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| Your Location: Home: Digest: On Knowing A Legend, A Eulogy For Alex Lowe |
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On Knowing A Legend, A Eulogy For Alex Lowe
by Kristen Ulmer
Photos by Gordon Wiltsie & Cameron Lawson
Reprinted from
ELEVATION Magazine
"I feel as though Superman died," ice-climber Fremont Shields e-mailed his best friend Brad. He had never met Alex Lowe before, but the impact of his death made Fremont slump down and mourn.
On October 5, 1999, just above advanced base camp on 8,046-meter Shishapangma, ski expedition members were taking a little walk, checking things out. Nobody even brought along a water bottle. From 6,000 feet above, a massive avalanche thundered down and killed both Dave Bridges, a national paragliding champion and mountain guide from Aspen, Colorado, and Alex. There was simply nowhere to run. That act of nature was far too tremendous to escape.
As word spread around the world, climbers, and anyone who had ever met, heard or read about Alex paused like Fremont had. Not Superman-he was never supposed to die.
We live our scattered lives searching for happiness, success and excitement, dealing with sadness and frustration and trying to make sense of it all…why are we here…what is the point to all this? Yet, sometimes a person appears who knows the way and can actually share it with others. Those who knew Alex would, without hesitation, say he was such a man.
This story, Alex's story, isn't about the death of a climber - another adrenaline sports junkie who played a numbers game and eventually lost. Besides, everyone who knew Alex Lowe wouldn't die making a mistake - he was just too good. It is about life and what's possible for a human who lives it to the limit.
The year was 1991, and a professional climber Marc Twight had just finished a out on Kusum Kanguru, a 6,300-meter peak in the Everest region of Nepal. His Sidar was brewing coffee and talking about some tall, lunatic American who had been there a few years before. "E wint up to solo dey mountain but lef with no backpack, caring jus' candy bars end a water bottle. Den he jus' disappear." The man threw up his hands, not knowing what to think.
Marc knew exactly what to think. He had never met "The Mutant" before, but knew there was only one man who fit that description.
A few years later when Marc finally stood before Alex and confirmed he had indeed poached Kusum Kanguru, Marc smiled with amusement: "I hear you went really light."
"Well yeah, I brought some candy bars and a lighter," Alex said, understating the feat as usual, as if referring to a morning jog rather than a godly act of alpinism. A lighter? Apparently Alex soloed a new 5,000-foot route, much harder than others previously climbed on the mountain (mixed-water-ice 5 and rock), and then turned his back on base camp and descended the other side. He spent the night alone and hiked back around the next morning. This same feet would have entailed months of planning, a fat pig of a backpack and four or five days of hard work for any other pro. But for Alex it meant a casual, 24-hour stroll, some chocolate and…a lighter?. "I knew it would be cold that night, so I figured I'd build a fire," he had explained nonchalantly to Marc.
In the proud world of climbing, such a maverick event would warrant life long bragging rights, a magazine cover story or perhaps even a tell-all novel. To Alex though, it wasn't even worth mentioning - just add it to the list of a thousand mind-boggling accomplishments that wouldn't even make the cut on his resume.
In fact, most of his feats were never recorded, photographed or even mentioned except in rumor until recently, when grandiose media attention and corporate sponsorship from companies like The North Face bought him a first-class ticket to tackle any vertical on the planet. But so what - he just ached to climb anything, anywhere. It could be Pakistan's ominous 6,000-plus vertical-foot Trango Tower or some heap of mudrock at the other end of town. And no matter what vertical form Alex had just scaled, he'd always peer around at the top and say, with the gleam of a million stars, "It just doesn't get any better than this."
One thing's for sure: We can assume every rumor - of post-holing alone through waist deep snow to the top of Everest, coming down and climbing it again the very next day with his client; freezing all night in Antarctica protected only by a wind-breaker, yet still climbing the route; or carrying an injured stranger up a steep, icy slope at 20,000 feet to a rescue helicopter - is true. In fact, there's something exquisitely rare about Alex Lowe rumors: they are often strangely understated.
One early story, comically reduced to, "Alex's crampon broke on the Rooster Comb in Alaska and he hurt his arm," when scrutinized, is an epic survival tale with enormous pucker factor. Around 2,000 feet up the climb, Alex was encouraging his partner to simul-climb (climb at the same time) water-ice 5 (translation: hard) with only one six inch ice screw between them. His crampon broke, causing a 100-plus-foot fall that violently pulled his partner off, as well. The little screw miraculously held, Alex broke his arm, and they were left swinging in space, trying to sew their minds back together. Meanwhile, they faced a 15-pitch repel, and hoped like hell a bush plane might arrive within the next few weeks. (Alex was probably upset, but undoubtedly because he couldn't finish the route.)
In a world where the line separating control and panic is often just a brittle inch wide, Alex's abnormal confidence and complete understanding of his limits is bewildering. He would fearlessly ascend routes and seem so childlike and startled when no one else would repeat them, as if pouting, "Won't someone come play with me?" Peers could only stand back and shake their heads. "We all operate at this one skill level…and then there's Alex, way out there in the stratosphere," they'd all say. But because of him, only him everyone knows it's possible to push a little harder next time.
Two winters ago, en route to La Grave for a ski "vacation", Alex and his companions were grounded unexpectedly in Cincinnati, Ohio. They looked in the phone book and rushed off to spend the day at a local climbing gym.
When stopping to buy shorts that day, the sales girl who took his credit card started to tremble. "Are you okay?" asked Alex with concern. "I'm shaking," she replied "because of who you are."
This was great ammunition for later goading, but at the time, Alex was anxious to hear about her own climbing - all with a big grin and some excited exclamations: "Great! Great!" To this girl he was a hero, and his taking the time to stop, focus and comment on her life made a huge impact.
In fact, Alex was everyone's hero - even the tough guys whom he partnered - but perhaps they could never say it out loud.
The climbing at the gym that afternoon was a combination of Marx Brothers and Keystone Kops-like antics. The gang first had to undergo a belay and knot-tying test. Alex proved his "skill" by having a friend launch from 30 feet up, catching his fall a mere two feet before slamming the deck. "Good, good" noted the employee with the clipboard. Alex went on to repeatedly "miss" an easy dyno only five feet off the ground (Alex was six feet tall), so he grabbed a nearby ladder, leaned it against the wall and proceeded from there. Every climb that day, run-out and at the top, it was the same thing. "I can't hold on anymore!" Alex would scream, "Oh my God!!!" and he'd launch into space.
The worried owners stood at the other end of the gym, talking quietly, looking with crinkled eyebrows at this weird group, before finally checking the register. Those same owners, plus a captivated crowd, eventually gathered to watch Alex repeatedly finesse 30-footers.
Smelly and bruised, the gang arrived back at the airport. While everyone thought Alex was negotiating a cash-back deal from the overbooked airline for the group, fellow skier Hans was paged. "Yesss sir, yur bags 'ave made it to Delhi. Is no problem for you sir," Hans was told, sending the poor guy into a state of shock. It was Alex, of course, in his best Indian accent. There was no moping in Cincinnati with him around.
Alex finally did make it to La Grave that winter. He sent the Cincinnati climbing gym a postcard - one with some ridiculous French girl on it, skiing topless. I'm sure they have it proudly framed on their wall...Superman was here.
"It wasn't the size of his lungs - it was the size of his heart," good friend Doug Chabot often said. Alex never spoke ill of anyone, always made eye contact, only looked for the good in people, and always, always took the time to be a memorable warm and caring human being.
Although the image of a set of lungs attached to a pair of legs is hard to shake…it fits.
"Alex is really just one inch tall," joked Renny Jackson, mountaineering partner and head climbing ranger for Grand Teton National Park. Most climbing partners experience this humbling sight - as their lungs explode and their veins bulge - of Alex growing smaller and smaller up the mountain ahead. When they finally catch up, Alex will be on the ground cranking push-ups or bounding around like a kid.
One day, a muscle-bound, pumped up gym rat approached Alex at the Bozeman Athletic Club and tried to kick a little proverbial sand in his face: "I hear you can do a one arm pull-up." Alex didn't say a word, went over to the bar and quickly pulled 25 with his left arm. Before walking away, he smiled at the crushed, slumped meat-hulk and said, "I can do more with my right."
How many pull-ups could he do? A standard day meant 400, but that might happen five minutes after summating El Cap. Alex knew all the best places in the world to log pull-ups - the perfect branch outside the Fresno airport, or two grooved boulders on an Antarctican glacier between which he could easily lodge a travel bar.
On the Grand, it was wise to leave on full day before Alex. He would effortlessly catch up. A regular workout included pounding out a quick lap on Montana's Saddle Peak - 2,000 feet of ELEVATION over five to six miles. He'd skin it, ski it and be back to the car in 45 minutes. On Cardiac Arete, a 5-12b test piece littered with sketchy, dime-sized edges, he'd solo laps just to work out. Was he not the greatest all around climber that ever lived, but perhaps also the fittest man in the world?
Does climbing really matter…did it ever? Will the super-human displays of climbing prowess be what Alex's family remembers him by? Of course not. But there's no way around repeating these stories - they're part of Alex's mystique. They're fascinating and nearly unbelievable. Nearly every mountaineer has a favorite "Alex" tale and we'll all smile and roll our eyes and laugh aloud in awe of them forever.
On his many road trips, Alex carried a picture of his wife Jenni and three boys in a pocket by his heart. It was torture to be away from his family, but his relentless call to hunt vertical was just too strong. Jenni seemed to understand. "I'm the luckiest man in the world because I'm married to a woman who knows me better than I know myself," he once told climbing partner Jack Tackle.
When home, being a dad was given the same passion and attention he offered his sports - he would take the boys to the aviary or out for cocoa (while satiating his own world class latte habit, slamming them like a teenager drinks Big Gulps). And his wife, oh, hoe he adored her! After almost 20 years of marriage he still brought her flowers and dressed up for dates like a silly, love-struck boy.
Renowned for never taking rest days while home, Alex would often forgo sleep and, instead, would go on one of his legendary "dawn patrols." By 3:30 a.m. he'd have already baked "muffins" (rather, two-pound bricks), chugged two latte's and set out on his way to solo a never-to-be-repeated ice climb or ski an if-you-fall-you-die descent with is friend Andrew McLean. He'd be back in town by eight to take the kids to school.
This past summer his 11-year-old son Max finally asked to climb the Grand with his dad. Alex told everyone about his new partner, and the climb was perhaps one of the happiest moments of his short, firefly life.
If Tom Jungst could go back in time to that Rockwellian Christmas day, ring the doorbell and say anything to him, it would be this: "I've cherished every moment with you - I've felt more alive than ever when climbing with you. You have a sensitivity and intelligence that is so, so rare in the sports world - and many people have seen it, even if they've only met you once. And I feel special, because I know your time is precious. It is a real gift that you shared some of your life with me."
Indeed, hardly a soul whose path crossed Alex's could feel otherwise. Alex, we thank you. It was a gift to have been touched by your brilliant existence.
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