With the establishment of mountain tourism on most of the eight-thousanders and all of the Seven Summits plus a few other mountains, the required alpinistic skills have been reduced to almost zero. By alpine skills I mean independent climbing, acting and making decisions on the mountain. Everything that used to be required on these mountains has now largely become superfluous thanks to the technical infrastructure on the mountain. It is enough if you learn to walk with crampons in the base camp and to attach yourself correctly to the fixed rope.

Style debate: Adam Ondra on preclipping, the influence of kneepads on difficulty levels and chipping & gluing.

The international climbing association IFSC presented climbing holds in a video today that could be used for the first time in an official competition. But the handles are not well received by many. Why?

Opinion article: Markus Hutter is convinced that clipsticks have contributed massively to the dilution of ethics in climbing.

After much consideration, James Pearson awards the grade E2 for the second time. Which leads him to make Bon Voyage the hardest trad route.

Guest author Markus Hutter expresses his exciting and stimulating thoughts on the subject of fixexing on rock in this article.