Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In between insurrections, impeachments, and inaugurations, we’ve found time this month to scrounge around the depths of the dark web to bring you sweet climbing-related content.
Fortunately, this magic trick was made easier due to the lucky occurrence of some actual climbing news. We discuss the known-knowns of the first winter ascent of K2—completed by a badass crew of Nepali and Sherpa climbers. K2 in winter was called mountaineering’s last great prize, and the fact that it goes to perhaps the most deserving group you could imagine is an uplifting moment.
Don’t worry, though, because from there, it’s all downhill to Joshua Tree, where an interesting fashion shoot pushed the limits of toprope photography so far that—poof—even the toprope disappeared.
Our main bit is a lovely conversation with our comrade in climbing media, Natalie Berry, the editor in chief of UKC, one of the most popular climbing websites in the world.
Our final bit is a special, special treat. Hear ye! Hear ye! The Duke of Mason Earle delivers a concord of sweet sounds to attending ears. Ne’er a more mellifluous lute perchance one might hear in all the podcast kingdom of climbing …
Show Notes
Follow Natalie Berry: Instagram and Twitter.
A nice profile of Natalie on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/160236614
K2: First Winter Ascent report on the NY Times https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/sports/summit-k2-nepalese-sherpas.html
Sidetracked Magazine has all the fluff on the Gucci / TNF collaboration: https://www.sidetracked.com/thenorthfacexgucci/
Follow Mason Earle on Instagram
Watch Mason battle an outrageous off width.
Learn more about the Renaissance Lute from a nerd.
4 responses to “RunOut #54: Climbing Media Ethics”
I found it unfortunate that while listing female trad ascents of 5.14s, you left out Beth Rodden’s Meltdown (5.14c) and Hazel Findlay’s Magic Line (5.14c?). Maybe some others too…this podcadt sounds like a lame bros club nowadays with incredibly low bar for researching subjects you cover.
What about Lynn Hill? How dare you leave her out! And Maddy Cope is Hazel’s friend and you just dissed her! She climbed 5.14 R!
Yeah, I (chris) literally saw the post from Brittany about the send as we sat down. I actually edited out the part where we wander through the list off the top of our heads, forgetting a few, but getting the most popular ones, not because we sounded like idiots, but the because the beats were off to make it funny.
Interestingly, Gripped had the most complete list I saw but hedged its bets with the word “including…” (which means these are the ones the author can think of off the top of his/her head or with a tertiary google search without going down the rabbit hole of trying to quantify a definitive list and leave themselves open to a comment like this one because they left off some reader’s crush or pal). But also, there is really no way to know if some nobody sent some shit somewhere and only their friends know. Also, I have a crush on Hazel Findlay, too, and she knows it.
Incidentally, Zombie Rock and Ice made a more emphatic statement although parenthetical for some reason, “(Lynn Hill, Beth Rodden, Barbara Zangerl, Heather Weidner, Nadine Wallner, Maddy Cope, Molly Mitchell, and Hazel Findlay are the others)” daring to imply this was a definitive list, but at least leaving off this Em Pellerin person and revealing a bias against Canadians, and women named Em, which you seem to share.
But here’s something funny, Lynn Hill rated the Nose 5.13b!!!! And its most commonly referred to now as 5.13+, but more and more is getting casually referred to as 5.14a. So did Lynn Hill really climb 5.14 trad? Both these sources state it as definitive fact. How do you square that with her rating?
See how this works? (What do you have against Molly Mitchel, by the way?) We went for entertainment and self deprecating jokes targeting your very complaint. Two bros being bros and jokingly acting like they have some sort of sway. It also ties to Babsi and Jacopo (AKA Babsi’s boyfriend) fetish we’ve stated several times on both this show and the Enormocast. Not comedy gold, I’ll admit, but self-deprecating.
Finally, please show Nadine Wallner some respect.
Amazing response!
Hi Chaps [that’s British-speak for ‘guys’, rather than some sort of cowboy trouser arrangement].
Really enjoyed this one. I detect a general view among UKC membership that the People In Charge made a good call when they recruited Nat, and it’s a view that seems to be reinforced by those of my limited circle who can actually write. I’m probably not qualified to comment – much of her more literary writing is somewhat above my level – but these days the site seems to include a good mix of informed editorial content that, with a bit of luck, can cater for the modern climbing demographic.
You mentioned that it was never made clear who first set foot on the summit of Everest in 1953. I’d like to think that it doesn’t matter – and indeed it doesn’t – but it’s certainly on record that Hillary summited first. [I should point out here that I’ve no idea whether the record has since been disputed.] Quoted in his biography ‘Man of Everest’ – first published in 1955 – by James Ramsey Ullman, who of course later wrote Harlin’s biography ‘Straight Up’, Tenzing recalls “We went on slowly, steadily. And then we were there. Hillary stepped on top first. And I stepped up after him.” Writing in his own autobiography ‘High Adventure’, and also contributing the crucial chapter in John Hunt’s ‘The Ascent of Everest’, Hillary is less specific: “A few more whacks of the ice-axe, a few very weary steps, and we were on the summit of Everest/A few more whacks of the ice-axe in the firm snow and we stood on top.” A bit later he continues: “I turned and looked at Tenzing. Even beneath his oxygen mask and the icicles hanging from his hair, I could see his infectious grin of sheer delight. I held out my hand, and in silence we shook in good Anglo-Saxon fashion. But this was not enough for Tenzing, and impulsively he threw his arm around my shoulders and we thumped each other on the back in mutual congratulations.” If you add in the obligatory high-fives, this could be any successful climbing team nowadays – with emphasis on the ‘team’.
One other point here perhaps deserves attention. At the time, cutting steps was still the default means of getting up snow/ice that was too steep to simply walk up; although Heckmair and Vörg had been equipped with twelve-point crampons – possibly/probably prototype? – on the Eiger in 1938, it was largely due to the ladder of steps cut by Kasparek that they were able to ‘run’ across the Second Icefield and catch up with the Austrian pair, and I suspect that twelve-pointers didn’t actually become standard until the 1960s. Hillary was in the lead, cutting steps, which seems quite unremarkable; he was a leading alpinist of his generation, and as such would have been as proficient and efficient at it as anybody. And in my admittedly limited experience of reaching a summit in a rarified atmosphere one doesn’t necessarily pause, regroup, and compose oneself for ‘the occasion’; totally spent, and gasping for air, one simply plods on to a point where there’s no more ‘up’ – and then stops!
Having said all this; when your mention of the subject rang a bell but I couldn’t actually remember who was ‘first’ – I rather hoped that my research would yield the alternative outcome.
Loved the Cello Suite #1 at the end, and was most impressed – although I can’t remember what he said he was playing it on! While my normal modern preference is for ‘classic rock’ – in most of its guises and via many of its instrumentalists – the absolute top of my heap is occupied by one JSB.