''Skiing Everest'' is a 2009 American adventure documentary directed by Les Guthman and Mike Marolt; written by Les Guthman, and featuring high-altitude ski mountaineers Mike Marolt, Steve Marolt, John Callahan, Jim Gile,

Hans Kammerlander Hans Kammerlander (born 6 December 1956, Bolzano, South Tyrol, Italy) is an Italian mountaineer, living in Ahornach, a hamlet nearby Sand in Taufers. He has climbed 13 of the 14 8000m peaks. In 1984, together with Reinhold Messner he was the ...

Chris Davenport Chris Davenport (born January 4, 1971) is considered one of the world's most accomplished big-mountain skiers and mountaineers. A native of Aspen, Colorado, he has been called "one of North America's top 25 skiers by ''Skiing Magazine'' and is a ...

, Laura Bakos, Mark Newcomb. The film also features

Fredrik Ericsson Jan Fredrik Ericsson (14 March 1975 in Sundsvall, Sweden – 6 August 2010 at K2, Pakistan) was a Swedish mountaineer and extreme skier. He grew up in Umeå in the northern part of Sweden, but spent most of his time in Chamonix, in the French Alps ...

, who died skiing on K2 in 2010. Filmed by Mike Marolt over ten years, ''Skiing Everest'' tells the story of a group of friends, led by Marolt and his twin brother Steve, who grew up in

Aspen, Colorado Aspen is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 7,004 at the 2020 United States Census. Aspen is in a remote area of the Rocky Moun ...

, and went on to become the first skiers from the Western Hemisphere to ski from above 8,000 meters (26,247 ft.) when they skied from the summit of

Shisha Pangma Shishapangma, also called Gosainthān, is the 14th-highest mountain in the world, at above sea level. In 1964, it became the last of the 8,000-metre peaks to be climbed. This was due to its location entirely within Tibet and the restrictions ...

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ) is a region in East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are some other ethnic groups such as Monpa, Taman ...

in 2000, and then tried the highest slopes in the world on

Mount Everest Mount Everest (; Tibetic languages, Tibetan: ''Chomolungma'' ; ) is List of highest mountains on Earth, Earth's highest mountain above sea level, located in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas. The China–Nepal border ru ...

and Cho Oyu. The film follows the Marolts and their childhood friends Jim Gile, and John Callahan, who was an Olympic cross-country skier, on skiing expeditions into the

death zone In mountaineering, the death zone refers to altitudes above a certain point where the pressure of oxygen is insufficient to sustain human life for an extended time span. This point is generally tagged as , less than 356 millibars of atmospheric ...

above 8,000 m, without using oxygen. ''Skiing Everest'' also tells the history of high-altitude skiing, dating back to the 1930s, and includes interviews with Hans Kammerlander, who was the first to ski from the summit of Everest; Laura Bakos, the first woman to ski from the summit of an 8000-meter peak; and

, the two-time world extreme skiing champion, who is an avid ski mountaineer as well. And it tells the Marolts' personal story: the sons of U.S. Olympic skier Max Marolt, who grew up in Aspen, before it became an internationally famous ski destination and who took to skiing in the hope of escaping what was an isolated, decaying former mining town. ''Skiing Everest'' was shown in film festivals and theaters in 2009-2011 and was bought by

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...

in July 2011 for broadcast in the United States and Europe. It debuted on ESPN Classic in November 2011 with six primetime broadcasts over the weekend of November 18–20.Skiing Everest Weekend on ESPN Classic
/ref> ''Skiing Everest'' was converted from 2D to 3D in 2012 by Blue Hemisphere 3D. It will premiere in December 2012 and be released in theaters and on 3D Blu-ray Disc in January 2013.

References

External links

* * {{IMDb title, 1359029
Denver Post

2009 films 2000s English-language films Mountaineering films

See also

References

External links