Slovenians Win 2006 Piolet D'Or

The first ascent of Chomo Lhari’s 6,000-foot Northwest Pillar by Slovenians  Boris Lorencic and Marko Prezelj won the 16^th Piolet d’Or, the annual prize awarded in France for the year’s “best” alpine climb. The two men climbed the 24,000-foot Tibetan peak in a six-day round trip, finding severe difficulties and brutal cold en route. The same climb also won Climbing’s 2006 Golden Piton in the “Global Alpine” category and is featured in Climbing No. 255. See Climbing.com for last fall’s news about the climb.

Slovenian Pavle Kozjek’s solo, single-push new route on the Southeast Face of Cho Oyu won the “People’s Choice” award at the Piolet d’Or ceremony, held January 26 in Grenoble, France. (http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/8000mfas/index.html)

The three other climbs nominated for the 2006 award were:

• Kedarnath Dome, Southeast Pillar, Ian Parnell and Tim Emmett from Great Britain.

• Manaslu, Northeast Face, Denis Urubko and Sergey Samoilov from Kazakhstan.

• Shingu Charpa, North Ridge, Igor Chaplinsky, Andrey Rodiontsev, and Orest Verbitsky from Ukraine. 

The Piolet d’Or is awarded by the French magazine Montagnes, and the jury is comprised of an international group of climbers and journalists, including Americans Vince Anderson and Steve House, winners of last year’s award for their new route on Nanga Parbat.

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