GOLDEN ICE-AXE

Info taken from www.mountain.ru



Yuri, did you expect to become the winner of the 13th Golden Ice-Axe award?

- I did. I had a feeling that we would be prize-winners. However, my mind was telling me that there were enough grounds not to get the award. For one, Valeri would have gotten it for the second time, and that would have been the third “Golden ice-axe” given to the Russian climbers. I thought that it would be too good to be true. However, we were leading by the cumulative points. Valeri had already been nominated five times, and I had been nominated thrice. It was a voice of the heart that bade me to get go of all expectations and believe in my fate. I trusted in that voice, and it very important to me.

Main Rivals

- Frankly speaking, I thought that the award could be given to Ian Parnell (UK), John Varco (US) and Kenton Cool (UK) for their ascent of Annapurna III. Jean-Christophe Lafaille also had a fair chance for his cumulative ascents. He had been nominated several times, but never won. I also liked the French duo who had climbed Jirishanka in Peru. This summit has a lot of charisma.

The Polish and the British climbed the Citadel. Just a big wall classics. Though well-done, it lacks originality and unpredictability. I didn’t refer Talay Sagar to potential candidates for the award, either. The Nizza people climbing was very much the same like that of the Australians who had already gotten the “Golden Ice-Axe” (1998).

Golden Ice-Axe: Tendencies

There are neither particular tendencies, nor rules, in my opinion. One can speak of the established pattern of the award giving procedures, what we call its spirit. They take into consideration the total complexity and intensity of the whole endeavor, and not the technical difficulty of the object as such.

Much depends on the professionalism of the selection committee, too. There are always new people on the committee, but there are also permanent members (e.g. Montagnes Magazine and GHM group members who are very experienced).

As to the newness in mountaineering, I see it (some climbers may disagree with me) in climbing technically challenging faces plus the altitude of the climb (higher than 7,000 meters)

Up to 7,000 m. high, the climbers feel quite comfortable, but ascents higher than 7,000 m. are rarely fascinating.
World Climbing: what is new?

- It’s difficult to do something new now. Everything original would presuppose a higher degree of unpredictability. Mountain climbers cannot be a 100 % adapted to the reality that awaits them. Athletes in other sports are better fit and prepared for the challenges. Especially difficult are the climbs with a bunch of dangers: complexity, a tricky relief, gigantic slopes, and high altitude.

Climbing a face at a lower altitude has become more predictable. There is a lot of climbing gear and technical solutions available, so that one can climb a wall using a ready-made pattern. The only thing is to carefully choose the route and to avoid dangerous places prone to avalanches. The most challenging are vertical walls like that of Trango (6300 m), for example. This is the wall you can never tell for sure you will come back from. When we were climbing it for 24 days, our partners suffered from sickness and acute altitude disease; then we faced a spell of nasty weather which wore us away and led to mistakes. Entropy was growing with each day of the ascent. But we pressed on, and after the climb I was totally exhausted and had to go through a long recovery.

Nuptse Assault

- Nuptse was a different story. In its lower part, it’s more like a Moshnikov’s route 6B, Aksu. The first 10 ropes are not technically difficult, though rather dangerous due to avalanches and falling debris. We often find the ropes to be damaged. And it is quite common to evade from falling rocks and stones.
On the day we summitted, a big stone flew only 5 cm far from Valeri’s face. It could have been his last day.

Before this incident, I found out that the rope was threadbare and had only two threads. I realized that after I had put a load on it. So, we had to climb free-style with the backpacks on our backs and plunging an ice crew in front of us.

The next rope was thrown in a peculiar manner due to the strong wind. To get it off, I had to balance on the ridge with a very slippery and brittle edge. I needed to approach a stone conglomeration. I thought to myself: “If it’s the beginning of the assault, what might follow?
Although I compared this route with the Moshnikov’s route, it’s not exactly true. Nuptse has the so called “hollow” snow. If the snow does not have a base, it tends to form “mushrooms” with an edge made of icicles. We had to use snow bars (special pickets) for safety.

Vertical faces А2-А4 gave us extra trouble. At the Diamond Tower there is a stretch that Jeff Lowe graded as a A4 difficulty route. It is 25 a meters high off-width leading to an ice river.

At the Diamond Tower, there are a few rocky and mixed stretches starting at an altitude of 6300 м. They require a lot of thinking and tactics maneuvers: now go up, now a bit down and around, up, down, and around again.

The difficulty of the route depends on the seasonal condition of the mountain. In spring, Valeri Babanov climbed one route. In autumn, our duo had to choose a different route.
It often happens that ropes freeze in the ice which makes them unusable. The best thing I could do was to dig out a small piece and make a belay. We climbed alpine style.

The autumn route welcomed us with congestive ice, М5/М5+ grade. At the lower part, there are difficult mushroom like rocky stretches of the fourth grade; there is also heavy snow of the sixth grade. The summit tower is of M4 grade, at times even M5. The route difficulty can depend on the season. So a certain discrepancy in grading is possible.

Таctics
At 6400 m we fixed the ropes. The rocky and snow-ice band. There was ice and hollow mushrooms of snow in store for us. We continued to ascend alpine style. We decided to get acclimatized at 6900 m., bivied there and descended. Then we began to get prepared for the summit assault. This region is notorious for problems with acclimatization.
Summiting Nuptse
The central section is a classical five grade snow route. Although it can’t really be compared to the famous Russian 7,000 meters peaks, as it is riddled with wide bergschrunds and threatened by huge hanging ice towers in many places.

The climb was hard, as we had to belay everywhere, especially after 6500 meters when we began to swing leads. At 6500 meters the crest became less steep, then we got to the ridge of sharp crests stretching into the traverse of the pillar’s crest. We traversed the wall. Up to 6.900 m. it was a difficult climb of 4-5 grade.

At 6900 m. we made a bivouac. At this point the crest stretches into the southern wall of Nuptse. бивуак, ещё одно выполаживание гребня, которое растекается и переходит в Южную стену Нуптзе.

Bivouacs

C1 – 6200 m
C2 – 6900 m
C3 – 7250 m
C4 – 7450 m

Summiting Nuptse

After the bivouac, we conquered a stretch of no much difficulty. We climbed simultaneously. Then we faced the wall which was shattered and had wide bergschrunds and huge hanging ice towers in many places. At this point, the pillar ends, turning into a snowy ice slope of sixty to sixty-five degrees.

Top Tower
The Top Tower begins with two difficult ropes: one is of 4+ grade; the other is of 5-6 grade. Then there are some tricky snow slopes. The crests are like stripes: you either get into a hollow, or get on the ridge with two ropes. All this is followed by hard mixed rocks, ice and snow (4-5 ropes М4/М5).

Peculiarities

It’s important to turn around here. When we turned around, we were not sure if it was the right decision, as the Sun had already set. The ridge leading to the summit was clearly visible though.
We reached the ridge in the complete dark. We decided not to bother about the belay and climbed together.
Although the ridge had seemed within reach, it was actually more than 100 meters away. We had to climb at a 4 grade employing the belay.

Nuptse Route

The route line catches one’s eye for its smooth lines. Maybe there is no charm of the summit itself, as the wall has a number of peaks and crests. There is no obvious recognition of the destination, unlike that of Matterhorn (???) or Ama Dablam. But the very ascent line is beautiful. No wonder so many climbers had ventured it before us.