Tag: Interview

Climbing News, Everest, Everest 2024 Coverage, Everest News, Everest Popular Posts, Interview

Everest 2024 Podcast: Ryan Mitchell on his Everest Summit–”Life Changing”

Ryan Mitchel Everest Summit

Massachusetts native 19-year-old Ryan Mitchell summited Mt. Everest on May 23, 2024! This extensive podcast discusses his experience from training to the summit and back home.

Ryan, a Summit Coach client, contacted me about a year ago, wanting advice and coaching on how to climb Everest in the Spring of 2022. He had little to no experience, so while I told him many companies would take his money and have him on Everest, the best approach would be to wait at least a year and gain the skills and experience it would take to make a safe attempt on the world’s highest peak. He agreed, and we’ve worked together for the past year.

In this podcast, Ryan explains how he funds his climbs, training approach, and “why.” We cover a lot of topics, including:

    1:22 – Was it hard? Was it fun?
    2:50 – How did you train to get the required experience?
    8:33 – What part of your training meant the most once on Everest?
   11:35 – You created a YouTube series documenting each day of the expedition.
   12:13 – What cameras did you use, and how did you keep the batteries warm?  
   18:50 – What other gear did well for you, like the down suit from Himali and your La Sportiva 8000-meter boots?
   20:11 – Discuss the trek from Lukla to Everest Base Camp
   21:32 – Did video logging distract you from the overall experience?
   23:12 –  Describe arriving at EBC and meeting the Sherpas for the first time.
   26:10 – How was climbing through the Icefall? 
   31:41 – How hot was the Western Cwm?
   33:00 – Did you ever get sick?
   34:45 – What were the climbing conditions on the Lhotse Face?
   40:10 – Did you experience severe crowding on Everest?
   41:42 – Describe the good and bad at the South Col.
   48:50 – Walk us through the Summit push.
   53:46 – Sunrise from Everest
   56:07 – How was the Hillary Step?
   59:10 – Seeing dead bodies
1:01:25 – What emotions did you feel on the summit?
1:06:36 – You had a fast climb back to C2. Why so fast?
1:09:30 – Were you happy when you finished your last trip through the icefall?
1:13:03 – How did it feel to arrive back home?
1:15:55 – What are one or two words or phrases describing your Everest journey?
1:17:30  – What’s next?
I know you will enjoy this.

#everest2024

#everest2024

Climbing News, Everest, Everest 2024 Coverage, Everest News, Everest Popular Posts, Interview, K2, K2 2023 Coverage

Everest 2024 Podcast: Ryan Mitchell on how a 19-year-old can afford to climb Everest

Ryan Mitchell

How a 19-year-old can afford to climb Everest? Well, Ryan Mitchell, 19, living in central Massachusetts, explains how in this podcast.

Ryan, a Summit Coach client, contacted me about a year ago, wanting advice and coaching on how to climb Everest in the Spring of 2022. He had little to no experience, so while I told him there were many companies who would take his money and have him on Everest, the best approach would be to wait at least a year and gain the skills and experience it would take to make a safe attempt on the world’s highest peak. He agreed, and we’ve been working together for the past twelve months.

In this podcast, Ryan explains how he is funding his climbs, his training approach, and critically, is his “why”

#everest2024

Adrian Ballinger, Climbing News, Everest, Everest News, Everest Popular Posts, Interview, K2, K2 2023 Coverage

Podcast with Adrian Ballinger, Alpenglow: Records, Rescues, Deaths and More

The past few months have been difficult in the mountaineering world. We have seen climbs on many 800ers that turned out tragically: Mohammed Hassan on K2, Anna Gutu, Migmar Sherpa, American Gina Marie Rzucidlo and Tenjen Lama Sherpa on Shishapangma. A few dramatic rescues and a neverending quest for records.

I turned to long-time alpinist Adrian Ballinger, co-founder of Alpenglow, to try and make sense of what’s going on, what can be done to prevent these seemingly preventable deaths and if the pursuit of records is worth the risks. We also discuss his return to Everest planned for 2024 after missing the last four seasons, due to China’s closure of their side of Everest.

Climbing News, Interview, K2, K2 2023 Coverage

Podcast Interview with Kristin Harila

Norwegian Kristin Harila, 37, Tenjen (Lama) Sherpa summited all fourteen 8000ers in three months and 1 day (92 days.) The first was Shishapangma on April 26, 2023, and the last K2 on July 27, 2023. In 2022, Harila summited twelve of the fourteen, but China refused them entry into Tibet to attempt Shishapangma and Cho Oyu thus, she returned this year to complete her project.

Harila’s journey was not with controversy. They included switching teams and Sherpas from 2022 to 2023, using helicopters to fly Sherpas to Camp 2 on Manaslu, and the one that caught global attention when a High Altitude Porter, Muhammad Hassan, not climbing with her team died on K2. Her team gave aid, but he died. A video taken hours later showed other climbers, not Harila’s team stepping over the dead body on the way to the summit. Harila was widely criticized for his death, yet her team did everything to save his life.

The Pakistani government investigated the incident and posted a detailed report clearing Harila’s team of any wrongdoing and gave her photographer, Gabriel Tarso, an “appreciation letter” for his effort to save a life that night. We explore all of these controversies in detail in this podcast. #k2023

Everest, Everest 2023 Coverage, Interview

Everest 2023: Interview with Lukas Furtenbach – The Evolution of Oxygen Delivery Systems on Everest

Lukas Furtenbach, a major mountaineering expedition guide company and is now a top supplier of supplemental oxygen systems to all teams climbing Everest.  He partnered with Neil Greenwood of Summit Oxygen to create Everest Oxygen focusing on supplying supplemental oxygen to the mountaineering industry.

His Austrian-based Furtenbach Adventures offer global climbs, including most of the 8000-meter mountains, the Seven Summits, the Volcanic Seven Summits, and Ski Mountaineering. However, they have made a name for themselves with their “Flash Expeditions,” which takes only three weeks to climb Everest, compared to the classic style, which takes six to eight weeks.

In this Podcast, we explore the evolution of using supplemental oxygen, Lukas’s approach and several other Everest topics. We cover:

 2:24 – The Chinese closure of Everest for the past four years, and will they open in Autumn for 8000ers?
 4:45  – Will COVID be a factor for Everest 2023?
 5:55 – Furtenbach Adventures Carbon Neutral approach to mountaineering
10:02 – Climbing Everest in three weeks vs. six to eight weeks
11:35 – Pre-acclimatizing at home using altitude tents
22:13 – The history of altitude tents (In France in the late 1970s)
25:52 – Is using supplemental oxygen cheating?
29:54 – Everest Oxygen supplies systems to other teams
30:04 –  Understanding the Oxygen Delivery System
30:37 – Oxygen Cylinders
31:43 – Oxygen Regulators
39:29 – Oxygen Masks
42:15 – System Reliability
45:15 – Sherpas using Oxygen
47:22 – Types of Delivery Systems
47:32 –  Constant Flow
47:41 –  Pulse Dose
49:41 – On Demand
52:14 – Remote Monitoring of a Climber’s Health
56:17 – Everest 2023 Predictions

Everest, Everest 2023 Coverage, Interview

Everest 2023: Interview with Scott Lehmann and Shayna Unger, Deaf Climbers

Podcast: Scott Lehmann and Shayna Unger, are aiming to be the first American couple and, to their knowledge, the second and third deaf climbers to summit Mount Everest. Also, they are trying to become the first deaf couple to compete the Seven Summits. Both were born, as they say, profoundly deaf, meaning they had no hearing at all. They live in the Washington, D.C., area and are educators and mountaineers. They summited Denali, Aconcagua, Kilimanjaro, Ecuador’s Chimborazo and Cotopaxi, and Mont Blanc, plus Scott has all the US High Point.

A third-generation deaf person, Scott is an educator and a mountaineer. Given the lack of deaf representation in the outdoors and lack of communication access to outdoor education, the outdoors was not a big part of Scott’s life until he was 23 when he climbed a mountain for the first time. Shayna is a deaf woman, an educator and a mountaineer. Growing up, Shayna often went on camping trips with her deaf family in the 1990s, but they never did. They have full access to outdoor sports. It was not until college that Shayna started traveling and fell in love with climbing mountains.

Climbing News, Interview, K2, K2 2022 Coverage

Going for 8000er Record: Kristin Harila all 14 in Six Months

A new trend in 8000-meter climbing is how many you can get in one trip and how fast. Norweigan Kristin Harila is on track to smash long-time records this year. Thus far, she has eleven of the fourteen, all with climbing Sherpas, Pasdawa Sherpa, and Dawa Ongju Sherpa, of 8K Expeditions. I had the opportunity to record this interview with her during a short respite back home in Norway.

The current record is 189 days between April 23 and October 29, 2019, by Nirmal Purja Pun Magar and is recognized by Guinness World Records. However, a study posted online notes it took Nirmal five years, four months, and 25 days to complete all 14, primarily due to their conclusion that he didn’t reach Manaslu’s true summit during his 2019 campaign and only did in the autumn of 2021. Kristin’s first summit of the project was Annapurna on April 28, 2022. She will need to finish by November 3, 2022, to get the speed record.

She is no stranger to mountaineering. In 2019, she became the fastest woman to climb Everest and Lhotse in a record 12 hours. The 36-year-old is from Vadso/Norway and is a former cross-country skier. Today, she claims her profession is as a mountaineer, runner, and skier.

Next up for the trio are Nepal’s Manaslu true summit, before trying Cho Oyu and Shishapangma. She prefers climbing both from the Tibet side, but as we know, the Chinese have closed Tibet for climbing due to COVID since 2000. They will have to get an exception to enter the country for their attempt. She tells me she will attempt Cho from Nepal if she cannot enter Tibet.

Climbing News, Interview, K2, K2 2022 Coverage

K2 2022: No O’s, Unsupported Summits on Broad Peak and K2 – Interview with Andreas Frydensberg and Eric Gilbertson

K2 had a record year this 2022 summer. Most of the summits were by Sherpas or Pakistani climbers helping their paying clients, but a handful were the rare type: no supplemental oxygen, no Sherpa support, and no commercial team.

Danish climber Andreas Ritzau Frydensberg with American Eric Gilbertson summited Broad Peak on July 18th and K2 on July 28th. On his website, Country Highpoints, Eric describes their Broad Peak, and K2 climbs in detail. They climbed unsupported, using Pakastani Alpine Adventure Guides for base camp services. So they climbed with no on-mountain support – no Sherpas to set up tents, cook food, or break trail. They also didn’t use supplemental oxygen.

Before getting to their story, I admit that 2022 caused me to lose some hope in the sport I admire. Too many inexperienced climbers, too much talk of records, most important only to the individual seeking it, and teams with too many clients supported but too many Sherpas. It just felt out of control. I’m thankful we had a relatively small number of deaths, but as I learn more, I see many rescues and near misses, so this was a season of luck.

In looking at what Eric and Andreas did, they gave me hope. I am excited to see younger climbers demonstrate creativity, excellent judgment, and impressive results, all in good style. It gave me hope for our sport, and I’m proud of them and several others who climbed similarly. Now, onto the interview.

This relaxed-paced interview with Eric and Andreas only days after they returned home to Seattle and Denmark, respectively.

Climb On!
Alan
Memories are Everything

Climbing News, Everest, Everest 2022 Coverage, Everest News, Everest Popular Posts, Interview

Video Interview Adventure Consultants Guy Cotter

Guy Cotter

If you follow mountaineering, Adventure Consultants is one of the names that evoke almost three decades of memories. Guy Cotter, who began running the company in the mid-1990s, has deftly led his team through years of climbs worldwide. But in 2010, COVID was too much, and Guy made the difficult decision to put AC into ‘hibernation.’ Now, in 2022, he is ready to resume operations, smaller, leaner, and with an increased focus on running high-quality expeditions with discerning clients.

In this interview, I talk with Guy about his decisions with AC over the past few years and where he wants to take the company. We also delve into this new world of climbers’ linking multiple 8000-meter peaks in a single season, the record crowds on K2, and the discussion in the mountaineering community around the validity of claiming summits, especially on the fourteen 8000-meter peaks.

Guy is uniquely qualified to discuss these topics. I hope you enjoy our chat.