With the Alps devastated, the game of mountaineering takes on a new dimension thanks to Kilian Jornet. Transgressing imagined limits, evolving, growing, going beyond and returning, dreaming that something is possible when no one has even dared to imagine it… is part of the history of humankind’s passage through the mountains. It is difficult to describe Kilian Jornet’s latest achievement in a fresh way: flying over the Alpine arc in record time, passing by each and every one of its 82 peaks of more than 4,000 metres. Certainly, it is not the triumph of an ultra-endurance athlete, but that of a major mountaineer, even if his profile is not as technical as, for example, that of Ueli Steck, the swiss machinewho also climbed (in 2015) all the four thousanders… in 62 days. Kilian needed just 19 days. This figure says it all, because Steck was not only a technically gifted mountaineer, but also a true lung with legs. Nor does it seem a coincidence that the Catalan ended his trip in the Écrins accompanied by the Frenchman Benjamin Védrines, an elite mountaineer, technically impeccable, but also capable of flying: just a few weeks ago he needed 11 hours to climb K2.
It makes no sense to imagine the runner of the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc, the Zegama-Azkorri or the Zinal, or the person who has placed the gesture of running in the mountains in all the shop windows of the industry: Jornet has changed his skin to shake the foundations of mountaineering based on legs, knowledge of the terrain and skill. His alpine journey marks the path to follow for those who wish to participate in the evolution of an activity where mistakes are paid for with life. And in his crazy ride through the Alps, Kilian has taken risks: he has advanced at night and at full speed (sometimes by choice and other times because there was no other option) through a universe in decline accelerated by climate change, a crumbling terrain, with treacherous cracks, decomposed edges, falling rocks…
Jornet began his challenge on August 13 at 5 a.m., at the eastern end of the Swiss Alps, without offering too many clues about his route, beyond expressing his desire to “discover his physical and psychological limits.” It quickly became clear that the Catalan wanted to climb each and every one of the four thousanders in their path. It remained to be clarified how he intended to do it: in the codes of mountaineering, the how matters more than the what. For example: just a month ago, a guide and his client, both Swiss, also climbed the 82 four thousanders in 51 days… taking off in a paraglider from the peaks, then saving many hours and metres of negative gradient in the legs. His admirable feat therefore cannot be compared with Jornet’s journey.
Style, the means employed and ethics weigh much more than the end achieved, which is why it was shocking that Jornet did not speak clearly about the purpose of his project and the margins indicated for tackling it. Although he said that he would not use anything other than his legs to move and linked some valleys pedalling on his road bike, his journey was not undertaken independently, but rather supported by a team of half a dozen people who assisted him, fed him or equipped him as well as filming him. Nor can it be counted as a solo feat, since several guides and mountaineers have accompanied him at times on his journey, a wise decision that has notably improved his margin of safety. Purists observe that it is the duty of every media mountaineer to demonstrate and explain clearly what he does and how. Pedigree mountaineers who did not want to be in the media, like Jordi Corominas, keep 80% of their CV in the shadows: they never needed to give explanations because they always chose the freedom of anonymity.
If Kilian Jornet is one of the standard-bearers of the era of time-trial mountaineering, the cold data that his challenge yields is astonishing, if not incomprehensible: nearly 1,100 kilometres covered, just over 300 hours and just over 70,000 metres of positive elevation gain, not to mention almost the same negative elevation gain. Tremendous.
Behind these inhuman figures, or hidden among them, Jornet wanted to achieve a greater degree of “knowledge” of himself: to know what could stop him first, whether his engine or his mind. To know how far he can go. The Catalan athlete said shortly after finishing his challenge that this had been one of the “most demanding at all levels”: physical, technical and psychological. “I need time to process what I have experienced. I have in my head the wonderful sunrises and sunsets I have seen, the laughter with the friends who have accompanied me. I will soon share an extensive analysis of what I have done.”
If his body seems intact, even in the best shape of his existence, the struggle with his mind has been somewhat more severe, as he acknowledged a few days ago. Accustomed to measuring everything he does, to evaluating it and drawing conclusions that lead him to improve, if possible, many now await his testimony, which seems like a manual for the future. One of the most amazing mountain trips perpetrated by a human being.
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