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Only one incident has been reported with no injuries, but if you bought a Vision harness back to 2018 you can get a full refund
The post Harness Recall: “Immediately Stop Using It” appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/harness-recall-immediately-stop-using-it/
The west face of Sloan Peak, about 20 kilometers southwest of Glacier Peak in Washington’s North Cascades, has seen a flurry of winter climbing in the past five years. But one obvious plum remained: a direct route up the center of the face, with an intimidating crux pitch leading past steep rock to a hanging dagger. In January, Northwest climbers Justin Sackett and Michael Telstad picked that plum, climbing nearly 2,000 feet up the west face in a long day. We’re sharing Telstad’s report for AAJ 2025 here.
The west face of Sloan Peak (7,835’) has been at the forefront of my mind for about as long as I’ve been winter climbing. Despite numerous attempts, the main face was unclimbed to the summit in winter until 2022, with the completion of Superalpine (IV WI3/4, Legallo-Roy). In 2023, the Merrill-Minton (a.k.a. The Sloan Slither, 1,600’, IV WI4+) climbed partway up the center of the face, then moved rightward to join Superalpine. A previous winter line on Sloan Peak, Full Moon Fever (IV AI4 R 5.8, Downey-Hinkley-Hogan, 2011), started on the west face then angled up the northern shoulder.
Directly above the point where the Merrill-Minton cuts right to easier ground, a large hanging dagger is guarded by gently overhanging, compact gneiss. Known as one of the biggest unpicked plums in the North Cascades, the direct line past the dagger was going to get climbed sooner or later—it was just a question of by whom and in what style. When a perfect weather window arrived in the forecast, I convinced Justin Sackett to drive up from Portland for an attempt.
Early on January 19, 2025, we stepped away from the car and into the rainforest. We reached the base of the route at first light. Following the Merrill-Minton for the first three pitches, we encountered climbing up to WI5 R—a far cry from the moderate ice reported on the first ascent. Below the dagger, we took a short break and got ready for an adventure. I’d chosen to leave the bolt kit behind. This route deserved an honest attempt on natural gear before being sieged.
After traversing back and forth a few times, I chose my line to the ice and started up. The rock on this portion of the wall is highly featured but compact and fractured. Just about every seam that might take gear was packed full of frozen moss; finding decent protection was a slow, agonizing process. A steep crux near the end of the pitch held potential for a huge fall, but an improbable no-hands rest allowed me just enough of a reprieve to get good gear.
Justin joined me in the sun above the dagger, and we continued up a pitch of perfect blue water ice to snow slopes. Rather than finish via the standard scramble route, we opted for an obvious corner system above us. Reminiscent of Shaken Not Stirred on the Mooses Tooth in Alaska, this narrow slot held steps of water ice broken by sections of steep snow—the ideal finish to an excellent climb.
Arriving on the windless summit around 3:45 p.m., we took a short break and began our descent along the southeast shelf. After what felt like an eternity of steep downclimbing, we post-holed back to the cars, arriving a bit after 8 pm. Our direct new route is called Borrowed Time (1,900’, IV WI5 M7).
In a sad footnote to the Sloan Peak story, a climber was severely injured in a long fall on the mountain about a week after the ascent reported above, apparently attempting one of the initial pitches on either this line or the Merrill-Minton route. The climber was pulled from the face in a dramatic helicopter mission—the five-minute video from Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office is a remarkable window into such rescues. We wish the climber well in his recovery.
Crashhhhh! rang through the perfectly still night. To say this woke up August Franzen, Cody Winckler, and me would be a lie. How could we sleep? We were camped below the biggest objective of our lives, on our first trip to Pakistan, alone in the Yashkuk Yaz Valley aside from our two cooks and liaison officer back at base camp, surrounded by the most beautiful, terrifying, inspiring, and chaotic mountains we’d ever seen. Now, on the glacier beneath Yashkuk Sar I (6,667m), about a mile past our advanced base camp, I poked my head out the tent door to see a gargantuan avalanche roaring down the peak’s north wall, its powder cloud billowing toward us.
“Should we run?” asked August.
https://americanalpineclub.org/news/2025/2/25/the-line-from-the-cascades-to-the-karakoram
Howdy fellow climbers, little money saving tip: resole your climbing shoes. Costs about 50 euros instead of a new pair.
This is the message from the current CEO of Patagonia. Places noted as being threatened include Bears Ears National Monument, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the watershed of Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
The post Trump Gov Should Not Sell U.S. Public Lands appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/trump-gov-should-not-sell-u-s-public-lands/
There have been several major alpine ascents completed in Europe this winter, but this might be the most incredible
The post Epic Alpine Big Wall Climb Over Seven Days appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/epic-alpine-big-wall-climb-over-seven-days/
The challenging gear route was first climbed nearly 20 years ago. The first ascensionist just dropped the original FA video on YouTube
The post Sonnie Trotter Climbing The Path 5.14R appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/profiles/sonnie-trotter-climbing-the-path-5-14r/
It took me a bit to figure out a sequence through the start of this problem, but it was fun to spend some time on.
Mirrored 5.14c/d is the newest hard route in one of North America's steepest sport crags
The post Jonathan Siegrist Opens New 5.14+ appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
Less than a year after climbing her first 5.14, Veronica Chik has ticked her first V10
The post Nine-Year-Old Climbs V10 Traverse in China appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/nine-year-old-climbs-v10-traverse-in-china/
NICAS (National Indoor Climbing Award Schemes) is proud to announce a new partnership with Access Sport to create more inclusive climbing opportunities for disabled young people across the UK.
Originally published in Guidebook XIII
I.
Zach Clanton was the photographer, so he was the last one to drop into the couloir. Sitting on the cornice as he strapped his board on, his camera tucked away now, his partners far below him and safe out of the avalanche track, he took a moment and looked at the skyline. He soaked in the jagged peaks, the snow and rock, the blue of the sky. And he said hello to his dead friends.
In the thin mountain air, as he was about to revel in the breathlessness of fast turns and the thrill of skating on a knife’s edge of danger, they were close by—the ones he’d lost to avalanches. Dave and Alecs. Liz and Brook. The people he had turned to for girlfriend advice, for sharing climbing and splitboarding joy. The people who had witnessed his successes and failures. Too many to name. Lost to the great allure, yet ever-present danger, of the big mountains.
Zach had always been the more conservative one in his friend group and among his big mountain splitboard partners. Still, year after year, he played the tricky game of pushing his snowboarding to epic places.
Zach is part of a disappearing breed of true dirtbags. Since 2012, he has lived inside for a total of ten months, otherwise based out of his Honda Element and later a truck camper, migrating from Alaska to Mexico as the seasons dictated. When he turned 30, something snapped. Maybe he lost his patience with the weather-waiting in Alaska. Maybe he just got burnt out on snowboarding after spending his entire life dedicated to the craft. Maybe he was fried from the danger of navigating avalanche terrain so often. Regardless, he decided to take a step back from splitboarding and fully dedicate his time to climbing, something that felt more controllable, less volatile. With rock climbing, he believed he would be able to get overhead snow and ice hazards out of his life. He was done playing that game.
Even as Zach disentangled his life and career from risky descents, avalanches still haunted him. Things hit a boiling point in 2021, when Zach lost four friends in one season, two of whom were like brothers. As can be the case with severe trauma, the stress of his grief showed up in his body—manifesting as alopecia barbae. He knew grief counseling could help, but it all felt too removed from his life. Who would understand his dirtbag lifestyle? Who would understand how he was compelled to live out of his car, and disappear into the wilderness whenever possible?
He grappled with his grief for years, unsure how to move forward. When, by chance, he listened to the Enormocast episode featuring Lincoln Stoller, a grief therapist who’s part of the AAC’s Climbing Grief Fund network and an adventurer in his own right—someone who had climbed with Fred Beckey and Galen Rowell, some of Zach’s climbing idols—a door seemed to crack open, a door leading toward resiliency, and letting go. He applied to the Climbing Grief Grant, and in 2024 he was able to start seeing Lincoln for grief counseling. He would start to see all of his close calls, memories, and losses in a new light.
II.
With his big mountain snowboarding days behind him, Zach turned to developing new routes for creativity and the indescribable pleasure of moving across rock that no one had climbed before. With a blank canvas, he felt like he was significantly mitigating and controlling any danger. There was limited objective hazard on the 1,500-foot limestone wall of La Gloria, a gorgeous pillar west of El Salto, Mexico, where he had created a multi-pitch classic called Rezando with his friend Dave in early 2020. Dave and Zach had become brothers in the process of creating Rezando, having both been snowboarders who were taking the winter off to rock climb. On La Gloria, it felt like the biggest trouble you could get into was fighting off the coatimundi, the dexterous ringtail racoon-like creatures that would steal their gear and snacks.
After free climbing all but two pitches of Rezando in February of 2020, when high winds and frigid temperatures drove them off the mountain, Zach was obsessed with the idea of going back and doing the first free ascent. He had more to give, and he wasn’t going to loosen his vise grip on that mountain. Besides, there was much more potential for future lines.
But Dave decided to stay in Whistler that next winter, and died in an ...
https://americanalpineclub.org/news/2025/2/10/guidebook-xiiicgf-spotlight
Despite not the best conditions, Jenny Abegg set the fastest known time round-trip up Cerro Solo
The post American Jenny Abegg Sets Patagonia Record appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/profiles/american-jenny-abegg-sets-patagonia-record/
Leo Billon and Enzo Oddo spent two nights making the first ascent of this test-piece where they aided one pitch at A4 before freeing it at M10
The post New 500-metre Alpine Climb Goes at M10 Trad appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/new-500-metre-alpine-climb-goes-at-m10-trad/
Benjamin Vedrines has made the second ascent of a test-piece alpine big wall called BASE
The post Alpinist Solos West Face of Petit Dru Over Five Days in Winter appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/alpinist-solos-west-face-of-petit-dru-over-five-days-in-winter/
Canmore-based guide Sean Isaac wrote this story back in 2001 during the early days of mixed climbing in the Canadian Rockies
The post The Beginning of Mixed Climbing in Canada appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/profiles/the-beginning-of-mixed-climbing-in-canada/
The giant Buttermilks line Direct North is one of her hardest sends to date
The post Single-Session V14 Highball for Brooke Raboutou appeared first on Gripped Magazine.
https://gripped.com/news/single-session-v14-highball-for-brooke-raboutou/
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