UKC

Climbing in two separate teams, Edu Marin, Babsi Zangerl and Jacopo Larcher have all succeeded in freeing Eternal Flame (VI 7c+ [5.13a], 650m) on the south face of Trango Tower (6,240m), also known as Nameless Tower, in the Trango Group of Pakistan's Karakoram range over the past week.

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Good effort by all of them.

I'm intrigued, however by the use of the word "freed", which always used to mean 'having been the first to climb a route without aid'. Thereafter, the route has been freed and is now a free climb. I know there's no question that subsequent climbers doing it in a similar style are 'free climbing' but can it really be said that they have 'freed' the route?

A relatively minor semantic point, I accept, and perhaps this is simply a morphing of language over time, but this is the first time I've encountered it and to my eyes it looks strange.

I think it's quite common terminology when it comes to routes that are done as aid routes a reasonable percentage of the time.

E.g. "I french-freed to Sickle and freed the Stovelegs, but the Great Roof pitch was all aid".

I do see your point though, these sections have all obviously been done before, so you're not 'freeing' the route of aid. However, you are free climbing as opposed to aid climbing, so the term 'freed' does make sense to me in a context where the distinction between aid and free needs to be made.

Yes, when I read the headline, I immediately assumed (in my ignorance!) that it was a FFS.

Sorry, did you guys miss the bit where it said that babsi and jacopo onsighted every pitch?

(Apart from the two they climbed last year)

That is unimaginably impressive, especially as it had just taken a 9b climber 28 days to free the route.

This seems like a substantially more interesting talking point than some semantics over Natalie's choice of words in the headline.😉

The world moves on. Once a rope, a rack and the shirt on my back was the ideal of non-artificial climbers. Or continuous, more or less, free ascent from bottom to top. Nowadays  as standards have risen and equipment has improved there are all sorts of ways of climbing a route. Some grinding slowly forward. Others over a long time, climbing very quickly for the quick 'free'. Everyone chooses there own way and is not too particular which of the various of ways of freeing a route was done. It is really only important if you are comparing/competing with others. Or wanting one's name added to a guide book. I have noted in Spain, at least on long routes, a lot of guide books only list the names of first ascentionists be they free or artificial. The FFA guys get no mention. But in most cases the FFA remains inbedded in their own memories.

Ha!

Gobsmacking, if you ask me - they really are an incredibly talented pair of climbers!!

I don’t understand this story - wasn’t Eternal Flame done free years ago?

jcm