Climbing a mountain is hard already, however, climbing back down is even harder, at least according to mountaineers. The descent is always the hardest part it appears. However, that reason does not seem to be enough for some people, particularly skiers of snow mountains. Those guys always have to make it harder on themselves, don’t they?
This is what polish skier Andrzej Bargiel is all about, reaching new heights and pushing himself to the limits or back down. You see, Bargiel recently climbed up the mountain range of the Karakorum/Karakoram which spanned the borders of Pakistan, India, and China. He also did it without an oxygen tank as that would only be dead weight for the skis.
He then descended the steep 8,600-meter high snow giant known as the K2, one of the mountains of the Karakorum. This was the first time it has been done on K2 and in freeride skiing with no safety ropes nonetheless. Here’s the video below, be sure to remember to breath once in a while:
Okay, time to make up for all those breaths you did not take while watching. It is worth noting that not many people can brave skiiing the mountains of the Karakorum. Not to mention that K2 was only 200 meters shorter than Mount Everest. However, K2 was a lot more dangerous than Mount Everest and remained one of the few un-skiid peaks in existence. Props to Bargiel for conquering K2 with skis.
So, you can guess how much focus and training it will take to not pass out or slip on that high a mountain using skis only for the descent. It took Bargiel seven hours to complete the descent. His feat will go down in history as one of the most daring ski descents ever.
