Tima Deryan

She does not fit into the clichés that many people in the West have of Arab women. Fatima, called Tima, Deryan does not stand in the shadow of a man. She is cosmopolitan, self-confident and independent. She has founded a company in Dubai where she lives – and she is a mountaineer: Tima has already scaled five of the “Seven Summits”, the highest mountains of all continents. Mount Everest and Mount Vinson in the Antarctica are still missing from her collection.

On 23 March, the 26-year-old will fly to Nepal to climb the highest mountain on earth. On the trek to Everest Base Camp, Tima will certainly pay special attention to the yaks. In October 2017 on her way to Island Peak, she was attacked by a yak when she had just crossed a bridge over the Dudh Kosi between Phakding and Namche Bazaar. She was flipped over by the yak. The horns hit her at the thigh, Deryan was slightly injured.

Tima, how did you become a mountaineer?

On the summit of Aconcagua (in 2017)

I was born in Kuwait, my family moved to Lebanon when I was two years old and then moved to Dubai when I was nine years old. I‘ve been always into sports in general. During my teenage, I was into bodybuilding and then started bungy jumping by the age of 16. I then started my scuba diving and got my advanced PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) license, then I thought I should also get my skydiving license and I did.

In 2015 I attended a speech by Omar Samra, the first Egyptian man to climb Everest (in 2007) and I was reminded about my goal: I’ve always wanted to climb Everest ever since I was 14. I have visited Nepal five times and flew over Everest twice and I always said I will climb to the top of this mountain one day. So I took the first step to see if I like mountaineering or not and took off to climb Mount Elbrus in Russia. This was when I got hooked and my mountaineering journey started.

How would you describe your character?

I’m am a strong woman both physically and mentally. I love laughing and I enjoy the simple things in life. I‘m a minimalist, so to me it’s all about the experience rather than material. I have two jobs when I’m not on the mountain, one is in finance, the other is my own business which means I work hard for my money.

I‘m a loud person when I’m happy and I try to control it. I would consider myself between both an extrovert and introvert at this stage in life. Mind over matter is what I believe in. A positive, balanced and happy life is what I try to achieve all the time.

On the ladder across a crevasse (on Island Peak)

Which of your qualities do help you the most in the mountains?

Believing that I’m strong, being positive and laughing (especially when the altitude hits me) and of course now that its all about mind over matter which I actually tattooed on my hand as a reminder.

What does mountaineering mean to you today?

I honestly wish mountaineering is my job but this doesn’t work in my world. My dreams are big and I need to earn a lot to be able to achieve them. So now mountaineering for me is a run away from the standard city life and mainstream world. It‘s when I refill all my positive energy and boost my confidence. It‘s when I’m in peace with myself and I push all the limits happily. It‘s when I rebalance my thoughts and mentally heal. Mountaineering is literally my heaven on earth and happy place.

How do you prepare for Everest?

While rock climbing

Given that Everest has been a long time dream of mine, when I decided that I want to do it, I discovered that it takes about two months! As a newbie, I continued climbing for three years until I gained confidence and learned enough to take such a decision.

As for training, I do my strength training from 6am to 7am then I’m off to a long day at work. I come back and do my HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) in the evening.

I run ten kilometers one or two times a week, do indoor climbing two, three times a week and I’m always hiking over the weekend.

How do you finance the expedition?

I’m a minimalist, I live with my family so I really do not spend much of what I earn. Everything goes into mountains and trips. As for Everest, it is a launching event for my new company Yalla Cleaning (an online portal for cleaning industry). Part of my initiative is contributing to cleaning Everest, so currently working with the Nepalis on how I can help to bring the trash off the mountain through a system.

South side of Mount Everest

What are your expectations for Everest?

I think anyone wanting to climb a mountain would have the ultimate goal of reaching the top. For Everest, my ultimate goal is definitely reaching the top but I am very well aware that things might go against my expectations. The fact that I have the chance to spend around 50 days on the mountain, be there and live the experience, it is way too beautiful. But to top the cake with the cherry, it’ll be great to come back home with the summit! So I really do not have a lot of expectations besides – expecting the cold, stainless-steel ladders, Khumbu Icefall, crevasses, and the epic basecamp life!

A woman as a mountaineer – there are not many in the male-dominated Arab world. What resistance did you have to overcome?

I always say the Arab world is in a transition phase. It is true that it is male-dominated but women are rising up in all domains. Women in the Middle East are achieving the impossible whether it is in fitness, business, culture, music and entertainment.

Nepal, I’m coming

As I started my mountaineering journey, it was difficult to convince my family to travel alone knowing that I will be disconnected and they might not hear from me for a while. It was very hard for them to accept it but I managed to convince them. Otherwise, I did not really face a lot of difficulties kick-starting my passion.

As for society, I usually have a lot of respect from both men and women when they know what I go through to reach the peak. Just like in any other part of the world, some people think I’m too crazy and my future will be complicated. I don’t really bother explaining instead I climb more and prove them wrong. It’s all about action at the end of the day.

How do Arab men react to your mountain successes, how do Arab women?

Both Arab men and women react in a beautiful way towards my summit successes. It makes me so happy to hear “we are proud of you”. I must say, I do get challenged by some men when it comes to fitness so they can prove a point. I accept it for fun. Whether I lose or win doesn’t matter but I make sure my message goes through which is: Women are strong creatures with a high pain threshold.

Is there also a message that you want to give to Arab women by climbing Everest?

On expedition (to Denali)

Yes. Through my Everest climb I would like to demonstrate that an Arab woman is able to fight all sorts of limitations that society imposes upon her. She can earn her freedom only by action. If she wants something she must work really hard to get it! Being strong does not mean not being feminine enough. Being strong is way more attractive than being “soft”.

Arab women are still going through the phase of being independent and doing anything on there own. Most women still find it difficult to date to depend solely on themselves. So If I can climb Everest and depend on myself on the mountain then they can do anything. All it takes is courage and hard work.

I want Arab women to know that they are beautiful, they are strong and they can conquer the world. But only with the right mindset.

P.S.: By the way, the first Arab woman on Everest was the Palestinian Suzanne Al Houby, who reached the highest point at 8850 meters in spring 2011.

Alexander Huber on Choktoi Ri

Still crazy after all these years. This title of a song by Paul Simon could also stand above the lives of many climbers – if they have survived their daring adventures into old age. Being a little crazy – and I mean that in a positive way – is just part of the game. Alexander Huber, the younger of the two Huber brothers, will celebrate his 50th birthday this Sunday.

The list of his successes is long. Thus Alexander opened several rock climbing routes in the eleventh degree, climbed (with his two years older brother Thomas, Toni Gutsch and the US-American Conrad Anker) for the first time through the West Face of the 7,108-meter-high Latok II in the Karakoram in 1997, stood one year later without bottled oxygen on the summit of the eight-thousander Cho Oyu or climbed free solo difficult routes in the Alps such as the “Hasse-Brandler-Diretissima” through the North Face of Cima Grande (in 2002) or the “Schweizerführe” at the 3,838-meter high Grand Capucin in the Montblanc region (in 2008). Last summer, Huber and his German climbing partner Fabian Buhl opened a new 2,200-meter-long route via the South Buttress of the 6,166-meter-high Choktoi Ri in the Karakoram (see video below).

Alexander lives with his wife and three children on a farm near Berchtesgaden. I called him a few days before his big birthday.

Alexander, you are about to turn 50. Is that a day like any other for you?

Alexander at the trade fair “Outdoor” in 2017

It’s certainly not a day like any other, because I’m well aware that another decade has passed. But it won’t be a special birthday for me, I already know the feeling from my previous big birthdays.

If you compare yourself today with Alexander, who was 25 years old, do you still recognize yourself?

I still absolutely recognize myself as I was then. You go your own way in life. There are many things that change, some things remain the same. Maybe I’d like to be 25 again, but my sense of reality tells me that it won’t happen that way. And it’s not like everything was better at the age of 25. There are also things that are better at 50.

Have your priorities changed?

The priorities are constantly changing. This is a completely normal process in life. It would be a miracle if it wasn’t so.

Have you become more cautious?

Yes, in the sense that I no longer do the wild actions like at the age of 25 or 35. That also has a lot to do with my sense of reality. I know that I pulled things off at a level I don’t have anymore. That means I can’t top the things I’ve already realized anyway. And that’s why I just take it easier and do the things that are possible for me.

Last summer you opened with Fabian Buhl a new route via the South Buttress of the six-thousander Choktoi Ri. How good did it feel – after some failed expeditions in the Karakoram?

Such a success always feels good. It’s fun to reach the summit. That’s the reason why you set off at all. But it is quite normal in the life of a climber that there are actions that don’t lead to success. Especially on larger expeditions, I have a success rate that is well below 50 percent. If you can’t cope with that, you have no business going to these mountains with ambitious goals. If anybody claims to be a “Mister 100 Percent Success”, I can only say: Well, then he never really tried to push himself to the limit. I prefer to keep pushing my limits and taking a setback from time to time instead of trying things that are easy to get.

But on Choktoi Ri, it ran smoothly for you.

Yes, although we had a difficult season due to the meteorological conditions. Also in the Karakoram you notice the impact of global warming. There was a lot of bad weather this year. But in terms of tactics we performed extremely well, so that in the end the result was success. Only a single wrong tactical decision would have meant that we would not have made it. We did well, but also had the bit of luck that you need.

Fabian is 28 years old, more than 20 years younger than you. Were you already a little bit in the role of the mentor, who passes on his experience?

With Fabian Buhl on top of Choktoi Ri

Sure, that’s the role you automatically take on. Of course I am a mentor of Fabian. But in the end I was looking for a competent climbing partner for my idea. One of Fabian’s strong points is that he is incredibly motivated, has incredible fun while climbing and is not afraid of anything, he really enjoys every effort. That’s exactly the kind of partner you need on a mountain. This is the only way it can work.

Was it perhaps also a model for you for the next few years to be en route in a team of only two?

I’ve done that before, so it’s not a new model for me. In principle, I prefer to be on the road in a team as small as possible. But it also depends on the goal. To tackle, for example, Latok II in a team of two, would almost mean to ignore the danger of the mountain. If something happens, you have only a minimum safety reserve.

Is there a highlight in your climbing career that stands out and that you particularly like to remember?

I am happy that I was able to set my highlights in very different fields of climbing and that I have always kept alpinism alive and interesting for me. It all started for me on top level with alpine sport climbing. Today I can’t imagine being a sports climber with the same enthusiasm again, it would probably have become much too boring for me. But if you look at what alpinism is all about – be it in Antarctica, Patagonia, the Yosemite Valley, the Dolomites, doing speed climbing, free solo climbing, difficult alpine routes, expeditions, eight-thousander, sports climbing in the eleventh-degree – then all you can say is: Cool to have such a sport that can be interesting on top level even after thirty years.

Extreme climbing, here in Mount Asgard on Baffin Island

Let’s look ahead, what goals do you still set yourself as a climber?

I only set myself medium-term goals. In the long run I can only say: I want to be happy with what I do. But what exactly will that be? I don’t know. It will happen. I am lucky to have come through my climbing almost injury-free. I’m still healthy, nothing hurts me, and that’s why I continue to go to the mountains. But of course it can look completely different from one day to the next.

Is there already a concrete project for 2019?

The only thing I know for sure is that I will not go on expedition. I still want to climb various routes here at home in the Alps. But the concrete project for 2019 is not to travel to the Himalayas or the Karakoram.

And how will you spend your birthday?

Like every year. I’ll celebrate my birthday with my friends.

Luis Stitzinger on a mountain above his home town of Füssen

Without him, I couldn’t call myself a first ascender. Luis Stitzinger was the expedition leader of the German operator “Amical alpin” in summer 2014, who led us to maximum success on the 7,129 meter high Kokodak Dome in western China: All 16 team members reached the summit – not least thanks to Luis’ experience and circumspection. Stitzinger already stood on eight eight-thousanders: Cho Oyu (in 2000), Gasherbrum II (2006), Nanga Parbat (2008), Dhaulagiri (2009), Broad Peak (2011), Shishapangma (2013), Manaslu (2017) and Gasherbrum I (2018). He scaled them all without bottled oxygen, six of them together with his wife Alix von Melle.

This Sunday, Luis will celebrate his 50th birthday, “under palm trees on a sandy beach,” he tells me laughing. With Alix, he treats himself to a three-week holiday in the Greek climbing paradise of Leonidio: “I gave it to myself for my birthday.” I spoke to him before he left to Greece.

Luis, half a century old, doesn’t even an experienced mountaineer get a bit dizzy?

Luis (2nd from left) the day before our summit bid on Kokodak Dome (in 2014)

The number five in front is a bit frightening at first sight. On the other hand, I had a year to get used to the idea. And if you think it back and forth, you also realize that this transition is only defined by man and that it is not razor-sharp. It is only a number. I still feel good. 50, that sounds a bit like close to retirement. But I actually don’t feel that way at all.

If you now compare yourself with Luis, who was 25 years old, do you still recognize yourself?

Yes, but of course I have also changed over time. I wouldn’t want to be 25 again because I feel much more confident now. I can enjoy things much more than I did then. If I could transport myself back in time, I would rather head for 36 or 38 years.

Why this age?

Because then you have already gained some experience in life. Also professionally I felt I had arrived. In my private and sporting life, that was an age at which I was well on my way and I was at one with myself. At mid-30s, you’re no longer a greenhorn, but you’re not really old either.

His skis always in the luggage

50 years is a mark to look both back and forward. Let’s first look back! Is there an achievement in your mountaineering career that you would like to highlight?

I like to think back to Nanga Parbat in 2008. We experienced there three times as much as others, because we were really on the mountain three times. First we reached the summit with the “DAV Summit Club” team via the Kinshofer route on the Diamir side of the mountain. Then I tried with my mountain companion Josef (Lunger) to traverse the Mazeno Ridge. We got to the Mazeno Col, but then we had to descend because we ran out of gas and food. And finally I succeeded a ski descent down the central Diamir flank.

With Alix on the summit of Manaslu

You climbed your first eight-thousander, Cho Oyu, in 2000. From your point of view, how has mountaineering in the Himalayas and the Karakoram changed over the past 18 years?

On certain mountains there are much more climbers en route than back then, it has generally become more expensive and therefore more elitist. On some mountains only rich people are able to afford an expedition. The scene of the operators has changed too. Formerly there were only a few bigger companies, now there is a large number of operators. More and more local companies are taking over the market. They organize huge expeditions of several hundred people on the mountain – as for example on Manaslu in fall 2017.

In the meantime, Asians have also discovered high-altitude mountaineering for themselves. There are many people on the way, some of them inexperienced, who need comprehensive support. The change of style, away from the great eight-thousander expeditions of the early days towards individual mountaineering, which Messner, Habeler and others initiated, has reversed again.

That sounds as if you are concerned.

Queue on Manaslu

It doesn’t please me because it’s a very tippy thing in my eyes. It is safe as long as these inexperienced expedition members are massively looked after and the people in charge do the right things at the right time. But what if it happens too late or for some reason there is no support any more? Then it quickly becomes a dangerous all-or-nothing gamble. I expect a bigger accident to happen at some point. It will come inevitably.

Do you think such an accident would change anything?

I don’t think so. If you see, for example, how the expedition rules in Tibet have now been tightened, it’s actually completely into the wrong direction. Individual climbers are restricted, because the Chinese authorities see those who play their own game as a danger – even if they have the game under control and know what they are getting into. On the other hand, the authorities perceive as safe what the big operators are doing there: massive deployment of Climbing Sherpas and mountain guides in order to give the inexperienced clients as much staff as possible. For the authorities this is the path to the future. In case of an accident, there would probably be even more requirements for the operators, but individual mountaineering would hardly be strengthened again.

In high camp on Gasherbrum I

You are also working as a mountain guide for commercial groups. How do you resolve this conflict for yourself being part of the system on the one hand and realizing the negative aspects on the other hand?

Sometimes it is a tightrope walk. As German operators, we still have a slightly different tradition. The commercial expeditions in our country have developed out of group trips. The members are regarded more as self-reliant mountaineers and have to lend a hand. This is sometimes quite different with American or many Nepalese operators: There clients are kept on short rope and are of no account.

This year you scaled your eighth eight-thousander, Gasherbrum I in the Karakoram. How difficult or easy was it for you, or to put it another way: Did you feel that the ravages of time took their toll?

It was very exhausting, due to all the snow and because we were only a team of two. The other climbers had all descended in the storm of the previous day. Gianpaolo (Corona) and I were the last ones in the high camp and just tried it. It was 13 or 14 hours of stomping through deep snow. Although it was so exhausting, I really felt very good. Also in the days after I was not as burnt out as on some other mountains before.

Ascent to the summit of G I

Let’s look ahead! What goals do you still set in your mountaineering career?

At the age of 50 it’s not over yet! I still have some goals. I have not set myself an age limit. I just look at how I’m doing at the moment and then decide. Specifically, I’m planning to tackle Mount Everest again in spring 2019 from the north side (his first attempt there in 2015 failed because the mountain was closed after the earthquake in Nepal)– first as a mountain guide, as a work assignment. Maybe I can do something on the mountain myself afterwards with (Austrian) Rupert Hauer – a good friend of mine who leads another group on Everest.

Without bottled oxygen?

Yes, if possible without it.

Are the 14 eight-thousanders still a topic for you?

I have scaled eight of them so far, there are still six missing, that’s quite a lot. Usually, I try one mountain per year, and it doesn’t work every time. So six outstanding eight-thousanders means several years. I don’t know if I’m running out of time. I’m interested, but there are other things that might appeal to me even more, e.g. to climb a challenging route on an eight-thousander.

P.S.: Alix von Melle will not accompany Luis to Everest next spring, she is indispensable in her job.

Adam Ondra

Even the master of the impossible sometimes faces profane problems. “Get in, I still have to find a parking space,” Adam Ondra tells me when we meet two weeks ago at the agreed place in the centre of the northern Italian city of Trento. The 25-year-old Czech is one of the top stars of a sports festival to which he has travelled with his van from his hometown Brno.

Ondra has been pushing the limits of sport climbing for years. Already at the age of 13, he climbed a route with a 9a degree of difficulty on the French scale which is commonl in the sport climbing scene – which in the rating of the International Climbing and Mountaineering Association (UIAA) corresponds to a route in the eleventh degree. For comparison: Reinhold Messner mastered the seventh degree at his best times as a rock climber. At the end of 2016, Ondra succeeded the first repetition of the “Dawn Wall” route on El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, which is considered the most difficult big wall route in the world, in just eight days. In September 2017, he mastered an extremely overhanging route in a cave near Flatander in Norway – the world’s first 9c (twelfth degree in the UIAA scale). The climbing world bowed once more to Ondra, nobody doubted his rating.

After guiding Adam to the parking garage in Trento, where my car is parked too, we use the way back to the venue for the interview.

Adam, you’re climbing since you were a little boy. Can you imagine that one day you’ll get tired of it?

Adam in the Route “Silence”

I think this would be a moment being just tired but not necessarily by climbing. Sometimes it’s definitely necessary to recharge the batteries and to feel fresh again. But I think that has nothing to do with climbing. Climbing is so great. And this is why I don’t think I’ll get tired of climbing, because there are so many different disciplines. It’s obviously very different climbing a two-meter- high boulder or a 1,000-meter wall. And by switching these disciplines, I think I can always keep the motivation very high.

What are you doing to relax from climbing?

Every December I take two or three weeks off from climbing. After the whole season of training and climbing a lot, my body needs it. And mentally, as I said, it definitely helps me to change between climbing gym and rock climbing, from competitions to climbing outdoors. All this helps me to be always 100 percent motivated.

Does one have to be a little crazy to climb such amazing routes as you do?

What really motivates me to climb harder and harder is not necessarily that I want to push my limits and be happy about it or show the others who’s the best, but also because climbing harder and harder routes is somehow more fun. The harder routes you climb, the more interesting the climbing gets and the more crazy moves you are forced to figure out. And once you know how it feels to climb a certain grade you don’t really want to go back because you don’t have the same feelings.

Adam Ondra: Somehow more fun to climb harder and harder

You have a climbed the world’s first route in the French grade 9c (UIAA grade 12) in a cave near Flatander in Norway. First you called it “Hard Project”. When you had finished it, you named the route “Silence”. Why did you do that?

Normally when I reach the end of a super hard route I just scream of joy. But that moment the emotion was that strong that I was unable to say anything. And it was one minute of silence.

What was the reason for that?

I don’t know. Maybe I just didn’t realize that it finally happened. If you are working on a single project for fourteen weeks and have trained specifically for it for like two seasons and when it finally comes together, this is what happens.

“It fits my style”

Do you think this route will be repeated? And if yes, when and who might be able to do it?

I don’t know. I wish it could be repeated, but let’s see. There are definitely people like Alex Megos who is in my opinion capable of doing a 9c. At the same time I don’t really think that it fits his style. He would definitely be able to climb 9c on pockets or small crimps. My route “Silence” is very special in terms of style. And I do admit that I chose this route because of its style because I thought that it really fits my advantages.

Adam Ondra: Silence fits my advantages

That’s exactly what Alex told me.What is the special challenge of your route?

It’s the route that took me the most time ever. I did most of the 9b+ routes in the world and I consider that it’s a route that really fits my style. And that’s why I had the courage to say: This is the world’s first 9c. If I wasn’t really sure about it, I would rather step back and call it 9b+. But if it’s ever been downgraded, it will be total embarrassing for me. (laughs).

Ondra at the World Championships in Innsbruck

You also take part in climbing competitions. You took second place in the Combined Olympic Format at the World Championships in Innsbruck last September. Are the Olympic Games in Tokyo 2020 a goal for you?

Yes, definitely. The next big goal is the Olympics. The next year I am gonna do both World Cups in Boulder and Lead and take it as a preparation for the season 2020 when the Olympics will be the biggest goal.

I remember that you were one of the critics of the Olympic format – the combination of speed climbing, lead and bouldering – when it was decided that sport climbing would become an Olympic discipline for the first time in Tokyo. Have you changed your mind?

In the competition

That I’m still against the format, doesn’t change anything. I always wanted to go for the Olympics, no matter how critical I am towards the format. And I am still critical nevertheless. But I have to accept it, as long as I want to compete in the Olympics. That’s the format, there is no option. The only other option is not taking part.

So it’s the bitter pill you have to swallow.

Yes, exactly.

Can the Olympic Games push climbing in any way?

I would still distinguish the world of competitions and the world of outdoor climbing. I believe it can definitely improve the competitions themselves. They will become bigger, there will be more mainstream media interest. It could even be a better show. At the same time it doesn’t have to have a negative influence on rock climbing because that’s a world for itself. And I don’t believe that the potential disadvantage is that our sport eventually gets just too big and that our climbing spots will be just too crowded. I think as the competitions are getting more popular, there are much more people going into the climbing gym. The number of people climbing outdoors will maybe growing as well but not as significant.

Adam Ondra on the possible effect of the Olympics on climbing

Adam in the route “Dawn Wall” on El Capitan

At the end of 2016, you repeated the route “Dawn Wall” on El Capitan for the first time, in eight days. It took Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson, who succeeded the first ascent, 19 days and more than seven years to prepare.

I needed one month all in all.

How was it for you to climb such a difficult big wall route solo?

For me, it was definitely a very new experience because I was a total beginner in terms of big wall climbing. And as one of my first routes I happened to choose the one which is considered the hardest in the world. I learned a lot, but in the end to learn these big wall intricacies might not really be that difficult. The difficult part is really the climbing itself. For sure it’s hard and it took me quite a long time to adept to this specific style. But I finally succeeded. But I must say the reason why it took Tommy and Kevin such a long time and why it’s so impressive is that they first had to find how to climb the wall. For years they were not even sure that it would be possible at all. And that’s why it is super impressive to me. I already knew everything and I just needed to have the climbing level to climb it.

Adam Ondra on climbing Dawn Wall

Pushing the limits until the age of 35

That sounds as if you enjoyed it but not as much as sport climbing.

No, I definitely enjoyed it a lot. But for sure big wall climbing is a lot of work. (laughs) And I don’t think it will be a good idea to only climb on big walls even in terms of training. In order to climb such a route very fast, you first need a very high sport climbing level. And you reach this level most of all by – just sport climbing. And if you have very high physical fitness you can go to Yosemite and try to climb it fast.

Do you think that the 9c grade is the limit for you?

I believe that humans can climb harder. If it’s gonna be me or someone else who will climb 9c+, I don’t know.  It would be nice to climb one day a 9c+ but I am definitely sure that I can never climb a 10a even though I believe that it’s possible. But in like 20, 30 years, I’m pretty sure that there will be 10a routes.

You’re only 25, but the day will come when you notice that your physical strength is weakening.  Have you already thought about what will happen after sport climbing?

I’m pretty sure that I will be sport climbing for as long as I will be able. I am definitely sure that I maybe can push my sport climbing level until I am 35. But then it probably won’t be possible. At the same time I am definitely very interested in trying to bring everything I learned into the bigger walls, not necessarily climbing eight-thousanders but like six-thousanders where the main difficulty will be really rock climbing with bare hands and climbing shoes. That’s something that is very interesting for me in the more distant future.

Adam Ondra: Pushing the limits until I am 35

So you’re not afraid of the cold you’d have to stand on six- or seven-thousanders?

For sure. But that’s part of the game, a little bit of adventure to make the climbing more interesting.

Beat Kammerlander (at the IMS in Brixen)

The 59-year-old is a phenomenon, a living climbing legend: Austrian Beat Kammerlander is still overcoming vertical walls, almost without climbing grips – preferably in the Rätikon, quasi on his own doorstep. The Vorarlberg native lives with his wife Christine and their two children in the city of Feldkirch. A week ago, at the “International Mountain Summit” (IMS) in Brixen, Kammerlander received the renowned “Paul Preuss Award“, which honours climbers who stand in the tradition of the free climbing pioneer who fell to his death in 1913. Preuss had pleaded for a far-reaching renunciation of climbing equipment such as ropes or bolts (“Skill is the measure of what is allowed.”). “Actually, the award could also be called the ‘Beat Kammerlander Award’,” said Hanspeter Eisendle from South Tyrol, winner of the prize in 2013, in his laudation. I spoke with Kammerlander during the IMS.

Beat, next year you’ll be 60 years old and you’re still climbing crazy tours. Will you tell us the secret of your success?

In the wall

There’s no secret. Do what you love! Only that counts. (laughs) I once planned to continue with this competitive sport until I was 40. Then I turned 40 and was stronger than before. Then I said: Why should I stop now doing something I like best? Over the years there have been setbacks, stagnation, injuries, but also highlights again and again. I realized that I feel much better about the way I lead my life and how I can finance it than if I did any job. And I am allowed to go climbing. So this question has become superfluous. Now I will soon turn 60, that’s just a number. What matters is how I feel.

While last year was great, this year was not a good one. I was bitten by a tick, got Lyme disease and had to be treated. That kept me pretty small over the summer. Now I have to be a stand-up man. I am well again. But I still need a few more months with targeted training and physiotherapy so that I can climb again on a very high level.

Have you been ordered to rest?

No, but I have a family with two small children. Sarah is two and a half, Samuel turns five in February. I spend a lot of time with them. In the past I used to goof around far too much and to train senselessly. My time management is much more targeted now. It suits me very well.

En route in rock with (almost) no grips

In 2017, you opened a new extremely difficult route in the Rätikon and called it “Battle Zone”. Do you have to fight more today than in the past?

You always fight as good as you can, at any time. (laughs) Depending on the type. Maybe I even developed a bit more motivation on this route than I used to, more consistency to achieve this goal. It was so difficult to open this route from bottom to top and to set the bolts, then to climb the passages freely. And finally it was about climbing the route Redpoint, in one day these five pitches of high difficulty. 10+, 11-, 10-, 8 and 9+. It requires a very high intensity to connect these pitches. For this project, I once again chastened myself extremely and prepared myself in a very special way. Even in the most adverse weather conditions I went there and didn’t waste any time. I also went out in the rain. I knew that it was windy on the other side of the mountain and that the fur would get dry. The whole thing at 2,800 meters, in a summit region where it always blows. You have to wrap up warm and still climb – and don’t say: Today I don’t feel like it, today I’m too comfortable. It’s always about wanting.

Does being able to bite through make you stand out?

Probably.

Do you need that to stay in business that long?

I rather see that being allowed to bite through. I have fun doing it. Surely it’s sometimes painful to hold such small grips. But it’s nice to be able to decipher such smooth, small-grip rock and climb it. If you are the first to tackle this rock and leave a trace, a line there. That is my motivation.

The view upwards

Even after such a long time? Doesn’t there ever come a point at which you say: Now it’s enough?

I’m not on the road every day. Spread over the year, it’s just a few days you work towards – mentally and physically, until you get released like a racehorse.

To be such a racehorse, do you also need competition with other climbers?

No. That would be so repugnant to me. I only do that for myself. I don’t want to compete with others. I don’t give a damn.

But climbing in a team is something important for you, isn’t it?

Of course. I only climb with friends, otherwise it doesn’t work. It’s a give and take. It’s a real act of friendship if someone joins you who is not able to climb these difficulties. You have to be grateful when a good friend is belaying you the whole day on a first ascent and feels sorry for you. And who is always on the ball. Because if he doesn’t belay you well, you can be injured seriously.

Very small ledges

Has your role shifted in the decades, from greenhorn …

I wasn’t a greenhorn for long. (laughs)

… to mentor?

Of course. I have a big climbing scene around me and have shaped it very much in terms of ideology and attitude: That you have to be honest and say what you did and how you realized it.

Do you think that the problem of a lack of honesty increases in times of marketing?

Sure. You can dream a lot of climbing projects up that aren’t really worth anything, but that make a good headline above a bad report. You will then have received your media echo, and that won’t be revoked. However, you have a loss of image which you also have to live with.

You have opened most of your routes in Europe. Why did you never go to the very high mountains in the Himalayas or the Karakoram?

That just didn’t happen. My projects, which were constantly present, simply kept me here. I would have had the motivation and the interest to climb the high walls of the Karakoram, but now that’s passé.

Let’s talk about risk. How much risk are you willing you take?

I believe that my routes, in the way I climbed them, are relatively safe. On some of my previous routes the risk was of course much higher, for example when I was doing free solo ice climbing or difficult routes in sport climbing. But alpine sport climbing is about the awareness you have developed. I am not someone who flees from a dangerous situation as quickly as possible. I have the necessary patience and the mental power too. Again and again up and down, until I manage it. Many people can’t stand it and then make the fatal mistake.

“Do what you love!”

Have you ever been lucky while climbing?

Of course. Frequently.

And what did that teach you?

Above all, to be careful with routine matters. Or when stupid emotions come along. Then sometimes you do fooling things. And that’s not smart.

Has your father role also had an effect in terms of risk taking?

When I’m out freeriding as a mountain and ski guide with guests or even for myself, it’s actually the big dangers I’m afraid of. Sometimes you can’t judge a flank’s risk exactly. Then you stand somewhere up there and have to go down. You can keep the alpine safety rules, but every now and then you also need your portion of luck. I have become much more cautious than before.

Would you encourage your children if one day they came and said: We want to do the same as you?

Of course. Do what you love! But I never want to manipulate anyone in one direction. That must come by itself.

And you have the feeling that all your life you have done what you wanted?

I think so. (laughs)

Robert Jasper (at the IMS in Brixen)

He himself was the most dangerous polar bear in Greenland. Whenever the German extreme climber Robert Jasper pitched up his tent last summer during his one-month solo expedition in the eternal ice, he built a protective fence against polar bears around it. If one of the predators had touched the fence, a flare would have gone off to chase the polar bear away – and of course to warn Robert. One day, however, the 50-year-old was so in mind that he touched the fence when he wanted to climb over it. “I almost blew myself up,” says Jasper.

Jump between two worlds

Alone in Greenland

We meet at the 10th and last “International Mountain Summit” in Brixen last week. In April, Robert had celebrated his 50th birthday. “I thought to myself: Before I get a midlife crisis now, I’d rather do a solo expedition,” says Jasper and laughs. “It was as if I was jumping back and forth between two worlds.” Jasper paddled through the fjords of Greenland in a folding kayak, hiked to the foot of the mountain he had chosen, and succeeded the first solo ascent of Molar Spire in three days. He called his route through the 450-meter-high rock face “Stonecircle” because “the most impressive things in life are often rocky and hard”.

Inner peace and strong nerves

Kayaking through the fjords

The mixture of being alone en route, kayaking and bigwall climbing was “very special” says Robert. “It was an absolutely ingenious adventure.” Even though he had a queasy feeling in the beginning, he coped well with the loneliness overall: “It was very, very quiet. You only have the sounds of nature. About this silence you find very fast to yourself. I was quickly in harmony with myself and absorbed the silence in me. This loneliness, combined with the wilderness, was a wellness holiday for the soul.”

When Jasper talked to others about his experiences after his return to civilization, his vocal cords were overstrained. “It took me a few days until I could speak properly again.  After four weeks I was simply not used to it anymore.”  He “would never have been able to spend so much time in the wilderness at the age of 20,” Robert believes. “Not at 30, maybe not even at 40. You must know yourself well, have inner peace and strong nerves as well.” Aged 50, he now fulfills all these qualifications. “Nevertheless, it was an experiment. It could also have gone wrong.” However, according to  Jasper’s words, he never had the feeling in all that time that “he was giving up control”.

Preserving lived stories

During the solo ascent

Expeditions like these on Greenland are “like jewels that I put in a treasure box. These are memories that make me happy,” says Robert. “I know many colleagues, especially younger ones, who go from one tour to the next, who are addicted to adventures and simply consume it. So I think to myself: ‘Be careful!’ You can have an accident and maybe the next day you won’t be able to climb anymore. If you haven’t learned to appreciate experiences, this situation can even break you. It is important to preserve stories you have experienced.”

Even though it was his first solo expedition, there have been – besides team successes – also some solo achievements in Jasper’s long career. For example in 1991, he climbed solo through the “classical” alpine north faces of the Eiger, Matterhorn and Grandes Jorasses. Together with his wife Daniela, Robert opened the first Eiger route in the tenth degree (“Symphonie de Liberté”) in 1999. His route “Odyssey”, mastered in 2015 along with Swiss Roger Schaeli and South Tyrolean Simon Gietl, is considered the most difficult route via the Eiger North Face to date.

Expeditions took him to the 7,804 metre high Nuptse East in the Himalayas, to Baffin Island in the Arctic – and to Patagonia: For their new route through the north face of the Cerro Murallon in 2005, Jasper and his team partner Stefan Glowacz were nominated for the Piolet d’Or, the “Oscar of the Climbers”.

More like a decathlete

On the summit of Molar Spire

Robert is not only on the move in extreme rock, but is an excellent ice climber too. “I was never a pure sports climber,” says Jasper. “I practice various disciplines of alpinism and am therefore more like a decathlete. Sport climbing is my basis: The safer you can climb the more buffers you have in alpine terrain.” Being father of a daughter and a son, “the backpack I carry has become bigger and heavier,” Robert admits. “I have more responsibility, but the experience outweighs that.” Safety is his top priority, not only on the mountain. “You have to try to minimize the risk but nevertheless take the step towards your passion, your adventures. That’s my philosophy.”

Tamara Lunger at the IMS

“I often wish I had been born a hundred years ago,” says Tamara Lunger. “When I hear the 90-year-olds talking, I think to myself: Oh, they were still adventurers! Today we are only pussies compared to them.” Yet, in 2010, at the age of 23, the professional climber from South Tyrol stood on the summit of the eight-thousander Lhotse, as the youngest woman at that time, and in 2014, she scaled K2, the second highest mountain on earth, without bottled oxygen.

During the “International Mountain Summit” in Brixen I am hiking with Tamara from the Latzfonserkreuz downhill. Her parents are keeping the alpine hut up there. We talk about Tamara’s adventures of the past years. The 32-year-old is a honest soul and doesn’t mince her words: “People tell me: ‘You can talk easily, you can live what gives you pleasure.’ However, sometimes there is something negative in my pleasure that I have to accept and learn from. That’s actually what’s important.”

Close to death

Tamara (2nd from l.) with the winter first ascenders of Nanga Parbat, Alex Txikon, Simone Moro and Muhammad Ali “Sadpara” (from l.)

In February 2016 in Pakistan, Tamara Lunger turned around just below the summit of Nanga Parbat. She was only 70 meters short of fame to become the first woman among those who succeeded winter first ascents of an eight-thousander. During the whole summit day she had felt bad, she quasi had dragged herself up the mountain. Then God spoke to her, Tamara tells me: “Normally I always get what I ask for. But that day, ten hours of praying did not help. Then I knew there was something wrong.” She turned around. In the descent she slipped. “It was my experience closest to death so far. I also talked to the Lord when I fell: ‘I didn’t think it would happen so early now. But if that’s the way it has to be, I’m ready, and that’s okay.'” After 200 meters Tamara stopped slipping in loose snow.

Much learned

She survived with injuries of her shoulder and ankle. In the following weeks she was in pain, not allowed to do any sports. And the media hassled her with interview requests. It was a “difficult time”, says the climber. “It was only with time that I understood what Nanga Parbat had given me.” Now she knows that it doesn’t always have to be the summit, says Tamara. “I also learned a lot about myself. For example, how I behave in fear of death. Do I panic or remain calm? Can I still think clearly? These insights are extremely important because they are part of the game in our profession or vocation.”

Lack of respect

A strong team: Tamara Lunger with Simone Moro (r.)

Her next eight-thousander expedition in spring 2017 led her to Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world. With her team partner and mentor Simone Moro, she wanted to traverse all peaks of the massif. However, this did not happen because Moro’s health did not play along. The experiences in the base camp, which the two professional climbers shared with members of commercial expeditions, spoiled climbing eight-thousanders for Lunger for the moment. “It’s incredible what some people are doing there,” says Tamara and shakes her head. “I was partly ashamed of them. The only thing they wanted was to get up somehow. They no longer have any respect, neither for the mountain, nor for other people. In the high camps people are stealing.”

Never again a base camp with others

A Sherpa of the Nepalese operator “Seven Summit Treks” had felt pretty bad on the mountain, unable to descent. “The boss of the Sherpas didn’t give a damn. He preferred to play around with his mobile phone on Facebook instead of helping.” That was so much against her principles that she was losing all her strength, says Tamara: “I swore to myself at the time: No more going to a base camp with other people! I hope I can pull it. In the future, I will approach the mountains in winter or from another side, with a base camp where I have my peace.

Relief in the cold of Eastern Siberia

During the first winter ascent of Gora Pobeda

Last February, Lunger and Moro succeeded the first winter ascent of the 3,003-meter-high Gora Pobeda (also known as Pik Pobeda) in the ice-cold Eastern Siberia at temperatures of minus 50 degrees Celsius. After the failure on Manaslu in winter 2015, her turnround on Nanga Parbat in winter 2016 and her unsuccessful attempt on Kangchenjunga in 2017, she felt under great pressure, Tamara says. She tried to enjoy every step in the beautiful nature of Siberia and not to think about what any people expected of her. “I did that relatively well and it really set me free. When I arrived at the summit, I breathed a sigh of relief. At last!”

Living what she feels

In her future adventures she wants to listen more to her inner voice, Tamara Lunger reveals: “I try to live what I feel. I can’t tell what I’ll do tomorrow or in a week from now. I am currently searching.” And she is not only fixated on the mountains. “I would also like to set off with a sailboat.”

Alex Megos at the IMS in Brixen

There are people who seem to be able to override the law of gravity. Alex Megos is one of them. The 25-year-old German from the city of Erlangen is one of the best sports climbers in the world. At the age of 19, he was the first in the world to master onsight a route in the Spanish climbing area of Siurana in French grade 9a, which corresponds to eleventh grade according to the classic UIAA difficulty scale. For comparison: Reinhold Messner climbed the seventh degree in his best days. Onsight means that Alex simply climbed straight on without having got any information about the route beforehand. This coup opened the door to professional climbing for him. This spring, Megos added another highlight: He managed the first ascent of the route “Perfecto Mundo” in the climbing area Margalef in the northeast of Spain (see video below showing one of his failed attempts), his first 9b+ (according to UIAA scale a climb in the lower twelfth degree). A single route worldwide is currently considered even more difficult.

I met Alex Megos during the 10th International Mountain Summit (IMS) in Brixen, South Tyrol, where the big names of the mountain scene have been passing the mike to each other for years.

Alex, you are one of only three climbers in the world who have climbed a route with difficulty level 9b+. So you’re right at the front of the pack. How does that feel?

Of course it doesn’t feel so bad. But actually I don’t do it to become famous, but simply because climbing is good for me and because I want to know how difficult I can climb, how far I can push my own limit.

Please explain to a layman what a 9b+ route is like.

It means many, many difficult climbing moves one behind the other in a very steep, partly overhanging rock wall. For example, if someone has a normal door frame of two centimeters, then I can hang on it with one arm. That’s not very difficult. But 9b+ is difficult. (laughs)

Strained fingers

What kind of training are you doing?

I actually train every day. About five days a week I go to the climbing wall, the rest of the time I do balance training and other strengthening exercises on the rings, the pull-up bar, the fingerboard, etc.

The Czech Adam Ondra, who has climbed probably the most difficult route worldwide with a 9c, employs his own physiotherapist who shows him new movements that he can integrate into his climbing moves. Do you also have such consultants?

I don’t have my own physio, but I have two trainers, Patrick Matros and Dicki (Ludwig) Korb, with whom I have been working together for twelve years. We analyze together where I can get even better, work on training, invent new exercises. Compared to running or cycling, climbing is still a very young sport, but I think it is much more complex. You have very varied movements, never the same ones. That’s why there are so many different world-class climbers. One is perhaps 1.50 meters tall and weighs 50 kilograms, the other measures 1.85 meters and weighs 80 kilograms. Both are world class, but in different climbing styles. That’s why climbing is so special for me. You just have to find out for yourself where your strengths and weaknesses lie and then work on improving yourself holistically as a climber.

In vertical rock

When you climb spectacular routes, the same names always appear in your surroundings: Chris Sharma, Stefano Ghisolfi, Adam Ondra. Is this a small clique in high-end climbing?

Absolutely. We know each other both in rock climbing and in competition climbing. After the two days here at the IMS I will go to Arco to visit Stefano and climb with him. You know each other, you visit each other, you climb together. It is really a small clique.

The mentioned 9b+ route, which you were the first to master, had actually been drilled by Chris Sharma years ago, but he didn’t manage it himself. Does that bother him?

I think he’s out of his age. (laughs) He drilled the route nine or ten years ago, tried it for a few years and failed again and again. Then he turned to another project, the “Dura Dura” route, which four years ago became the world’s first 9b+. He then also climbed it. He was already 33 years old. He became a father, opened a climbing hall and simply had less time. When Stefano (Ghisolfi) and I tried the route in Margalef, it naturally motivated him mega, and he tried it again himself.

You are now 25 years old. Do you already feel at the zenith of your performance?

I definitely don’t see myself at my limit yet. I have found so many weaknesses that I can work on so that I can climb even more difficult things.

Climbing in overhanging rock

There is a 9c route called “Silence” in the cave “Hanshallaren” near Flatanger in Norway, which was first climbed by Adam Ondra in 2017. Doesn’t this extremely overhanging route excite you?

I don’t think this route is ideal for my climbing style. It’s a climb that doesn’t suit me very well. My strengths lie in other climbing fields. If I really want to climb at my limit, then I have to find something that serves my strengths. Only then will I be able to make it.

Whereby Adam Ondra said: If someone can do it, it’s you.

But for that you would have to invest a lot of time. There aren’t that many people who have a) the level to climb something like that and b) also the will to invest so much time. I would rather invest time in something that suits me better.

You originally came from competition climbing.

As a teenager I did many, many competitions, about until I was 18 years old. Then I stopped completely for six years. At the end of 2017, I came back again with some competitions and won again my first World Cup competition in Briancon in France. I would like to get more involved in competition climbing again.

With the long-term goal of Olympia 2020 in Tokyo, where climbing will become an Olympic sport for the first time?

Of course that’s an issue. But I have to think about it carefully, because I haven’t competed at all in recent years. That’s why I’m a little behind. The format presented at the Olympics – a combination of the three disciplines bouldering, lead and speed climbing – doesn’t suit me, because until recently I’ve never been speed climbing. And even in bouldering I still have deficits, because I lack competition practice. So I have to think about it: Do I want to use the next two years to reduce these deficits and qualify for the Olympic Games? Or is that too time-consuming for me and I lose too much time on the rock?

Despite gravity

There have been heated discussions in the climbing scene about the decision to combine the three climbing disciplines into one competition for the Olympic Games. What do you think of that?

I take a very critical view of the format. In the end, the 20 best combiners will go to the Olympic Games. It is not said that the best speed climbers, the best boulderers and the best lead climbers will be there. From the speedclimbing aces – except for the world champion, who automatically qualifies – nobody has a realistic chance to compete in Tokyo, because the time is too short to make up for the deficits in the other two disciplines. The best in bouldering and lead climbing may be there, but they won’t cut a very good figure in speed climbing. I don’t know what sort of impression this will make on the spectators. It’s not really the way we want to present our sport.

In what ways can competitive climbing benefit from the Olympic Games?

More funding will then be available to make sport climbing more popular and to enable more climbers to make it their profession. That would, of course, be desirable. Nowadays it is rare for someone to say that he or she is a professional climber and can really make a living from it.

Body tension

You started climbing when you were a toddler. Has it become an addiction? Could you even be without it?

No. I couldn’t live without climbing at the moment. It has really developed into a kind of addiction. I started when I was five or six years old. It was great fun for me. Then it became more and more. I just couldn’t get enough of it. And it’s still like that. (laughs)

If you hang in these rocks and climb these moves that seem impossible to us, what is going on inside you?

I think for me it is ultimately a way to test my limits. Everyone has his own thing in which he is good and wants to see how good he can become. For me that’s just climbing. It is my way to let out energy and to live my dream.

Are you actually a fair weather climber?

No, I like it when it’s cold and uncomfortable. (laughs)

Chris Sharma once told me that he prefers to climb in the sun. That’s why the very high mountains are out of the question for him.

The very high mountains are also out of the question for me. There are minus 20 degrees and snow, it makes no sense to climb. But for me, it doesn’t have to be fine weather. I also go climbing when it rains or when it is cloudy.

The Huber brothers, Thomas and Alexander Huber, also came from sport climbing, but at some point they switched to the high mountains. Would that also be a perspective for the future for you?

Just now I can’t imagine going on an expedition and climbing any seven or eight-thousander in ten or fifteen years. But that doesn’t mean that it won’t happen sometime after all. At the moment, I think, I will leave it at sports climbing. (laughs)

Dani Arnold during his stay in Cologne

Once again, he has almost sprinted up a wall. Last August, Swiss Dani Arnold climbed the Grandes Jorasses North Face solo and without rope in the new record time of 2:04 hours. In 1938, it had taken the first climbers (led by Italian Riccardo Cassin) three days to complete the route via the Walker Spur. Since 2015, the 34-year-old is also holding the speed record for climbing the North Face of the Matterhorn (1:46 hours). Dani had made his first bang in 2011 when he broke Ueli Steck’s record in the Eiger North Face by 20 minutes and reached the summit after 2:28 hours. Steck had regained the best time in 2015 (2:22 hours).

Dani Arnold is a mountain guide and lives with his wife Denise in the canton of Uri in the 4,000-person village of Bürglen, where more than 200 inhabitants (no joke, he confirmed it to me) bear the name Arnold. I met Dani in my hometown Cologne – before his appearance as the main speaker of the Cologne Alpine Day.

Dani, how do you like the name “Usain Bolt of the classical north faces in the Alps”?

I think it’s a bit exaggerated. I am certainly very fast, but there are many other very, very good climbers. I think it’s just not true that I’m the best.

Grandes Jorasses North Face

But perhaps the fastest. After all, you hold the speed record on two of the three classic north faces in the Alps. When you climb so fast, do you sometimes get into a state of intoxication, like when running, when at some point a flow sets in and everything seems to go by itself?

Yes, there is such a feeling. I then feel free and light. If you, for example, climb the Waterfall Chimney, the Fragile Band and the Fragile Crack in the Eiger North Face, it usually takes you a lot of time. But when you’re doing it solo and at speed, you just follow one spot after the other. And then you really have the feeling that it’s fast.

Last summer you climbed the Walker Spur on the Grandes Jorasses in two hours four minutes, 17 minutes faster than the previous record holder Ueli Steck. You climbed completely without rope and other security equipment. How much risk is allowed from your point of view?

It’s not possible without risk, that’s quite clear. On the other hand, it was my goal to climb the Walker Spur without any security equipment. It was just to be the mountain and me. I first had to find out: Do I dare at all? Is it still safe? Then I decided upon this route. And I never had the feeling that I was taking a huge risk. I don’t think you can say in general that less equipment means higher risk.

How did you prepare yourself? Did you know every climbing move of this route?

The route is 1,200 meters long. I have the talent to remember places and climbing moves very well. I know, for example, how the grips look like at the Rebuffat-Corner, one of the difficult spots, and which hand I have to use on which grip. You also need a “rolling planning”, as I call it,  and a lot of self-confidence.

In the wall

You once said that there was a right to risk. What did you mean by that?

If you live for something, prepare seriously for it and then enter a danger zone, society will not accept that. I don’t think that’s right. After all, you don’t just approach these things negligently, out of ignorance or stupidity. If you really prepare yourself for something and take it seriously, you can also take a little risk, because it’s one hundred percent worth it.

Dealing with your speed records means also coming across the name Ueli Steck, because it was his records that you broke. He fell to his death at the age of 40 last year on Nuptse. Was that a warning, a reminder for you?

He did exactly the same as I do now. And of course you immediately think: Hej, that can also happen to you. I believe every accident – not only Ueli’s, but also those of other climbers – remains in the brain. That doesn’t mean that you are going a completely different way now. But I’m sure that I take not as much risk now as I did five or ten years ago.

Dani shortly before leaving the wall

When climbing at the highest level, there is always the danger of overtightening the screw one day. How do you protect from this?

The danger of going a step too far at some point is obvious. This also scares me a little, because of course I always try to reach the optimum and a little bit more. In order to counteract this, I go fishing, for example, or I simply spend time with friends and family, where we don’t talk about the subject of climbing at all. That helps me to get away from it a bit. Otherwise everything would be about climbing and also about this more, more, more. I have to have other thoughts and also to leave it well enough alone.

In the general public you are known above all because of your speed ascents. And yet you are a complete climber. For example, you are one of the first winter ascenders of Cerro Egger in Patagonia and you were also on expedition with the Huber brothers in the Karakoram. Does it bother you that you are often reduced to speed climbing in public?

It bothers me a bit. On the other hand, speed climbing allows me to make a living from climbing because there are enough lectures and sponsors. That’s why it’s important. When I do a 90-minute lecture on an evening, I use the fame for speed climbing to tell my heart stories, for example about mixed climbing in Scotland, these very, very difficult climbs.

Dani Arnold (3rd from r.) in 2015 with Thomas and Alexander Huber, their Pakistani companion Rasool, Mario Walder and Seppi Dabringer (from right)

Will you go on big expeditions again in the next few years?

Definitely. In terms of difficulty and speed, things won’t go on this way forever. Then new stories on new mountains in unknown regions will come up. With the Huber brothers I really found two great guys with whom I really enjoy traveling. This is almost more important to me than being extremely strong. You have to have a good time together. And that’s what we have.

Would an eight-thousander also be interesting for you?

Certainly. Up to now I never felt the need to climb up there, but it’s developing slowly. I would like to experience what it feels like.

Do you have a dream destination, a mountain you absolutely still want to climb?

Actually not. The Eiger North Face, for example, wasn’t this one and only goal for me. I have many, many ideas. When it becomes more concrete in preparation, I focus on a mountain. And then it suddenly becomes my mountain, and there is no other one.

Dani while ice climbing in the Helmcken Falls in Canada

You have climbed the three big north faces of the Alps solo and at great speed, so a circle has closed – unless you want to regain the Eiger record. Are you going to tick off speed climbing now?

With the record in the North Face of the Grandes Jorasses, it’s a bit over. Most likely I won’t go back to the Eiger again. But I want to keep the whole topic open. I don’t really have a concrete speed project at the moment, but that can change suddenly for me. I think I haven’t quite finished that yet.

When will we see you again on a big expedition?

In winter I want to go ice climbing in Russia or China. I have never been there in high winter. I also want to meet the people living in these extremely cold regions. That fascinates me too. There are certainly cold fingers there! (laughs)

Can you climb a mountain just completely normal, without any ulterior motive on an extreme route?

Yes, there are those days when I have no ambitions and can just enjoy it. I still love this being outside. 

David Göttler

They have two homes. German professional climber David Göttler and his partner Monica Piris spend the winter in Chamonix am Mont Blanc, the summer in Monica’s native northern Spain, between the towns of Bilbao and Santander, “where Spain is still really green”, David enthuses. This summer, as reported, Göttler had returned from Pakistan empty-handed. Bad weather had put a spoke in the wheel of him and his teammate, Italian Hervé Barmasse, on the 7,932-meter-high Gasherbrum IV in the Karakoram. Yesterday Göttler celebrated his 40th birthday in Spain – not in the mountains, but on the construction site, as he tells me, when I belated congratulate him: “I have finished my training room. So it was a good day.”

40 years, David, that’s a mark. Many ook back then on their lives or make plans for the future. You too?

For me it was just a normal birthday. However, you are thinking a little bit about the fact that now perhaps the middle of life has been reached. I don’t feel I’ve missed anything or done something wrong. But I’m also looking forward to the next 40 years. My father turns 79 next winter and is still every day en route in the mountains, paragliding, snowboarding or climbing. If I have only inherited a little bit of these genes, then I still have 40 more good years ahead. Especially in high-altitude climbing I can still do amazing things in the next few years. And I’m looking forward to it.

David with Ueli Steck (l.) in spring 2016

Did you yesterday also think of Ueli Steck, with whom you tackled Shishapangma South Face in spring 2016? Last year, he fell to his death on Nuptse – at the age of forty. Are you worried about overtightening the screw yourself one day?

I always try to deal with the risk very consciously – as Ueli did too, by the way.  I thought of him yesterday, but more with my future in mind: It would have been so nice to be able to plan new goals with him.

What goals have you set for yourself?

First I plan to run a marathon in the lowlands in a respectable time. I will probably do this at the beginning of December. In the longer term, for the next five years or so, I want to tackle some of the eight-thousanders. Gasherbrum IV, where Hervé and I were this summer, is also still on the list.

Yoga in base camp

Which eight-thousanders do you have in mind?

I have not yet decided in which order to approach them. But one of the eight-thousanders on my list is Kangchenjunga, where, on the fascinating north side of the mountain, my eight-thousander career began in 2003. I would like to make another attempt there. Then Nanga Parbat, a super exciting mountain, where I was already once in winter (in 2014 he had reached an altitude of 7,200 meters with Polish climber Tomek Mackiewicz). Mount Everest without bottled oxygen is also still a goal for me, even though there are so many people on the highest of all mountains. I would like to try out how the 400 more meters of altitude feel compared to the other eight-thousanders I have scaled so far (David has reached the summits of five 8000er so far: Gasherbrum II, Broad Peak, Dhaulagiri, Lhotse and Makalu). Also Gasherbrum I, which I viewed this summer from G IV, still offers many possibilities for new or unusual trips beyond the normal route.

With Herve Barmasse (r.)

You were with Herve Barmasse on Gasherbrum IV. What did you experience?

It was a super strange season in the Karakoram due to the weather. People may have been blinded by the news that there were more summit successes on K2 than ever before. But commercial climbing has meanwhile also reached K2: There are fixed ropes from the bottom to the top, many Sherpas are in action, breaking the trail and pitching up the camps. Almost all summitters used bottled oxygen. Things looked very different on the other eight-thousanders. On Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II, for example, only two climbers each reached the summit: Luis Stitzinger and Gianpaolo Corona on G I, Adam Bielecki and Felix Berg on G II. Bad weather and resulting adverse conditions on the mountain also made Gasherbrum IV difficult for us and prevented a real summit attempt.

How high did you get?

We reached our highest point during our acclimatization phase at 7,100 meters, just below the East Face. During the summit attempt we only got to Camp 1 at 6,000 meters. It snowed all night and still in the morning, there was no visibility. Because of too high danger of avalanches we then turned back.

En route on Gasherbrum IV

There were many other climbers besides you who returned home empty-handed too because of the persistently bad weather. As in the last years, the conditions in the classical summer season in the Karakoram were problematic. Shouldn’t one arrive later in the year because of the effects of climate change?

We discussed this topic in base camp. Maybe we really shouldn’t climb during these “old school weather windows” when the best conditions used to be in the past. Climate is changing. Not only high precipitation, but also too hot and dry summers are rather bad for many climbing projects. I think we might really have to experiment in the future and travel to the Karakoram at other times. In the classical summer season it seems to become more and more difficult.

Hansjörg Auer in the West Face of Lupghar Sar West

“It was very, very cool and intense,” Hansjörg Auer tells me. After his successful solo project in the Hunza region in northern Pakistan, the Austrian top climber is back in his native Ötztal. As reported before, the 34-year-old had first climbed the approximately 1,000-meter-high West Face of the rarely attempted 7157-meter-high Lupghar Sar West – solo. First Hansjörg climbed from the base camp to a bivouac site at the foot of the wall at about 6,200 meters. From there he left on 7 July at 5 am and climbed up to the summit in six and a half hours. At 8 pm, Auer was back at the base camp.

Hansjörg, you said in advance that you wanted to know what it’s like to be alone in the wall of a very high mountain. How did you experience it?

Lupghar Sar in northern Pakistan

Since our first ascent of the 7400-meter-high Kunyang Chhish East in 2013, I had asked myself this question again and again. I only waited for the right moment. This year the time had come. It felt very, very good. Of course, it was very different from climbing with a team. You are much more focused, you also feel stronger, as if you are drilled for a goal. Overall, it’s less emotional than I’m used to. But when it does get emotional, it’s much more intense because you are alone and have the strong urge to somehow manage it. 

What was the special challenge for you while solo climbing through this wall?

It wasn’t so much about climbing a difficult route, but really about being alone. In this altitude you are generally very exposed. This is multiplied if you are climbing alone and have no friend or rope partner as a kind of back-up. It’s also mentally more difficult. If you have a bad phase and begin to doubt, there is no one to support and motivate you. You have to do it yourself.

Selfie from the bivouac tent

Did you have moments of doubt?

Yes, sure. When I was lying in the bivouac that night, I was wondering if I could make it. Then I said to myself that I had already completed so many solo projects. That helped. Besides, I’m now in my mid-30s and have a lot of experience. This also helps, of course.

Did you have the exact route in mind before entering the wall?

I had two lines in my mind, in the left part of the wall part. I waited for my inner voice. Finally I decided for an icy couloir and several ice fields up to the Northwest Ridge, which I reached at about 6,900 meters. Then I climbed over the ridge to the summit.

How close were you to your limit?

View into the depths

It was running relatively smoothly. I had actually planned a second bivouac on the way up. But I made relatively rapid progress. At 6,700 meters, I found that the summit was not so far away anymore and that I should climb directly up. I had already thought beforehand that it might actually be possible to climb the wall non-stop. But because the weather was not so consistent and I was afraid that a snowstorm might catch me on the ridge, I took the tent with me. But then I deposited my backpack at 6,900 meters and climbed the last 250 meters up to the summit without any equipment.

The route through the wall was, of course, technically not as difficult as routes that can be climbed by a team. The ridge was exposed, with very loose rock, so I had to be careful. On the descent, I took my time. At the bergschrund, a snow bridge broke and I slipped 50 meters deep. Nothing happened because the snow was soft. In the end, everything went well.

What are you taking from this solo project in Pakistan? Will you be back with a team in the future? Or have you now tasted blood and think: How far can I get in climbing solo in high altitude?

On the summit

Of course, I always have many solo projects in mind. However, it’s important to me that the right moment comes and I don’t put pressure on myself. That’s why I cannot tell you anything about this at the moment. At this point, only so much: I will remain true to the technical lines at high altitude. Of course, it is also very challenging in a team to climb new routes on very high mountains, because in a rope team you can push the technical limits much further.

Generally speaking, it’s not easy for family and friends when I go for solo climbing. This time, nobody told me before the expedition that it was a bad idea. Shortly before my departure, Simon Anthamatten (Swiss climber with whom Hansjörg and his brother Matthias Auer scaled Kunyang Chhish East in 2013) called me and strengthened my vision. That felt good.  It would be a lot harder if everyone says: “Hey, what the hell are you doing?”

Will you put your feet up now?

Hansjörg Auer

Last week, I felt very tired. It just takes time to recover – even mentally. But now I’m going to climb in the Alps again. For example, I plan to open a new route in the South Face of Marmolada. For me, one expedition at high altitude per year is enough. I think to myself, the devil never sleeps. Of course, you never want to stop doing what you like to do. But in order to minimize the risk, you should focus more on quality than quantity.

Tendi Sherpa

He leaves the records to others. “I could do something to set a record on Everest, but I don’t want to do that because I have so much respect to the mountains,” Tendi Sherpa tells me. “I have no problems with others who do records. But for myself, my interest and my aim is: I just want to keep climbing mountains, keep leading and working as a normal guide. I don’t need to be super popular.” Tendi is already known. He has scaled Mount Everest eleven times so far, eight times from the south, three times from the north. Summit success number twelve could follow this spring. The 34-year-old will be the Sirdar, the head of the Sherpas, on an expedition of the US operator “Climbing the Seven Summits” on the Nepalese south side of the highest mountain in the world. Five of his clients want to climb Everest, two Lhotse.

Tendi: No Everest record man

At the age of seven to the monastery

Tendi with his brother Karma Nima (r.)

I would not have taken much more and Tendi Sherpa would be a Buddhist monk today. When he was seven years old, his parents sent him as the eldest son to the monastery. Aged twelve, he returned to his home village near the eight-thousander Makalu, because it turned out that his younger brother was better suited for a religious career than Tendi: “My brother was more interested in becoming a monk. I myself played a lot and always wanted to explore.” His father earned the family’s living as a porter of trekking groups. “Every time when he came back home, he brought chocolate and toys. And he said: ‘That is a gift from the tourists.’ And I really wanted to see those tourists,” recalls Tendi.

Barefoot in Kathmandu

He annoyed his parents until they let him go to Kathmandu at the age of 13. „I had neither shoes nor sandals. I didn’t know that they existed,” says the Sherpa. “I said: What happened? Where are your feet? I have all my fingers and toes, and you have nothing!”

Tendi: Without shoes to Kathmandu

Tendi got his first job as a porter, although the owner of the trekking agency had actually rejected him as too young and too weak. A friend of his father advised him to hide in the bus and only stir when they were already en route. “I was just little enough to fit under the seat,” recalls Tendi. “I still look now every time under the seat of a bus and ask myself: How did I fit in there?”

Tendi: Hidden under the seat of the bus

43 kilos on his back

Thorong La, highest point of the Annapurna Circuit

For three and a half weeks, the little Sherpa carried a load of 43 kilograms on the Annapurna Circuit – for a wage of one and a half dollars a day. “At first, I could not move my neck in the evening. I had to turn my whole body,” says Tendi. “The first thing I learned from this trek: You should not work as a porter at the age of 13, not even 15. You should not work as a porter unless you are 18.” Today he always hires for his groups a porter guide who has knowledge about the mountains, climbing techniques and high altitude sickness and who takes care of proper clothing and equipment of the porters.

On the roof of the world

For the eleventh time on top of Everest (in 2016)

In 2003, Tendi first worked on Everest, as a member of a Japanese cleaning expedition. At that time, 25 Sherpas brought eight tons of garbage off the mountain, and Tendi climbed up to the South Col at about 8,000 meters. “It was something very important for me to begin my profession on Everest this way,“ says Tendi. “It taught me a lot of respect towards the mountain, towards the people, towards the environment, how we should keep the mountain clean.” In 2004, he reached the summit of Everest for the first time, leading a client via the Northeast Ridge: “We keep going, going and going. Suddenly there are a lot of prayer flags. What is it? Actually, that is the summit. I realize I am at the top of Everest, now everything is great.”

Tendi: First time on Everest summit

On the descent, Tendi saved the life of his Bulgarian client when he left his breathing mask and oxygen bottle to him at 8,700 meters. “The summit of Everest was not a real summit for me,” says the Sherpa. “When you come back to your home, see your family, celebrate your success, share your experience, see them get excited about your story, I think that’s a bigger summit. If you have lost your life on the way up there, there is no point.”

Tendi: The real summit of Everest

Always with breathing mask

Mount Everest

As a co-owner of the Nepalese expedition operator “TAGnepal”, Tendi’s top priority is safety. That’s why he always uses bottled oxygen on Everest. “If I get sick on the way down or the way up, is it my client who will rescue me, his guide? That would be awful,” says Tendi and laughs. “That’s why I always make sure that I use oxygen and that I am strong enough to help my clients in case he or she needs help.”

Tendi: Not without O2

Helicopter rescue on Everest is dangerous

Experienced in helicopter rescue

The Sherpa has a international mountain guide certificate from UIAGM (International Federation of Mountain Guide Associations). In 2011 he also completed training in longline helicopter rescue in Sion in Switzerland. He warns Everest candidates to rely on help coming from the air in an emergency: “Longline rescue above 6,000 meters is actually too dangerous and really tough. The helicopter has to fly through a super narrow corridor between Nuptse, Lhotse and Everest. Only if there are no clouds and no wind, a rescue is possible.” Above the South Col, climbers who get into trouble have to be brought down anyway, says Tendi. “The higher you get, the more difficult it is for the rescuers.”

Never made a knot

Tendi in the Khumbu Icefall

Tendi complains that in recent years many inexperienced climbers have tackled Everest: “Some people have no knowledge on any rope, they don’t know what crampons mean, they don’t know what a harness is, they never have done one knot with a rope.” Last year, he received 28 requests for Everest, reports the guide. “I have not accepted any of them.” Tendi Sherpa advises such people to first gain alpine experience on lower mountains: “You are rich, you have money, just don’t jump on Everest! Try to make sure that you first make a training!”

Tendi: Don’t just jump on Everest!

Tamara Lunger (l.) and Simone Moro (r.) with Pope Francis

On Thursday, the (calendrical) winter begins – and thus the question rises again: Who will try to climb which mountain in the cold season? A top-class Polish expedition led by veteran Krzysztof Wielicki will attempt to climb K 2, the last remaining eight-thousander which has not been scaled in winter so far. The Pole Tomek Mackiewicz and the Frenchwoman Elisabeth Revol are said to have already arrived in Pakistan in order to return to Nanga Parbat.

And what’s about the South Tyrolean Tamara Lunger and the Italian Simone Moro? Both are considered as extremely “winterproof”. The 50-year-old Simone has four first winter ascents of eight-thousanders on his account (Shishapangma in 2005, Makalu in 2009, Gasherbrum II in 2011, Nanga Parbat in 2016). The 31-year-old Tamara and Moro tackled in vain Manaslu in winter 2015. A year later on Nanga Parbat, Lunger had to turn back only 70 meters below the summit, because she felt bad. In this Advent, Lunger and Moro already had a summit meeting: with the Pope. I contacted Tamara:

Tamara, two professional mountaineers (Simone and you) took a selfie with Pope Francis, how did that happen?

Don Marco Pozza, a prison chaplain from Padua, invited us to a television program called “Padre nostro”, which means “Our Father”. There were six episodes, each with different persons. Stories from their lives were told, fates, and for each episode there was a comment of the pope. This broadcast was a huge success, not only in Italy but also internationally. The Pope said: “All these people have given us their time, which present could we make in return?” Marco replied: “Maybe a mass in the Vatican, including shaking hands with the Pope.” The Pope then said: “We can not do that because not everyone believes in God. A private audience is better.” That’s how it happened. About 30 people – the whole production team and the participants – met the pope in the Vatican. That was really a nice hour. Personally, it means a lot to me because I’m very religious.

Did you have the opportunity to exchange a few words with the Pope?

Each of us had to introduce ourselves telling what we are doing in our lives. Then the pope talked about passion: “You have given me a lot today, because you – believer or not – are doing what you do with such a great passion. This is also divine.” He then gave us the blessing and gave everyone a book about the Lord’s Prayer, which he wrote with Marco Pozza, and a rosary.

Tamara Lunger

What does the meeting mean to you personally?

Of course it was very nice for me, because I am very religious. But I also saw that he is just a normal man. He is so normal that he actually almost does not stand out. His staff is trying to make everything work organizationally as perfect as possible, but he himself would probably do it very differently. I have looked into his eyes and he in mine, and I have felt something very beautiful. That’s why it would be even nicer to sit down with this man, drink a glass of wine and chat with him.

On Nanga Parbat in winter 2016, you had to turn around about 70 meters below the summit. That was bitter. On Kangchenjunga last spring, the planned traverse of the four summits of the massif fell through because Simone felt bad. Do you need a sense of achievement again for your motivation?

No, because I have seen that even without reaching the summit I always come home with a great lesson. On Nanga Parbat, my experience was much more valuable for me than “just” a summit success. The journey is the reward. Of course, the summit is the icing on the cake. But the experience and what you learn from it will be given to you during the journey. If it is not so easy to reach the summit and there are some difficulties, it may be a bit unpleasant at that time. But when you get home, you realize that it was the best thing that could happen to you.

There are already winter conditions in the European Alps with lots of snow, and the beginning of the calendrical winter is just around the corner. Will you go on expedition in the cold season? And if so, where to go?

Yes, I will go on an expedition again, it took me two months to decide. I will be traveling with Simone again. Unfortunately, I can not say more about it. But it will get freezing, freezing, freezing cold. I already started to prepare myself for it. Let’s see what it will be like.

How will you spend the Christmas holidays?

I will eat many good cookies from my mom. (laughs) I’m just happy to be with my family and maybe I’ll do something with them, ski-touring, ice climbing and so on.

Successful team: Txikon, Lunger, Moro and Ali (from l. to r.)

Simone Moro also told me at the end of October that the next expedition will “will be probably the coldest climb I ever attempted”. Without speculating – the temperatures on Mount Everest fall in January down to minus 60 degrees Celsius. And did not Alex Txikon after his failed Everest winter attempt this year invite Simone and Tamara to try it along with him in 2018? The Pakistani climber Muhammad Ali Sadpara has yesterday announced a “big project of mount Everest 2017/18”. If I’m correct in my assumption, the successful winter team of Nanga Parbat 2016 would be complete again. I think it would be great and exciting.

Paul Ramsden

He is anything but a self-promoter. Paul Ramsden does not belong to the group of extreme climbers who are out to market themselves and want to be constantly in the spotlight. Though he certainly deserves it – the list of his first ascents in the Himalayas is long. In fall 2016, for example, the British, together with his compatriot Nick Bullock, succeeded to climb for the first time through the extremely demanding North Face of the 7,046 meter high Nyainqentangla South in Tibet. For this performance, they were recently awarded the Piolet d’Or. It was already the fourth time that Ramsden received the “Oscar of the Climbers”. And this is despite the fact that the 48-year-old is not a professional climber. He earns his living as a self-employed occupational hygienist who advises companies and furnishes expert reports.

Paul, you are a non-professional climber, you have a job and family. What is your motivation to set off year by year to remote mountain areas in the Himalayas to tackle unclimbed mountains, walls or ridges?

I love the mountains, it’s as simple as that. But as I don’t live or work in the mountains this maintains my enthusiasm for when I do visit them. Strangely with family and work commitments I find it more difficult to go climbing for weekends throughout the year than I do to go on an expedition once a year.

Summit selfie of Paul (l.) with Nick Bullock (r.)

What does real adventure means in your view?

Real adventure is not knowing the outcome, if success is in doubt you are having an adventure. However, for me adventure is so tied up with climbing style that the questions are inseparable. The British climbing tradition has always been like this.

How important is it for you to climb in pure style?

Style is everything, without good style climbing becomes a meaningless physical activity. For me good style is climbing in a pure alpine style, small team, no bolts, no fixed ropes, no outside support.

How many risks are you willing to take?

I try really hard to reduce the risks to a minimum. I am very selective about my route choices, always considering objective hazards and the means of descent. The risk assessment in my head is a constant process and difficult to describe but I have turned back on many routes.

The route on Nyainqentangla South East

What is your secret of success?

I don’t know to be honest. I suppose it’s a combination of experience, judgement and climbing in a style that suits my abilities and temperament.

You have climbed for many years very successfully with Mick Fowler, now with Nick Bullock. Which criteria has a perfect team partner to meet?

The perfect climbing partner is safety conscious, has a good sense of humour (The British sense of humour helps a lot on the mountain) but is still prepared to commit to the max when the need arises.

Mick was diagnosed with cancer this year. What did you feel when you heard it?

This was a real blow and a total surprise as he appeared to be very healthy and has always seems indestructible to me. He has just finished his treatment and hopeful all will be well. It does make you think about the future though and consider all the things you haven’t done yet.

Piolet d’Or winners Ramsden (l.) and Mick Fowler

You were awarded the Piolet d’Or, the “Oscar of the climbers”, four times, you’re the record winner (along with Marko Prezelj). Does this mean anything to you?

While it’s very pleasant to be recognised by you peers it has virtually no impact on my life. As a non professional, part time climber, I don’t really need sponsorship or publicity. However I do support the Piolet D’Or as a tool for promoting good ethics and style in mountaineering.

Is there already a climbing goal that you have set for next year?

Yes, I am going on another expedition in 2018 with Nick Bullock. I like to keep objectives secret though!

Simone Moro

It does not hurt more than usual. I can say that from my own experience. It is rather a mental challenge to realize that the first 50 years are over and the second half of life has definitely begun. Time to take stock. This Friday, Simone Moro celebrates his 50th birthday. The Italian can already be more than satisfied with his career as a high-altitude climber. No one else besides Simone has four winter first ascents of eight-thousanders on his account.

In 2005, Moro summited along with the Polish climber Piotr Morawski the 8027-meter-high Shishapangma for the first time in the cold season. Three other first winter ascents followed: In 2009 with the native Kazakh Denis Urubko on Makalu (8,485 m), in 2011 with Urubko and the American Cory Richards on Gasherbrum II (8,034 m) and in 2016 with the Spaniard Alex Txikon and the Pakistani Muhammad Ali “Sadpara” on Nanga Parbat (8,125 m). Simone did all these eight-thousander climbs without bottled oxygen. Last spring, Moro and the South Tyrolean Tamara Lunger had planned to traverse the four summits of the Kangchenjunga massif, but had to turn back without having reached a single summit. Two attempts ended at 7,200 meters, because Simone suffered from stomach ache. Moro is married to the South Tyrolean climber Barbara Zwerger and has a 19-year-old daughter and a seven-year-old son. Simone has also earned his merits as a rescue helicopter pilot in the Himalayas.

Simone, half a century in your legs, how does that feel?

Well I’m still alive, with all toes and fingers and with motivation. My body weight is the same as when I was 25, same volume of training. So I feel happy and lucky.

Simone with Muhammad Ali (l.) on top of Nanga Parbat

You succeeded first winter ascents on the eight-thousanders Shishapangma, Makalu, Gasherbrum II and Nanga Parbat. Is there any of these climbs which is particularly important to you and why?

With Shisha Pangma I reopened the winter games on the 8000ers after 17 years of “silence”. Makalu came after 39 years of winter attempts and we were just two members in super light style. Gasherbrum II was the first ever winter ascent of an eight-thousander in the entire Karakoram. And on Nanga Parbat I became the first man who succeeded first winter ascents on four different 8000ers. So how can I choose?

What is for you the fascination of climbing the highest mountains on earth in winter?

Solitude, wilderness, adventure and exploration feeling, very low possibility to succeed, no discount on difficulties, wind, rare good weather windows. A winter expedition is NOT just the cold version of a summer expedition!

Last spring on Kangchenjunga, you suffered from health problems. Do we need to worry?

Not at all. I made just very stupid mistakes. I drank simply coke, sprite and other shit in BC, and on the mountains I drank not enough. Don’t worry, I feel and I’m strong and healthy like before at the moment.

Strong team: Moro with Tamara Lunger (l.)

Recently you have been regularly en route with the South Tyrolean Tamara Lunger. Do you see yourself as her mentor?

Yes, I was and I had been. Now Tamara is 31 and she learned a lot and is absolutely independent. But we work so well together and it is a rare condition to find, so (it’s) better to keep our team spirit as our extra power.

Where will your next expedition take you?

Unfortunately I can’t declare yet where I will go. I can tell you that it will be this coming winter and will be probably the coldest climb I ever attempted.

If you had three wishes for the second half of life, which would it be?

Health, health and health. All the rest I will provide myself. I had and I have everything and only GOD can give me health even though I work a lot in protect to as much as I can with a healthy life…