International Peak-baggers' 

Tables 2023

 HoFClerk's Annual Report

Introduction

This is the fourth report for the BwB International Peak-bagging Tables, comprising Halls of Fame for all the BwB prominence categories, and Progress Registers and Rolls of Honour for some.  The BwB Tables began in 2019, but the annual report that year only related to Tables of Progress Registers.  The Halls of Fame were introduced in 2020.

Review of the Year

Following the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021, which still had an impact into 2022, 2023 was the year when peak-bagging, both at home and abroad, got back to how it had been in 2019 and before.  Indeed, the attraction to our engaging pastime seems to have increased – perhaps as more people have become aware of peak-bagging as a way of improving physical and mental well-being after the shock of the pandemic.

One hundred and forty-seven people (1) have been recorded in the 2023 edition of these Tables, an increase of thirteen on the previous year.  In addition, eight deceased baggers feature in the Halls of Fame and/or Rolls of Honour.

The average age of those in the 2023 Tables was 54 years (2).  Ages ranged between 8 and 94 years.  The median age of those participating was 58.    

61% of the people in the Tables this year reside in Europe, 36% in North America, and 3% in Africa, Asia and Australia (3).  12% of the people in the Tables self-identify as female and 88% as male (4).

In the 2021 Tables we introduced a new feature - a separate section in the Progress Registers for Juniors, with annual certificates for those who made progress in the year in at least one P-Category.  It would be good to continue the Junior Progress Register, but new members are needed to replace those leaving it as they reach eighteen years.  If you sometimes hike the hills and mountains with your children or grandchildren, ask if they would like to be included in the BwB Junior Progress Registers.  The minimum age qualification is 5 and oldest 17.

The annual P-Index League Tables were introduced in 2022.  Following a recruitment drive in 2023, a further twenty-eight people registered to compete for one of the fifty places.  You can find the information about the P-Index League here.  I am standing down as the Referee from 2024, and Brent Lynam will be taking on this role.       

The BwB Journal began in 2022 as a biannual online publication on the website.   The enthusiasm to contribute from BwB Members and Associates has been very encouraging, with a wide range of interesting articles published, some of which have drawn attention in wider circles than just within our small online community.  Please keep your contributions coming.  From this year (2024) the BwB Journal will move to an annual publication, appearing on the website in the summer months.  After the 2024 edition, I am intending to step down as editor, so if the Journal is to continue into 2025 and beyond, one or more people will need to step forward to take on the role.  Please contact me if you are interested. 

7000m+ Report

In previous Reports, I highlighted the peaks over 7000m in altitude that BwB Members & Associates have climbed.   To this list can now be added Kangchenjunga 8586m, P3922m, climbed by Eric Gilbertson in June 2023, as well as two Snow Leopard peaks he also climbed in 2023 - Pik Korzhenevskoy/Ozodi 7105m, P1603m in Tajikistan (together with BwB Forum Member Reuben Kouidri), and  Pik Ismail Samani 7495m, P3402m, also in Tajikistan.  Eric is only the third American to complete this list – see here.

The number of BwB members in 2023 who have reached the summit of Mount Everest 8849m, P8849m has now risen to four.  Steven Song summited the current highest peak on Earth in May 2023, despite suffering from a viral infection – see his detailed account here.        

An updated Table of 8000m and 7000m peaks climbed by BwB participants is given below.

Certain themes emerge from reading the 2023 HofMeisters’ Reports.  Now that travel restrictions are largely gone, many more adventurous peak-baggers are heading further afield.  With our USA members, the volcanoes of South and Central America have drawn an increasing number.  For some Europeans, prominent peaks on the African continent have proven to be a draw.  As well as the continuing attraction of the great Asian ranges to the mountaineers among us, less-known countries for peak-bagging, such as Mongolia and the ‘-stans’ have featured.  Among the less adventurous Brits, sometimes stuck on their wet and windy island during the COVID years, southern Europe has again begun to draw larger numbers, perhaps from a need to dry out.   

BwB continues to grow.  From a group of 76 Forum members and participators in the Tables in 2019, the number expanded to 199 joining in one or more aspects of BwB by the end of 2023.  And more people have already joined in 2024.  Although the focus of the BwB international Tables is on worldwide peak-bagging by prominence, all who have an interest in hiking and climbing peaks in their home country or beyond are invited to join the Forum and P-Index League.  Whether you are a part-time peak-bagger with limited time to clock up large numbers of new ascents, or a member of the cadre who could almost be classified as ‘professional peak-baggers’, you are all welcome into the BwB fold.  Peak-bagging is a pastime, not a sport, and so it is for you to decide what rules suit you, within your age, capabilities, infirmities and character.  Your personal parameters, in consequence, may change over the course of your life.

Obituaries

Each year in this Report there are short obituaries of any BwB peak-baggers who died in the year.  In addition, there is normally a tribute to a person who died in an earlier year who had an interest in international peak-bagging.

Gordon Adshead (1940 – 2023)

There have been many tributes to Gordon from members of the British hill-walking community, and beyond (see, for example, here).  Gordon was a well-known and loved figure, with an indomitable nature.  Despite needing crutches in his final years due to spinal/leg problems, he still managed to go peak-bagging, as he continued to clock up more of the lower British Tumps (P30m hills).  By the time of his death, he had recorded on the British Hill Bagging website a total of 1972 British HumPs (P100m) and 4,570 Tumps.  He had also completed most of the popular British hill-lists, including the Munros and Tops, Corbetts, Nuttalls and Wainwrights.

In his earlier years he had often ventured beyond Britain for rock-climbing and mountaineering.  Even in his school days there were long treks in the Alps.  In his twenties, after giving up an interest in car racing, he joined the British Rucksack Club, remaining a member for the rest of his life.  As well as exploring the hills and mountains of Britain, his club adventures took him back to the Alpine countries and beyond.  His career in design automation took him to Japan and the USA, allowing him to explore the mountains of these countries.  He thought nothing of driving hundreds of miles to climb in the Rockies during any spare time at the many conferences he was obliged to attend.  In his later years he contributed his skills and knowledge to the BMC and the EU.  

Gordon was a member of the BwB Forum since its inception in 2019.  When I contacted him some years ago to see if he wished to continue as a member, he told me he very much enjoyed reading all the posts.  He said he was too old now for international peak-bagging and had limited records of his exploits beyond Britain in his younger years, and so was unable, much to his regret, to participate in the International Tables. 

Greg Slayden remembers Edward Earl (1964 – 2015)

It’s been almost nine years since the tragic passing of Edward Earl, the mathematical genius who first automated the calculation of prominence values for peaks.  He was also an accomplished climber, as his ascent list attests.  I had the distinct honor of accompanying Edward on over a hundred summits or attempts, from Alaskan giants to forested “dumpster” peaks near Seattle.  Our first trip was in 2003 to Mount Daniel, high point of my home county.  We hit it off immediately, and that first day he made some important intellectual contributions to my hobby project that later became the Peakbagger.com website.

Edward and I could easily pass the hours chatting endlessly about mountains, geography, science, and computers.  One memorable tent-bound afternoon in Montana we spent hours comparing notes on our personal year-by-year order of states and state high points visited, entirely from memory, figuring out who was ahead for all possible years.  But when it came to other subjects, he was intentionally and strikingly ignorant.  He had never heard of pop culture icons like Robin Williams or Bruce Springsteen, as if they never existed.

In the mountains, Edward moved slowly, but analytically and with a steady efficient gait.  He was comfortable rock climbing, kicking steps up steep snow, and crossing glaciers, mostly self-taught.  Unlike many of our peak-bagging friends, we were both backcountry skiers—he carefully snow-plowed down even easy slopes, and at ski resorts hotshots whizzed right by him.  But on a trip to the Columbia Icefield, he was able to safely and methodically ski down the icefall of the Athabasca Glacier with a 60-pound pack, something none of those show-offs would contemplate.

Analysis was Edward’s strength, and he was very good at planning trips, route-finding, and selecting campsites.  Like most eccentric geniuses, though, he had his endearing quirks.  He never carried a headlamp, maintaining that properly adjusted eyes were superior.  He wore blue jeans on almost all of his trips, apparently never analyzing the effects of wet cotton on a cold body.  His gear was mostly old and run-down, since the many months he spent in the mountains every year severely reduced his earning potential.  His beat-up old pickup truck was the prime example, prone to running out of gas due to a bad gauge, fogging up dangerously, or, on one occasion, getting hopelessly stuck in the mud far out in the Wyoming backcountry.

But Edward was a good-hearted soul, passionate about his mountains and his mathematics, and surprisingly social.  Many of us in the Seattle still miss his “anyone up for a hike?” emails on Wednesdays that often led to fun weekend summit-goal adventures: difficult scrambles, biking logging roads, or even boat trips to remote islands.  He is still sorely missed by a large number of mountain lovers, locally and worldwide.

Greg’s obituary of Edward on Peakbagger can be found here.

2023 developments

In 2023 there have been yet further developments in transforming what started in 2019 as my personal project to link peak-baggers across the world.  In my 2022 Report I mentioned there was now:   

·      A discussion Forum on matters of interest to peak-baggers across the globe.

·      A resource for linking those planning trips and expeditions.

·      Annual International Tables celebrating peak-bagging achievements, not just for the dedicated, but also those who are starting the pastime or have more modest goals.  These are more about achieving personal goals than competing with others, although the competitive among us may see them differently! 

·      P-Index Tables, deliberately designed with a greater degree of competition inherent in them than in the International Peak-baggers' Tables.  However, they should be taken with a sense of fun, rather than too seriously.  They are a tool, rather than an end in themselves.

·      Online meetings and an annual talk.  In 2023 Petter Bjørstad gave an intriguing talk on his two expeditions to Papua New Guinea to climb Mount Boising 4150m, P3710m.  We also held two online social events for people to put faces to names and discuss their peak-bagging plans.  My thanks go to our social secretary Denise McLellan for arranging and hosting these.

·      A website journal publishing articles of interest on mountains and those who climb them, and

·      A website gallery of pictures contributed by the members.

In 2023 the new features added to the BwB portfolio were:

·      The BwB Annual Awards, designed to recognise other achievements beyond the awards system in the annual international peak-bagging Tables (focused on peak numbers only).

·      The BwB Achievements Register, to provide a more rounded picture of the BwB community’s peak-bagging achievements, not only abroad but also in their home countries.

My thanks go to Rob Woodall for the idea in setting these up, and for running them.

Also in 2023 we moved further, thanks to Deividas Valaitis’ IT skills and Greg Slayden’s help, to a system whereby we can directly grab bag-totals from the pages of those who use the Peakbagger website to record all their ascents.   In 2023 we obtained the data for 75% of the people in the International Peak-baggers’ Tables.  There will be another push in 2024 to increase this percentage still further (see below).

Looking forward

In 2024 I hope to introduce one further facility promised in previous years.  I already send e-certificates to those in the Junior Progress Registers when they have climbed at least one new peak in the year, and also to the winners of the BwB Awards.  I want to expand this to a system for people to obtain e-certificates for their achievements in reaching the Halls of Fame, and the Bronze etc. Awards.  Many are content with the ‘warm glow’ of gaining these thresholds, but a sizable minority are interested in obtaining formal recognition.  There will be an announcement about e-certificates later in 2024.

Please also look out later this year for an announcement on further developments in obtaining the annual bag-totals, designed to simplify the system.  Producing the annual International Peak-baggers’ Tables is a very time-consuming operation for the HoFMeisters and me in the first few months of the year.  We are all unpaid enthusiasts with many other commitments, not to mention our own peak-bagging priorities.  Now that the Tables have reached eight in number and an ever-increasing population, we need to streamline the operation as much as possible.

In my 2022 Report I mentioned the measures I have taken to ensure some form of continuity for BwB in the short term, should I no longer be able to act as HoFClerk etc.  The risk with all such projects as BwB is that they are in jeopardy when the originator is unable to continue them.  I do hope that BwB can continue in some form when I am no longer able to coordinate its activities.  To this end, my medium-term goal is to transform BwB into a peak-bagging club, run by its motivated members. 

More people are much needed to help.  As the years go by, I will have to hand over the various activities I now undertake on your behalf to others.  I am getting older and my abilities are beginning to fail.  I have already handed on the running of the P-Index League, as mentioned above.  Please look out for an open letter to all of you from me later this year about the medium and longer-term future of BwB, and how you can help.

As always, I wish you all a safe, rewarding and exhilarating peak-bagging year, and again encourage you to pass your love of the mountains on to others.

Mark Trengove

BwB HoFClerk

Wales, April 2024

The 2023 Tables can be accessed via the menu board on the left-side of the website, or directly by the links below:

• P100m

• P300m

• P500m

• P600m

• P1000m

• P1500m

• P2000m

• P-Top 100

• P- Index League

• Achievements Register.

Footnotes

(1) The number of participants over the years has been:

·        2019:  63, and 0 deceased

·        2020:  99, and 9 deceased

·        2021:  124, and 11 deceased

·        2022:  134, and 8 deceased

·        2023:  147, and 8 deceased.

The decrease in the number of deceased after 2021 is due to a more detailed appraisal of whether they were interested in peak-bagging by prominence, as well as internationally, when alive.

(2) The average age of the participants over the years has been:

·        2019:  not known

·        2020:  55

·        2021:  57

·        2022:  53

·        2023:  54.

(3) The distribution of participants across the world over the years has been:

·        2019:  Europe 86%; North America 13%; Asia 1%.

·        2020:  Europe 61%; North America 35%; Africa, Asia and Australia 4%

·        2021:  Europe 63%; North America 34%; Africa, Asia and Australia 3%

·        2022:  Europe 65%; North America 30%; Africa, Asia and Australia 5%.

·        2023:  Europe 61%; North America 36%; Africa, Asia and Australia 3%.

(4) The distribution of participants self-identifying as female or male over the years has been:

·        2019:  10%/90%

·        2020:   8%/92%

·        2021:  10%/90%

·        2022:  11%/89%

·        2023:  12%/88%.