The »caretaker« of the north face of the Eiger – Stefan Siegrist

Even as a 20-year-old, he created headlines with his winter ascent of the north face of the Eiger. Since then, the Bern-born climber has already climbed his »local mountain« twenty times and is at home in the mountains of the world.

Playing at home in the Bernese Alps

Stefan has climbed his most difficult routes in his local Alps. In 2000, he opened the »La vida es silbar« route (7c) and in 2001, he successfully completed the first ascent of »The Young Spider« (EX+, 7a, A2, WI6/M7) with Ueli Steck. He proved his all-round abilities, likewise with Steck, when they climbed the north walls of the Eiger, the Mönch and the Jungfrau in just 25 hours in 2004 and also notched up the fastest rope ascent of the north face of the Eiger. With a time of nine hours, they took one hour off the thirty-year-old record set by Messner and Habeler. The current highlight was achieved by the Dreamteam in 2008 with the first ascent of »Pacienca« (8a), the most difficult sport climbing route on the north face of the Eiger.

In the mountains of the world

Stef often travels and is happy to do so; in 1997, he climbed the Fitz Roy and in 1999, he successfully made the first winter ascent of the west wall of Cerro-Torre. And he kept going higher; in 2004, he climbed over the north-west ridge of the Thalay Sagar in the Himalayas, which had never been done before and in 2006, his expedition team successfully climbed the Gasherbrum-East via the northern side. In December 2008, Stef was successful with the ‘Huberbuam’ team. On their joint expedition to Queen-Maud-Land in Antarctica, they successfully completed three first ascents, including the west wall of the Holtanna via the »Eiszeit« route (VII+, A4).

The way to finding himself

On the rare occasions when Stef is not travelling, the mountain guide and qualified carpenter lives in Interlaken. One thing characterises the aims of Stef Siegrist: it does not matter whether he is in the Himalayas, Patagonia or Antarctica; the extreme mountain climber who is in tune with nature does not just look for physical challenge in his projects but also the way to finding himself.

Source: Der Bergsteiger

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