Ski Touring
History maker: Skier Andrzej Bargiel defeats all of Karkoram’s 8000m peaks
Achieving yet another record, the Polish ski mountaineer becomes the first person ever to scale and ski down all the 8,000m peaks in the Karakoram range without the use of oxygen.
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On July 26, Polish ski mountaineer Andrzej Bargiel made mountaineering history when he skied down from the summit of the 8,080-metre-high Gasherbrum I mountain in the Karakoram region of the Himalayas. In doing so he became the first person to have skied down from the summits of all the Karakoram 8,000m mountains.
Only days before, Bargiel scaled the 8,035m Gasherbrum II peak and skied down the mountain, as he did with Gasherbrum I, without the use of supplementary oxygen. The achievement of climbing and skiing down all the Karakoram 8k peaks cements Bargiel's status as one of the world's foremost adventurers and someone who redefines the limits of what's possible in the mountains.
Andrzej Bargiel, a man on a mission
© Bartłomiej Pawlikowski/Red Bull Content Pool
More on Andrzej Bargiel and his ski mountaineering feats
Commenting after getting back to base camp for the Gasherbrum expedition, Bargiel was happy to have returned safely back down from both peaks.
"Reaching the peak and skiing down from Gasherbrum I was a bit more difficult than our action on Gasherbrum II last week. Mainly because of the fog, so I decided to wait below the summit of GI for better conditions," he said. "Due to the fog, I had to be more focused to remember the ski descent line because of limited visibility."
Bargiel is no stranger to monumental feats. In 2015, he was the first man to ski down Broad Peak (8,051m), and in 2018, he achieved the seemingly impossible, skiing down K2 (8,611m) without removing his skis or using supplemental oxygen.
The tale of Bargiel's journey to the summit of K2 and his impossible descent was captured in the documentary 'The Impossible Descent', which you can watch in the player below.
1 h 6 min
K2 The Impossible Descent
Andrzej Bargiel reaches Pakistan to descend K2, the world's second-highest peak after Mount Everest, on skis.
Bargiel's Karakoram journey to tackle Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II began with an expedition to Pakistan on June 30. After climbing the Khosar Gang, which is 6,400m high, as part of his preparation and acclimatisation for the Gasherbrum peaks, Bargiel and a support team consisting of fellow Polish climbers Janusz Gołąb and Maciej Sulima moved to tackle the Gasherbrum II peak first.
That journey to Gasherbrum II saw Bargiel reach the peak and complete the ski descent on July 19.
On the way up Gasherbrum II
© Bartłomiej Pawlikowski/Red Bull Content Pool
The ski descent down from Gasherbrum II
© Bartłomiej Pawlikowski/Red Bull Content Pool
The lack of ample weather windows made a single outing traverse between the two peaks untenable so the team started their ascent of Gasherbrum I in the early hours of July 25. Bargiel reached the peak of Gasherbrum I at 4.15am local time on July 26 and then descended on skis making a triumphant return to base camp a few hours later.
The Karakoram range, which spans the borders of three countries – Pakistan, India, and China – has the greatest concentration of the highest mountain peaks globally and the largest glacial system outside the polar regions.
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