Phoenix

KLK: "AR in Verdon, MR on RW, HJA on eP"

Cld I gt sm vwls pls?

AR: Alain Robert?
HJA: Auer, eP= the fish route on Marmolada?

In other news: Well there is some big doings on the Chouinard Hurbert route as Hondo is soloing it for 60 Minutes. Lots of locals are employed and it should be interesting to see what spin the editors put on the event. All the best wishes go out to Alex, one of the really nice guys in the climbing community.

I'm leaning toward Drummond's view (http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=1122068);. Anyone else concerned about whether Alex will still be with us in 5 years? When cameras, sponsorship and fame are the rewards for risking your life, the end result seems almost inevitable.

Yet we rarely criticize them for the level of risk or label them "suicidal."

"Overhanging, right-leaning (barn-doory), tip-locks, dime-sized feet, 7-8 solid moves long and the crack is angled at a 45 degree angle upward into the rock so it's really awkward to get the right body position. The first 25-30 feet would also be crazy - solid 5.12 pin scars that are widely spaced in a very shallow corner - smearing for feet. After the crux it's full on endurance for 100 feet or so of overhanging, right-leaning, off fingers."

folks drop like flies on 8000ers, but there's not a huge thread on ST or wherever with a famous climber weighing in to say that no one should ever climb annapurna.

Elcapinyoazz -- "All this is an illusion anyway. Do you know what is real?"

He's a nice guy- for a dick.

Peter in Sf, of course everyone here is concerned, and concerned about each and every one of us. We have discussed this at length already as you do note. Part of what climbing has always meant are these kinds of adventures---- ones where the climber very well might die in the doing and for the slightest of reasons. It is nothing new. Roped or not. Climbing is actually real, you know, and has hideous danger in much of its execution. It may or may not be able to justify it deaths; that is a huge and separate subject.

What you might consider understanding better, is your notion that Alex’s reward for his unroped outings is “cameras, sponsorship, and fame”. It just isn’t. His reward and the result of such radical outings is so far beyond the material realm as to make your query blatantly uninformed, with due respect. When you do climbing like this, the ecstatic and transcendental nature of your outing is ever so much more your focus that suggestions by others that you are up there seeking ordinary gain can only seem to be irrelevant and in fact churlish, even if not intended to be so.

We have been doing these kinds of extreme solos for more than fifty years.

So this link brings you to Alex's comments on his ascent, tells us it was filmed by Peter Mortimer and perhaps most interestingly of all, Ray Jardine's reaction to Alex's climb.

I once lost my grip while free soloing 1,100 feet above the ground, and started to fall but managed to grab a tiny (5.11) hold another foot down. I learned a big lesson from that - that I wasn't in "total" control. And that was my last free solo.

I never filmed my solos because I never wanted to share a very personal experience. More over set a bad example, but that's just me.

I'd say that all risk taking for your own glory and satisfaction is selfish, it certainly take maturity to understand the difference in a higher purpose and purpose of the self.

Still though, solos are the crowning experiences of my time climbing.

It is rather interesting that we discuss Honnold's soloing so much more that any other major solo climber's soloing.