Alpine style

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The alpine style is a variant of high-altitude mountaineering in which the entire ascent is carried out “like in the Alps”. This means that even the highest mountains up to eight-thousanders can be climbed as a small rope team, without outside help, without a previously prepared route and in one go from the base camp to the summit and back. The necessary food and all the alpine equipment are carried with you yourself. Tents are set up if necessary and repacked the next morning. The use of bottled oxygen and “siege alpinism” as it is characteristic of the classic expedition style are completely avoided : high girders, permanently installed high camps, material depots , fixed ropes , ladders, etc. Thus, in terms of the means and procedures used, alpine style is the opposite of ascent in the expedition style . However, an ascent in alpine style does not rule out the possibility of reaching the foot of the mountain (or base camp) as part of an expedition.

In high-altitude mountaineering, alpine style on difficult routes is seen as a great challenge to the abilities and willingness of mountaineers to take risks, and successes are viewed as being of very high quality in terms of sport. To date, most of the climbs of the highest mountains in Asia and America are carried out in the expedition style. Alpine style is rather the exception on these mountains and is essentially limited to the difficult routes. Since the first alpine style ascent of an eight-thousander - the ascent of Gasherbrum I by Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler in 1975 - there have been spectacular successes on these mountains, which are of particular public interest. Only a few mountaineers have reached several of these peaks in alpine style, none have tried to do this on all fourteen eight-thousanders.

Descriptions

The term “alpine style” has not been given a fixed definition, but is used uniformly in specialist circles. The Elizabeth Hawley biographer Bernadette McDonald describes it as follows:

"Alpine-style climbing, which is generally defined as climbing a route in a single, continuous push without external help, without preplaced fixed rope, camps, or caches of supplies, and without reconnoitering the route."

"Alpine-style climbing, which is commonly defined as climbing a route in a single, continuous ascent without external help, without previously laid fixed ropes, bearings or stored supplies, and without exploring the route beforehand."

- Bernadette McDonald : I'll Call You in Kathmandu: The Elizabeth Hawley Story

Chris Bonington approaches the term ex negativo :

"True alpine style is without any kind of preparation or recce's"

"True alpine style is without any preparation or exploration"

- Chris Bonington

Reinhold Messner said about his ascent of Gasherbrum I in 1975:

“For the first time we worked on this ascent without any preparatory work, no high camps were set up, no fixed ropes were imposed, we had no high girders, we just climbed up from the base camp with their backpacks for three days, the tent further and further behind pushing up, have reached the summit of this eight-thousander and have […] returned to the base camp. And this style, called 'Alpine style', not only gave me the opportunity to finance all expeditions myself in the future because they were much cheaper than the expensive Himalayan-style expeditions, it was also much more elegant, it was the future [ ...] of mountain climbing. "

- Reinhold Messner : Everest - Heaven, Hell, Himalaya.

A description by Gerfried Göschl of a new route variation on the Diamir flank of the Nanga Parbat, completed in 2009, sounds similar :

“[...] in the supreme mountaineering discipline, in alpine style, that is, no fixed ropes, no prepared bearings, no artificial oxygen, no outside help such as porters. We just packed our rucksacks in the base camp, set off and marched through to the summit. We climbed the ridge for four days, every step completely new. "

- Gerfried Göschl : Interview

development

Serious ascent attempts and successful ascent were made on the high mountains of the world very early on. In the Himalayas, British explorers and surveyors climbed numerous six-thousanders in the Himalayas from around 1850, some of these climbs would now be referred to as "alpine style" because they were, for example, a long direct day tour to the summit. With very puristic means, Albert Mummery made the first ascent attempts on Nanga Parbat (8125 m) in 1895 and was able to climb about 2000 meters in altitude up to about 6600 meters on the Diamir flank with just one companion. In 1937 Herbert Tichy reached the Gurla Mandhata (7694 m) with the means of alpine style (two people, one tent, direct ascent) a height of about 7200 meters.

However, it had already been shown early on that the expedition style is the much more successful strategy for climbing seven and eight thousanders. The use of oxygen bottles, on the other hand, was controversial from the start and was only used on a few other mountains, apart from when attempting to climb the highest eight-thousanders. As early as 1924, Edward Norton had reached Mount Everest in an expedition style, but without additional oxygen, an altitude of around 8,600 meters. Nevertheless, in the period that followed, the opinion prevailed that the highest eight-thousanders could only be climbed with additional oxygen.

Against the zeitgeist of the large expeditions, which required a lot of material and personnel, small expeditions to the highest mountains in Asia were organized time and again. Often the lower costs were the decisive factor, but there were also mountaineers who preferred small ventures due to their personal attitude. These small expeditions are considered to be important pioneers of the alpine style. In 1936 the first ascent of Nanda Devi (7816 m) was a first important success for a small team of seven English mountaineers. No fixed ropes were laid, no bottled oxygen was used, and Sherpas were no longer in use over 6200 meters. Three years later, Fritz Wiessner reached an altitude of around 8,400 meters on K2 (8611 m) with a small American expedition he organized . In 1954 the first ascent of Cho Oyu (8188 m) was designed by Herbert Tichy as a small expedition, the team consisted of three European mountaineers and seven Sherpas, the expedition luggage and food only weighed 800 kilograms. A year earlier, the British expedition needed 350 porters and 13 tons of material to climb Mount Everest for the first time.

In 1957, all four mountaineers on a small Austrian expedition reached the summit of Broad Peak (8056 m) on the same day . The entire preparatory work on the mountain was only carried out by the four first climbers Hermann Buhl , Kurt Diemberger , Marcus Schmuck and Fritz Wintersteller . The expedition managed with two tons of material and did not use additional oxygen. Three high camps were set up and about 500 meters of fixed rope attached above camp 2. This approach was later referred to as the "Western Alpine Style". Immediately after this success, Schmuck and Wintersteller managed to climb the Skil Brum (7410 m) for the first time, climbing from Broad Peak base camp to the foot of the south-west wall (6060 m), pitching their tent there, and reaching it directly the next day the summit and returned to the tent. The next day they descended to Broad Peak Base Camp again. They only needed 53 hours for the entire tour, limited themselves to a minimum of material, which they carried completely in their backpacks, and waived any preparatory work on the ascent route such as high camp chain, fixed ropes, exploration or the like - it was the first summit success in Alpine style on a seven-thousander. Hermann Buhl and Kurt Diemberger attempted a first ascent a few days later, also with heavy rucksacks and in a train from Broad Peak Base Camp. They chose the nearby Chogolisa (7668 m). At an altitude of about 7,300 meters they had to turn back due to a change in the weather, while Buhl had a fatal accident on the descent due to an aborted guard . The undertakings of 1957 were important pioneers for the alpine style on the highest mountains in the world, but the term "alpine style" was coined much later.

In 1975 Peter Habeler and Reinhold Messner reached the summit of an eight-thousander in alpine style for the first time with a quick and direct ascent through the north-west face of Gasherbrum I (also called Hidden Peak , 8080 m) (see Messner's quote above ) . For this approach to climbing high mountains, the expression "alpine style" was already widespread among experts at that time. The English equivalent of the term, alpine style , was used regularly in the American Alpine Journal from around 1970. The term and its meaning only became known to a broad public through this ascent and the subsequent publications and public appearances by Messner.

In the 1970s, the use of additional oxygen was called into question again, all five high eight-thousanders were now climbed for the first time without this aid, but in the tried and tested expedition style. The beginning was made on Makalu in 1975, followed by Lhotse (1977), Mount Everest (1978), K2 (1978) and Kangchenjunga (1979). Messner and Habeler caused a particular sensation with their ascent of Everest without additional oxygen; as members of an expedition they also benefited from its infrastructure (high girders, fixed ropes, high camps), but they had shown that it is possible to reach the highest peak on earth without reaching bottled oxygen, which was previously doubted by many.

Messner brought the alpine style to Mount Everest in 1980, he chose the Norton Couloir for ascent and descent , also so as not to be dependent on the ladder on the Second Step , and he went during the monsoon season in August to avoid any challenges to his solo Avoid alpine style ascent. He was completely alone on the mountain and outside help was excluded. The ascent took place in one go from the base camp to the summit and back without any previously established depots or high camps. It took him about four days.

In August 1986, Erhard Loretan and Jean Troillet only needed about 40 hours for their spectacular alpine style ascent through the north face of Mount Everest, the equipment was reduced to an absolute minimum, they rested in self-dug snow caves. Many other well-known mountaineers have also completed difficult and sensational alpine style climbs on the high seven-thousanders and the fourteen eight-thousanders since the 1970s. In the past few years, North American mountaineers in particular have made a name for themselves with first ascents in alpine style. Vince Anderson and Steve House's new tour through the Rupal flank on Nanga Parbat (2005) or the ascent of a new route on Chomolhari by Marko Prezelj and Boris Lorencic (2007) were awarded the renowned Piolet d'Or .

Requirements and dangers

The psychological and physical demands on the individual mountaineer are almost always significantly higher in alpine style than in expedition style ascents under otherwise identical conditions. Due to the low fuel and food resources, each alpine style ascent is limited to a few days. Therefore, speed is an important prerequisite for the success of a summit attempt. A relatively short stay on the mountain can reduce the risk of avalanches, sudden changes in the weather and altitude sickness, but the risk situation shifts because if an emergency situation arises, this does not affect the infrastructure and logistics of an expedition (high storage chain, fixed ropes, supplies, help from lower camps ) can be used. Any help from outside, if at all possible, takes significantly more time to arrive on site.

The equipment and the food must be planned very carefully for an alpine style ascent in order to keep the backpack weight so low that a summit success is possible and at the same time everything necessary is available. For an alpine style ascent, significantly less luggage is generally required than for an expedition style undertaking. This is why alpine style is often referred to as " light-weight ". With all equipment and food, attention must always be paid to the lowest possible weight. Nevertheless, mountaineers usually have to carry significantly heavier rucksacks on large alpine style tours than mountaineers who are on an expedition and therefore receive extensive help from high porters or who have deposited large parts of the material themselves in high camps on previous climbs.

misunderstandings

The complex requirements for an alpine style ascent are often wrongly or incompletely perceived by the public and the media and are occasionally reinterpreted or inaccurately documented by mountaineers in order to upgrade their own ascent with the designation alpine style. An alpine style ascent can therefore only be assessed by outsiders if those involved document their success in detail and correctly.

It often happens that mountaineers report numerous successes in alpine style, which, with a more detailed knowledge of the processes, can only be rated as “ascent based on alpine style”. For example, climbing most eight-thousanders on the normal routes and during the normal climbing season is not possible in alpine style, because help from outside or companions cannot be ruled out due to the large number of mountaineers and a prepared route is available without any preliminary work.

On the eight-thousanders it is widespread that mountaineers from different teams take turns on the strenuous deep snow tracks, and controversy regularly arises when individual mountaineers are accused of only benefiting from the work of others or of completely entrusting the track work to their Sherpas. Any outside help and thus the use of pre-groomed routes or pre-groomed route sections is excluded when climbing an alpine style. A resource-saving division of the track work can only be done within the alpine style teams.

Mixed forms

In the meantime, numerous hybrid forms between expedition style and alpine style have developed. Today, some style-conscious mountaineers are on the eight-thousand-meter normal routes with all their equipment (including tent) in their rucksacks, deliberately avoiding high porters and bottled oxygen, but cannot avoid the already prepared route (fixed ropes, ladders, pre-groomed deep snow). to use. Such an ascent is more athletic than the classic expedition style, but can neither be rated as an alpine style nor as "without outside help".

In 1996 the Swedish mountaineer Göran Kropp tried to reach the summit of Mount Everest via the southern route without any outside help. He cycled around 15,000 kilometers from Sweden to Nepal and already carried all the material and the expedition food for the ascent with him, then transported everything to the base camp without porters and looked for a way through the dangerous Khumbu icefall himself so as not to go To have to rely on the fixed ropes and ladders of the other expeditions. Kropp was the first mountaineer to start the spring season and therefore did not have a prepared route when he attempted the summit. Shortly below the summit, at an altitude of 8,750 meters, he had to give up, mainly because of the exhausting deep snow tracks. On the second attempt at the summit he was able to reach the summit, this time together with other mountaineers. However, despite the complete renunciation of outside help, the first attempt was not alpine style, since he did not approach the summit in one train from the base camp , but walked some stretches several times to cope with the load transport.

recognition

Apart from the normal routes, it is generally respected when mountaineers only manage a difficult and large section (e.g. an eight-thousander wall) of the entire ascent in alpine style and then document it correctly. Such an ascent can achieve the highest recognition depending on the difficulty of the route. In 2007, for example, Karl Unterkircher and Daniele Bernasconi succeeded for the first time in the ascent of the north face of Gasherbrum II (8034 m) in a direttissima over the northeast pillar, a difficult and dangerous route that they mastered in alpine style from a depot at an altitude of about 6000 meters. In the lower part of the wall they had attached some fixed ropes.

Since alpine style is extremely difficult and dangerous on eight-thousanders, it has never really caught on among most " eight-thousander collectors ".

In 2009 Boris Dedeshko and Denis Urubko proved very impressively that on one of the most popular eight-thousanders, alpine style is still possible without compromises. They climbed the south-east face of Cho Oyu on May 6, 2009 and, after a long direct ascent and four nights of bivouac, reached the summit via a new route. The descent via the ascent route required another three days. You were on your own during the entire first ascent and carried all material, food and fuel in your backpack for a week; There had been no preparation, exploration or acclimatization ascents on the route beforehand. For this uncompromising alpine style ascent, they were awarded the Piolet d'Or 2010.

literature

  • Peter Habeler: The lonely victory: Mount Everest '78 . Goldmann, Munich 1978.
  • Reinhold Messner: The challenge: 2 and 1 eight-thousanders . BLV-Verlag, Munich 1978.
  • Rollo Steffens: Fascination Karakoram. The wild mountains of Asia . Bruckmann Verlag, Munich 2000.
  • Richard Sale: Broad Peak . Carreg, Ross-on-Wye 2007, ISBN 978-0-9538631-5-0 .

Web links

Wiktionary: Alpine style  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bernadette McDonald: I'll Call You in Kathmandu: The Elizabeth Hawley Story . The Mountaineers Books, 2005, ISBN 0-89886-800-9 , pp. 224 f . ( Limited preview in Google Book Search [accessed July 31, 2010]).
  2. CHO OYU. ARCHIVED REPORTS. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on May 30, 2010 ; accessed on August 10, 2010 .
  3. Reinhold Messner : Everest - Heaven, Hell, Himalaya. Audiobuch Verlag, Freiburg 2002, ISBN 3-933199-87-5 .
  4. ^ Herbert Waldeck: Gerfried Göschl writes alpine history . In: Official news and information from the city of Liezen . No. 169 , September 2009, p. 44 f . ( Online as PDF , approx. 5  MB [accessed on August 10, 2010] Interview with Gerfried Göschl).
  5. cf. Sale, Richard; Cleare, John (2000). Climbing the World's 14 Highest Mountains: The History of the 8,000-Meter Peaks. Seattle: Mountaineers Books, p. 21.
  6. Martin Grabner ( Der Standard ): Book review on Herbert Tichy: To the holiest mountain in the world. (www.bergnews.com)
  7. Edgar Schuler: George Finch - AACZ President and Pioneer on Everest - English Air.
  8. Thomas Rambauske: The closeness of heaven - October 19, 1954: Herbert Tichy at Cho Oyu. (www.bergnews.com)
  9. Thomas Rambauske: Everest - The story of its ascent. (www.bergnews.com)
  10. ^ Kurt Diemberger: Entre 0 y 8000 metros. 1995, ISBN 84-87746-55-1 . (Spanish)
  11. www.summitpost.org: Broad Peak
  12. www.summitpost.org: Skil Brum
  13. www.summitpost.org: Hermann Buhl
  14. ^ Short Everest Chronicle ( Memento from April 2, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  15. ^ Bernadette McDonald: I'll call you in Kathmandu: the Elizabeth Hawley story. Elizabeth Hawley's judgment on a summit attempt wrongly declared as an alpine style, quote: “ […] Although Babanov's climb was an impressive effort, she pointed out that it wasn't alpine-style […] ” (p. 224); Another example: “ […] but what really rankled was how the less-equiped climbers boasted of how they were freeloading and getting up the mountain 'alpine-style', and yet were utilizing other teams' fixed ropes, tents, and food. "P. 177.
  16. Clyde Soles, Phil Powers (2003): Climbing: Expedition Planning (www.books.google.com), On the Need for Correct Documentation, Quote: “ Yet leaving anything changes your next attempt into something other than a pure alpine ascent. [...] Your second try makes use of the cached food and gear. There is nothing wrong with this, assuming the climb is reported accurately. "(P. 28f.) And a general summary, quote:" With few exeptions, even the most amazing feats of skill and endurance are not truly super-alpine efforts. Instead, there is often a fair amount of expedition-style preparation, or at least some support from others. One-day round trips on Everest and K2 have, to date, been supported by the fixed lines, established trail, or even food and shelter of others. ”(P. 29f.)
  17. Example: The mountaineer Christian Stangl claims his skyruns are always alpine style and his Everest Speed ​​ascent on the northern normal route from 2009 was "without outside help" and " single-handedly ". At the same time he admits that he met other mountaineers and fixed ropes, Having used ladders and pre-groomed routes. This interpretation of alpine style (as well as going it alone ) is generally not recognized. (See A question of style (sueddeutsche.de); Interview with Skyrunner Christian Stangl (www.bergstieg.com); Day tour Mt. Everest - without O2. (No longer available online.) Christian Stangl, archived from the original on 19. August 2012 ; accessed September 17, 2012 . )
  18. ^ Neue Zürcher Zeitung , November 11, 2004: June 9, 1957: Broad Peak (www.nzz.ch); Quote: "[...] On Broad Peak, which the team climbed after only a short preparation time and in alpine style - without high porters and oxygen devices [...]." Note: It is common knowledge that this ascent was not an alpine style, it became an ascent route groomed (fixed ropes and fixed high camps).
  19. www.bergstieg.com: 50th anniversary of Hermann Buhl's death: The trail in the snow to the edge. Note: In this article, too, the first ascent of Broad Peak is erroneously rated as an alpine style.
  20. www.bergleben.de: Lexicon: Alpine style. Note: In this article, both the Broad Peak first ascent and the first ascent of Mt. Everest without supplemental oxygen are mistakenly cited as examples of alpine style.
  21. Neue Zürcher Zeitung, January 22, 2010: A question of style. Quote: "To date, 18 mountaineers have climbed all 14 eight-thousanders (as of October 2009), 10 of them all in alpine style, i.e. without artificial oxygen." Note: Equating alpine style with ascent without additional oxygen is also a widespread misunderstanding so far no mountaineer has climbed all 14 eight-thousanders in alpine style, or even came close to this goal.
  22. Michael Wulzinger (DER SPIEGEL): Extreme mountaineering - race in the death zone. (January 11, 2010) Quote: “In the last few years, three European women emerged as the best high-altitude mountaineers: the […] Austrian Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner […]; the Spaniard Edurne Pasaban […]; and the Italian Nives Meroi […]. All climb in the so-called alpine style [...]. “Note: Edurne Pasaban is generally known and documented that she did not climb an eight-thousander in alpine style; she was always on a larger expedition. Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner and Nives Meroi have also used the means and procedures of the expedition style to varying degrees in the past.
  23. Der Standard : Record hunting and style issues on the eight-thousanders (www.derstandard.at, April 19, 2010), quote: “Kaltenbrunner, Meroi and, with some reservations, Pasaban, on the other hand, are predominantly alpine-style, insuring their routes themselves, they largely do without on porter assistance and entirely on artificial oxygen. ”Note: A misunderstanding, with Alpinstil no route is insured and porter assistance is completely dispensed with, as is any other external assistance.
  24. n-tv : Oh Eun Sun creates a record (www.n-tv.de, April 27, 2010)
  25. FAZ: Oh Eun-Sun conquers the last eight-thousander, the women's summit storm (www.faz.net, April 27, 2010)
  26. ^ Jon Krakauer year = 1997: In icy heights . S. 179, 183 f, 332 .
  27. www.alpinst.com: ITALIANS CLIMB CHINESE FACE OF GASHERBRUM II (2007)
  28. www.russianclimb.com: Cho Oyu (8201 m), South-East Face Kazakhs route, First climb in alpine style. Quote: “ We have not yet approached to the SW Face, have acclimatized aside, we want to look at the wall carefully before the ascent. [...] gas and food for a week. […] We summited May, 11 […] then the decsent during 3 days via the ascent route. We didn't eat 2 days.
  29. The two recipients of the Piolets d'Or for ascents in 2009 are ... ( Memento from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive )