Outdoorsports Team Goes Climbing - Chamonix-Mont-Blanc (FRA) & Taghia Gorge (MOR)

adidas Outdoor Sports Team Show 1/2018 - Men's Climbing

Outdoor Sports Team goes Climbing

2017, France & Morocco


PROFILE ROMAIN DESGRANGES (FRA)

35-year-old Romain Desgranges is currently France’s best competition climber and one of the most creative minds in the World Cup circuit. He is the reigning European Champion and the 2017 Overall World Cup Champion. This portrait gives an insight into the life of the perfectionist competition climber, who initially wanted to become a soccer player and was introduced to climbing through school sports. What he started reluctantly became an absolute obsession. Romain thinks, eats and breathes climbing. He leaves nothing to chance. Through dedication and hard work, he made it into top league of competition climbing. Since he was a teenager, he spent 95% percent of his time in a gym to achieve his goals and only discovered the beauty of outdoor bouldering recently. Being a true creator, he’s not only looking for challenging piece of rock, but for an extraordinary setting when climbing outdoors. That’s how he conceived the idea for a bouldering expedition at Mer de Glace, a valley glacier located on the northern slopes of the Mont Blanc massif, in the French Alps.

 

 
ALEXANDER HUBER (GER) AND FABIAN BUHL (GER) -  LA GRANDE ROUGE

“It’s not about what you do, but how you do it – style matters!” When looking for a new joint climbing project, the imagination of German Alpinists Alexander Huber (49) and Fabian Buhl (27) was caught by an overhanging wall of red limestone in the seclusion of the High Atlas Mountains in Morocco. Along with alpine photographer Heinz Zak they start for the remote Berber village Taghia, hiking behind a mule, which carries most of their gear. The central bastion of the Tadrarate, a 400-meter high and impressively steep wall in the Taghia Gorge, holds an unfinished project of Arnaud Petit. The two realize quickly that it is very hard to open a direct route ground-up in good style, i.e. free climbing. Bolting their way up is neither the motivation nor the style of Huber/Buhl. They believe that opening an alpine route by drilling, leads the free climb idea ad absurdum. Hence the two climbers find a new way. Other than the Direttissima, their line LA GRANDE ROUGE (the great red route) through the massive Tadrarate is intelligent, elegant and free-climbable while opening the route ground-up with a minimum of bolts. An initial redpoint ascent, captured by photographer Heinz Zak for future generations of climbers.
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