over 40 years, and a part of Front Range from the beginning. He has climbed throughout the United States and Europe, and done many high-quality first ascents.
Stewart is the author of over 15 books, including ‘Rock Climbing Colorado’ and ‘Rock Climbing Europe’. His photographs are also widely published in advertisements, catalogues, and magazines including Climbing magazine and Rock & Ice.
As a Front Range climbing guide, Stewart brings an unrivaled range of experiences and knowledge to all our clients.
Mollie Bailey
Guide
Mollie started climbing in 2011 at Sand Rock, Alabama and realized that an outdoor life was the one for her. She migrated to Colorado shortly after to pursue the outdoor lifestyle that’s overwhelmingly present in Colorado. Mollie has visited nearly all 50 states and has a passion for traveling and experiencing new things.
Mollie wanted to be able to share her love for rock climbing and the outdoors with as many people as possible. This passion is what led her to start guiding for Front Range Climbing Company in 2013.
“I guide because I love watching people succeed in a sport they didn’t even think was possible for them. The best part of my day is taking someone from learning the jargon all the way to standing on top of a rock, totally awestruck. It’s pretty rad.”
Jimmie Dunn
Guide
Jimmie Dunn is a climbing legend in his own right, notable for many pioneering and cutting edge ascents in the Utah desert, Colorado, and Yosemite.
Born in New Hampshire, Jimmie started climbing in 1966 at the Garden of The Gods in Colorado Springs. While studying botany at Western State College, the 2000-foot vertical walls of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison became an inspiration for what became a life of climbing. In the 1970’s, Jimmie was the director of the Eastern Mountain Sports Climbing School in North Conway, New Hampshire.
Jimmie now lives in Colorado Springs with his wife Hellen and son CharlieJoe.
Jameson Fleck
Senior Guide
Jameson is a local Colorado climber who discovered his passion for rock climbing over two decades ago, since then he’s been traveling the west exploring new climbing areas and repeating the classics. He says you don’t have to look far for amazing rock in Colorado and get follow in the footsteps of some of the legendary climbers who defined this sport. When he’s not climbing he spends time with his wife and dogs exploring the untouched corners of the state looking for first ascents to push his limits and grow the sport for generations to come.