Re: Styl do poprawy?

04 lis 2021 - 07:35:12
Wyważony komentarz Colina Haleya (via FB):

A few hours ago I heard about Tom Livingstone and Matt Glenn’s successful ascent of Tengkampoche’s northeast pillar. I was naturally a bit envious of their achievement, but also impressed and surprised. Checking back into the internet an hour ago, I see the social media storm that has been brewing surrounding one detail of their ascent: that they used some gear that had been left low on the wall by Quentin Roberts and Jesse Huey.
I know that the safest choice for me to make right now would be to stay out of this discussion completely. The internet, especially social media, is unfortunately a volatile medium, and it is easy for a mob mentality to gain momentum - in my opinion this scenario is yet another example of that. I know that sharing my opinion, no matter what it is, has the potential to bring undesired drama to me personally. However, in this instance I happen to think that Tom and Matt are being treated unfairly, to a ridiculous degree, and I feel that speaking up in their defense is the ethical choice. When Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk removed the bolts on Cerro Torre’s Southeast Ridge, I felt that speaking up in their defense was the right thing to do, even though it resulted in a lot of drama and bad feelings for me personally, such as having people screaming at me in an El Chalten grocery store. (I do not mean to imply, however, that this controversy is anywhere close to the same scale as the controversy that surrounded removing the bolts on Cerro Torre.)
I feel it is important to mention that I do not have any personal stake or bias in this. I know or have met all of the people involved in this drama (Tom, Matt, Quentin, Juho, Jesse). Tom and Quentin are perhaps the main characters in this drama, and I am roughly equally good friends with both of them. They are both very talented climbers, whose skill I respect. They are also both very ambitious climbers, who I think both have a fire inside to prove their skills to the world. I have communicated with both of them about potentially trying ambitious alpine climbs together (because they are both obviously very skilled and motivated), and with both of them my biggest reservation about potentially teaming up is my perception that they have a fire inside to prove themselves. I find it a bit pretentious of Tom to try to put down aid climbing and jumaring, but at the same time I find it a bit pretentious of Quentin to name a “new route” on Torre Egger that was really just a variation of an often-climbed route. I don’t mention these things to try to diss either one of them - I mention these things here to try to illustrate that they are young, ambitious climbers out to prove themselves, and to illustrate that my respect and hesitations towards both of them are equal. I will also mention that I think 10 years ago I was equally on a mission to prove myself to the world as they are now, and I am trying simply recognize it, not judge it negatively.
OK, first of all, there is one thing that should be made very, very clear: No one owns any projects in the mountains. Not in this instance, or any instance ever. For a rock climb (or other sort of crag climb, like a sport mixed climb) the “red tag” concept is very logical: When someone has put in the work of cleaning and/or bolting a route, it is a logical courtesy to let them try to make the first redpoint (at least for a while). In the big mountains it is a totally different scenario. When Rolo Garibotti and I made the first ascent of the Torre Traverse in 2008, I absolutely do not think it was wrong of us to climb it, even though Ermanno Salvaterra, a major hero of mine, had tried it so many times over so many years. Likewise, when Tommy Caldwell and Alex Honnold succeeded on the Fitz Roy Traverse, I didn’t feel that they had done anything wrong whatsoever, despite the fact that Rolo and I had been scheming about it for years, and had made two strong attempts. In fact, when our third attempt was aborted nearly as soon as it started, it was my suggestion to give Alex a pair of crampons that would actually work on his approach shoes. If I had gone to Nepal this fall to attempt the northeast pillar of Tengkampoche, and had succeeded, I would not have felt that I had done anything wrong, even though Quentin and Jesse are friends of mine, and even though I knew they had ambitions to try it again. Also, it is very important to mention that Quentin and Juho and Jesse were not the ones to dream up this climbing project. It had been tried by at least several teams previously. I remember first hearing about this line from Ueli Steck in 2015. Ueli referred to it as the line “that the Canadian guys tried.” He was of course referring to Matt Maddaloni and John Furneaux, who had made the highest attempt at that time (in 2006) (http://publications.americanalpineclub.org/.../Asia-Nepal...). Until Tom and Matt’s recent ascent, the Maddaloni-Furneaux attempt was the second-highest attempt after Quentin and Juho’s.
Next: The gear cache of Quentin and Jesse’s was left on the mountain, not in a lodge in the closest village. If Tom and Matt had raided a blue barrel or duffel bag that Quentin and Jesse had left cached in the village or base camp, then that would clearly be stealing. On the mountain is a different story, however. I think that most people experienced in climbing big mountains would agree that gear that was left on the mountain by a different party the previous season is considered fair game to take. Keep in mind I’m talking about big mountains, not something like a stashed haulbag on the Incredible Hulk or Snowpatch Spire (which are essentially big crags in the modern era).
What can we really say about Tom and Matt using gear from Quentin and Jesse’s gear cache? We can say that, for sure, Tom and Matt’s ascent was not done in pure alpine style. Of course, at the same time, we can say for sure that Quentin and Jesse leaving the gear cache there meant that they intended to make their next attempt not in pure alpine style. Some people have mentioned that leaving a gear cache on a climb, such as Quentin and Jesse did, is a questionable choice because there is always the possibility that you won’t be able to return, and it will simply turn into garbage. I don’t personally feel comfortable judging Quentin and Jesse for this tactic, because I have done similarly questionable things sometimes in my past, but it is worth mentioning that this possibility should go into evaluating Tom and Matt’s decision to take gear from the cache. In 2008 Maxime Turgeon and I were attempting to climb the [still unclimbed] southeast ridge of the Ogre, and we left a gear cache at the col between Ogre I and Ogre II, which is at the start of the difficult climbing, but above a difficult ice fall and 70-degree ice gully. We had impressively terrible weather on the trip, and in the end were completely unable to retrieve our gear cache despite our best efforts. I actually returned to the Choktoi Glacier in 2009 and was able to completely retrieve the cache, but that was a very lucky ending - leaving a gear cache on a high-altitude mountain on the other side of the world is never a really sure bet. During the year in between, a French team actually rappelled past the Ogre I-II col and noticed my cached backpack. They were too exhausted from days of high-altitude climbing to bother looking inside of it, but if they had taken all the gear I wouldn’t have been even 1% offended or surprised.
In synopsis: Tom and Matt took gear from a cache left on a mountain by a previous party in a previous season. I definitely don’t think it was unethical of them to do so. However, to be clear, I definitely don’t judge Quentin and Jesse for leaving gear on the mountain either, and I certainly don’t think that Tom and Matt took gear in any way as an effort to “clean up” the mountain (obviously it was just to help their chances of a successful ascent). We cannot consider Matt and Tom’s ascent to have been made in pure alpine style, and we must keep in mind also that if Quentin and Jesse had returned and succeeded on the route, their ascent would not have been in pure alpine style either. Beyond that style footnote on this ascent (and hypothetical ascent), there really is nothing big going on here: A couple guys left a gear cache on a mountain, hoping to eventually retrieve it, and a couple other guys took stuff from it the next season.
Tom and Quentin are both very talented climbers, with already impressive climbs under each of their belts, and presumably many more in the future. I think that Quentin and Juho’s strong attempt should be rightly celebrated, and I think that Tom and Matt’s successful ascent should be rightly celebrated (with the footnote about it not being done in pure alpine style). I really hope that people take a deep breath and calm down a minute, and realize that the gear we are talking about is not of great value - the main value it held was simply in the fact that it had already been carried part way up the mountain (which, of course, is why we can’t consider Tom and Matt’s tactics, nor Quentin and Jesse’s tactics, to be pure alpine style).
Even after writing this, I feel hesitant to put it on the internet, since the internet is a volatile place. I have nothing to gain in writing this, and only the potential to get dragged into the drama myself… fingers crossed that doesn’t happen! I may even refrain from replying to comments. Anyways, I need to go to bed and tomorrow won’t have much time to look at the internet, for better or worse. I hope that I haven’t offended Tom or Quentin with this post. I also hope that Tom and Quentin become friends again in the future, and that eventually this will just be a story that they joke about together… It is actually possible!
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Styl do poprawy?

kierownik 03 lis 2021 - 18:21:09

Re: Styl do poprawy?

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szczepan2 05 lis 2021 - 20:05:25

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łojant 05 lis 2021 - 14:27:49

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jerrygwizdek 06 lis 2021 - 05:39:29

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kali 11 lis 2021 - 09:46:15

Re: Styl do poprawy?

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Re: Styl do poprawy?

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