UKC

Our Friday Night Video this week is a biopic of Hansjörg Auer. When people think of Hansjörg they mainly remember his outrageous solo of The Fish on the Marmolada. No Turning Back combines some stunning cinematography with a story that begins with Hansjörg's early years, through to his obsession with soloing and his objectives in the greater ranges. The film portrays him as a vulnerable character who becomes comfortable in his own skin through climbing.

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In reply to UKC News:

Never heard of him. 

In reply to aln:

I've heard of (and seen) The Fish. A solo of that is more than enough to make sit up.

In reply to aln:

Well now you have

In reply to UKC News:

Geeky kid who finds it hard to make friends grows up to be he coolest badass with a chalkbag. The vid was spectacular as it showed a very human side of the whole thing, very honest so even us mere mortals can relate to what he's saying. I have to admit, North Face do some pretty amazing vids on the adventures without the crazy music and the usual high octane d**k head stuff. Product placement was minimal and you have to respect that. I hope this guy doesn't die doing that free solo stuff.

In reply to UKC News:

I thought that was excellent. A moving story, an interesting and authentic character, great footage, well put together and even a cool and fitting score.

In reply to UKC News:

Yes, that was really good

In reply to UKC News:

And by all accounts he’s an exceptionally nice fella.

In reply to UKC News:

A really fantastic and moving film.

In reply to UKC News:

Liked him in the Hot Aches film. This is a good film. Beautiful drone shots.

In reply to UKC News:

Great film. The Jimmy Hill of climbing?

In reply to UKC News:

Good vid, thanks UKC.

I think HJ has been a bit overlooked, maybe because he's not American, and they were probably robbed of the Piolet d'Or for their Khunyang Chish climb, which was a biggie.

He's one of a small handful of climbers doing what is meant to be the height of the game - alpine style new routes on steep 7000m peaks. But such peaks are not well-known or appreciated by the modern audience for climbing media. Ambassathletes get more eyeballs for a posed pic on some famous local thing that the market can relate to.

I like that there's no training advice, or inane cod-philosophy telling us how to live our lives. He just goes climbing and his media is the account of his climbing. Hope he keeps it up.

In reply to UKC News:

Only got [suffered] to 14 mins ,,,, very impressive cinematography but far too 'poor me' for me if that makes sense.

I don't doubt the chap's talent BTW.

In reply to UKC News:

I really liked that! Amazing achievements.

In reply to Damo:

My new favourite word to encapsulate one of my least favourite concepts

Yes, and let's hope for a move toward sponsors getting respect for films like this rather than shoving logos in our faces to increase brand awareness. NF has gone up in my estimation.

 

Beautiful film and really genuine, felt, meaning. Thanks.

 

In reply to UKC News:

Lovely film

In reply to Robert Durran:

Maybe. Branded content, such as this, is a seriously double-edged sword for the outdoor community in general. It can produce some really good content - or some woeful dreck as has been on here a time or two recently - and we like it because it's 'free' (the cost just being added onto our raincoats we buy from them).

But what about independent film and writing? Will commercially-borne material ever take on contentious issues or question ethical things within the industry? Branded content can squeeze out independent, content-led work. It also focuses on its ambassathletes, understandably, rather than possibly more interesting or accomplished non-sponsored climbers.

Of course it provides reasonable paid work for 'creatives', the photographers, videographers and writers who have flourished due to technological advancements, and there's a lot more pretty stuff for the rest of us to look at online and at festivals.

But what might we miss out on?

In reply to Removed User:

Now that did make me laugh. Seriously though, how come his solo of Attraverso il Pesce in 2007 got so much less coverage than that bloody Honnold doing El Sendero Luminoso in 2014 or Freerider in 2017? It's blatant chin-ism if you ask me.

In reply to lem:

probably because there's no film about him soloing the fish... The 'news' of his fish solo only got out because a couple was climbing a route closeby and took a picture of him and published that. later on, he returned with a photographer to reclimb some pitches for pictures. So basically, he didn't climb the fish with the intend of using this performance for promotion, whereas the 2 Honnold solos mentionned ( and a few more...) were planned to be filmed. By the way, Auer just published his first book 'Südwand'

In reply to Damo:

Good points, but independent film-makers/authors still need to get paid. And the question is, by whom? I read the article in `Climber' yesterday, regarding the new doc on Chris Bonington. Seemed like a great idea, everyone involved is up for it, and the subject is still probably the UK's best-known mountaineer. Could they get sufficient funding? Nope. It took Berghaus to chip in to get it off-the-ground.

In reply to lem:

I would say his solo of the fish is at least as well known as Honnold's of Sendero Luminoso and probably a runner up to Honnold's Freerider in an all time list, and arguably justifiably so.

 

In reply to Southvillain:

No one wants to pay because the return isn't there because the audience won't pay because they've become used to getting so much for 'free', and this just keeps that vicious cycle spinning.

And if they do this work, they're not "independent film-makers/authors" - they work in advertising.

 

In reply to lem:

I wrote something these lines but my post disappeared and I could not be arsed to type it again. I admire Honnold's fast and confident climbing style, but the bullshit about his El Cap solo being a ground breaking achievement, way beyond what anyone had thought of soloing before in terms of length and risk and difficulty got on my nerves.

Freerider: 36 pitches, 5.12d / 7c

Via attraverso il Pesce: 35 pitches, XI- / 7b+

Both faces are about 1000m in height. The fish has some easier pitches towards the end, Freerider has more cracks that are inherently safer for soloing than face climbing pitches. Soloing either route is completely unbelievable and insane.

Not much between the two IMO, except for the marketing...

CB

 

In reply to cb294:

The level of security of the moves when soloing is crucial, so it is not just about the grade. I am in no position to comment on the routes in question, but, in my experience, granite climbing is generally much less secure feeling than limestone. And I wouldn't say that cracks are necessarily more secure than face climbing.

It would be interesting to hear from someone who has done both routes.

In reply to Robert Durran:

I agree in principle, and either route is also way over my skill level.

However, from the limited amount of soloing I have done (or run out leads, same thing) I always felt much safer with cracks. I know I simply will not fall from a solid jam, whereas with face climbs you never know 100% whether the grips will hold. 

Maybe that feeling is tainted by too much sandstone/grit climbing: When going back home to Frankenjura to climb on limestone I always have to re-learn trusting the rock!

I could therefore imagine that for someone used to granite climbing a clean crack would feel as safe as the lower angle pitches near the top of the Marmolada face might feel to a limestone expert.

Obviously from the available short videos of Honnold's solo the sketchy bits were the face moves between crack systems, but the Fish offers plenty of featureless slabs, too!

CB

In reply to cb294:

I don't think you can call any bullshit without knowing more about the routes.

In reply to pasbury:

I am not calling BS on Honnolds performance at all, but on the press coverage.

I have argued that the solo climb by Honnold, insanely impressive as it was, was not as ground breaking as it was made out to be in the press (especially in the US press, comparing it to the moon landing amongst other things, the hyperbole was just ridiculous):

After all it was the second, not the first, solo climb of a 1000m wall at roughly UIAA XI- / XI or 7b+/7c.

I do not see why I should have climbed the routes for concluding that the two achievements were comparable.

CB

 

 

In reply to cb294:

Fair enough and I agree that the Fish solo must be on a level with Honnold's achievement especially as it was done years before.

The difference must be that the media had nothing to catch hold of for the Fish - no publicity or film.

Both are worthy of a great deal of hyperbole but Auer missed out on it (or didn't want it).

In reply to pasbury:

I guess the latter, he did it for himself, as alluded to even in the video that started this thread!

I also agree that both ascents are way above anything else in the soloing game, with the possible exception of the crazy stuff in the greater ranges, like the Annapurna South face by Steck or K7 by House.

CB

In reply to cb294:

Hmm... wasn't it the first unroped solo?  Big difference!  (And no shred of disrespect to Pete W - an amazing achievement.)

And - not wishing to be picky - but isn't it F7c+?  I don't know about you but I find these pesky little pluses can unfavourably influence the outcome - and that's just at (near) ground level.

As Robert rightly says, above, 'the level of security of the moves when soloing is crucial, so it is not just about the grade...'  F8b has been soloed, yonks ago, so F7c+ must be a breeze?  Err... not so.

Let's just take the fabled boulder problem crux. V8 on slippery granite. Tommy Caldwell popped off it despite getting superb beta from Honnold. And Caldwell climbs F9a.

Just that single boulder problem crux seems like Russian roulette to me, no matter how talented, how composed you are. At the time, somebody (on here?) said it was the sort of thing you could lap 30 times and then suddenly your feet would pop and you'd be back to square one, with your nerves in shreds. And I believe this did happen to Honnold.

So you've got this 'one chance only' do or (literally) die, you've got offwidth horror, you've got a ton of hard, slippery soloing in the sun. The stuff of nightmares.

I'm guessing that soloing the Fish is also the stuff of nightmares.

Lovely boy, Auer. Arrow climber. Wall without end.

Mick

P.S. As per the rest of us, I'm speculating about stuff way too hard for lil ole me.

In reply to UKC News:

A beautifully crafted story with a genuine heart. I like the understated way in which he talks about his faith, the humility with which he approaches his climbing, and the poignant reflections on the loss of his friend. A great example.

In reply to Robert Durran:

Pretty sure Alex is out there online somewhere saying that if he can get a fist jam then it's basically like a belay for him. Thus they don't take big cams on speed record attempts, because for anything that big, a jam replaces pro.

 

In reply to pasbury:

 

HJ's Fish climb was reported in the climbing media at the time, in more than a few places.

But it's a major difference that Alex's Freerider climb had dedicated documenters ready and in place - a very different situation. It's not just the media reporting on the climb, it's that the media was involved with the climb. Chin & Co were literally in place at the time with Alex. This is because it's Alex, and he has a mini-industry built around his brand, so interpreting the whole event from the outside is a result of quite different things making it difficult to compare to other climbs.

This is not a criticism of Alex himself at all, I think he's great, and one of the very few climbers around who actually deserves, or exceeds, the hype around them.

 

 

In reply to Damo:

I was more thinking of finger cracks and those nasty off-finger widths with sketchy feet. I'm sure most of us would feel pretty happy with a good handjam (though maybe not so much a fist........)!

In reply to Damo:

Also Freerider solo is ‘probably’ the hardest solo ever performed.

In reply to pasbury:

If by 'hardest' you mean an overall subjective judgement taking into consideration technical difficulty, length, exposure, style etc, then yeh, probably.

But as others mentioned above, 8b has already been soloed.

And...

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alain_Robert_(grimpeur)#Escalades_sur_des_fal...

In reply to UKC News:

Do I remember that Hansjörg’s solo Was not after lots of pre practice? That he had climbed it once?

do I also remember that Dave McCleod solo’d  A single pitch 8c+ for one of his films?

lots of groovy stuff done by people including Alex H.

In reply to Damo:

Well...the audience does pay (I couldn't get into "Mountain" at the weekend in Bristol because it was sold out) and I can't remember an era when there was a ton of independent climbing/mountaineering films asking tough questions being released/screened. Apart from the odd BBC `Old Man' OB, or the odd `Rock Athlete' series, there wasn't a lot about in my youth! And what there was was hardly tough investigative documentary film-making, just nice outdoor/travelogue-style adventure films. There's arguably more intelligent outdoor docs now, e.g. recent films on K2 etc, asking questions about guided climbing/deaths etc. And on the sponsored front? The range of output is extraordinary, and gives us mere mortals coverage of climbing that is unprecedented.

In reply to UKC News:

Having sponsors involved in productions does inevitably change the output, and topics can easily become, and often are dumbed down. Equally, the same stuff gets peddled out time and time again. This is a shame but it's a also one of the only way filmmakers/photographers/writers can get paid to work in the outdoor industry. Who else is going to pay? Crowdfunding is the only other way to go really, and can work very well.

It's important to remember that output is effected by almost any funder though. Creative England look for a specific pitch that fits for them, Channel 4 want to speak to a particular audience, the BBC can and can't say certain things. This issue isn't confined to outdoor media.

One plus though is that the public over time becomes critical and expects more, and companies follow suit so they can keep them happy. Every now and again you get a company that sticks their head above the parapet and says something with their films that actually matters (Patagonia is a good example) and others follow suit because they know their audience wants more. That's why we have films like the one mentioned, not just someone throwing moves to techno like many used to be.

Making media free has up and downsides. Perhaps it's hard to get paid, I'm not sure. There is certainly more media out there and it wasn't all made for free. It certainly encourages democratisation, so it isn't just fat cat production houses making the work, and consequently there are more people striving, there's more creativity flying about and lots of inspiration. Not such a bad thing in my book.

In reply to puppythedog:

If you're talking about Alex Huber. Yes he soloed a ton of crazy things. Up to f8b+.

Why does no one talk about that Yosemite has just the most famous piece of rock of this world and it might also affect media coverage?

In reply to Spanish Jack:

It's famous for good reasons and there's media hype for a reason; it's not just about grades - it's about the first free solo of the most iconic big wall in the world

Anyway, it is daft to compare a single pitch limestone 8b with 1000m of slippery granite. Very different games.

 

In reply to Robert Durran:

I would rather compare Alex Hubers alpine free solos or his free solo on the Riglos in Spain as it was actually quite high in the risk-game. But in fact I just wanted to mention him as people tend to forget what others besides Honnold did.