Breaking: Two American Ascents Receive Alpinism’s Highest Honor

The Piolet d’Or, or Golden Ice Axe, is alpinism’s highest formal honor. Unlike the Oscars or Grammys, this prize doesn’t come with international fame, nor the promise of riches. But the Piolet d’Or awards do serve the greater climbing community: bringing stories of the high mountains down to the valley bottoms; celebrating climbers from all over the world; and providing context as to how these giant multi-day efforts can even take place.

This year, a seven-person international jury awarded three parties the prestigious prize, two of which were American. For a long list of Piolet contenders, read here.

And now, the Oscar—er, Piolet, goes to…

Kaqur Kangri (6,859m), Nepal, (October 15-21, 2024)

Maximum adventure was the name of the game for Americans Spencer Gray, Ryan Griffiths, and Matt Zia during their first ascent of the Southwest Arête (5.10 A0 M7 WI5; 1,670m) of Kaqur Kangri (a.k.a. Kanti Himal) in Nepal. Armed with just a few photos of the upper mountain, the trio decided to attempt the unclimbed aspect in pure alpine style. According to a press release by the Piolet d’Or committee: “After acclimatizing on a nearby 6,200-meter peak, they made a first attempt on the southwest ridge in mid-October, climbing to 5,800m in a day before their stove failed. This forced a descent to the base of the arête to retrieve another stove, after which Zia, deeply affected by recent news of a friend’s death, decided not to continue.”

Gray and Griffiths returned to the Southwest Arête and climbed solid granitic gneiss to the base of a steep headwall, the imposing feature that their photos had initially inspired them to try. The headwall was broken up into eight sustained mixed pitches, which they climbed over two days. After reaching the summit the following day, the pair descended the unclimbed Northwest Ridge, then a west-facing slope, mainly downclimbing with a dozen rappels.

The jury commended this party for completing what is now one of the hardest routes in West Nepal, doing so in a committing, explorative style, and proving to other alpinists that “many challenging unclimbed objectives still exist in little visited regions of the Himalaya.”

Gasherbrum III (7,952m), Pakistan Karakoram, (July 31-August 4, 2024)

The first ascent of Edge of Entropy (M6; 3,000m), a.k.a. the West Ridge of (the nearly 8,000-meter) Gasherbrum III, flew under many armchair-mountaineers’ radars since it occurred at the unsexy elevation of 7,952 meters. Nevertheless, this was clearly one of the proudest ascents of 2024. Completed by Tom Livingstone (U.K.) and Aleš Česen (Slovenia), this behemoth ridge toed the line between “Psycho—but not too psycho,” Livingstone told Climbing. He went on to explain that the mountain’s west ridge is technically difficult and committing, but it’s also relatively safe from objective hazards like seracs, rockfall, and avalanches. Plus, should you reach the summit, a smooth descent awaits down the mountain’s normal route.

Livingstone and Česen first attempted the line in 2022 but were stymied by brutally high winds. They returned last year under much more favorable weather, though deep snow on rock slabs made for tenuous mixed climbing conditions. “Your crampons and axes would slip,” Livingstone said, “and you’d skid down a few inches with each move, like a cat on claws, sliding down a pane of glass.”

Livingstone and Česen also said it was hard to apply an accurate grade to the climbing due to the altitude, which turns climbing that would be easy at sea level into something much more desperate. “M6 is a good guess, but it doesn’t tell you much,” Česen said. “It’s not representative of what it’s like up there.” Livingstone quipped: “It’s like climbing 5.12 with a plastic bag on your head.”

The pair made three acclimatization climbs up to 7,000 meters before returning to basecamp to rest. They blasted off on July 31, regained 7,000 meters two days later, at the base of the West Ridge, then spent another night at 7,500 meters, and a final, horrible bivouac at 7,800 meters. They had chopped a snow ledge and clambered inside, only to have half of the ledge collapse, leaving the tent corner hanging in space. So they disassembled the tent, crawled into their two-person sleeping bag, and spent the night sitting on the remains of their ledge while snowfall piled around them. “Our teeth were chattering like in the cartoons,” Livingstone said.

A difficult and runout M6 pitch greeted the frozen climbers the following day, then the summit, then a descent down the mountain’s original route, and finally the fixed lines of Gasherbrum II’s (8,035m) normal route. The jury was impressed by the small team’s lightweight alpine style, leaving nothing on the mountain, who proved that “quality adventure over new ground is still possible on the world’s highest mountains.”

Yashkuk Sar (6,667m), Pakistan Karakoram, (September 19–23, 2024)

The Americans August Franzen, Dane Steadman, and Cody Winckler had an impressive first trip to the Karakoram last year, netting the first ascent of Yashkuk Sar (6,667m), via the Tiger Lily Buttress (AI5+ M6 A0; 2,000m).

After establishing an advanced camp on the Yashkuk Yaz Glacier, the trio acclimated to 5,300 meters on an unnamed 6,084-meter peak to the north of Yashkuk Sar, then established a new route up the southeast aspect of nearby Sax Sar (6,240m) which afforded them a clear view of their chief objective. They had spied a subtle ribbon of ice—steep enough that it was protected from overhead hazards like seracs and rockfall—extending to the top of the mountain’s upper headwall. “It would be steep, hard climbing, but we were pretty damn certain this was the way,” Franzen told Climbing afterward.

The team climbed for two days up steep snow and ice to an exposed bivouac on the north pillar. There, they watched a large avalanche tear down their intended line through the headwall—it clearly wasn’t as safe as they’d thought. “We just sat in silence, experiencing this sinking feeling of knowing we shouldn’t be here,” Franzen explained. “All our planning, our scouting—we put so much faith and certainty into this line, and all of it just blew up as this avalanche tore down our intended route.”

Morale was low but all hope wasn’t lost. The next morning they made a diagonal rappel to the left to scout out an even steeper line that would be free from such extreme overhead hazard. They climbed delicate mixed terrain and steep ice on the left edge of the headwall, bivouacked on a ludicrously narrow snow mushroom—the “airiest bivouac of our lives”—at 6,200 meters, then continued to the top of the headwall the next day. Wind-sculpted snow formations led them across the summit ridge, which Franzen called a “Cerro Torre simulator,” and finally onto the untrodden summit. The team descended via a prominent western couloir, then climbed up the west ridge, and finally down a section of the north face to reach their camp.

The Piolet jury was “full of praise for this highly committing ascent and descent, and the young team, who embody the spirit of alpinism, searching journals and earth imagery for far-away objectives that push the boundaries of both technical difficulty and exploration.”

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