Sorry Steve, Russians sent it

[wayne]

I remmember Steve House saying this was his dream route, The Ruskies got the West face of K2 first though. Any discussion of the ethics?

[jshamster]

The Russian Big Wall Machine keeps on rolling!

Pretty amazing climb, but I hope not the winner of

the next Golden piton/axe/schlong award.

 

Obviously lots of room for improvement left for Steve,

or any of the new breed of alpinists.

 

[Adam13]

They are friggin amazing. Sergey Kofanov and Valery Babanov are gonna try to open a new route on the "wall of shadows" on jannu's north face this fall in full alpine style. The same wall some of the guys on the west face team won the Piolet d'Or for a few years back.

[Adam13]

They are friggin amazing. Sergey Kofanov and Valery Babanov are gonna try to open a new route on the "wall of shadows" on jannu's north face this fall in full alpine style. The same wall some of the guys on the west face team won the Piolet d'Or for a few years back.

[ericb]

I remmember Steve House saying this was his dream route, The Ruskies got the West face of K2 first though. Any discussion of the ethics?

 

Obviously it's early, but it would be interesting to know how much crap/fixed ropes they left on the route this time relative to the siege of Jannu. IMO the first alpine style ascent will be undiminished by this effort.

[Adam13]

I agree alpine is in a class by itself. I cant remember who said it but i agree, "there are no significant expeditionary climbs left" a first ascent is still a great accomplishment but the first person who does it alpine is still better in my opinion.

[Adam13]

With this climb, Everest's North Face, and the wall of shadows climb the Russian's have done a great job of proving that if you throw enough climbers and gear at a mountain sooner or later you'll climb it. Now its time for them to stop trampling over the last great alpine climbs and start climbing alpine style like everyone else who wants to be taken seriously these days.

[dt_3pin]

The first crux of the direct route up the West Face was a rock wall more than 3,000 feet high, the Bastion, ending at over 25,000 feet

[Adam13]

It was an amazing ascent I'm not taking anything away from them for what it took to get up that wall, but they left a hell of alot of gear on Jannu and thats just not clean climbing accomplishing a first ascent does not give one the right to trash the route. Hopefully they learned from their mistakes and climbed cleaner but that won't be known for awhile.

 

-but for the record im not exactly getting on the next plane to Pak to try and climb the bastion either, great job but considering the work it takes to put the route in, cleaning it off on the way down, atleast to an extent is nothing compared to it.

[Raindawg]

It was an amazing ascent I'm not taking anything away from them for what it took to get up that wall, but they left a hell of alot of gear on Jannu and thats just not clean climbing accomplishing a first ascent does not give one the right to trash the route.

 

Wake up, pal. "Clean climbing" barely exists at your local crag, nonetheless in the big mountains.

 

 

 

[Adam13]

I dont need to "wake up" im fully aware of the reality of things but that doesnt mean its right. People are murdered every day that doesn't make it any more ok to walk up to someone and shoot them.

[Choada_Boy]

...they typed from behind their computers.

[matt_m]

...they typed from behind their computers.

 

Exactly - people make it sound like this climb was EASY because they didn't do it alpine style. Whatever. Alpine style whiners are like wine snobs. They'd miss out on a great bottle of table wine because it wasn't pure enough for them. Fact of the matter is there are some routes / faces that alpine style doesn't work on. There may be a party here and there that can prove that statement wrong most of the time but I maintain there are routes that are not in the realm of non-suicidal alpine style.

 

 

[Adam13]

I understand what you're saying and I think i did go off a bit more than i should have considering im at best 1/10th the climber those russians are. But in reply to that there are routes alpine style doesnt work for we will see because the Wall of Shadows is a harder climb than the west face and it is being attempted alpine style, although one of the guys trying it basically carried a climber on his back from high camp on everest this year so i guess just cuz he can do it doesnt really mean a mere mortal can.

[matt_m]

I guess what I mean by "alpine style doesn't work" is that, in my mind, there comes a point when you cross over from "alpine style" to "suicide style". At some point in the high mountains you're really just rolling the dice - no amount of skill and determination mitigates the hard facts that high altitude climbing kills you at some point. Routes of extremely high difficulty such as the K2 route above cause the climber to walk a razor sharp line and at some point it turns into blind luck they survive and succeed alpine style. It's at this point, where success in an alpine style ascent becomes more luck and a willingness to die trying, that I no longer care about it being "done in good style". Now this is admittedly an impossible point to define but for me personally, fixed ropes and siege tactics will earn my respect more than wining a game of "russian roulette" with the mountain.

[Adam13]

I agree with you there at a certain point it stops being a pure climb and becomes purely stupid. I do wonder how the hell those two are planning to climb Jannu alpine style considering the russians had to aid climb most of the all to get up it, how the hell can two guys carry enough gear to climb a 3000m wall that overhangs at some points. And i dont think the act of pulling large amounts of supplies up the ropes they will have to fix to stick to the wall constitutes alpine style anyway.

[LUCKY]

 

 

 

Iceman/raindawg/Don Ryan I noticed you keep posting this pic, I could not find the one with the burgers where the bolts are. What’s up? This is my favorite warm up Hurly Burly 5.9 I start off with it when I get to the crag than I do Lovey Dovey 10-A to the left and by then all the crew has shown up and we head to nevermind to pull down on the harder stuff, I don’t under stand why you seem to think hang’n with friends climbing sport routes is a bad thing. Some of us old men like how climbing hard sport routes can put you in really good shape and extend the ageing process, at over 50 I can climb harder than most kids…love that steep stuff and the upper body strength. Iceman I think you are getting old and senile, dude give sport climbing a try, What up, afraid of getting the body back you had 20 years ago?

[crazy_t]

3 bolts in 1 body length

[Alex]

Any discussion of the ethics?

 

No supplemental oxygen is difficult to argue with despite the fixed ropes.

[glassgowkiss]

It was an amazing ascent I'm not taking anything away from them for what it took to get up that wall, but they left a hell of alot of gear on Jannu and thats just not clean climbing accomplishing a first ascent does not give one the right to trash the route. Hopefully they learned from their mistakes and climbed cleaner but that won't be known for awhile.

 

-but for the record im not exactly getting on the next plane to Pak to try and climb the bastion either, great job but considering the work it takes to put the route in, cleaning it off on the way down, atleast to an extent is nothing compared to it.

yeah, i am sure you could check yourself about fixed lines?! i am sure you send a bunch of hard alpine routes on high peaks. get off your high horse and from behind your computer and show us how it's done.

for all you complainers i must say- you can go up there and show how it's done. when you are sucking air your focus is on not loosing your fingers not on some fixed lines (that only a handful of people will ever see first hand).

[Adam13]

I'm kinda suprised no one said that to me before. I do think alpine style does raise the level of accomplishment but I got out of line, anyone who climbs K2 regardless of the route or style deserves respect from all climbers, these are not people who paid 50,000 to be short-roped up everest by a sherpa.

[Choada_Boy]

There was a not too shitty "Most Dangerous" story on the boob-tube the other day about K2. Focused mostly on the '86(if I remember correctly) season. Read "K2: Triumph & Tragedy" by Jim Curran for the full scoop.

 

I'm fully with Bob on this one. Would you fault the Apollo astronauts for leaving the base of the Lunar Lander behind?

[LUCKY]

3 bolts in 1 body length

 

 

 

 

 

This is what I think about 3 bolts in one body length

The rock there is steeper than it looks in the pic and actually it is 3 bolts with 2 rusty chain links for pro. I use to skip the 2nd bolt till a few years ago my girl friend took a lead fall with the bolt at her feet in the same climbing area (nevermind) she has had multi surgeries and will never get back to 100%, now I clip all bolts own a stick clip and use it. Something like that can wake you up to climbing safe.

It’s a sport climbing area, we go there to have fun and get in shape for when we really need strength and bravery to pull us out of danger.

Funny how a few like to talk trash about the most used climbing area in Washington you do realize you are just a few screaming crows and in the minority.

Yo Iceman you can expect a reply every time you post this pic in the future LUCKY

[Raindawg]

 

[olyclimber]

when you don't have anything meaningful to say...