1. Special Mention. For the past two years, women have been entitled to a special mention at the Piolets d’Or awards. This year, it’s Italian Nives Meroi who receives it “for women’s mountaineering”, in this case for all her achievements and for her presence in the roped party that climbed the West Face of Kabru South (7318 m) in 2023, with her husband Romano Benet, Slovak Peter Hámor and Slovenian Bojan Jan. Above all, Nives Meroi is the third woman to have climbed all fourteen 8000 m summits.
2. The Piolet d’Or in posthumous title. In July 2023, the Japanese team of Kazuya Hiraide and Kenro Nakajima made the first ascent of the north face of Tirich Mir, The Secret Line, at 7,708 m. a.s.l. in the Hindu Kush, north-west Pakistan. The route was long, complex and extremely challenging, requiring them to climb (and descend) from a col at 6,200 m. before being able to climb the north face of Tirich Mir. Sadly, the Japanese team did not receive the Piolet d’Or they were awarded this year: Hiraide and Nakajima died on K2 a year later – last summer – while attempting a new route on the West Face. Hiraide’s and Nakajima’s widows attended the Piolets d’Or ceremony in the Dolomites.
Kazuya Hiraide Kenro Nakajima ©Coll. Piolets d’Or
3. A Piolet d’Or for young people? That’s the feat of the three young Swiss mountaineers who were awarded one of this year’s three Piolet d’Or for their daring ascent of Flat Top, a 6000-meter peak in the Indian Himalayas – in Kishtwar, to be precise – whose north face is extremely steep. Aged between 24 and 28, the three young Swiss guides spent 3 bivouacs on the face before reaching the summit, and at the cost of a single bivouac on the descent, they came down safely.
As the Piolets d’Or jury pointed out, an “elegant and technically challenging line in a region little visited in the last 40 years” even if the AAJ mentions an attempt in 2017. In fact, two of the three Swiss, Hugo and Matthias, climbed Chomochior (6278 m) in 2022, in the same Kishtwar massif – which gave them the idea of returning. And pick up a Piolet d’Or.
India, Flat Top, 2023 Swiss route. ©Coll. Piolets d’Or
4. The rectified Piolet d’Or. Two piolets d’or for the same face, but not the same era. In October 2023, Americans Jackson Marvell, Alan Rousseau and Matt Cornell climbed the North Face of Jannu (7,710m) in alpine style. This was the Americans’ third attempt, and this time they achieved one of the finest ascents of the decade. It takes a good memory, or a search of the Internet, to remember that the North Face of Jannu has seen a few other teams, one of whom traced a futuristic route right down the center of the face, at the cost of considerable resources that had little to do with alpine style… and a very controversial piolet d’or at the end.
Indeed, almost two decades earlier, a more direct route had been mapped out in the middle of Jannu’s north face by a Russian team (Odintsov, Bolotov and co.), who were awarded the Piolet d’Or 2004 for this technically demanding ascent (fixed ropes, oxygen) but curiously forgotten by commentators. French Montagnes Magazine’s Piolets d’Or 2024 article featured a photo of the 2004 Russian route instead of the 2024 American one. Oops.
Jannu. Russian route, 2004. From Montagnes Mag website.
5. A Piolet d’Or Carriere, but not a career-minded one. Unlike his climbing companion on K2 (and namesake for his first name, Jordi Tosas), Spain’s Jordi Corominas has an anemic Instagram, at least not in keeping with his impressive career, which saw him awarded the Piolet d’Or Carrière, a delicate exercise which consists of raising a climber judged to be excellent – and still alive – to the level of Bonatti (the first recipient). No mean feat.