The Piolets d'Or - The 'Oscars' of Mountaineering Achievement

Jordi Comominas headlines mountaineering's most prestigious awards, The Piolets d'Or, winning the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Walter Bonatti Award.

Jordi Corominas / Piolets d'Or

The Piolets d'Or - The Golden Ice Ave

The Piolets d’Or, known as the ‘Golden Ice Axe’, represents mountaineering’s highest honor. Founded in 1992, The Piolets d’Or are annual mountaineering and alpine climbing awards presented by the Groupe de Haute (“GHM”). Golden Ice Axes are given to the yearly winners at a weekend awards festival based on their achievements in the previous year. The event is known as the "Oscars of Mountaineering".

The Piolets d'Or have progressed from being a competition-single-award event (Le Piolet d'Or) into a broader celebration of mountaineering and alpinism, with several awards (Les Piolets d'Or) presented each year. The awards criteria focus on the style and innovation of mountaineering accomplishments, respect for the mountains and the environment, a commitment to exploration, and care and instruction for future climbing generations.

The Piolets d'Or Mountaineering Award / Lucyna Lewandowska Fotografia

In 2009, the first Lifetime Achievement Piolet d’Or was awarded to Walter Bonatti.  His style of mountaineering perfectly reflected the spirit of the Piolets d’Or. Bonatti was revered by those who received the award after him. In honor of the man and his spirit, it has been renamed the “Piolet d’Or Lifetime Achievement, Walter Bonatti Award”. The Career Piolets d'Or was created to reward a career where one’s spirit inspired following generations, in a fashion reflecting the criteria set down by the convention.

Mountaineer Jordi Corominas

Jordi Corominas / Jordi Corominas

Spanish mountaineer Jordi Corominas epitomizes the criteria and spirit embodied in The Piolets d’Or, and will receive the 16th Walter Bonatti Lifetime Achievement Award for 2024. Elite alpinist Kilian Jornet recently said of Corominas in an Article for AlpineMag about Corominas, “His achievements, like the Magic Line on K2, and his bold, uncompromising style have inspired several generations. I’ve been fortunate to learn from him during my initiation into high-altitude mountaineering, which has deeply influenced my vision of climbing.”

Jordi Corominas, born in 1958, lives in Benasque in the southern region of the Pyrenees, where he began his impressive climbing career as youth and later as a full-time mountain guide. Jordi served as Director of the Spanish National Mountaineering Team from 2002-2010. During his tenure, Corominas earned a reputation for expertly training new guides, and developing a modern progressive style of climbing – lightweight, free climbing.

In the spirit of the Piolet d’Or, Corominas speaks through his amazing accomplishments, rarely mentioning his massive feats throughout the decades. Alpinist and journalist, Oscar Gogorza, said about Jordi: “Long before I met Jordi, he was already a legend in the small world of Spanish mountaineering. Yet he preferred to listen than to talk. I have known him for 25 years and I have never heard him say, ‘I’ve climbed this, or that’. Never.” (From AlpineMag Article) Corominas did not seek the most popular peaks and routes, but rather sought the most difficult and elegant.

Extensive Success in the Pyrenees

After climbing nearly all of the most challenging routes in the Pyrenees in the 1990s, he set goals in Patagonia, the Andes and, ultimately, the Himalaya – home of the 8,000-meter peaks. While he climbed Dhaulagiri in 1991, and the North Side of Mt. Everest in 2000, Corominas focused more on less known peaks and near-impossible routes and faces.
On the 8,000’ers, Corominas started off with Dhaulagiri in 1991, made a no-oxygen attempt on the North Side of Everest in 2000, and Gasherbrum II in a single push in 2006. Other than these, he never showed great interest in the standard routes. The Himalayan giants offer other remote routes, which were more appealing to Corominas. Perhaps his greatest achievements include K2 and Lhotse Shar.

K2, SSW ridge or Magic Line / Jordi Corominas

Crowning Achievement on K2’s Magic Line

In 2004 Corominas conquered an insanely treacherous route on K2, known as the Magic Line. The Magic Line, located on K2’s SSW Ridge, is arguably the most technical and difficult route on the world’s second highest peak. Legendary climber Reinhold Messner called the Magic Line the ‘Suicidal Line’, as it had only been climbed once – until Corominas. After his climbing partners retreated, Jordi made a solo push becoming the second human to summit K2 via the Magic Line. It has not been accomplished since. The 2024 edition of the Piolets d’Or will be held in San Martino di Castrozza, in Trentino (Italy), on December 8th to 11th, where Jordi Corominas will receive his award – The 2024 Walter Bonatti Lifetime Achievement Award. The award won’t focus on any specific climb or mountain, but rather his approach, style, and humanity throughout an incredible lifetime body of work.

Lhotse South Face and Lhotse Shar / ©JC