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The
Power of Change The
Employee Owners of Black Diamond
The
only constant in this world is change. As ice climbers
and designers of ice climbing equipment, that’s a hard fact we live with everyday.
To us, routes that appear solid at this moment
melt out tomorrow. The difference between getting
the goods and not is timing. So we move frantically
when the window opens, and sometimes we get lucky
with solid sticks in ethereal ice. Other times
we get hosed. But missing it teaches us lessons
too. Instead of letting change get the better of
us, we let change spur our imagination and impulsive
innovation. Because just adapting is not enough.
Embracing change is the way we live, just like
it’s the way we climb. Ice climbing is a
never-ending series of adjustments, creativity
and problem solving. We work this way, because
we climb this way.
Our openness to the power of change began with Chouinard Equipment and our progenitor’s
need for an improved piton back in 1957 and it continued a few years later when
our climbing skills bumped up against the limitations of current ice tools. The
necessity for a better tool, one that provided a secure placement in hard water
ice, resulted in the first curved pick, a design carefully crafted to match the
arc of a climber’s swing. This change metamorphosed the sport overnight.
We’ve continued to evolve with each season, using new materials and new
ideas. From the knowledge gleaned by those early hickory-shafted piolets, came
the iconic X-Tools and everything between then and now.
Now, 50 years since we began making pitons, and forty-some years since the innovation
of the modern piolet, we’re harnessing the power of change more strongly
than ever. We’re proud to introduce a completely redesigned carbon fiber
Cobra and hydroformed Viper ice tool, as well as significant refinements of the
Express ice screw. Along with the new Samurai and Torque gloves, this season’s
collection of ice gear is ready to complement your best efforts on ice. Like
much of what we do, tinkering away at good designs and making them great, Fall
2007 contains several pieces of gear that reset the benchmark for what’s
possible: the lightest, strongest, most advanced and most functional gear made
for ice climbing.
The development of these ice tools evolves our ice climbing mentality. When you’re
part of an environment that’s always in flux, those who stay in the game
find ways to win. We have become the power of change. It gives us the never-ending
challenge we call ice climbing, work and life. Thanks for changing with us and
loving the potential of an alpine start, the calming effect of a solid tool placement
and the sharing of a big day in the mountains with friends.
We've
Always Been Toolmakers
The
excitement of planning the next climb is intoxicating.
Like a bad kung fu movie, you never know if you’re
ready so you just have to go find out. Late nights
with photographs, plotting the next day’s
epic beyond the boundaries of certainty, filing
tools and sipping scotch—how quickly these
long nights turn into early mornings with java
and headlamps.
We create ice gear the same way we ready for an ice climb. Not all-knowing, but
willing to find out. This is how we do it—by using in-house design, engineering
expertise and feedback from relentless field and lab tests, fueled by faith in
our ability to figure it out and make better ice tools.
Mush Rolando
Garibotti
The
roaring forties is the name given to the latitudes
between 40°S and 50°S, where the prevailing
westerly winds mean business. Because there is
less landmass in that part of the planet to slow
them down, they rage across the Pacific, picking
up speed and humidity. By the time they slam into
the southern tip of the American Continent they
are ripe for the anger management class served
up by a series of jagged peaks called the southern
Andes. The winds rise past the foothills, over
glaciers and strike the higher peaks to the east,
leaving a strong imprint of enormous frost mushrooms
from Paine Grande in the south, to Murallon, Cerro
Torre, and San Lorenzo much further north.
I have never been too fond of ephemeral, unstable ground. Waterfall ice has usually
felt like the limit of what is acceptable to me, but the frost mushrooms are
a far step beyond. I encountered their airy structure on Cerro Standhardt, on
Paine Grande and on Murallon. Courtesy of partners willing to take the leads,
my meetings with mushrooms were relatively benign. I felt great relief when,
in late 2005, I pulled onto Cerro Torre’s west ridge. The main difficulties
were supposed to be over and the three mushrooms that stood between Alessandro
Beltrami, Ermanno Salvaterra, myself and the summit had been climbed a half-dozen
times starting as early as 1974. I relaxed, put my guard down and prematurely
savored our success. I should have known better.
A friend had made two heart-shaped shovel-like contraptions to attach to the
picks of our axes, with which we hoped to get more purchase on the unconsolidated
frost. Since nobody had ever used such contraptions before and didn’t know
what to expect, we expected too much, taking only two snow-pickets for protection.
Ale and Erman burrowed through the first two mushrooms making trenches their
fellow country men in World War I would have been proud of. The pace was slow,
but with only two pickets and unable to protect themselves with anything else,
it took everything they had to get up.
The last mushroom, 200 feet of looming vertical cotton candy above. Ale took
at stab at it, but retreated drenched and tired. Erman went next and managed
a few more feet. I had led most of the lower 4000 feet of our climb and had hoped
to skirt the mushroom terror, but in spite of myself, I offered to lead. Initially
I charged ahead a bit too enthusiastically, but after two or three moves I realized
that I was going nowhere. I stopped and breathed deeply, eventually finding calm.
It took me nearly two hours to finish the lead. Slowly and patiently I cleared
the snow overhead, dug a half pipe in the Pacific Ocean frost, compacted it into
a small step in front of me, then sunk the shafts of my ice-tools and pulled
myself up gingerly. Speed was everything, not fast, but slow. A fall was not
an option with only two 80 centimeter pickets in 200 feet of mush.
By the time I reached the easy slope leading to the summit it was dark and snowing
heavily, less than ideal conditions for reaching the top of a mountain as severe
as Cerro Torre. My earlier eagerness had turned to calm sensory awareness—the
result of leading a pitch with consequences that required my full attention.
For once, the inconsistent frost proved useful when I dug a deep hole to lodge
myself as an anchor from which my partners could jumar. As I sat waiting, I reached
down, deep into the frost, hoping that the roaring forties winds had brought
some sand and warmth from a distant beach far beyond.
Rolando
Garibotti
Rolando
Garibotti has visited the Fitz Roy and Cerro
Torre Massif over 20 times, the first at
age 15 when he climbed Aguja Guillaumet.
His finest ascents in that area include the
first complete ascent of the North Face of
Fitz Roy in 1995 and the first ascent of
the North Face of Cerro Torre in 2005, both
alpine style. Born in Italy, raised in Argentina,
and currently living in the U.S., he considers
himself a Bariloche national.
Eternal
Winter Sean
Isaac
I
wish winter would last all year. There, I said
it. I know; it sounds twisted but I’m addicted.
Fifteen years ago, I moved to the Canadian Rockies
because they boasted short summers. The joke here
in Canmore is that we have two seasons: winter
and construction. The snow falls and the ice freezes
in October and sticks around until May and I still
feel depressed when the days start getting longer.
Most climbers sample the Bugaboos in summer when
the granite is solar heated. Winter is a different
game. The stone is frosted white. The access
complicated. The crowds of August are replaced
with cold quietness. Perfect.
Marc Piche, another invernal junky, and I ski
through the Pigeon-Howser Col and down the Vowell
Glacier to the north face of Pigeon Spire. Our
focus is an old Becky route that attacks a mossy
wet gash. Seemingly unappealing and most likely
unrepeated. Frozen, it should deliver classy mixed climbing. We hope.
Taking turns mimicking gophers, we dig a deluxe snow condo, complete with his-and-his
matching ice beds. Waking the next morning to -30° Celsius makes it hard
to shed our cozy cocoon of feathers. Being veteran ice climbers, we pride ourselves
on getting smarter with experience. We have a “-15° clause” which
informally states that we do not climb when the mercury drops below this non-user-friendly
temperature. Of course, rules are meant to be broken so we suit up to face
the Arctic cold front.
Marc stretches our ropes up the first pitch. I transform into a belay popsicle.
Struggling with 20 wooden digits, I clamber up steep corners packed with useless
powder, shamelessly shouting for a tight rope. Reaching the belay coincides
with the onset of the screaming barfies in both hands and my right foot. Unsure
whether to yell or gag, warm blood surges back to my searing extremities.
Once I regain my composure, I rack up and delicately chip up the next lead.
When the foot-wide ice vein runs out, steep rock provides strenuous torquing
in turf-choked cracks. I fight to stay glued to the wall while Marc loses his
own battle at the belay as I pummel him with snow. The next two moderate pitches
go fast but the pace screeches to a crawl while Marc gets down and dirty with
a tight squeeze chimney. A blank section above the slot stumps him. Drytooling
doesn’t
work, nor does aid climbing. Bare handed rock climbing is not an option. He
finally overcomes this alpine boulder problem with cowboy trickery by lassoing
a horn from five meters away. Yeeeh-haww!
More snow groveling and rimed mixed terrain gains the summit just in time for
us to enjoy the final weak rays of sun. We are the only climbers in a range
that is typically swarming. With the first winter ascent of Pigeon Spire beneath
our numb toes, I’m reminded once again why winter should last forever.
Sean
Isaac
Sean
Isaac writes, “...between cooking
supper, changing diapers, reading bedtime
stories and packing for the next day of work...
It’s a fun challenge balancing being
a parent, a guide and a climber. I LOVE it!” While
mastering this balancing act, Sean’s
put up bold routes in the Canadian Rockies,
the Bugaboos and Alaska.
A
New Plan for Hyalite Canyon Emily
Stifler
The
Montana ice climbers were gripped: the Gallatin
National Forest’s 2007 travel plan called
for closing and gating the access road to Hyalite
Canyon’s world-class ice climbing. The new
plan was a drastic 180 from the previous draft,
which proposed plowing the road to the trailhead.
Would ice climbers lose access to their favorite
backyard alpine playground?
With leadership from the Southwestern Montana Climbing Coalition (SMCC) board
and the Access Fund, dedicated local climbers pooled their resources and put
their heads down. They had to work this out. Hyalite has arguably the best access
to high-quality vertical ice in the lower 48.
Over the following three months, a group of climbers, led by SMCC board members
Joe Josephson and Bill Dockins, met with multiple user groups including backcountry
skiers, local and federal government representatives, environmentalists and advocates
of motorized access. Together, they developed a coalition, and have since met
with Rebecca Heath, the regional Forest Supervisor. Heath, who had previously
been hard-set in her plan of gating the road, agreed to work with this coalition
on a seasonal basis to determine when the road will be closed.
As a result of these recent efforts, the Forest Service proposed a new plan that
acknowledges the unique non-motorized recreational assets of Hyalite and allows
the community to be directly involved in the creation of a management plan for
the road during the winter season. This latest proposal includes a long-term
goal of plowing at least ten out of the 12 miles of the Hyalite road and will
explore designation of Hyalite Canyon as a Public or National Recreation Area.
Currently, the SMCC is organizing the coalition to work with the Forest Service
on development of road standards. “Things are moving forward,” says
Bill Dockins, SMCC board member. The statute of limitations for filing petitions
for judicial review of the travel management plan allows several years to work
toward improved access for climbers so “as long productive discussions
aimed at solving the access issues are ongoing, and as long as the Forest Service
is working with us in good faith, we won’t file the appeal,” Dockins
says. He says climbers would like to get a plan in place before November of 2007.
This process of keeping and improving access to ice climbing in Hyalite is dependent
on the support of the climbing community, both in the Bozeman area and nationally.
Road improvement, plowing and recreational status, and administrative and legal
work will all depend on political and financial backing. Local fundraisers, outdoor
stores and national companies have all helped fund the process so far. The Access
Fund and the Gallatin County and Bozeman City Commissions have provided leadership
and facilitated communication and negotiation.
By working together with diverse local and national user groups on Hyalite Canyon
access, SMCC is also setting a great example for how communities of the modern
West can develop uncommon alliances to achieve common goals.
To find out more about Hyalite Canyon, Montana, go to www.hyalitecanyon.com.
Emily
Stifler
What
can you do to keep Hyalite Canyon accessible
to ice climbers? Write your Congressmen asking for
support of the Montana delegation and the efforts
of their constituency to provide funding to keep
the road open in winter. Visit the League of Conservation
Voters’ website at www.lcv.org to find the
best way to contact your elected representatives.
Emily Stifler is a writer, climber and ski patroller
based in Bozeman, Montana. Her articles have been
in a variety of publications, including Rock and
Ice, Powder and Alpinist. This year she climbed her
first El Cap route and got her first cubicle as an
intern at Rock and Ice.
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