“There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.” attributed, some say wrongly, to the great Ernest Hemingway does hold some sway.
Mountains have captured the imaginations of people for centuries, old civilization’s believed them to be the home’s of the god’s, Such as the Greek’s and Mount Olympus, over the past 150 years mountaineering has become a way of life for thousand’s, from Edmund Hilary and Tenzing Norgay reaching the summit of Everest in 1953 to the first successful summit on the Eiger North Face mountaineering continues to develop.
The sport is becoming more and more extreme and it is a pursuit that put’s one at risk of severe injury and as has occurred time and time again death.
Today’s benchmark setters are the like’s of Ueli Steck, Killian Jornet, Ed Viesturs and many more are continuing to push the boundaries of what people believed possible and adding to the reputation of a pursuit that test’s an individual both mentally and physically.
In previous generations reaching the summit of mount Everest was the biggest aspiration among mountaineers, but today the summit is much more reachable, improved technology and resources are what make this possible.
But like in any sport once a boundary has been breached and a benchmark set it is inevitably shot at. Nowadays the emphasis is on speed, and through a style known as alpine climbing huge speeds are being achieved.
Alpine style is a very self sufficient style of climbing, carrying your own food and equipment all the way up a mountain makes for a very quick and light ascent, the dangers associated with it is that in an emergency you become much more exposed to death than with the older methods.
Mountaineering is becoming more and more exciting and extreme each and every year, from climbing all 14 of the worlds highest peaks without supplemental oxygen to speed records on the matterhorn and the eiger north face, the pursuit of height will keep on developing.
Naoise Ó Gibne 