Bozeman, MT (December 15, 2014)-- The recipients of the 2015 Mugs Stump Award were announced at the Bozeman Ice Festival on Thursday. The award, a collaborative effort of Alpinist Magazine, Black Diamond Equipment, Ltd., Mountain Gear, Patagonia, Inc., and W.L. Gore & Associates, Inc., was created in 1993 in memory of Mugs Stump, one of North America's most visionary climbers. In the 23 years since its inception, the Mugs Stump Award has provided $400,000 in grants to small teams pursuing climbing objectives that exemplify light, fast and clean alpinism.

"This was perhaps the strongest group of applications we've ever seen," said Michael Kennedy, one of the grant's founders. "It will be exciting to follow these climbers as they pursue their alpine dreams all over the world." Eleven teams with outstanding talent and objectives will receive a total of $38,500 in grants.

2015 Mugs Stump Award recipients:

Revelation Mountains, Alaska Range, Alaska. Chris Thomas and Rick Vance will fly into the remote Revelation Mountains, in a southwesterly pocket of the Alaska Range, to attempt several new routes on its 8,000' and 9,000' peaks. "[T]o be honest, we were so excited about the huge number of options available in the relatively untapped Revelation mountain range that we couldn't pick just one," says Thomas. Their objectives include a first ascent of unclimbed Peak 9304 by its 4,000' southwest face; a new route on the steep and technical west face of Pyramid Peak (8,572'); and the first route up the runnel-streaked north face of Golgotha (8,940').

Mt. Deborah, Hayes Range, Alaska. Elliot Gaddy, Bayard Russell and Michael Wejchert will return for their second attempt on the unclimbed south face of Mt. Deborah (12,540'). In spring 2013, the trio established base camp below the face, expecting to try a 4,500' line connecting sharp buttresses to the peak's long, corniced summit ridge. "After two weeks of prolonged cold [as low as -40ºF], we were unable to make an alpine-style attempt," Wejchert says. "We are hungry to return."

Shispare Sar, Hunza Region, Pakistan. Veteran alpinists Doug Chabot, Steve Su and Rusty Willis will return to the Karakoram in pursuit of "the most promising untried line" Chabot says he's ever laid eyes on. Shispare Sar (7611m) has seen two previous ascents, by a Polish/German team in 1975 and by six Japanese climbers in 1995. Each ascent was aided by more than 1000m of fixed rope. Chabot, Su and Willis plan to climb the north face in alpine style, without fixed ropes or fixed camps.

Latok I and Ogre II, Charakusa Valley, Pakistan. Kyle Dempster and Scott Adamson will spend more than three months in the Karakoram next summer, attempting light and fast ascents of two storied alpine objectives: the North Face of Ogre II (6960m) and the North Ridge of Latok I (7145m). "An ascent of either will be a milestone for Karakoram climbing and its history," Dempster says. "It would also mark a personal achievement that would frame a lifetime of alpine pursuits." This trip will mark Dempster's third attempt on these two objectives.

Ogre II, Charakusa Valley, Pakistan. The trio of Will Mayo, Josh Wharton and Stanislav Vrba will also attempt the North Face of Ogre II, where they'll find difficult and sustained mixed climbing and a lack of bivy options to the summit ridge.

Unclimbed Towers, Sam Ford Fjord, Greenland. In 2014, Mike Libecki made his eighth trip to the east coast of Greenland, travelling 600 miles by boat, kayak and foot. Along the way, he found a handful of steep granite towers ranging from 800-1400m tall. "There is not evidence of any kind of climbing or exploration at all, on or near these walls and towers other than by [me] and my partners," Libecki says. In 2015, he and Ethan Pringle seek to free climb each of these by the steepest and longest natural lines they can find.

Svarog and Main Parus, Ashat Gorge, Kyrgyzstan. Jewell Lund and Angela Van Wiemeersch will pursue new routes on two 5000m peaks in the lesser-known Ashat Gorge, adjacent to the well-travelled Ak-Su and Karavshin valleys. They'll follow a narrow line of ice to the unclimbed summit of Svarog (ca. 5000m), and take one of several options up the intricate northwest face of Main Parus (5053m).

Nuptse East, Khumbu Region, Nepal. Colin Haley and Ueli Steck will team up to make the first pure alpine-style ascent of the infamous South Pillar of Nuptse East (7804m). After attempts by Jeff Lowe, Mark Twight, Barry Blanchard, Steve House, Marko Prezelj, and others, Valeriy Babanov and Yuri Koshelenko summited in 2003 by fixing lines up to 6400m. "I do not object to Babanov's decision to fix ropes on the route," Haley says, "but I do believe that the original and greater challenge remains and is as relevant as ever: to climb the route in alpine style."

K6 Central, Nangma Valley, Pakistan. Young alpinists Scott Bennett and Graham Zimmerman will join veterans Mark Richey and Steve Swenson in pursuit of the unclimbed central summit (7100m) of the K6 massif. As two teams of two, they will skirt objective hazard by climbing a steep pillar that rises directly up the south face to the summit. For Bennett, "This expedition is not only an opportunity for a group of strong alpinists to visit a significant unclimbed objective, but also a fantastic opportunity for a sharing of knowledge between two generations of alpinists."

Hathi Parbat, Garhwal Himalaya, India. Though Hathi Parbat (6727m), an oblong peak in Nanda Devi National Park, was first climbed by an Indian team over 50 years ago, its southwest face remains unexplored. In 2015, Bozeman climbers Anne Gilbert Chase and Jason Thompson will attempt the complex face in alpine style, weaving between steep snow, ice and a broad rock face to top the 1500m wall and continue to the summit.

Ngadi Chuli, Mansiri Himal, Nepal. Justin Griffin and Skiy DeTray will venture to the massive south face of Ngadi Chuli (aka Peak 29; 7871m), immediately south of Manaslu. They believe the face, estimated 2700m tall, to be "one of the great unclimbed challenges of this generation," Griffin says.

These climbers--and all of this year's Mugs Stump Award applicants--share Mugs' vision of climbing as a celebration of boldness, purity and simplicity. For more information on the Mugs Stump Award, including reports from previous years, please visit mugsstumpaward.com.

Contact: Michael Kennedy, 970-309-4651, mkclimb@comcast.net

Over 13 days in November, twenty-two-year-old Marc-Andre Leclerc fired a series of demanding ice and mixed routes lines in the Canadian Rockies. It was his first visit to the Icefield Parkway and first time using ice tools on limestone.

"You know how you hear stories of people who climb 10 to 15 days in a row because they are so excited?" Leclerc said over the phone. "I can't take rest days on ice climbing trips."

Leclerc has been scampering up rock and in the mountains for 11 years and ice climbing for the past seven. A year ago he climbed 32 pitches on Squamish's Chief in 17 hours. In an interview about the climb, Chris Geisler said, "This is just the beginning, just warming up, before Marc actually knows what he'll truly be able to accomplish." [Read more on Leclerc's Squamish link-up in our September 5, 2013 Feature.--Ed.]

This year, Leclerc kicked off his Rockies climbing spree on November 8 by establishing a difficult new mixed route directly through the Storm Creek Headwall with Jon Walsh. The Plum (WI6 M7) follows a cascade of thin ice flows for 120 meters. Walsh called Leclerc's Pitch 1 lead "the best first lead in the Rockies [he's] ever witnessed."

A few days later Leclerc camped for two days on the Icefield Parkway, weathering -30 Celsius at the base of Mt. Andromeda. He attempted to solo Shooting Gallery (IV 90 degrees), named for its frequent rockfall, but poor conditions forced him to retreat.

The next day he intended to solo Professor Falls (III WI4). He erred on the approach and instead ascended a drainage below Sacre Bleu he thinks is unclimbed. The line consisted of 10 pitches of sustained M5 climbing including a thin, freestanding pillar he rated WI5+. He finished on Sacre Bleu, which climbed like WI6, "but I might have just been a bit tired [and] scared," he said. Jon Walsh on the first ascent of The Plum (WI5 M8, 110m), on the Stanley Creek Headwall, established on November 8. Once week later, Leclerc, Walsh and Joshua Lavigne established Magic Bullet (WI3 M7, 110m) on the south end of Weeping Wall near Polar Circus. Neither the of the new routes has bolts. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

The next day, November 16, the trio of Leclerc, Walsh and Joshua Lavigne headed to the Weeping Wall.

At 9 a.m. the team started up their new line Magic Bullet, on the south end of Weeping Wall near Polar Circus. They soloed the easy first 30 meters, then Leclerc led a thin WI3+ before Walsh entered the crux, a long pitch with three overhangs rated M7. Both Lavigne and Leclerc followed free. Lavigne told Alpinist he believes Raphael Slawinski and Ian Welsted had previously attempted part of the route.

Two days later, on November 18, Leclerc and Lavigne headed up Mt. Chephren (3266m) to climb The Wild Thing. Not only did they complete a rare, one-day ascent of this circa 1400m mixed route, they did so without bivying at the base on either the approach or descent. They freed the route in 18 hours and made a swift, 29-hour round-trip. When Peter Arbic, Barry Blanchard and Ward Robinson established Wild Thing in March 1987, it took them three long days. Jon Walsh and Jon Simms climbed the route free in 2008, with a variation to avoid an A3 section, rating it WI5 M7. Leclerc and Lavigne followed Walsh and Simms' line of ascent.

The team carried one 80m rope, a light rack, puffy jackets and a stove. Lavigne led the crux just before dark. He encountered the hardest moves on the pitch with his last protection--two stubby ice screws in rotten ice--three body lengths below him. Below that was a tied off knifeblade. "It was a no-fall situation," said Leclerc. They rated that section of the route M7 R/X. The northeast face of Mt. Chephren (3266m), Banff National Park. Beginning at 7:15 a.m. on November 18, Leclerc and Lavigne climbed The Wild Thing (VI 5.9+ M7), reaching the summit at 1:00 a.m. the following day. [Photo] courtesy Marc-Andre Leclerc

Difficult climbing continued through the upper half of the face. "We had to do runout drytooling pitch after pitch by headlamp. It was more freaky than hard," said Leclerc. "We kept wondering when we would get to the top."

Summiting at 1:00 a.m., the team shivered around their stove and melted snow, waiting for sunrise. At one point, still under darkness, Leclerc rapped off a single pounded-in nut only to discover, as he neared the end of his rope, that it didn't reach a ledge. He then locked off his device, removed his pack and dug out slings to construct prusiks. He ascended the rope by the light of his fading headlamp. Back at the top, he found Lavigne asleep near the anchor. Lavigne leading The Wild Thing's crux pitch, rated M7 and in R/X conditions. The snow chimneys above Lavigne are "burly and poorly protected," Leclerc told Alpinist. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

They descended at first light and reached their car midmorning.

At 4:00 a.m. the next day, November 21, Leclerc caught a ride in a van with a team of climbers heading to the Weeping Wall. He made a solo enchainment of the Polar Circus (WI5, 700m) and Weeping Wall Right (IV WI4-5).

Arriving back at the van at last light, Leclerc found it locked. Using his ice axe as a jimmy, he opened one of the van's small windows, hooked a sleeping bag and jacket and pulled them out. He spent the next five hours sleeping by the side of the vehicle until his friends arrived.

Now, a few weeks later, Leclerc is in Argentina on a three-month climbing trip. With southern Patagonia, Valle Frey and Aconcagua all on his ticklist, we doubt he'll have time or patience for rest days.

Sources: Joshua Lavigne, Marc-Andre Leclerc, Jon Walsh, summitpost.org, climbing.com, canadianrockiesice.com

Alan Rousseau paused, breathing hard at 6200 meters above sea level. Lifting his arms out of the neck-deep snow, he used his ice tools to clear his path upward. The light, faceted flakes sloughed back onto him, but he burrowed upward; his partner, Tino Villanueva, followed behind. The motions repeated for 60 meters. Another pitch higher, he and Villanueva emerged on the summit of Pachermo (6275m).

Over seven weeks in October and November, Americans Rousseau and Villanueva climbed 2700 meters of technical new terrain in Nepal's Rolwaling Himal. They made a Grade V ascent of Pachermo's west face and reached 1500 meters on Tengi Ragi Tau (6938m) before descending, unable to find a safe bivy option.

Their expedition is one of several small climbing teams visiting the broad, U-shaped valley this season. "We were blown away by how much action was going on in the Rolwaling this year. There was no one else there on our last trip," Rousseau told Alpinist. "I think more people are going in there because the peaks are steep, super intimidating, and there is lots of new-routing potential." [Read about ascents of Chukyima Go (6258m) and Chekigo (ca. 6260m) in the December 5, 2014 NewsWire.--Ed.]

Rousseau and Villanueva first traveled to the Rolwaling in November 2012, when they made a number of climbs in light style. Six hundred meters of exposed M4 brought them to the summit of Pt. 5766, and they climbed Langmoche Ri (ca. 6600m) by its northwest ridge, an ascent that consisted mostly of steep, aerated snice. They'd hoped to try the unclimbed north ridge of Tengi Ragi Tau, but high winds and low temperatures deterred them.

On that trip, they learned to expect slow, difficult climbing on the Rolwaling's ridges, so this year they sought direct routes up open faces. They chose a line up the 1200m west face of Pachermo -- a mountain that is frequently climbed via its north ridge by trekkers and acclimatizing alpinists, Villanueva says. Touching the Void author Joe Simpson knows it as the peak where, in 1991, he dislocated an ankle, ruptured a nostril and broke a cheekbone in a 200m fall.

Streams of solid neve and water-ice amid granite rock composed the lower face, but the desirable terrain dissolved into deep, unconsolidated snow as they moved higher. The pair summited after 12 hours of climbing. They followed the north ridge back to base camp in strong winds.

Next, they aimed for Tengi Ragi Tau, one of the higher summits in the Rolwaling Himal. Despite a number of attempts since the Nepali government opened the mountain and 102 others to climbing in 2002, the main summit of Tengi Ragi Tau has seen just two ascents. That year, a Japanese-Nepali team made its first and second ascent in siege style by the 1600m southeast face. The average age of the six Japanese members was 59 years.

This autumn, the Americans started up the untrammeled western aspect and reached 6200m before making camp. "All night we heard objects whizzing past us, with fortunately only small objects bouncing off our ultra-thin tent," Rousseau told climbing.com. Though they made consistent progress the following day, the available bivy spots at 6500m were even more exposed to debris.

"Tino did not feel the rib offered enough protection. We debated for a bit, but I told Tino a vote to descend always trumps a vote to go on when a partner feels the situation is unsafe." Rousseau wrote to Alpinist. "I was struck by a piece of ice on our first rappel so maybe he had a point."

Twenty-five rappels and more than eight hours later, their feet touched the base of the mountain again.

Sources: Alan Rousseau, Tino Villanueva, 2003, 2010 and 2013 American Alpine Journals, The Game of Ghosts, climbing.com

[This story was first published on pataclimb.com on December 29, 2014.--Ed.]

On December 27, Austrian alpinist Markus Pucher free soloed the Ragni route (M4 90 degrees, 600m) on the west face of Cerro Torre for the second time. He had free soloed this route back in early 2013, when he blazed up it in a mere 3:15. What was unique about his recent ascent is that it was carried out during a raging storm. No other ascent was done that day in the entire massif. Most climbers stayed safely inside the warmth of their hostels.

Markus started from Filo Rosso at around 6 a.m. There was much fresh snow on the way to the Col de la Esperanza so breaking trail was heavy work. The mountain was completely enshrouded in clouds, and therefore visibility was very limited. At the col, he stopped to have a cigarette and noticed two climbers below and to the right. They were on their way down, having judged the conditions too severe to continue. At the base of the Elmo formation he found a small cave that offered shelter. Here he smoked his second cigarette of the day. Smoking a cigarette from time to time, he says, gives him a sense of normalcy, bringing him back to the mundane and out of the wild energy that surrounded him.

Above, the mixed pitches were entirely snow covered, so it took much effort to find the way. He went too far to the left and had to negotiate some stiff M6 climbing. The headwall was also covered by a veil of snow, and the ice below was very hard, so as the ground got steeper and steeper he had to fight off a growing pump. Visibility was so poor and the terrain so severely snow covered that he failed to notice the end of the headwall and kept climbing up on the vertical ground to the right. After correcting his mistake, he tackled the first mushroom, where a vertical step led to a tunnel. At the end of the tunnel he found a sheltered alcove and had his third cigarette of the day.

Pucher pauses to photograph himself during his December 27 solo ascent of the Ragni route on Cerro Torre. [Photo] Markus Pucher

It was 7 p.m. when he reached the summit. It had taken him seven hours from the plateau below the Col de la Esperanza. In the middle of a raging storm, the summit of Cerro Torre felt like the center of the universe. But the adventure had barely started. To descend he had only brought a 60m 7mm rope and three ice-screws. He knew he had to hurry because the night would be upon him soon. Of all the anchors that usually can be found on the route, he was only able to find two of them, so it took much creativity to get down.

Pucher matches his tools while free soloing high on Cerro Torre [Photo] Markus Pucher

Visibility was still very poor, and he was unsure where the Col de la Esperanza was. He down climbed too far to the north, finding himself again on vertical ground. When his feet hit rock below he realized he was in the wrong place. As he started climbing back up, another Vertical Limit moment happened, when the ice he was climbing cracked horizontally, barely below his axes. He says he owed his luck to the talisman that his daughter had given him.

Finally he found the Col de la Esperanza and continued down the easy ground below. By now it was completely dark. Half an hour later, his headlamp gave out. When his foot punched through a crevasse, he built a dead-man above it and dropped inside. Here he found a small cave that provided shelter. It was midnight. He had no stove, no water and no food. For his first 20 minutes he felt warm, but a deep, biting cold set in. He spent the following five hours punching the air, doing squats, jumping, doing anything he could to stay warm.

As soon as it was light outside, he carried on. Past the mixed climbing, he found himself on a steep snow slope that was loaded with a meter of fresh snow. An avalanche could take him any minute, but he had no option but to continue down.

He reached his camp at Filo Rosso at 7 a.m., after 25 hours on the go. This had been one of the most harrowing ascents in Patagonian climbing history. He made soup, and then decided that he had better get out of there. The 12-hour walk back to Chalten was peaceful and effortless. He had just lived the most intense experience of his life. Nothing was in the way anymore. He thought of his two daughters, reflected on past behavior and felt content, at peace. After 25 hours balancing on a knife-edge, here was a much richer man.

Postscript: Last week pataclimb.com published a long rant on risk management. This week they celebrate risk taking. They are well aware of the apparent contradiction this implies. They hope you can grasp the difference between one and the other. What you just read is an account of one of the most impressive ascents in Patagonia climbing history, carried out by one of the fittest and most capable men around. This is an alpinist in his prime, taking serious--albeit calculated--risks, fully aware of his predicament, even if at times not fully in control of the situation.

On December 28, Ian Parnell and I established a bold, piton-free route with an X, 9 rating on the steepest part of Clogwyn Du in North Wales. Wide Asleep, 60 meters spread over two pitches, takes a line up the center of the overhanging face. The crux is steep, pumpy and insecure on poor hooks and has nasty fall potential should you fluff a move or fail to find gear while hanging out in a strenuous position. All the gear was placed on lead, though the decision not to carry pins was more to save weight than to take an ethical stance.

Clogwyn Du is an intense cliff, and there are few easy lines. On many of the routes, as soon as you leave the ground, you're straight into the meat of a steep mixed climb. Most of them are steeper than they appear. It can be difficult to get a handle on the angles. Turf, solidly frozen, plays an important role in forming pick placements.

Welsh mixed climbing comes into condition infrequently and is quick to disappear in a thaw. Because of this ephemeral quality, it feels very special. North Wales is already well-known internationally for its brilliant traditional rock climbing. In good winters, the mixed and ice climbing is equally brilliant--just don't plan any trips around it.

Our new route is steeper than the typical trad and mixed routes found at Clogwyn Du. It isn't a jug-fest, and requires a steady approach and good fitness. Ian said it was by far the hardest thing he's ever been on, and he's completed many high-caliber routes over many years. If it holds the grade, this climbs will represent one of few onsights of the this difficulty in the UK. I'm still surprised it went onsight.

The ascent is certainly one of the best moments in climbing I've ever had, and I can't think of many situations that compare to this one. It was hard and dangerous. While climbing, it felt like I was observing myself from deep within. What normally happens on first ascent attempts on steeper routes is you give in before you get yourself into a position where you're in danger of succeeding. In this case, I hung on until the top.

Results from the 2015 Ouray Elite Mixed Competition, which took place on January 10, are in. "I love the creativity of the finals route and how it represented real climbing," said competitor Jen Olson. A single move involving crossing the crack on an inverted tool placement stymied most climbers who got that high on the route.

(Top) Ines Papert falling off the finals route. She took fifth place. [Photo] Heidi Wirtz (Bottom) Jen Olson shakes out on the finals route. She placed fourth. [Photo] Emily Harrington

Men

Will Gadd
Simon Duverney
Andres Marin
Sam Elias
Justin Willis
Mathieu Maynadier
Ryan Vachon
Kyle Dempster
Jason Nelson
Mael Baguet
Chance Ronemus
Will Mayo
Kurt Ross
Adam Daily
Carter Stritch
Marcus Garcia
Jedrzej Jablonski
Phil Wortmann
Luke Lydiard
Aaron Montgomery

Women

Angelika Rainer
Sarah Hueniken
Katie Bono
Jen Olson
Ines Papert
Emily Harrington
Kendra Stritch
Dawn Glanc
Sasha DiGiulian
Beth Goralski

On January 14, after more than seven years of preparation and attempts, Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson made a final, 19-day push to complete the much-touted first free ascent of Yosemite's most difficult route: the Dawn Wall (5.14d, 3,000').

The climb has received international media attention from agencies including CBS News, NBC News and The Guardian. The New York Times dubbed it "El Cap's Most Unwelcoming Route," and "world's toughest." Despite 30- to 40-degree temperatures on the Valley floor, crowds gathered in quantities commonly seen only in the summer months. San Jose Mercury News posted a live video stream of the final four pitches.

(Top) January 14, Day 19: Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson on top of the wall after completing the most difficult and sustained route on El Cap: the Dawn Wall (5.14d, 3,000'). [Photo] Chris Burkard | (Bottom) Jorgeson, belayed by Caldwell, on Pitch 15 (5.14d). [Photo] Tom Evans

"It's a circus," Alex Honnold says over the phone. "It's outrageous. It's like nothing I've ever seen in the Valley. It's the middle of January, and I pulled up to the Meadow and couldn't find parking." Honnold is one of several people to visit the climbers on the wall these past few weeks.

Caldwell's free version of the Dawn Wall has 12 pitches of 5.13 and six of 5.14, including back-to-back 5.14ds--now Yosemite's two hardest pitches. In addition to standard cams and nuts, the duo protected moves with aid gear: copperheads, beaks and other pitons. They also used Warren Harding's aging rivets from the first ascent of the Wall of Early Morning Light, which parallels much of the Dawn Wall line.

El Cap with the Dawn Wall's free line drawn in. [Photo] Tom Evans

"On Pitch 17, Kevin had two thunder-clings [underclings using thumbs only] on a near-vertical slab and then dynoed what looked four to five feet left," Berkompas says.

Yosemite Bigwalls co-author Erik Sloan, who's also visited the team several times on the wall, describes the terrain as "face [climbing] with crack holds. You see all these chalked holds and you say, 'Oh I wonder if that's a foot, but it's a [hand] hold.'"

senderfilms.com

Caldwell has been freeing El Cap routes since climbing the Salathe Wall in 1999. He established the first free ascents of Lurking Fear (VI 5.14a), Dihedral Wall (VI 5.14a), West Buttress (VI 5.13c) and Magic Mushroom (VI 5.14a) and began work on the 30-pitch Dawn Wall route in 2007. Jorgeson was an accomplished highball boulderer, but had never climbed El Cap. He joined Caldwell on the route in 2009.

Throughout the years, the project has been stalled by both weather and injuries. In 2011, Jorgeson fell from the famous dyno, tearing ligaments in his ankle. Caldwell was injured during an attempt in 2013 when a 30-pound haulbag popped off a bolt and directly onto his harness, separating a rib from his sternum.

Jorgeson on Pitch 16 (5.14a). [Photo] Tom Evans

Warren Harding's ascent of the Wall of Early Morning Light (VI 5.9 A3) with Dean Caldwell (no relation to Tommy), in 1970, also received heavy media attention. They carried with them more than 300 pounds of supplies, including wine and brandy. Partway up the cliff, they ran dangerously low on provisions, refused support and rejected the offer of a rescue. Their climb required 27 days--twice the time anyone had previously spent on the wall at one time--and 328 drilled holes to complete. More than 100 reporters and friends greeted them on the summit. Royal Robbins chopped the first two pitches of bolts before recognizing the beauty of the line, recanting his outrage and continuing to the summit. Regardless, "the climb caused a rupture in the friendship of the two protagonists and resulted in much breast-beating from pundits and peripheral observers," states Steve Roper in Camp 4: Recollections of a Yosemite Rockclimber.

The Dawn Wall project has stirred some controversy of its own, for the surrounding media coverage and for Caldwell and Jorgeson's manner of ascent. "The style is a throwback to the '50s siege climbing [and] some locals are unhappy about this circus," El Cap Report photographer and blogger Tom Evans says. Caldwell placed several bolts on rappel, pre-examined pitches extensively, fixed crucial gear placements and scraped broad strokes of chalk on the wall (which wash off in the rain) to outline hard-to-see holds. His ascent has been aided, at times, by a support crew, from both the ground and summit. The team shared the wall with videographers and photographers who documented their ascent.

Over the course of this winter's attempt to finish the climb, Sloan and his partner have Jumared up to the climbers' camp five times with supply loads weighing in at 120 to 150 pounds. "Tommy and Kevin put a huge amount of work in. We just do the supplies. I take trash and poop away. It's glamorous."

Even with extensive assistance, Caldwell had doubts they would succeed. "The Dawn Wall looks harder than any other big-wall free climbing I've done," he said in a video outtake from Valley Uprising. He wondered aloud, "Can I do this? Will I ever be able to do this?"

The first of El Cap's 100-plus routes to be freed was the Salathe Wall (VI 5.13b), completed by Paul Piana and Todd Skinner over 30 days in 1988. Five years later, Lynn Hill freed the Nose (VI 5.14a) in four days after a rehearsal of the route. Hill returned a year later for the one-day ascent. This autumn, Honnold climbed the the Muir Wall (VI 5.13c/d) in merely 12 hours. The Dawn Wall marks the 14th free route on El Cap.

Though free climbing El Cap has gained popularity, annual aid ascents still outnumber successful free climbs of the wall. Large blank sections, overcome by aid climbers using pendulums, hook moves and bolt ladders, severely limit all-free ascents. The hardest pitches of the Dawn Wall route climb through several such blank spots, showing that more of this kind of hyper-difficult free climb might be possible elsewhere Yosemite Valley and beyond--perhaps only through years of work by the world's free-climbing elite. "It would almost certainly be a multi-year project for me as well," says Honnold, who has no plans to attempt the route.

After two decades spent in the Meadow looking through his telephoto lens at climbers on the wall, Evans knows this ascent is different. In one report, he admitted to being overcome with emotion after watching Jorgeson succeed on a crux pitch that had stymied him for several days. "It was a geniune emotion. It was so wonderful. I know how hard he worked for that," he says.

Tommy Caldwell makes a feast in the portaledge. [Photo] Kevin Jorgeson

In the last week of the ascent, Jorgeson balked at Pitch 15's 5.14d moves on the smallest, sharpest hold of the route--while Caldwell climbed on. Three days later, Jorgeson joined him at Wino Tower nine pitches below the top.

"[That] night on Wino was really emotional," Berkompas told Alpinist two days before the team topped out. "I think these guys are ready to get off the wall. Everyone smells like urine. They're dirty, they're smelly, they want to walk again."

[Video] Kevin Jorgeson/Adidas Outdoor

Last November 21 through 23, six members of a French expedition to Antarctica--Antoine Cayrol, David Lacoste, Paul Dudas, Emmanuel Chance, Laurent Bibollet, Yann Delevaux--made the first traverse of the "Seven Sisters," a string of dark, rocky, snow-covered peaks above Port Lockroy, on Wiencke Island in the Palmer Archipelago. The natural harbour of Port Lockroy has long been a favorite disembarking spot for cruise ships, and even features a post office and gift shop. Just above it, the Seven Sisters trail off along a stark, serrated ridge from the island's high point of Savoia Peak (1415m).

On November 21, a Zodiac dropped off the team at the toe of their "first" sister, the southwestern-most Janssen Peak (1085m), likely first ascended in 2000, via its east face, by a New Zealand team (Richard and Lizzie Craddock, Anton Woperis and Mike Roberts). Starting at sea level, the French climbed Janssen by its south side. They encountered five hundred meters of snow and ice up to fifty-five degrees, and a three-meter vertical step just below the summit. Topping out at 5 p.m., the climbers followed a "very fine snowy ridge" to tag Jansen's second summit, then made ten rappels down the south side to bivouac at Janssen's bergschrund.

The next day, the team circumnavigated Janssen via its southeast side and then climbed three hundred meters of snow and ice to regain the saddle between Janssen and the second sister. The ridge crest led to an overhanging snow mushroom, where the men made one rappel to the ridge's east side then climbed two pitches featuring eighty-degree ice and sixty-degree snow to the summit. A sharp arete led onward; now the team made three rappels off deadman anchors amidst a huge snow mushroom to reach the saddle below sister No. 3, climbed via steep (sixty- to seventy-degree) snow. Three more rappels along the ridge led to the col below sister No. 4, surmounted via a section of sixty-five degree snow and a serac skirted along its east side.

Sister No. 5 featured fifty-degree snow slopes and a blind descent in the "worst fog ever" along a gentler incline. Sister No. 6 included more steep snow (two sections at seventy degrees) and two rappels off the summit to a wide, flat glacier. The men tagged their seventh peak, the northernmost sister (aka the First Sister), at 7 a.m. on November 23, and then made eight rappels down a wide colouir on the Lockroy side to return to their sailboat, the Podorange. All told, they had traversed more than eleven kilometers on a "very long, committed and exposed climb" graded TD+.

While some of the sisters (Janssen and the First Sister) had been climbed previously, the ridge had not been traversed in its entirety, despite its prominence and proximity to Savoia Peak, the first real mountain climbed on the Antarctic Peninsula, during Jean-Baptiste Charcot's 1903-'05 French expedition to the continent. In 2004-2005, a mostly British team visiting the area aboard Alan Hubbard's yacht Gambo tried the traverse three times, only to be bouted by bad weather. Australian climber and Antarctica climbing historian/explorer Damien Gildea said that the maritime snow at low altitudes, as on the Seven Sisters Traverse, is often sketchy. "Generally, the rock there is not great," he says. "The problem with these ridge climbs there is that prolonged periods of good weather melt the crest and cornices, chunks fall off, and make big gaps in the ridge that stop climbers. Sometimes more snow is good."

To close out the expedition, the French team members also made a first ski/snowboard descent of a steep (fifty-five-degree) colouir on Mount Janssen on November 26, as well as the first ascent of the southeast tower (700m, TD/TD+) of nearby Cape Renard on December 1, with an M5/seventy-degree ice crux right below the summit. The latter climbed they named Voie Podronard, after their sailboat.

Sources: Damien Gildea, American Alpine Journals: 2000, 2002, 2005 and 2010, expeantarctique2014.com

On January 11, Lonnie Dupre became the first person to solo Denali (20,320') during this cold, dark month. [Photo] Richard Moore

On Sunday, January 11, the polar adventurer Lonnie Dupre, of Grand Marais, Minnesota, stood atop Denali (20,320'), having become the first person to make a January solo ascent of the mountain. His one-man expedition, which began December 18 when he was dropped off at Kahiltna Basecamp with thirty-four days of supplies, marked the fourth year he'd attempted to solo the mountain in winter. In 2011 Dupre reached 17,200 feet only to be trapped for a week by a ferocious storm; in 2012 he reached 15,400 feet; and in 2013 he reached 17,200 feet again only to have to turn around a final time. Dupre had summited the peak in 2010 with three partners over thirteen days, and he had spent sixty days total on the flanks of Denali during his previous winter attempts; his 2015 climb brought his total number of winter days on Denali to ninety.

Self portrait, at 16,900 feet, taken during a previous attempt to solo the mountain in 2013. [Photo] Lonnie Dupre

Dupre's choice of ascent in 2015 was the West Buttress, the trade route up the mountain. Only one other party has topped out Denali in January, the Russians Artur Testov and Vladimir Ananich, on January 16, 1998, also via the West Buttress. (The third member of their team, Alexander Nikiforov, waited for them in a snow cave at 14,200 feet.) A mere sixteen people--members of nine expeditions--have summited Denali in winter; six deaths have occurred during those climbs. Four of these nine expeditions were solo, but none of the previous solo climbers summited in January, a time of year with six or fewer hours of daylight, winds that can top 100 mph, and temperatures well down to -30 to -40 degrees. As the Alaska climber Jeff Benowitz puts it, in such conditions, the extreme cold and lack of sunlight make it hard to dry out your sleeping bag, which "night after night starts to become a sack of ice crystals."

Dupre is certainly not the first solitary climber to suffer such harsh winter weather in the Alaska Range. Among other soloists, the Japanese climber Masatoshi Kuriaki once stated in an Alpinist interview that he had spent 706 days total by himself in the range during the coldest months. On March 10, 2007, Kuriaki had made the first winter solo of Mt. Foraker (aka: "Sultana"), summiting while the air temperature was -50 F, with a 20-30-knot gale dropping it to -100 F. Anyone who attempts these peaks, so close to the Arctic Circle, in winter must be prepared to suffer--and to work, hard. Low on the mountain, Dupre pulled a sled with 165 pounds of supplies; on the upper slopes, he portaged his gear in a pack. Here he shares more details of his ascent in an interview.

Self portrait, from 12,000 feet, taken during an attempt in 2013. [Photo] Lonnie Dupre

Did you experience 100 mph winds?

The highest winds I experienced were 80 mph based on my past twenty-five years of running around the Arctic. I wasn't carrying an anemometer. You can tell the speed of the wind by [whether] you can stand up or not. It's impossible to walk around outside when it's blowing around at 80 mph; I was in a snow cave. When the wind gets at high velocity like that, it sounds like a train. To survive in snow caves, you have to make sure the snow is consolidated because otherwise your snow shelter can get excavated [by] the wind. You're safer in a cave than you are in a tent in the wind. You always have to think about the winds--where they are coming from and where they are the strongest.

Being caught out in the wind is bad. You just have to stop and dig in. I would dig down a 4' x 4' x 4' cube and then trench out my feet and roster out snow blocks for the roof and pile fresh snow on top. The modified snow shelter that I built is superior to a snow cave. In other snow caves, you lie down and shovel out. It's better to be on your feet, dig straight down and make snow blocks for the roof.

Did you carry/wear a ladder, to keep from falling into crevasses?

I've used a ladder, which is heavy and awkward. Another year, I used aluminum poles prussiked to my harness. Then I used a twelve-and-a-half-foot by three-inch skinny spruce pole to keep out of crevasses. It's the longest pole I can fit into an airplane.

I always think it's better to be hanging precariously by your spruce pole than stuck in a crevasse. If you go down a crevasse and you get wedged, you're finished. There are ways [to] wedge the pole in the ice and prussik up it. It's almost like having a ladder. My skis [provide] 90 percent of my protection [and] keep [me] from going down in the crevasse in the first place. Nothing's fail-safe though.

Tell me a bit about your skis.

They're specially designed from yellow birch from my property in northeast Minnesota, in Grand Marais ("big swamp" in French). [The wood] is very tough and can be laminated very well.

The tree was dragged out by draft horses and then cut on a portable land mill and dried for two years. Then I steam vented, added camber, toe and heel work, and shaped the skis to be four inches wide and eight feet long. I pine-tarred them and epoxied the base. This allows the skis to breathe a bit, and having an epoxy bottom gives a smooth glide and helps the skins to stick.

Tell me about the first few hours of your day on Denali.

There is such a short window of light, about four to six hours a day. In the middle of December, you only have five-plus hours of usable light; by the end of January, you have seven. I'd turn on my headlamp, get the frost out of my tent, take the sleeping bag outside so it doesn't get frosty, melt water and cook goat milk and granola, rice pudding and [dehydrated] huevos rancheros.

[I'd] tie my sleeping bag to the tent stay [so it won't blow away], rub it in the snow to have it suck up moisture and then scrap the snow off and bang the sleeping bag good to get the rest of the snow off. [Then I'd] just roll it up and put a rope around it. No sense freezing your fingers stuffing it in a bag.

How did you pass the time when you weren't climbing?

Because the days are short with long nights, when I was stuck in one spot and short of supplies, I would go into hibernation mode. I just stayed in my sleeping bag as long as I could. I broke my old record of sixteen hours and did several days of nineteen hours. It's good to get out once or twice a day to get your muscles moving, so you don't atrophy [and to] do chores no matter how mundane they may be [such as] shovel snow and make extra snow blocks.

Do you picture your loved ones back home to pass the time?

When those things creep in, the only way you can get through is to compartmentalize. You have to remove them from the front of your brain. Not to be uncaring--it's just a matter of survival. It takes years of experience to deal with it.

What was the cold like?

A January ascent is cold and dark, mainly. My forte prior to Denali was having a lot of polar experience. My training happened over the past couple of decades. I've experienced -58 F without windchill on the North Pole and Greenland. That's so cold that peanut butter shatters like glass, and white fuel pours out like syrup; even steel gets brittle at those temps. Still, you have warm clothes and your body becomes adapted. You need to have reserve in case the crap hits the fan.

Tell me about the recent storm that pinned you down on Denali.

I was stuck at 11,200 feet in a five-and-a-half-day storm. But I only had one-and a-half days of food and two-and-a-half days of fuel with me. I'd cached my supplies a ten-minute ski away [but] the weather was so bad I couldn't go get them. I had to parse out my food, and I was getting cranky.

What links did you maintain with the outside world?

I [brought a] Spot beacon [and satellite phone to] allow my project coordinator, Stevie Plummer, to know where I am and that I'm OK.

What was the most important tool for your success?

My skis, because there was heavy snow. Without my skis, I couldn't even have started. After 11,200 feet, I went up with crampons and a sled. Then, at 14,200 feet, it was crampons and a backpack to 17,000. From 17,000 to the summit, it was crampons and an ice axe--that's all I had.

How did you acclimate?

Simply by double carrying--I basically climbed the mountain twice. I would bring half my equipment up 10,000 feet, then hike back down and camp. I would hop scotch my gear up since I couldn't carry it all up [at once] anyways.

Marc-Andre Leclerc on the second pitch of Standhardt's south face, in a classic Patagonia situation: climbing overhanging 5.10 with boots and crampons clipped to the harness, with amazing scenery behind him. [Photo] Colin Haley

From January 18 through 22, Colin Haley and Marc-Andre Leclerc made the first ascent of what had been dubbed the "Reverse Torre Traverse," a south-to-north enchainment of Cerro Torre, Torre Egger, Punta Herron and Aguja Standhardt in Argentine Patagonia. They called their route, which was first attempted by Bjorn-Eivind Artun and Chad Kellogg in early 2012—and which Haley had also attempted that same year with Jon Walsh only to be stormed off—La Travesia del Oso Buda. The route was named in honor of the late Artun (Bjorn means "bear" in Norwegian, while oso means the same in Spanish; Buda means Buddha) and the late Kellogg (who was Buddhist), the former killed on the Kjerag wall in Norway just weeks after his attempt on the Reverse Torres Traverse, the latter by rockfall on Fitz Roy in 2014.

In 2008, Rolando Garibotti and Haley ran the same ridgeline from north to south for the first ascent of the Torre Traverse, an obvious and iconic prize that climbers had been trying on and off, and exploring in various sections, since the late 1980s. Given the ferocity of Patagonia's storms and winds, and how quickly conditions can morph from dry rock into a rime-covered nightmare on this exposed ridgeline of four towering spires, any successful attempt needs a solid good-weather window of at least a few days. As Garibotti wrote in his write-up of La Travesia at pataclimb.com , the "reverse" direction, while it does involve less overall elevation gain than the 2,200 meters of the Torre Traverse, differs in character in that it entails "much more ice and mixed climbing."

Haley, an alpinist from the Northwest, and Leclerc, a climber based out of Squamish, British Columbia, hiked in to the Col de la Esperanza on January 18 and set up their tent. Starting at 4 a.m. on the 19th, the pair climbed the Via dei Ragni (600m 90 degrees M4) on the west face of Cerro Torre, topping out at 11:50 a.m. They rappelled the Ragni's top three pitches and then set up their tent to nap and wait while Cerro Torre's north face came into the shade and conditions stabilized. At 6 p.m., they began rapping the north face (El Arca de los Vientos), settling in on a snow ledge one pitch above the Egger-Torre Col (Col de la Mentira) at 10 p.m.

Marc-Andre Leclerc leading the sixth pitch of Venas Azules, a couple meters before the climbers realized there was too much rime, and decided to finish on the American route instead. [Photo] Colin Haley

The next morning, the 20th, Haley and Leclerc started up Torre Egger via the unrepeated Venas Azules (350m 95 degrees C1), a steep, futuristic ice line put up by Artun and Ole Lied in 2011. Here, they met their only snafu on the Travesia: five and a half pitches up Venas Azules, the climbers realized that the rime was too heavy to continue. "After the first four pitches, we should have immediately traversed rightwards to join the Americana [route]," Haley wrote in an email. Instead, correcting their error and anxious about having wasted time and energy, they made a single rappel and traversed right, climbing two pitches on the Americana (950m 80 degrees 5+ A4) to move rightward again and finish on the east pillar. The climbers spent the night of the 20th/21st on Egger's summit mushroom, in a comfortable tent bivy.

On January 21, they quickly rapped Egger's north face via the Huber-Schnarf to the Col de Lux, blasted up Punta Herron via its south face (Cara Sur: 80m 75 degrees) and then rappelled Herron's Spigolo dei Bimbi to arrive at 1 p.m. at their final col: the Col de los Suenos between Herron and Standhardt. From there, Leclerc led three new mixed pitches up and to the right to join El Caracol (250m 85 degrees 6a A1), a route Haley and Jorge Ackermann had first-ascended in 2011 and the only established line up Standhardt from the south. As Leclerc wrote in an email, this block of pitches involved "free, aid and ice." Six more ropelengths led to the summit, including Haley's final lead of an overhanging knifeblade seam that, wrote Leclerc, Haley "aided while digging a tunnel through rime" to top out in the gloaming.

"For three days I had been rushing as much as possible," wrote Haley, "but [on this final lead] I finally relaxed and took my time, because with only forty meters left to Standhardt's summit I knew it would take a raging tempest to convince us to turn around."

Colin Haley heading up the third pitch of Venas Azules, during day two of La Travesia del Oso Buda. Venas Azules, says Haley, is a testament to its first ascentionist Bjorn-Eivind Artun's vision and immense optimism: "I've now climbed two-thirds of the route on two occasions, and definitely would still like to go back and climb the whole thing," says Haley. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

The climbers summited at 11:10 p.m. on January 21 and then rapped through the night, reaching the glacier as it became light again and stumbling back into base camp at Niponino around 5 a.m. on January 22.

While Haley is a Patagonia veteran, Leclerc's only previous Patagonia climb had been El Mocho. "On day one, [Marc-Andre's] unfamiliarity with the terrain on Cerro Torre was evident," wrote Haley, "but he adapted amazingly quickly, made an awesome climbing partner for our first-ever climb together, and by day thee he was a veteran of climbing on the Torres." The duo enjoyed good weather for the duration, encountering strong gusts only on their final three rappels off Standhardt. Haley says that while La Travesia doesn't hold any single pitch of extreme difficulty, the challenge lies more in the logistics and endurance required.

Sources: Colin Haley, Marc-Andre Leclerc, pataclimb.com

Cerro Torre as seen from the west. [Photo] Rolando Garibotti

[This story was first published on pataclimb.com on February 2, 2015.--Ed.]

Over the past four decades, Cesare Maestri's claimed ascent of Cerro Torre in 1959 with Toni Egger has been widely discredited (*). An abundance of evidence has shown that their high point was only a quarter of the way up, 300 meters, near the so-called "triangular snowfield." What has remained a mystery is where Egger and Maestri (supported by Cesarino Fava) actually went during the six days that Maestri said their round trip required, and from which Toni Egger never returned.

Maestri was undoubtedly a phenomenal climber and an independent thinker, a vanguardist who deserves respect for his contributions. However, this should not preclude examination of his Cerro Torre claims. In doing so we are trying to establish the facts relating to the first ascent of one of the world's best known mountains. To this day, nobody has ever mounted a fact-based defense of Maestri's 1959 Cerro Torre claim, countering the contradictions, inconsistencies and evidence piled against his story.

Rolando Garibotti on the west face of a small summit immediately north of Col Standhardt holding the photo from Cesare Maestri's book Arrampicare e il Mio Mestiere, which the original caption claimed was of Toni Egger climbing "the lower slabs of Cerro Torre's wall," but which this new image indicates was actually of the climber on the Perfil de Indio, a summit north of Col Standhardt. [Photo] Rolando Garibotti

But proof of Egger and Maestri's whereabouts during those six days was out in the open all along. The previous days of the expedition, with the team portering gear, making day trips to the lower east flanks of Cerro Torre and fixing ropes to the triangular snowfield, were all accounted for and corroborated by Fava's journal, the journals of the three young college students who accompanied them on the expedition and by Maestri's own accounts. In Maestri's book Arrampicare e il Mio Mestiere (Milano, Garzati, 1961) a photo (on a non-numbered page, adjacent to page 64, effectively page 65) taken by Maestri shows the late Toni Egger climbing on what the caption claims are "the lower slabs of Cerro Torre's wall." Two years ago Ermanno Salvaterra and I had noticed the photo while working on a yet unpublished book; Ermanno and I knew the terrain, and it was clear that the photo had not been taken on Cerro Torre. What remained unclear was the actual location. The photo had been cropped in such a way that very little of the background could be seen. About a year ago Kelly Cordes asked me to look into it again, and he recently insisted, so I put forth a more decisive effort. After many hours studying images of the entire valley, with the help of Dorte Pietron, we recognized a feature that matched the photo in question. Bingo!

[Photo] Rolando Garibotti

Maestri's photo of Toni Egger was in fact taken on the west face of Perfil de Indio, a small tower north of the Col Standhardt, between Agujas Standhardt and Aguja Bifida, on the west side of the massif, the opposite side that they claim to have been climbing on.

What is the significance? In Maestri's many accounts of his 1958 and 1959 expeditions, never does he mention climbing on the west side of the massif. The six days when Maestri claims that he and Egger made their final push on Cerro Torre from the east are their only unaccountable days. What really happened during those days? This photograph provides another piece of evidence, and unequivocal proof of a place they went during their expedition that, curiously, Maestri never mentioned. Indeed it is nowhere near the location of his claimed ascent, and certainly no place one would unintentionally wander. Or forget. Perhaps in light of the massive difficulties faced from the east, the pair considered the west face of Cerro Torre, where Walter Bonatti and Carlo Mauri had found a line of weakness and made good progress a year earlier. From their east-side base camp, the only possible way to reach Cerro Torre's west face would be to climb the slopes to the Col Standhardt, and then rappel west (decades later, this would become one of two most common approach routes to the west face). In Maestri's photo, Egger is shown climbing below (west) and immediately north of the Col Standhardt, obviously returning to the east side of the massif. It is an impressive lesson in route finding. In the last decade parties trying to return to that same col from the west have needlessly battled with steep, hard climbing directly up to it. The line chosen by Egger and Maestri is far easier (III). From the Col Standhardt, the pair would have faced a return down the wind-loaded, avalanche-prone slopes that feed into the bottom of the Upper Torre Glacier - where Toni Egger's remains were later found.

[Photo] Rolando Garibotti

Toni Egger's death remains a mystery. Based on this new information it seems possible that he suffered an accident descending from Col Standhardt. The one person who knows what really happened refuses to speak, leaving us to try to piece together the truth. The most troubling aspect of Maestri and Fava's story is that they told inaccurate information to Egger's family regarding his death. Upon their return Maestri and Fave did not bring back any of Toni's clothes, equipment or diaries (Toni was well known for writing detailed entries in his diary) for his family. Toni's sister is still alive. She is in her late 80s, living alone in a small town near Linez, Austria. It is long overdue for Maestri to provide her, and the world, with a truthful explanation of what happened during those six days in 1959.

Toni Egger's last lesson to us is that of clever, ingenious route finding. Hopefully Cesare Maestri's last lesson will be one of integrity, coming clean once and for all.

The original photo taken by Cesare Maestri published in Arrampicare e il Mio Mestiere, page 65. [Photo] Courtesy Rolando Garibotti

What the photo proves:

- that this photo, which Maestri used in his book, was not taken on Cerro Torre as he claims.

- that Egger and Maestri visited the west side of the massif, the opposite side to what Maestri claims, likely to attempt the west face of Cerro Torre (what other objective could have possibly made them want to head that way?).

- that, because no days were unaccounted for, undoubtedly they went there during the six days when Maestri claims they were climbing and descending the east and north face of Cerro Torre.

- that the camera was not lost as Maestri claimed.

* The first publicly expressed doubts were from Carlo Mauri, a renowned alpinist from Lecco, Italy. Later the case was picked-up by Ken Wilson, then editor of Mountain Magazine. Much has been written about the many inconsistencies in Maestri and Fava's accounts, and about what might or might not have actually happened. On top of Wilson's excellent articles, some key publications include Tom Dauer's book Cerro Torre: Mythos Patagonien; my article "A Mountain Unveiled," first published in Dauer's book, later reprinted and expanded in the American Alpine Journal; Reinhold Messner's book Torre Schrei aus Stein; and more recently Kelly Cordes' book The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre. All who examined the facts have reached the same conclusion: Maestri's account is but a tall tale.

Sources: Leo Dickinson, Colin Haley, Dorte Pietron and Ermanno Salvaterra also contributed to this article, pataclimb.com

Marc-Andre Leclerc following Colin Haley's lead--the first of his lead block on the north face--before the team rejoins El Arca de los Vientos during the first ascent of Cerro Torre's first integral north face route. [Photo] Colin Haley

From February 2 to 3, less than two weeks after establishing La Travesia del Oso Buda--aka the Reverse Torre Traverse-- Colin Haley and Marc-Andre Leclerc climbed the first complete ascent of Cerro Torre's north face. Haley and Leclerc, both arriving most recently from Squamish, British Columbia (Haley is originally from Washington state), have made major ascents in back-to-back weather windows in El Chalten. Their new route on Cerro Torre follows Rolando Garibotti, Alessandro Beltrami and Ermanno Salvaterra's 2005 line, El Arca de Los Vientos, up Cerro Torre's lower northeast face to the Egger-Torre col. Above the col, where El Arca traverses to the upper northwest face, they continued straight up the north face for six new pitches before rejoining El Arca, and the Ragni Route to reach the summit. According to Haley, the new terrain is characterized by "splitter cracks on good rock," and mixed climbing. At times, they aided off ice tools. Haley noted that these six new pitches "are mostly covered in rime ice about 90 percent of the year, and under those conditions would be extremely slow and difficult [to climb]," alluding to the possibility that this may be why El Arca traverses west at the col instead of continuing up the north face. In spite of comparably favorable conditions, Haley described their time on Cerro Torre as "climbing for two days straight in a nearly constant shower of grape- to golf ball-sized ice chunks." Leclerc climbed much of the upper pitches with knuckles bloodied by falling ice. Leclerc added, "It's not a hard climb technically, but due to various alpine factors its not quite like the yellow-tape 10+ jug haul in the gym."

Haley leading the second-to-last pitch of El Arca de los Vientos, high on Cerro Torre's north face. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

Haley and Leclerc named their route Directa de la Mentira (the Lie Direct) as a reference to Italian Cesare Maestri's purported 1959 ascent of Cerro Torre via its northeast ridge.

In a post to his website pataclimb.com, Garibotti noted Haley and Leclerc's continued dominance of the Chalten Massif this season, and described the North American duo as "the two fittest and hungriest men here at the moment, 'the unstoppable two.'"

Leclerc on pitch three of six new pitches on the north face of Cerro Torre. [Photo] Colin Haley

While Haley is renowned for his groundbreaking first ascents in the Chalten massif--including the first ascent of the Torre Traverse in 2008, with Garibotti--Leclerc is better known for fast and bold solos on granite rock climbs around his home in Squamish, British Columbia and for free soloing hard ice. Yet during this trip to El Chalten, only his second visit to the region, Leclerc showed impressive versatility and the ability to pick up new skills in real time. Says Haley, "I can't think of any other 22-year-olds anywhere who have the same combination of skills and experience."

Although poor weather rendered last year's austral summer inaccessible to most climbers, this season has featured a few good weather windows, which have allowed for a variety of big objectives to get tackled such as the the first integral ascent of Tobogan by Toni Ponholzer and Peter Ortner to the summit of Torre Egger. Still, it hasn't been all sunshine and high-pressure systems: Garibotti was quick to point out that "in comparison to good seasons, this has been a bad one."

[Photo] Rolando Garibotti

Sources: Rolando Garibotti, Colin Haley, Marc-Andre Leclerc, alpinist.com, americanalpineclub.org, gripped.com, pataclimb.com

Leclerc on the summit of Cerro Torre after completing the first solo ascent of the Corkscrew route. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

Capping an already successful season in Patagonia, 22-year-old Marc-Andre Leclerc, from Squamish BC, raised the bar yet again by making the first solo (sometimes using a self belay) ascent of Cerro Torre's Corkscrew route (5.10d A1 90 degrees, 4,000'). His February 21 ascent--the seventh overall solo of the formation--was completed in wet and icy conditions.

"A solo of this magnitude is probably only second to [Italian] Renato Casarotto's ('God with a mustache') first ascent of Fitz Roy's north pillar (5.10d C1, 1250m)," states Rolando Garibotti on his Patagonia Vertical page. [Casarotto completed his climb, which required the use of fixed lines, on January 19, 1979, after his teammates abandoned him--Ed.]

The Corkscrew is a linkup that contains 200 meters of independent climbing out of 1200 meters total to reach Cerro Torre's summit. The route begins on the SE Ridge (aka Filo Sureste; 5.11d WI5 A2 70 degrees, 800m) for 14 pitches to reach the ice towers. Here, Leclerc says, "It was slow because of the poor conditions [including] rain, running water, verglas." From the ice towers, the route heads west over an icefield and meets up with the Ragni Route (M4 90 degrees, 600m), following it to the summit.

"Looking down into the clouds from the Southeast Ridge of Cerro Torre during the first solo ascent of the Corkscrew." [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

Additionally, Leclerc chose not to rope up with the other parties he passed while crossing glaciers on the approach and descent.

He reports:

I left Nipo Nino base camp around noon on February 20 and climbed easy, but slushy, terrain to the Col of Patience, arriving around 6 p.m., where I set up a bivy in a crevasse. It rained all night and I got soaked. My alarm went off at 2:30 and I started Pitch 1 of the Southeast Ridge at 3 a.m.

I carried a single 80m 8mm half rope. For hardware, I carried a triple set of micro cams to red C3 size, then a single set from 0.4 - #1 Camalot, two daisy chains, two extendable draws, a light quickdraw, a V-thread tool, two ice screws, two knifeblades, boots, tools, crampons, sunglasses, a tiny tube of sunscreen, and an iPhone and headphones.

"Approximately pitch 10--not 100 percent sure." [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

I forgot my umbilical leashes, which added to the exposure.

The entire SE Ridge was one big moment of doubt. Being low on the route [I was] thinking, 'Am I really going to do this?' The conditions were so bad for a majority of that section [that] it seemed improbable, but I kept managing at whatever pace felt reasonable. When I reached the point [where] the Corkscrew leaves the ridge, I realized I still had the timeframe to continue, and fully committed.

When I was climbing the wild arete pitches on the Salvaterra section of the SE ridge, I was really enjoying myself. The climbing is so good, and it was dry and sunny. Most of the time I was really focused and in the zone.

The traverse over the south face was very long--at least twice the '200m' distance described in the book, likely six full rope lengths--and the south face ice was extremely brittle. It was not technical, 70 degrees, but in a way the crux of the route.

The Ragni was in very good condition, with a long, natural tunnel on the second-to-last pitch and a half-pipe [rime-ice ramp] on the final mushroom. I climbed the first half of the half-pipe with my hands in the rime as it was more secure than using my tools, [and] then it turned to ice and was bomber. [I] summited at 5:45 p.m.

As for the descent:

On the summit I just hoped I would get through the ice towers before dark, as that's the most complicated part. But I made it all the way to my crevasse at the col before dark. I was stoked.

"Pitch 12. Aiding the thin seam of 'Haston's Crack' on the fair-means SE Ridge. This is one of the two sections where I used a backloop to protect myself, although here my backloop was clipped to a single black Alien." [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

This report marks the third time we've featured Leclerc's Patagonia climbs in a NewsWire since mid-January. Previous notable ascents include the Reverse Torre Traverse with Colin Haley, between January 18 and 22; and a new route, Directa de la Mentira, between February 2 and 3 with Haley, that marks the first integral ascent of Cerro Torre's north face. On February 13, LeClerc free soloed ther majority of the 2,500-foot, 20-pitch Chiaro di Luna on St. Exupery (5.11a) with 23-year-old Brette Harrington. They roped up for four pitches and completed the route in three hours. Harrington returned to Chiaro on the same day that Leclerc soloed the Corkscrew to make the first free solo of the route; in so doing, she also became the first woman to free solo of any of the towers in the massif.

"It's incredible," says Hayden Kennedy of Leclerc's solo of Cerro Torre. In January 2012, Kennedy and Jason Kruk climbed the tower in about 13 hours making a fair-means ascent. "[Leclerc] is definitely pushing it. That's the progression, you know. He's taking his skills from Squamish and applying them to the mountains."

Cerro Torre [Photo] Jason Hollinger

Sources: Hayden Kennedy, Marc-Andre Leclerc, pataclimb.com, Patagonia Vertical's Facebook Page, rockandice.com

Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz high on the Troll Wall while climbing their new route. [Photo] Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz

On February 9, after 18 days of ascending ice-filled cracks under poor weather, and three days of hurricane winds, Polish climbers Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek "Ragan" Raganowicz completed a new line up the steepest, longest stretch of the 1100-meter (3,609') Trollveggen (Troll Wall) in Norway's Romsdal Valley. Their 27-pitch route, Katharsis, contains multiple stretches of M7 and aid climbing from A2 to A4. The team placed a total of nine lead rivets and 19 belay bolts over 21 new pitches, using no fixed lines. Their ascent marks the first time the Troll Wall has been climbed by a team of two, via a new route, in winter.

In February 2002, a team of six--Vladimir Arkhipov, Sergey Cherezov, Eugeny Dmitrienko, Oleg Khvostenko, Anton Pugovkin and Pavel Zakharov--used fixed lines to complete Krasnojarsk (VI 5.10 A4+). This line was later free climbed in 2012 by Ole Johan and Sindre Seather at 5.12-.

On the bench during bad weather. [Photo] Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz

After weaving in and out of the French Route (VI 5.10 A4; FA 1967) for the first two pitches, Tomaszewski and Raganowicz entered new territory by going straight up the north face and zigzagging across Krasnojarsk and the Arch Wall (5.11- A4+; first free ascent: Sindre Seather, 2010), several times, before meeting back up with the French Route for four pitches to the summit.

Katharsis is Tomaszewski and Raganowicz's third new big wall in recent years. Their other new big-wall routes include Superbalance (VII 5.11 A4 WI4) on Baffin Island's Polar Sun Spire in 2012, and Bushido (VII M7+ A4) on Pakistan's Great Trango Tower in 2013; the latter was nominated for a Piolet d'Or in 2014. Tomaszewski describes the team's experience on the Troll Wall as "the sum of what is most challenging in winter alpinism," and adds that no other climb they had done before compares to the challenges they faced here.

Rapping back to camp. [Photo] Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz

Climbing any route on the Troll Wall in winter is an inherently demanding--even in large teams as most previous ascents have been. There is little light in the day, and the weather is particularly inhospitable. The winter maritime temperatures of the Romsdal Valley typically hover around freezing. While these temperatures are not terribly cold, the chief difficulties are the constant precipitation and daily freeze-thaw cycles, which effectively soak climbers and their gear for the duration. Staying warm in these conditions, compared to colder, drier ones, can be very challenging. In addition, the cracks are constantly becoming iced, hacked out, and re-iced. And from the approach to the finish, the Polish climbers were constantly at risk of avalanches and cornices falling from the summit. By the time Hurricane Ole hit, Tomaszewski and Raganowicz were 15 days into the wall, and heavily committed.

This kind of winter climbing in a team of two is heavy work. "In a two-man team it often seems that an extra pair of hands would be more than welcome," Tomaszewski explained. "Climbing in an independent two-man team makes everything much more demanding and constitutes completely different quality. When it was freezing we had to fight the pain caused by our soggy skin and the penetrating cold that made our feet and body go numb. Decreased comfort hindered recovery and made us resort to our mental strength and to pushing our limits of endurance." With a larger team, after a challenging lead block you can retire to the portaledge for hot drinks and rest while your teammates take over. But with a team of two, as Tomaszewski and Raganowicz were, both climbers are incessently exposed to physically and psychologically draining activities, whether climbing, belaying, hauling or setting up camp.

On the way to the third camp. [Photo] Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz

The two men spent most of their 18 days on the climb wet and shivering, with numb extremities. Only two days could be construed as rest days, and these were spent waiting out a hurricane in a portaledge, which according to Tomaszewski, "also left much to be desired." Because of miscommunication, they had carried a one-person fly for a two-person portaledge. On day five, Tomaszewski lost his rain shell, and for the following two weeks he climbed in a soaked primaloft, "which after frequent and long spindrifts gradually turned into an icebound rag. Anytime it got warm again I needed to squeeze water out [of it]," he says.

The Troll Wall hosts a long history of important Polish ascents, which had earned it the nickname "the Polish Wall without a Polish route." These include the first winter ascent, via the French Route, by Marek Kesicki, Ryszard Kowalewski, Wojciech Kurtyka, and Tadeusz Piotrowski, and the first winter ascent of the Arch Wall by Jacek Fluder, Janusz Golab and Stanislaw Piecuch. Katharsis is the first line established up the Troll Wall by a Polish team.

Katharsis came to fruition after many years of planning and dreaming. Tomaszewski and Raganowicz made several trips to the wall to scout out the line before they started up. "We'd been tracking the wall as if it had been an animal, waiting for the right moment to attack. It was our great dream," says Tomaszewski. "It meant a lot more than just another climbing goal."

Raganowicz and Tomaszewski's line of ascent. [Photo] Marcin Tomaszewski and Marek Raganowicz

Sources: Marcin Tomaszewski, americanalpineclub.org, bigwalls.net, borebloggen.blogspot, Tomaszwewski's Facebook Page, rockandice.com, thebmc.co.uk

Ines Papert during her succesful ascent, on February 22, of The Hurting (XI,11). [Photo] Nadir Khan

The wind travels like a thundering train, snaking around the frosted glacial cirque of Coire an t-Sneachda in the Cairngorm Mountains of Scotland. Unpredictable gusts threaten to knock the climber Ines Papert off her tenuous stance, high on the cirque's exposed Fiacall Buttress. The falling snow quickly turns into sharp ice pellets, stinging skin and plastering every crevice of the vertical wall, hiding what small placements the route allows.

Visibility closes in. There is no ice to swing a tool into securely, only rime-choked cracks and a jigsaw puzzle of seams that spit out gear. Papert breathes and continues. A few millimeters of crampon steel touch a tiny snow-covered edge. She reaches long, and an ice tool finds a small hook. Then it pops. Papert's feet skate. She hangs straight-armed off a single tool high on the thirty-five meter pitch, an E4 6a in summer, but in winter a heady XI 11 (M9/M10). Papert reattaches her feet to the wall and continues up into the storm, making, on February 22, the fifth-ever winter ascent of the climb.

Papert had sussed out and attempted The Hurting two days prior to her successful lead. Unwilling to risk a ground fall on the sparsely protected lower terrain, she approached from above and rappelled five meters right of the line to inspect protection options. "I wasn't planning an onsight of The Hurting," she tells Alpinist. "I just wanted to check out some gear placements at the very bottom, which I knew were sketchy." She decided not to practice any moves on toprope before her first lead attempt.

"I pulled the ropes and led the route [while belayed by Seppi Pfnuer], taking two falls--one onto a Pecker on the sequence below the roof, one onto a cam on the upper wall," she says. "Seppi seconded the route, removing all the gear." By the time he reached the top he had lost feeling in his fingers.

Coire an t-Sneachda in winter. [Photo] William M. Connolley

The Scottish climber Dave MacLeod established the The Hurting as a mixed climb in February 2005, after abseil inspection and after having fallen three moves from the top on a flash attempt; at the time, this smooth, vertical buttress was considered the hardest single-pitch traditional mixed climb in the world. The route is sustained from bottom to top. As MacLeod describes on scottishclimbs.com, "The climbing is hooking rounded edges, tiny torques, tufts of turf and undercutting...Then a thin hooking wall leads to a roof. The next section is burly lay backing through the summer crux crack followed by a culmination on the last few moves of thin wall climbing."

When Papert and her partner for the day, Simon Yearsley, set out on February 22, conditions did not look promising. "Even though the cracks were white and there was snow on all the ledges, looking back, the overall feel of the route wasn't wintery enough," Papert told ukclimbing.com. Yearsely, however, persuaded her to leave the decision-making until they reached the base. Once there, they were fully exposed to 80-plus-mile-per-hour gusts coming from all directions. Papert set out. "I've been climbing for over 35 years, and this was the most impressive lead I've ever witnessed," Yearsley told ukclimbing.com. "Ines's ascent of The Hurting was extraordinary in the fullest sense of the word," echoes Simon Richardson, owner of scottishclimbs.com. It's perhaps fitting that Papert climbed The Hurting in the same "full conditions" as McLeod.

Frozen moorland from Coire an Lochan path. [Photo] Stuart Cankett

Fierce winds batted her from side to side, threatening to blow her off rounded smears while she picked at the the snow- and rime-ice-covered cliff, Yearsley reports. Papert worked through sketchy moves from the start with "a couple of bits of poor gear until a secure and comfortable sling." The next moves involved "a tenuous traverse before a dubious hex," Yearsley says. As Papert climbed a little above the traverse, a sudden gust caught the sling runner and blew it clean off. "The first ten meters felt kind of challenging, until I got the first good gear in," Papert says. "The crux, getting over the roof, felt quite good and safe, but the upper wall was super technical." She made it to the anchors on her first attempt of the day. Adding to the challenge, she says "none of the gear from the previous day was possible. [Everything looked] different with the ice and snow in the cracks."

Papert after completing The Hurting. [Photo] Nadir Khan

Papert is a four-time winner of the World Ice Climbing Championships and multi-time winner of Ouray Ice Festival. She had made notable first ascents including Power of Silence (400m, 5.13a, 11 pitches), Cirque of the Unclimbables, Canada; Quantum of Solace (ABO, WI 7+, M7), Great Walls of China, Himalaya; Northwest Face (5.11+ A1, 1200m) of Mt. Asgard's South Tower, Baffin Island; the previously unclimbed Himalayan Peak Likhu Chuli (6719m); and most recently the first repeat of Ritter Der Kokosnuss (M12, WI5), at the Breitwangflue at Kandersteg in Switzerland.

"What I learned on [this] trip is only attempt a route when it is in really good winter conditions, the rock is covered in white rime, well-frozen vegetation, and there is a 'wintery' feel to the route," Papert says. This was her third climbing trip to Scotland.

In related news, the Scottish climber Greg Boswell on February 25 made the first ascent of Banana Wall XII, 12 at Coire an Lochain, also in the Cairngorm Mountains. Boswell had originally attempted this very overhanging mixed buttress in December 2013, but backed off after eight meters because the climb, he blogged, looked "too god damn hard." Boswell made another attempt earlier in the 2014/2015 season, but again down climbed at the same height, unable to discern reliable protection options above. He then opted for a rappel inspection, but, he wrote "The second you have left the belay (rapp point) you are in space and free hanging, and despite placing a few pieces of marginal gear to keep me in a bit, it was obvious that I was going to get nowhere near my climbing high-point to see if there would be any protection to aim for."

On February 25, with Masa Sakano, Boswell returned for the lead. This time he pushed through a crux bulge/roof and into a blanker section above. Boswell climbed higher, fighting for protection, ever more exhausted, when his axe popped and he took a ten-meter fall. On his next go, high on a steep headwall above the radically overhanging lower terrain and far from his last runner, Boswell engaged a "heart in mouth sequence of thin hooks and shallow torques" to reach the belay ledge. The climbers completed one more pitch to the top of the crag in strong winds, in the dark, with only one headlamp between them. On his blog, Boswell wrote that Banana Wall's crux terrain felt like M11, and has proposed the rare grade of XII/12. Meanwhile, the gear, he was quoted as saying, is "there if you're fit!"

Hot Aches

To learn more about Papert, read the excerpt Falling from her book Im Eis on alpinist.com.

Sources: Ines Papert, Simon Yearsley, gregboswell.co.uk, ines-papert.de, planetmountain.com, scottishclimbs.com, ukclimbing.com

Will Mayo beginning Apocalypse Now's crux, Pitch 6, rated M9. [Photo] Anna Pfaff

[This story was first published on willmayo.us on March 8, 2015.--Ed.]

On March 7, 2015, Anna Pfaff and I sent a giant, long-standing traditional mixed project on the Cholesterol Wall above Ten Mile Pond in Gros Morne National Park outside of Rocky Harbour, Newfoundland. Apocalypse Now (WI7 M9, 220m) was one of the few remaining king lines of the area that had yet to be climbed. The route stands looming over the east end of the pond on an imposing south-facing monolith dubbed the Cholesterol Wall. The left side of the wall is the site of Joe Terravecchia, Casey Shaw and Jim Shimberg's testpieces Tundering Lard and Baby Beaver. Routes have been done to the right of the wall as well. The prominent lines in the center of the wall, however, had remained unclimbed.

For nearly two decades, New England alpinists Terravecchia, Shaw, Shimberg and Andy Tuthill have been exploring and developing the vast expanses of Gros Morne. Operating almost completely under the radar, these hard-core traditional activists have climbed nearly every prominent hard ice and traditional mixed line in the park, ticking off a mind-boggling list of radical, futuristic lines, all done in raw traditional style, completely without protection bolts or bolted belays. Preferring to render homage to the gifts of nature, these men have been rewarded with the pure satisfaction of sending the first ascents of many of the biggest and hardest traditional mixed climbs in North America. They also have paid a premium for the retention of risk, for the full engagement that is traditional mixed climbing.

Anna Pfaff following Pitch 1, rated M8. [Photo] Will Mayo

Our route, Apocalypse Now, was the site of two nearly fatal accidents involving Terravecchia. On the first occasion, in the early 2000s, Terravecchia, along with Shaw, was climbing the couloir directly below the icicle (later dubbed the Carry-Out Couloir) when the entire hanger spontaneously calved, pummeling the two men, who cowered helplessly in the funnel of the gully below with tons of ice, breaking Terravecchia's shoulder and giving both a full-body battering. On the second occasion, in 2004, Terravecchia reached the crux -ice section with Tuthill. Leading the crux near the top, Terravecchia pulled up onto the dagger, just above where he reckoned the would-be fracture line was, when the entire 20-ton structure of ice collapsed, crashing down, pinning the rope between the two climbers as it fell, ripping Terravecchia downward and pulling the rope violently through Tuthill's belay device, burning through his gloves and through the skin on the palms of his hands. The old Yankee Tuthill held on, and caught Terravecchia, now hanging unconscious 50 feet below the sheltered belay, having fallen 100 feet amid giant hunks of ice. Terravecchia woke to Tuthill yelling down at him in horror. The two managed to get themselves down, despite Terravecchia's broken tibia and a body completely covered with bruises. This route meant business.

About a month ago, my planned trip to Norway with a collection of French hardmen was cancelled last-minute due to warm weather in Gudvangen. Frustrated, I pondered how best to spend my already allowed free-time. Pfaff, who I met at the Michigan Ice Fest, was keen to climb and also happened to have the next few weeks off from her work as a nurse. We went to the Canadian Rockies and tested our mettle on the Stanley Headwall for a few days, sending Nemesis and an unformed and extremely challenging version of French Reality. I was impressed by Pfaff's abilities and her seemingly indefatigable motivation. We climbed well together, and I asked her if she was keen to go find some adventure in Newfoundland, the North American equivalent of Norway, which was still well within winter's firm grasp. She agreed without hesitation, so I sent Terravecchia an email.

Having grown up in New England, my formative climbing was steeped in the staunch traditional ethic of that area. Terravecchia is one of my long-time mentors from early adulthood, and I had long heard rumors of the towering ice and mixed routes that Terravecchia and company established silently every winter. In part because of him, Newfoundland has assumed an almost mythical quality among ice and traditional mixed climbers. It's a land awash with mystery and uncertainty, a land of adventure and full-value traditional winter climbing. I had always wanted to visit Newfoundland, and, finally, it seemed, I had found the opportunity. I asked Terravecchia if there were any hard-mixed lines that remained unclimbed. He sent me a picture of what would become our project, and told me the stories of his accidents, which I had already heard years ago, shortly after they had happened. Terravecchia said it would be a long time before he got back to it, having moved on to objectives farther north in the park, and we should give it a try.

Pfaff on Pitch 2, rated M8. [Photo] Will Mayo

Pfaff and I packed up my little Mooney single-engine piston aircraft in Denver, Colo. and flew to Madison, Wis. on February 26. We continued on to Burlington, Vt. later that day and spent the night filing our flight manifest for the trans-border flight the next day. In the morning we flew to Sept-Iles, Quebec, cleared customs, fueled up and then continued on along the vast untracked expanses of the frozen north coast of the Bay of St. Lawrence, outside radio communication and radio navigation as well as radar coverage. We turned back south at Lourdes-de-Blanc-Sablon, crossed above the partly frozen Strait of Belle Isle, and flew down the west coast of Newfoundland to our destination: Deer Lake.

My old friend, Damien Cote, noticed a social media post of mine about our travels to Newfoundland, and he sent me a message, which I received immediately upon our arrival in Deer Lake. Cote told me to contact Pete Thurlow, a prolific local climber who happened to have a snowmobile. I called Thurlow and he told me he was planning to use his sled to climb himself over the next few days, but he put us in touch with the local snowmobile guide guru, Rick Endicott. Endicott, Thurlow and virtually every other Newfie we met, are extraordinarily helpful and accommodating, replying to every question and request with the simple utterance: "Not a problem!" When we realized the magnitude of our project, Thurlow graciously loaned us jumars and ropes while we were waiting for a shipment of 200 meters of static line from the Mountain Equipment Co-op. Without the help of our friends and locals, for whom we are eternally grateful, this route never would have happened for us.

Mayo leading the crux, Pitch 6, rated M9. "The transition to the ice is terrifying, but not too dangerous," Mayo says. [Photo] Anna Pfaff

On our fifth day of effort on the Cholesterol Wall, we sent Apocalypse Now to the summit after climbing and fixing the first five pitches over the previous four days. Honestly, it's the wildest climbing I have ever done in my life. Pitch 1 (M8, 30m) is perfect dry-tooling crack climbing in a leaning corner with a smattering of welded smears of ice and two overhangs. I onsighted this pitch on our first day, after two false starts to the left. Pitch 2 (M8, 15 meters) is a short but spicy section to reach the ice. The gear was difficult to find and place, requiring me to aid the pitch to get the Peckers, tomahawks and knifeblades in place in the discontinuous seams. I redpointed this pitch on the third day on the route. Pitch 3 (WI4, 40m) is ice and a welcomed respite from the more demanding climbing below. Pitch 4 (WI7, 35m) is some of the most unstable and surreal ice climbing I have ever done. Basically, it involves climbing bizarre giant ice-blob formations interspersed with bare, compact granite and patches of parched two-inch-thick plates of ice. Pitch 5 (WI5, 20m) is a strange traversing pitch of completely unprotectable shell-ice covering a thin layer of hoar-snow over smooth, fissure-less brown granite. There is only one piece of gear on this pitch, half way across, and it is a #1 knifeblade in a seam. Pitch 6 (M9, 40 meters) is the money pitch. Words cannot describe the perfection of the traditional mixed climbing involved. Suffice to say, it's the best pitch of my life and the gear is perfect in the corner. The transition to the ice is terrifying, but not too dangerous. Pitch 7 (WI6, 4m) is the icing on the cake.

Mayo leading the route's last pitch, Pitch 7, rated WI6. [Photo] Anna Pfaff

Newfoundland is famous for its strict traditional ethic. There are no bolts anywhere in Gros Morne National Park. As Terravecchia says, "I just want to make it clear that neither I nor Casey nor any of the guys I've climbed with up there pretend to have any kind of authority over whether bolts should or should not be placed on these type of routes in and around Gros Morne. We may feel strongly that they are not appropriate but ultimately, it's not our decision to make but rather one for Newfoundland climbers. The few Newfoundland ice climbers that we have met and discussed the issue with have been very supportive of the idea." Basically, it's widely accepted that bolts are completely incongruous in Newfoundland and there is essentially "zero tolerance" for them among the locals. Newfoundland is an exceptionally adventurous and exciting climbing venue, like none other I have ever experienced, in a remote and savagely inhospitable place. And, we would like it to stay that way.

Apocalypse Now (WI7 M9, 220m), The Cholesterol Wall, Ten Mile Pond, Gros Morne National Park, Newfoundland [Photo] Will Mayo

Don Whillans and Sir Chris Bonington at the base of the Central Tower of Paine (2460m), Torres del Paine, Chile, in January, 1963. The team completed the first ascent of the tower via their route the Bonington-Whillans (IV 5.11 A2, 700m). Read more about the Central Tower here. [Photo] Sir Chris Bonington collection. Use agreed in connection with Chris Bonington Piolets d'Or award 2015 only.

[If this page auto-plays audio, scroll to the bottom and click pause on the Bonington clip--Ed.]

In advance of the Global Alpinism Meeting and awards ceremony to be held April 9-12 in Chamonix, France, and Courmayeur, Italy, the three climbs slated to receive the Piolets d'Or have been announced. The awards, now in their twenty-third year, are a joint effort between Montagnes and Vertical magazines, Niveales Publishing, the Groupe de Haute Montagne [GHM], and the townships of Chamonix and Courmayeur. The new format marks a departure from tradition for the Piolets--previously, the recipients were not revealed until the ceremony itself. Chris Trommsdorff, president of the GHM, says that the change was made in the spirit of the event being "not a competition, but a celebration" of modern alpinism, and that the Piolets are likely, upon further review, to continue in this direction.

This year, nine judges from nine different countries sat on the selection committee: Kazuki Amano, from Japan; Valeri Babanov, from Russia; Herve Barmasse, from Italy; Stephane Benoist, from France; Andy Houseman, from the United Kingdom; Michael Kennedy, from the USA; Ines Papert, from Germany; Raphael Slawinski, from Canada; and Andrej Stremfelj, from Slovenia. Each of the ascents chosen took place in 2014.

In no particular order, the three 2015 Piolets d'Or climbs are:

The Fitz Roy Traverse, Patagonia. Tommy Caldwell and Alex Honnold climbed for five days through poor conditions in rock and approach shoes to complete this oft-discussed linkup. [Photo] Tommy Caldwell, courtesy Piolets d'Or

* The traverse of the Fitz Roy group, from north to south, by the Americans Tommy Caldwell and Alex Honnold from February 12-16, 2014. This five-kilometer ridgeline involved summiting Aguja Guillaumet, Aguja Mermoz, Cerro Fitz Roy, Aguja Poincenot, Aguja Rafael Juarez, Aguja Saint-Exupery and Aguja de l'S, and featured close to 4000 meters of vertical gain with difficulties to up 7a (5.11d) C1 and ice at 65 degrees.

Thamserku, eastern Himalaya, showing Shy Girl (6B, 70 degrees). Russians Alexander Gukov and Alex Lonchinsky authored the line in eight days, climbing in alpine style. [Photo] Aleskey Lonchinsky, courtesy Piolets d'Or

* A first ascent from April 27-May 3 on the 1620-meter south face of Thamserku (6618m) in the Khumbu region of Nepal by the Russians Alexander Gukov and Alexey Lonchinsky. On their new climb, Shy Girl (Russian 6A/6B), the pair climbed steep ice, mixed sections of M4-M5 and four pitches of A2, making six bivies en route to the summit.

The Slovenians' new route on the north face (ED, 1350m), Hagshu. The peak behind is Hana's Men, which they summited on an acclimatization trip by a new route, marked here in green. [Photo] Marko Prezelj, courtesy Piolets d'Or

* A first ascent from September 29-30 on the 1350-meter north face of Hagshu (6657m) in the Kisthwar region of India by the Slovenians Ales Cesen, Luka Lindic and Mark Prezelj. Their 1350-meter climb was graded ED, with ice at 90 degrees. On their first day on the wall, the climbers pushed through until 2 a.m. before stopping to bivy.

Bonington making the first ascent of Shivling, Gangotri (6501m), 1983. [Photo] Sir Chris Bonington collection. Use agreed in connection with Chris Bonington Piolets d'Or award 2015 only.

In addition, the UK mountaineer Sir Chris Bonington will be receiving the the Piolets d'Or Lifetime Achievement Award, only the seventh recipient in its history. Bonington, climbing since 1951, has many significant climbs to his name including the epic first ascent of Baintha Brakk ("The Ogre") with Doug Scott. He also led the legendary expeditions that made the first ascents of Annapurna's South Face and the Southwest Face of Everest. Last year, at age 80 and with Leo Houlding, Bonington re-climbed the Old Man of Hoy, the demanding 450-foot Scottish sea stack he'd made the first ascent of with Rusty Baillie and Tom Patey in 1966.

View the list of major ascents considered for the Piolets d'Or compiled by Claude Gardien, from Vertical Magazine, and renowned mountaineer Lindsay Griffin here.

Listen to Sir Chris Bonington and Alpinist's Digital Editor Chris Van Leuven discuss Bonington's Piolets d'Or Lifetime Achievement Award and more below:

[Audio Edit] Anders Ax

The northeast buttress of A Peak (8,634'): the location of two routes established by Scott Coldiron and company between February 22 and March 7, 2015: Blackwell Falls (WI5 M4, 900') and Unprotected Four-Play (AI4+ M6 R, 2,000'). "Unprotected Four-Play is the leftmost couloir in the pic; Blackwell Falls buttress is in the foreground, with the route not shown," says Coldiron. [Photo] Scott Coldiron

On February 22 Scott Coldiron and Christian Thompson from Spokane, Washington, and Sandpoint, Idaho, respectively, established, "to my knowledge, the biggest steep pure-ice route in this little region," says Coldiron of their line in northwestern Montana's Cabinet Mountains, calling it Blackwell Falls (WI5 M4, ca. 900'). Their route ascends two-thirds of a 1400-foot buttress beneath Blackwell Glacier adjacent to A Peak's (8,634') northeast face. After 300 feet of easy terrain, Blackwell Falls angles up for continuously steep WI5 and M4 climbing that Coldiron describes as "just plain fun." Though many lines in the area were out of condition due to recent atypically warm temperatures, the north-facing route was still fat and in great shape, according to Coldiron. Except for the final pitch, the route protected almost exclusively with ice screws. The climbers used V-threads, cams and nuts predominantly for belays, and placed no pitons.

Leaving camp at Granite Lake at the foot of A Peak's northeast face at 6:30 a.m., the pair reached the base of the ice flow at around 8:30 a.m. After simulclimbing a few hundred feet of WI3, they pitched out another six to seven ropelengths of steep ice, and a final pitch of mixed terrain, before their route ended beneath an enormous impassable chimney. They began their rappels at 5 p.m., but did not return to the base of the wall until twelve V-thread rappels and three hours later. Having forgotten one of their ropes at the car, Coldiron and Thompson climbed and rappelled throughout the day on a single 70-meter half rope, which accounted for slow progress.

Scott Coldiron leading Blackwell Falls' third-to-last pitch. "To my knowledge [it's] the biggest steep pure-ice route" in northwestern Montana's Cabinet Mountains, he says. [Photo] Christian Thompson

Coldiron emphasized that what makes Blackwell Falls noteworthy is not its difficulty, but its quality. In 2013 Coldiron helped Craig Pope establish Chuck Norris and the Mortal (WI7 M8 R/X, 90m; bolt free, like all the routes established by Coldiron and company in the area) at Banks Lake, Washington--likely the hardest ice/mixed climb in the state. "The money of [Blackwell Falls]," according to Coldiron, "[are] the final four pitches: three consecutive WI5 pitches followed by a well-protected pitch of very steep M4 stemming out over the abyss"--an overhanging chimney with nearly 1000 feet of air beneath. "What looked like scary, hard climbing turned out to be rather safe and fun," Coldiron says. Both climbers agreed the route was "fat, fun, well-protected."

There is little documented history of winter climbing in the Cabinet Mountains, but summertime documented ascents date back to the 1940s. The climber, writer and German expat Hans Moldenhauer was perhaps the first to publicize the range. "These peaks," he wrote for an American Alpine Journal article in 1943, "are not spectacular in height or size, but they hold all my mountaineer's heart wishes for: from snow and ice to rock face, talus slope, and ridge--the wilderness of forests, and brisk air above the timberline; lakes, alpine meadows, solitude. And all this only 150 miles from home [Spokane], easy to reach over a weekend." Perhaps the most noteworthy prior ascent in the Cabinets was John Roskelley and Brad Weller's 1981 ascent of St. Paul Peak's East Face. According to Roskelley, their route "consisted of 10 pitches of rock... superb face... and possibly the best climbing in the Cabinets."

Christian Thompson follows Coldiron's lead, P5, on Blackwell Falls. [Photo] Scott Coldiron

It was Jess Roskelley--John's son, "an accomplished alpinist, much more than I am," says Coldiron, and Craig Pope's accomplice in freeing Chuck Norris and the Mortal just days after Coldiron helped open the line--who first brought the Cabinet Mountains to Coldiron's attention. For Coldiron, a Spokane resident just as Moldenhauer had been, it was a no-brainer to investigate the winter potential of the nearby range. Over the past two seasons, he and a handful of other Spokane climbers (including Jeff Vickler and Joe Lind) have begun to develop its ice climbing, establishing a handful of "high-quality four- to five-pitch lines" one drainage over from Blackwell Falls. Thompson, meanwhile, had established numerous summertime first ascents in the Cabinet and Selkirk mountains prior to this trip. Coldiron suggests that Blackwell Falls may be the best line he's seen in the area so far, but was quick to add that the Cabinets still boast plenty of potential. Perhaps the greatest obstacle to future ascentionists, says Coldiron, is a "burly six- to ten-mile ski approach, depending on the condition of the road."

Ben Erdmann and Jonah Job at the top of Pitch 1, Unprotected Four-Play (AI4+ M6 R, 2,000'), established March 7. [Photo] Scott Coldiron

On March 7, nearly two weeks after completing Blackwell Falls, Coldiron returned to the Cabinets to climb a new line up the northeast face of A Peak. "In winter, no one I know has tried the hard faces in the Cabinets," he says. Coldiron teamed up with Jonah Job, Benjamin Erdmann and Beau Carrillo. The four climbers separated into two independent rope teams, climbing parallel lines until reaching the final, and crux, pitch, led by Coldiron and followed by all three climbers. They named their route Unprotected Four-Play (AI4+ M6 R, 2,000') "because God knows the climbing world needs another bad-pun route name."

Coldiron describes Four-Play as: "Hero sticks in neve and bomber alpine ice, punctuated by scary runouts and thin vertical ice... perhaps a moment of panic scratching through sugar snow over featureless rock." The climb protects with beaks and blades, nuts, Tricams and cams, and in no spots was the ice thick enough to build a V-thread anchor. "We used a bit of everything. I never tied off so many ice screws in my life," says Coldiron, adding that twice he had to tie off a stubby, because it was the only gear he could find. "The Cabinets tend to take a lot of knifeblades, but this route took less than other routes I've done in the area. We had a lot of runouts," he says.

Continues Coldiron, "On the crux, at the thin ice at the end, I didn't trust my screws; they were all shit. One pulled out by hand. I'm usually comfortable on scary ice leads, but here I was placing everything I could." At one point, the climbers even had to simulclimb with no gear between them. The two teams climbed independently until the final pitch. It was here that the three climbers followed Coldiron's lead.

Jonah Job on Four-Play's P4. [Photo] Scott Coldiron

The runouts and poor pro aside, what makes this route stand out to Coldiron is the fun he had with his friends. At one point they met up on a large ledge midway, brewed soup and told jokes. "It was the best belay cave I've [visited]," says Coldiron.

Four-Play doesn't top out the formation--it finishes 200 feet below the summit, where the ice ends. From here, the team walked down.

Four-Play's final, and crux, pitch. "I'm usually comfortable on scary ice leads, but here I was placing everything I could. [It's a] good climb--just sketchy because of the pro," says Coldiron. "I didn't trust my screws... One pulled out by hand." [Photo] Ben Erdmann

Sources: Scott Coldiron, alpinist.com, americanalpineclub.org

Mason Earle at the base of the Bartlett Wash Project (5.14-, 115') after completing the first free ascent on March 12, 2015. [Photo] Jeremiah Watt

On March 12, 26-year-old Mason Earle completed his three-year-crack-project the Bartlett Wash Project (5.14-, 115'), thirty minutes outside Moab, Utah in the eponymous canyon. Earle--originally from Concord, Massachusetts, but today based in Salt Lake City, Utah--has been climbing for sixteen years, since age ten, and tackling cracks since he was eighteen.

Earle has had a prolific last couple of years leading up to his latest ascent. In July 2013 he established a six-pitch route--a previously abandoned project first tried by Mikey Schaefer--Psycho Bitch (5.13b) on Schultz's Ridge in Yosemite Valley. In January 2014 he climbed the Hidetaka Suzuki thin-crack route Stingray (5.13+) in Joshua Tree National Park. And in August 2014 he made the first free ascent of Sendero Luminoso with Nik Berry and David Allfrey (5.10 A4, Quinlan, 1980; FFA: 5.13d) on Mt. Hooker in Wyoming's Wind River Range. [We reported on this climb in a NewsWire on September 5, 2014--Ed.] He has also been working on Squamish's Cobra Crack (5.14, 120'), but "I've fallen off of the top of [it] a lot," he says.

Alpinist caught up with Earle over the phone while he was at a friend's house in Moab--where he joked that he was "kind of lost now that I don't have a project." A lawnmower turned on in the background, about ten feet from him, as we began the interview.

Earle jamming his way up the Bartlett Wash Project. [Photo] Jeremiah Watt

Alpinist: How did you discover the Bartlett Wash Project?

Mason Earle: It was a rest day. I was on the way to Canyonlands, saw a wall in the distance and thought I'd check it out. While driving along the base of the wall, I thought I saw a hint of an overhanging crack line. I found it in the autumn of 2012.

The first thing I did was to tie my rope to some rocks at the bottom and solo-aid it with a GriGri. Apart from breaking off a few chips, there were no loose blocks. It's in the Entrada sandstone--the softest garbage in the desert--like what you find in Arches National Park. It's a bit sandy: you brush it and you make more sand. Luckily, the route doesn't rely on face holds or a crimp--[the rock is so bad] it would've broken off.

It was way over my head. At first, I could only link one to two cam placements. I came back the next spring and autumn. Once the chalk was embedded in the sandy rock it started to link together. I felt like I had a good chance on it last spring, but I popped a tendon on my wrist, and the same thing happened this autumn. [The injury happened during] a thumbs-up jam--where your pinky tendon meets the wrist. [The injury] got worse and worse.

I probably gave it thirty attempts over three years. Once my hand healed again, the route went down.

ALP: Do you often work on routes alone?

I only solo projects by necessity. When I've had really psyched partners, that's been great, but more often than not I'm out solo with a GriGri. It's therapeutic when you work on something with no timeframe. You also need to not have a job for that to work.

I guess you could say that I'm a professional climber. The sponsors are what keeps the ball rolling and diesel in the tank.

ALP: What's your climbing schedule like?

ME: I maintain an average of two to three days on, then a rest day. I definitely couldn't work [the route] more than two to three days out of the week. The pressure on the knuckles from overhanging jamming takes awhile to recover from.

There are probably a lot of 5.14 cracks out there that would be just too painful and wouldn't be fun. There aren't any stopper moves on the Bartlett Wash Project; it's just steep and long, [and] without rests. It's like the perfect hard crack in that sense.

ALP: Did you train specifically?

ME: There were times when I trained on my little wall in Salt Lake City. Other than a bit of campus boarding, I didn't do any training.

ALP: I understand you climbed much of the route with one shoe off. Why?

ME: My left shoe was a [specialty limestone shoe] and the right [was a soft slipper], which fit in the 50-degree overhanging flare.

When I get a good fingerlock midway, I take my right shoe off and throw it in the sand dunes and continue with the taped foot. That was a very important move to recruit power--and throwing my shoe as hard as I could recruited power and got me psyched. [From here], it's purple and green Camalots, and every move except for one I can jam my right foot in.

ALP: What was the anchor like? Were you concerned about its integrity because of the soft rock?

ME: For the longest time, I had a two long 3/8-inch bolts in there [but that made me nervous], so I put in an enormous 1/2-inch by 5- or 6-incher.

I placed fifteen pieces on the send. The first piece off the ground is a No 5 Camalot, which you place out of a bush. You have to do a full-on offwidth move to place the next piece of gear. If the bush wasn't there, you couldn't do the first move.

Then there's a thin spot at half height, which is the hardest move on the route. The route jogs right and closes down for a bit, and you have to do a huge reach.

ALP: Any last thoughts?

ME: I'm hoping that [Alex] Honnold gets on it. I think he could do the thing--I don't know how quick, but quicker than me.

Sources: Mason Earle, blackdiamondequipment.com, eddiebauer.com, instagram.com

Marc-Andre Leclerc, winner of the 2015 Guy Lacelle Pure Spirit Award, in El Chalten, Argentine Patagonia, this past winter. [Photo] Matt Van Biene

Those who've been following the Patagonia season this year may have noticed one name popping up over and over, attached to big news out of the Chalten Massif: Marc-Andre Leclerc, a 22-year-old climber, known for his free climbing, ice climbing and free soloing, from Squamish, British Columbia. From January 18 through 22, he and Colin Haley made the first ascent of La Travesia del Oso Buda, aka the "Reverse Torre Traverse," covering rock and mixed ground to enchain Cerro Torre, Torre Egger, Punta Herron and Aguja Standhardt. From February 2 through 3, he and Haley made the first integral ascent of Cerro Torre's north face. And on February 21, Leclerc made the first solo (self-belayed, in spots) of Cerro Torre's Corkscrew (5.10d A1 90 degrees, 4,000').

In light of these ascents, Leclerc's many solos in his stomping grounds of Squamish and a recent multiday ice binge in the Canadian Rockies, Leclerc has received the 2015 Guy Lacelle Pure Spirit Award. Named for the late Canadian ice climber, who perished in a fall in 2009 at the Bozeman Ice Festival, the award is given to a climber who, according to its organizers, "embodies the spirit of integrity, humility and joy that Guy brought to his climbs." (The award is a joint venture between Arc'teryx, La Sportiva and Petzl.) Leclerc has an unshakable love of climbing and an unassuming mastery of many mountain genres, as Sonnie Trotter explains, "He's definitely got the spirit. Fun to climb with, inspiring, young and open-minded."

Leclerc on the summit of Cerro Torre after soling the Corkscrew, in a day, on February 21. [Photo] Marc-Andre Leclerc

Alpinist caught up with Leclerc, back home in Squamish from Argentina, for a few questions about his recent climbs and his approach to soloing.

Alp: Tell me about your recent solo of the Northeast Buttress of Mt. Slesse [in British Columbia].

ML: Slesse was awesome. Climbing it in winter is one of those things I had wanted to do "in theory" for ages. I actually wanted to find a partner and try either Navigator Wall or East Pillar Direct, one of the hard lines, but no one jumped on board so I went alone.

There was one section on the Northeast Buttress where I was not sure if the compact granite would be friendly to solo with crampons. It's a series of slabby ramps that bypasses a steep section midway. That whole section was bomber 75-degree ice and neve; I was cruising and psyched.

Higher up, the rock changes and is better for crampons, but there was still some really exposed and tricky mixed terrain that demanded a lot of attention.

Alp: You attempted Aconcagua, correct? How did it go?

I went to Aconcagua to see how I reacted to the altitude, and if all went well I wanted to climb the South Face. I learned a lot about acclimatization, but I ended up getting a bad stomach infection and leaving the area. It took me a solid three weeks to recover, but there were lingering effects for much longer.

Alp: How does soloing connect you with the vertical world (versus climbing with a partner)?

ML: When I'm alone, my brain goes into a hard-working mode, where I'm always problem-solving and thinking ahead, no slacking off. With a partner, you share the difficulties and make team decisions. I find that my mind performs really well when I'm alone because there is no one else there to pick up the slack when I start feeling tired, so it just stays turned on.

Alp: How do you select the routes that you'll solo?

ML: When I look at a mountain or climbing area, there are always routes that look rad that I would like to try with a partner, and there are routes that look rad that seem ideal to solo. The Reverse [Torre] Traverse and North Face of Cerro Torre were both sick lines that I wanted to do with a buddy. But the Corkscrew looked totally "solo-able" from my perspective, so I just wanted to do it in that style because it would be an awesome experience.

Alp: We've done quite a few interviews--from talking about your Squamish solos, Canadian Rockies solos and your recent solo of the Corkscrew. What do you tap into when you're soloing complex routes that require a mix of free, aid and ice?

ML: I like soloing complex routes because I feel it's a good way to actually use a wide variety of my skills to accomplish a single task. I've spent all this time learning to climb rock, ice, aid, etc., [so] why not choose an inspiring objective that will require all of it combined? I used to practice using hooks and dry tooling on the bricks on our chimney when I was fourteen; it's cool to be doing it on the side of Cerro Torre eight years later and see the progression.

Alp: Speaking of the prize you just won, has Guy Lacelle been an influence?

ML: I only learned about Guy Lacelle after his tragic accident, but, yes, he became an inspiration for my ice climbing right away. I've had a lot of influences while growing up climbing. Reinhold Messner has always been an influence; Guy Edwards and Dougal Haston are a couple of others who come to mind, but there are lots.

Sources: alpinist.com, arcteryx.com, facebook.com, instagram.com, marcleclerc.blogspot